Americans are taught the myth that their democracy is safeguarded by an independent press. But the government and other powerful entities have long mastered the art of manipulating the major media, even to the point of bluntly telling reporters the…
No War Over Rocks
U.S. foreign policy remains captive to unipolar hubris, enforced by neocon pundits who demand military interventions to solve the world’s problems. But this kneejerk response is particularly crazy when applied to Asian disputes over rocks far at sea, says Independent Institute’s…
Falling Short on ‘Challenge Grant’
From Editor Robert Parry: We’re in danger of falling short on our $10,000 “challenge grant” which we hoped would go a long way toward meeting our end-of-year fundraising goal. So, if you can help with a tax-deductible donation to Consortiumnews.com…
Constitution, Lost History, Obama Administration, October Surprise, Politics, Right Wing, The Bush-43 Administration
Judge Leon’s Dirty Climb to the Bench
Exclusive: Civil libertarians are cheering federal judge Richard Leon for his ruling against the NSA’s massive surveillance program and that’s all to the good but Leon’s route to the bench followed a twisted course of partisan investigations and one historic…
Playing Deadly Games with ‘Gun Rights’
Pro-gun extremists routinely edit out of the Second Amendment its stated purpose of having “a well-regulated militia” maintain state “security.” The tampering lets them pretend the Founders would be okay with slaughters like the Newtown massacre, as Bill Moyers and Michael Winship…
The Blacklisting of Noam Chomsky
An odd aspect of modern American life is that even with 24-hour news and its roster of blathering pundits, many creative thinkers with valuable insights are blacklisted from mainstream media, perhaps most notably Noam Chomsky who turned 85 on Dec. 7,…
Latin America Finds Its Footing
Exclusive: While the U.S. and Spain have wallowed in the Great Recession swamp, Latin America has begun breaking free of the old order that bogged down progress. Now, the region is restructuring relations with its old international masters, as Andrés Cala explains.
Wisdom in Restraint on Syria
The neocons are still beating the drums for U.S. military intervention in Syria, now supposedly for humanitarian reasons. But as horrific as the Syrian violence is it’s clear that President Obama’s restraint last summer averted making the mess even worse, says…
What Mandela Did and Didn’t Do
While an inspiring tale of resilience and reconciliation, Nelson Mandela’s saga also marked a failure of black South Africans to transform their hard-won political power into economic equality, as domestic and foreign whites retained the reins of money, as Danny…
The Real Existential Threat
Most people on Earth everyone born after World War II have lived their entire lives under the threat of nuclear annihilation. But just because an existential threat has always been there doesn’t mean it won’t be activated, as Ira Helfand and…
An Open Door to Leave Afghanistan
President Obama has promised to end America’s combat role in Afghanistan by the end of 2014 but is haggling with Afghan President Karzai over how to keep soldiers there for another decade, a dispute that Independent Institute’s Ivan Eland says is a…
The 2nd Amendment and Killing Kids
From the Archive: The comedy team Key and Peele cut through the Right’s Second Amendment madness best in a bit in which Peele travels back in time with Uzis to confront its authors over their careless wording. But there is…
The NRA’s War on America
From the Archive: One year ago, 20 first-graders went off to school in Newtown, Connecticut, some surely thinking about the upcoming Christmas holidays. But they never came home, becoming along with six of their educators collateral damage in the NRA’s…
Israel and the Bedouins
Israel’s Right suddenly finds itself in a strange new world where it can’t do whatever it wants to Arabs under its control without encountering international resistance, like the recent plan to forcibly relocate Bedouins in the Negev, as ex-CIA analyst…
Fresh Doubts about Syria’s Sarin Guilt
Exclusive: A new analysis, buried in a UN report, reveals that one of the two missiles at the center of the Syrian chemical weapons crisis, which nearly led to a U.S. military attack, showed no evidence of Sarin, further undermining…
Obama’s Syria Strategy at a Crossroads
Exclusive: The Islamic Front’s capture of a U.S.-stocked supply depot in northern Syria prompted a suspension of those shipments to “moderate” Syrian rebels. The incident also drove home how Islamists are gaining ground — and why President Obama may shift U.S. strategy, writes Robert…
In Case You Missed…
Some of our special stories in November focused on the war in Syria, the nuclear talks with Iran and the latest understanding of John F. Kennedy’s assassination.
$10,000 ‘Challenge Grant’ at Consortiumnews
From Editor Robert Parry: A family foundation has agreed to make a $10,000 “challenge grant” to Consortiumnews, meaning that we need to raise that much from other supporters in the next week. If you can help, the value of your donation…
The Bigger Risk: Private v. Public Spying
The fear of NSA’s metadata collection is as much in the potential for Big Brother government as in the present or as Edward Snowden says a “turnkey tyranny” all ready to go but private-sector abuses are another worry, ex-CIA analyst Paul…
Racism Through Rose-Colored Glasses
Many Americans tend to whitewash their country’s ugly history of racism all the better to feel good about “exceptionalism” but even sophisticated writers can ignore this grim reality when praising their favored presidents, as William Loren Katz explains.