House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is on a book tour, where she is being hounded by activists and questioned about her pledge that “impeachment is off the table.” She responded on the TV talk show “The View,” “If somebody had a crime that the president had committed, that would be a different story.” Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Ron Suskind may have provided the evidence she doesn’t want to see.
Filed under Weekly Column
Open opposition, the right to challenge those in power, is a mainstay of any healthy democracy. The Democratic and Republican conventions will test the commitment of the two dominant U.S. political parties to the cherished tradition of dissent. Things are not looking good.
Filed under Weekly Column
Rep. Gene Green (D–TX) is calling on the Pentagon to explain why a military recruiter was given a promotion despite being found to have illegally threatened a teenage boy with jail time if he decided to go to college instead of joining the military. The recruiter was eventually promoted to head a different recruiting station. Green sent the letter questioning Kelt’s new job after his Wednesday appearance on Democracy Now!
Filed under D.N. in the News
With no end in sight in Afghanistan and Iraq, military recruiters must be prevented from using desperate and aggressive measures to lure our nation’s young people—the poorest and most vulnerable—into the line of fire.
Filed under Weekly Column
Amy Goodman reports from the Baltics: “When I arrived in Estonia last week—a former Soviet republic that lies just south of Finland—everyone had an opinion on Barack Obama’s speech in Berlin.”
Filed under Weekly Column
The nominating conventions have become elaborate, expensive marketing events, but most people don’t know the extent to which major corporations fund them, pouring tens of millions of dollars into a little-known loophole in the campaign-finance system.
Filed under Weekly Column
While the presidential candidates trade barbs and accuse each other of flip-flopping, they agree with President Bush on their enthusiastic support for nuclear power.
Filed under Weekly Column
It is fantastic to see Ingrid Betancourt free, but the celebration of her release should not be confused with celebration of the Colombian government.
Filed under Weekly Column
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On May 1, activists locked themselves together in the lobby of weapons manufacturer General Dynamics in Burlington, Vermont. The activists were demanding “General Dynamics stop giving campaign contributions to the politicians responsible for regulating it, stop making Gatling guns, missiles and other weapons of mass destruction, and give back the $3.6 million in Vermont tax breaks General Dynamics received in 2007.” [includes rush transcript]
Thursday’s air strike comes in the midst of a deepening humanitarian crisis in Somalia that the International Committee of the Red Cross described as “catastrophic.” Over one million people have been made internal refugees, and 3.5 million, or nearly half the country’s population, may need food aid by the end of the year. [includes rush transcript]
In Bolivia, President Evo Morales has rejected an autonomy vote by the country’s richest region of Santa Cruz, calling the poll “illegal and unconstitutional.” The proposals voted on Sunday include giving Santa Cruz more control over land distribution and rich oil and gas reserves. [includes rush transcript]
Elections Under Threat portrays the everyday people of Iran as well as the candidates running for Parliament, as they debate and discuss the relevance of these elections, their economic conditions and the international pressures on their nation. The documentary offers a unique glimpse into the political dynamics of the struggles for participation and democracy in a nation facing increasing economic and military threats from the United States. [includes rush transcript]
A US military judge dismissed the argument Friday that Guantanamo’s youngest detainee, Omar Khadr, was a child soldier when captured in Afghanistan and therefore in need of protection and not prosecution. US Army Colonel Peter Brownback’s ruling clears the way for Khadr’s trial, which will be the first war crimes trial in history of anyone under the age of eighteen. [includes rush transcript]