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Koen
Administrator
Joined: 10 Mar 2004
Posts: 338
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 Posted: Sat Nov 26, 2005 2:28 pm Post subject: Censored by US Mainstream Media |
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Here you have stories, which the big corporations rather not wanted next to their advertisements:
| Quote: | #1 Bush Administration Moves to Eliminate Open Government
The 81-page report systematically examines how the Administration has implemented the major laws that govern access to government records. It finds a consistent pattern: laws designed to promote public access to information have been undermined while laws that authorize the government to withhold information or operate in secret have repeatedly been expanded.
"The Bush Administration has an obsession with secrecy," said Rep. Waxman. "It has repeatedly rewritten laws and changed practices to reduce public and congressional scrutiny of its activities. The cumulative effect is an unprecedented assault on the laws that make our government open and accountable." |
| Quote: | #2 Media Coverage Fails on Iraq: Fallujah and the Civilian Death Toll
Over the past two years, the United States has conducted two major sieges against Fallujah, a city in Iraq. The first attempted siege of Fallujah (a city of 300,000 people) resulted in a defeat for Coalition forces. As a result, the United States gave the citizens of Fallujah two choices prior to the second siege: leave the city or risk dying as enemy insurgents. Faced with this ultimatum, approximately 250,000 citizens, or 83 percent of the population of Fallujah, fled the city. The people had nowhere to flee and ended up as refugees. Many families were forced to survive in fields, vacant lots, and abandoned buildings without access to shelter, water, electricity, food or medical care. The 50,000 citizens who either chose to remain in the city or who were unable to leave were trapped by Coalition forces and were cut off from food, water and medical supplies. The United States military claimed that there were a few thousand enemy insurgents remaining among those who stayed in the city and conducted the invasion as if all the people remaining were enemy combatants.
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Burhan Fasa'a, an Iraqi journalist, said Americans grew easily frustrated with Iraqis who could not speak English. "Americans did not have interpreters with them, so they entered houses and killed people because they didn't speak English. They entered the house where I was with 26 people, and shot people because [the people] didn't obey [the soldiers'] orders, even just because the people couldn't understand a word of English."
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In late October, 2004, a peer reviewed study was published in The Lancet, a British medical journal, concluding that at least 100,000 civilians have been killed in Iraq since it was invaded by a United States-led coalition in March 2003.
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Ninety-five percent of reported killings (all attributed to US forces by interviewees) were caused by helicopter gunships, rockets, or other forms of aerial weaponry.
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The study was released on the eve of a contentious presidential election - fought in part over US policy on Iraq. Many American newspapers and television news programs ignored the study or buried reports about it far from the top headlines.
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During "Operation Spear" on June 17th, 2005, US-led forces attacked the small cities of al-Qa'im and Karabla near the Syrian border. US warplanes dropped 2,000 pound bombs in residential areas and claimed to have killed scores of "militants" while locals and doctors claimed that only civilians were killed. |
| Quote: | #3 Another Year of Distorted Election Coverage
The official vote count for the 2004 election showed that George W. Bush won by three million votes. But exit polls projected a victory margin of five million votes for John Kerry. This eight-million-vote discrepancy is much greater than the error margin. The overall margin of error should statistically have been under one percent. But the official result deviated from the poll projections by more than five percent - a statistical impossibility. |
| Quote: | #4 Surveillance Society Quietly Moves In
December 13, 2003, Bush, signed the controversial Intelligence Authorization Act. None of the corporate press covered the signing of this legislation, which increases the funding for intelligence agencies, dramatically expands the definition of surveillable financial institutions, and authorizes the FBI to acquire private records of those individuals suspected of criminal activity without a judicial review.
