Radical media, politics and culture.

CNN to Al Jazeera: Why Report Civilian Deaths?

Common Dreams

 
NEW YORK - April 15 — As the casualties mount in the besieged Iraqi city of Fallujah, Qatar-based Al Jazeera has been one of the only news networks broadcasting from the inside, relaying images of destruction and civilian victims-- including women and children. But when CNN anchor Daryn Kagan interviewed the network's editor-in-chief, Ahmed Al-Sheik, on Monday (4/12/04)-- a rare opportunity to get independent information about events in Fallujah-- she used the occasion to badger Al-Sheik about whether the civilian deaths were really "the story" in Fallujah.

Fascist Philosopher Helps Us Understand Contemporary Politics

Alan Wolfe, Chronicle of Higher Education

To understand what is distinctive about today's Republican Party, you first need to know about an obscure and very conservative German political philosopher. His name, however, is not Leo Strauss, who has been widely cited as the intellectual guru of the Bush administration. It belongs, instead, to a lesser known, but in many ways more important, thinker named Carl Schmitt.

Evil Does Often Triumph

John Chuckman


It did appear that that mountainous bulk of murder and corruption, Ariel Sharon, was about to leave politics. Much as with Al Capone, authorities only caught up with him through a trail of crooked money.


But we have heard less of his retirement lately and rather more about his plan to leave Gaza. Apparently, after killing hundreds of its occupants, including scores of innocent bystanders as Israeli helicopters fired missiles into city streets, Sharon thinks he'll get some good press about leaving Gaza.


Of course, what Sharon truly is leaving is an impossible situation. Gaza is a small, fenced-in enclave of nearly a million Palestinians where only the most mentally unbalanced Israeli settlers insist on living a life of guard towers, razor wire, patrols, and spies. Sharon's army is tired of protecting a few machinegun-toting fanatics, not to mention the small fortune it can save by ending the protection.

hydrarchist writes:

"The State of Copyright Activism"

Siva Vaidhyanathan

One of the great hopes I had while I researched and wrote Copyrights and Copywrongs (New York: New York University Press, 2001), a cultural history of American copyright, during the late 1990s was that copyright debates might puncture the bubble of public consciousness and become important global policy questions. My wish has come true.


Since 1998 questions about whether the United States has constructed an equitable or effective copyright system frequently appear on the pages of daily newspapers. Activist movements for both stronger and looser copyright systems have grown in volume and furor. And the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in early 2003 that the foundations of American copyright, as expressed in the Constitution, are barely relevant in an age in which both media companies and clever consumers enjoy unprecedented power over the use of works.

Flying Squads and the Crisis of Workers' Self-Organization

Alex Levant

On September 7, 2000, over 100 people from the Somali community and union
supporters visited an immigration office in Toronto in defence of four families
facing deportation and waiting for decisions on their appeals to stay on
humanitarian and compassionate grounds.  Although they were confident that their appeals would be successful, they feared that they would be deported before a decision was made (a common practice for Immigration Canada).  At the families'request, an action was called to secure a commitment from the authorities that this would not happen.

"The Bridge"

Stan Goff

WARNING: This commentary may cause anxiety.


The United States government has initiated a chain reaction that it
can no longer control. The stalled vengeance assault on Fallujah is
merely a symptom. So is the uprising triggered by the US closure of
a Shia newspaper in Sadr City, Baghdad, followed by gunning down the
demonstrators who protested (Ah, yes, we don’t even hear about that
when they talk about the latest demon, Muqtada al-Sadr… Memory is so
short.).

"What's Next in Iraq?"

Tariq Ali

Tariq Ali is a veteran political activist since the 1960s, and a filmmaker,
novelist and author. His most recent books include The Clash of
Fundamentalisms
and Bush in Babylon: The Recolonization of Iraq. Tariq
spoke
to Socialist Worker's Eric Ruder about the aims of the U.S. occupation and
the growing Iraqi resistance.

Q: What are the motives for the U.S. occupation? The Bush administration,
of
course, claims that it has removed an evil dictator and is promoting
democracy and freedom.


Tariq Ali: I don't think that very many people outside the U.S. believe
this. Even in countries that have troops there, the population is against
the war and occupation.

"Why We Need a Multilateral Magna Carta"

Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri

It is becoming increasingly clear that a unilateral or “monarchical” arrangement of the global order — centred on the military, political and economic dictation of the United States — is undesirable and unsustainable.


The crisis of this arrangement presents the opportunity for the proposition of a new global order by the “global aristocracies” — that is to say, the multinational corporations, the supranational institutions and the other dominant nation states.

From the excellent
Electronic Intifada


"As in Tiennamen Square"

Tanya Reinhart


An extensive discussion has already taken place in Israel regarding the cost-benefit ratio of Yassin's assassination. But the question of justice has hardly been raised.

According to international law, the execution of any person in an occupied territory is not allowed. The Geneva Convention, born out of the horrifying experience of the second World War, sets limitations on the use of force even in times of war. The convention distinguishes between war and a state of occupation. Its fundamentals are, first, that occupied people are "protected", and that the occupier is responsible for their safety. Second, it determines that the occupied people have the right to fight for their liberation. International conventions are one of the means people have developed for self-preservation. Without them, there is a danger that the human race would annihilate itself - first the strong would wipe out the weak, and then each other.

nolympics writes The Phonenix Program
was a CIA project in South Vietnam from 1967 which set out to eliminate popular support for the Viet Cong through assasination, kidnapping, torture, psychological operations, propaganda and general terror. The link above provides some original documents and some analysis of the operation.

What with Blackwater and the pressing need for counterinsurgency, as well as a voracious appetite for the usual slaughter, there is little doubt that Cheney, Bremer and dracula man Rumsfeld will be leafing through its archives.

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