On May 10, 2005, President Bush secretly signed into law the REAL ID Act, requiring states within the next three years to issue federally approved electronic identification cards. Attached as an amendment to an emergency spending bill funding troops in Afghanistan and Iraq, the REAL ID Act passed without the scrutiny and debate of Congress. |
| Quote: | #5 US Uses Tsunami to Military Advantage in Southeast Asia
At the same time that US aid was widely publicized domestically, our coinciding military motives were virtually ignored by the press. While supplying our aid, we simultaneously bolstered military alliances with regional powers in, and began expanding our bases throughout, the Indian Ocean region.
In the months following the tsunami, writes Rahul Bedi in The Irish Times, the US revived the Utapao military base in Thailand it had used during the Vietnam War. Task force 536 is to be moved there to establish a forward positioning site for the US Air Force.
The US also stepped up their survey of the Malacca Straits, over which China exercises considerable influence, and through which 90 percent of Japan's oil supplies pass. |
| Quote: | #6 The Real Oil for Food Scam
The US has accused UN officials of corruption in Iraq's oil for food program. According to Joy Gordon and Scott Ritter the charge was actually an attempt to disguise and cover up long term US government complicity in this corruption. Ritter says, "this is nothing more than a charade, designed to shift attention away from the current Iraq controverse"
According to Gordon the charges laid by the US accounting office are bogus. There is plenty of evidence of corruption in the "oil-for-food" program, but the trail of evidence leads not to the UN but to the US "The fifteen members of the Security Council - of which the United States was by far the most influential - determined how income from oil proceeds would be handled, and what the funds could be used for." Contrary to popular understanding, the Security Council is not the same thing as the UN. It is part of it, but operates largely independently of the larger body. (Kofi Annan cannot overrule it) The UN's personnel "simply executed the program that was designed by the members of the Security Council."
The claim in the corporate media was that the UN allowed Saddam Hussein to steal billions of dollars from oil sales. If we look, as Gordon does, at who actually had control over the oil and who's hands held the money, a very different picture emerges. "If Hussain did indeed smuggle $6 billion worth of oil in the 'the richest rip off in world history,' he didn't do it with the complicity of the UN. He did it on the watch of the US Navy." explains Gordon.
Every monetary transaction was approved by the US through its dominant role on the Security Council. Ritter explains, "the Americans were able to authorize a $1 billion exemption concerning the export of Iraqi oil for Jordan, as well as legitimize the billion-dollar illegal oil smuggling trade over the Turkish border." In another instance, a Russian oil company "bought oil from Iraq under 'oil for food' at a heavy discount, and then sold it at full market value to primarily US companies, splitting the difference evenly between [the Russian company] and the Iraqis. This US sponsored deal resulted in profits of hundreds of millions of dollars for both the Russians and the Iraqis, outside the control of 'oil for food.' It has been estimated that 80 percent of the oil illegally smuggled out of Iraq under 'oil for food' ended up in the United States." |
Here you have links to all the sources etc:
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/090805S.shtml |
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Koen
Administrator
Joined: 10 Mar 2004
Posts: 338
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| Posted: Sat Nov 26, 2005 2:50 pm Post subject: |
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Ah, this one is interesting too:
| Quote: | #9 Iran's New Oil Trade System Challenges US Currency
The US media tells us that Iran may be the next target of US aggression. The anticipated excuse is Iran's alleged nuclear weapons program.
In mid-2003 Iran broke from traditional and began accepting eurodollars as payment for it oil exports from its E.U. and Asian customers. Saddam Hussein attempted a similar bold step back in 2000 and was met with a devastating reaction from the US. Iraq now has no choice about using US dollars for oil sales. However, Iran's plan to open an international oil exchange marker for trading oil in the euro currency is a much larger threat to US dollar supremacy than Iraq's switch to euros.
They are creating a euro-denominated Internet-based oil exchange system for global oil sales. This is a direct challenge to US dollar supremacy in the global oil market. It is widely speculated that the US dollar has been inflated for some time now because the monopoly position of "petrodollars" in oil trades. With the level of national debt, the value of dollar has been held artificially high compared to other currencies.
The vast majority of the world's oil is traded on the New York NYMEX (Mercantile Exchange) and the London IPE (International Petroleum Exchange), both owned by US corporations. Both of these oil exchanges transact oil trades in US currency. Iran's plan to create a new oil exchange would facilitate trading oil on the world market in euros.
Without a doubt, a successful Iranian oil bourse may create momentum for other industrialized countries to stop exchanging their own currencies for petrodollars in order to buy oil. A shift away from US dollars to euros in the oil market would cause the demand for petrodollars to drop, perhaps causing the value of the dollar to plummet. A precipitous drop in the value of the US dollar would undermine the US position as a world economic leader.
The irony is that apparent US plans to invade Iran put pressure on the Chinese to abandon their support of the dollar. Clark warns that "a unilateral US military strike on Iran would further isolate the US government, and it is conceivable that such an overt action could provoke other industrialized nations to abandon the dollar en masse." |
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Craze
Joined: 30 Jan 2005
Posts: 5481
Location: Indiana, U
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| Posted: Sat Nov 26, 2005 2:53 pm Post subject: |
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| meh, I blame Bush |
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Trotsky1
Joined: 12 Apr 2005
Posts: 942
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| Posted: Sat Nov 26, 2005 3:12 pm Post subject: |
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This really worries me.
The president is suppose to represent the people and there interests. He is there too defend them, not the other way round.
Americans some at least seem to blindly defend Bush, irrespective of his actions.
For example in the case of Falujah, It took an Italian documentary to bring attention to what happened there. I do not no for certain that the U.S media did not question this attack itself. If it did i know nothing of it. I really hope they did because the message that gives to the rest of the world if they did not, is worrying.
If a candiatae does not represent the interests of the people, then the people should not vote for him. I do not belive the interests of george bush are that of the people at all. |
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dns-cv
Joined: 14 Feb 2005
Posts: 1
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| Posted: Sat Nov 26, 2005 5:47 pm Post subject: |
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You have no one to blame but yourself.
America is full of idiots. |
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DarkfnTempla
Joined: 02 Mar 2005
Posts: 119
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| Posted: Sat Nov 26, 2005 5:58 pm Post subject: |
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| shut your poser green day lovin ass! |
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wolvy96
Joined: 22 Jul 2005
Posts: 19
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| Posted: Sat Nov 26, 2005 6:05 pm Post subject: |
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| DarkfnTempla wrote: | | shut your poser green day lovin ass! |
ah... kudos to you. you have solved the problem of a divided nation... I will reccomend you for Nobel Peace Prize. |
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Memnarch
Joined: 31 Aug 2004
Posts: 22
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| Posted: Sat Nov 26, 2005 7:41 pm Post subject: |
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Bush:like a rock
only dumber |
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DarkfnTempla
Joined: 02 Mar 2005
Posts: 119
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| Posted: Sat Nov 26, 2005 8:29 pm Post subject: |
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| It is so easy to be cynical, but its hard to come up with real answers. And to the idiot with the "Nobel peace" smart ass quip, have u done any better? You criticized the criticizer. Its like stealing from a theif, is it really better? |
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DoItFaster
Joined: 19 Mar 2005
Posts: 1129
Location: California
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| Posted: Sat Nov 26, 2005 11:12 pm Post subject: |
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| Quote: | | Its like stealing from a theif, is it really better? |
That reminds me of a quote I read that I will share with you: "Democracy is the theory that two thieves will steal less than one."
| Quote: | | Americans some at least seem to blindly defend Bush, irrespective of his actions. |
You mean like me when I decide to talk? I believe its called Nationalism. |
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DaMasta
Joined: 09 Sep 2005
Posts: 79
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| Posted: Sat Nov 26, 2005 11:53 pm Post subject: |
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| OMFG!!! What is it with you and the U.S.? From what I'm told you don't live here So why do you feel the need to complain about it all day? You have a problem with everything we do!! Why does our politics and Econemy matter so much to you? And everything to you is bush's or some other guys fault! Well maybe you didn't know this but do you know what Immigrents like people from Mexico, Europe, Asia and other places do to our econemy.... It fucken KILLS IT!!! You don't mention that somone from china who makes less than a 50 cents an hour Busting there asses can come here and make 6 dollars an hour for Easier work. America is the world power and they have to make decisions that some times aren't fair But what do you think Europe would do with that power?? It would be much worst. You make as if you live in iraq and U.S. soldiers were affecting you in some way. Why don't you complain about how france is burning down or something. STOP BITCHING ABOUT THE U. Fucken S. of A. |
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SL|RedDemon
Joined: 02 Sep 2004
Posts: 116
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| Posted: Sun Nov 27, 2005 1:57 am Post subject: |
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From the same article
| Quote: | #10 Mountaintop Removal Threatens Ecosystem and Economy
Source: Earthfirst! Nov-Dec 2004
Title: "See You in the Mountains: Katuah Earth First! Confronts Mountaintop Removal"
Author: John Conner
Faculty Evaluator: Ervand Peterson, Ph.D.
Student Researcher: Angela Sciortino
Mountaintop removal is a new form of coal mining in which companies dynamite the tops of mountains to collect the coal underneath. Multiple peaks are blown off and dumped onto highland watersheds, destroying entire mountain ranges. More than 1,000 miles of streams have been destroyed by this practice in West Virginia alone. Mountain top removal endangers and destroys entire communities with massive sediment dams and non-stop explosions.
According to Fred Mooney, an active member of the Mountain Faction of Katuah Earth First!, "MTR is an ecocidal mining practice in which greedy coal companies use millions of pounds of dynamite a day (three million pounds a day in the southwest Virginia alone) to blow up entire mountain ranges in order to extract a small amount of coal." He goes on to say that "Then as if that wasn't bad enough, they dump the waste into valleys and riverbeds. The combination of these elements effectively kills everything in the ecosystems."
Most states are responsible for permitting and regulating mining operations under the Surface Mining Control Act. Now MTR is trying to break into Tennessee, specifically Zeb Mountain in the northeast. Because Tennessee did such a poor job in the '70s, the state renounced control, and all mining is now regulated under the federal Office of Surface Mining. This makes Tennessee unique because activists have recourse in the federal courts to stop mountaintop removal.
The coal industry has coined many less menacing names for mountaintop removal, such as cross range mining, surface mining and others. But regardless of the euphemism, MTR remains among the most pernicious forms of mining ever conceived. Blasting mountain tops with dynamite is cheaper than hiring miners who belong to a union. More than 40,000 have been lost to MTR in West Virginia alone.
Ninety-three new coal plants are being planned for construction throughout the US Demand for coal will increase as these new facilities are completed. Oil is starting to run out and there are no concrete plans for a transition to renewable resources such as wind and solar energy. Coal companies therefore will be well-positioned to capitalize on their growing market. Katuah Earth First! (KEF!) is one of several groups resisting MTR.
The coal taken from Zeb Mountain is being burned by the Tennessee Valley Authority, and continues to cause environmental damage. KEF! wants to raise awareness and direct attention to the perpetrators - TVA and the Office of Surface Mining (OSM). KEF! emphasized that "the issue of mountain top removal is not just a local one. It is intertwined with many global issues such as corporate domination of communities, the homogenization of local cultures and the over consumption of our wasteful society."
Four federal agencies that review applications for coal mines have entered an agreement that would give state governments an option that could speed up the process. The Army Corps of Engineers, Environmental Protection Agency, Fish and Wildlife Service and Office of Surface Mining said that the agreement was intended to streamline the procedures companies go through when applying for permits to start surface coal mines, including those that remove entire mountaintops to unearth coal.
Environmental groups are beginning to challenge these policies in federal district court. The current program allows the Army Corps of Engineers to issue a general permit for a category of activities under the Clean Water Act if they "will cause only minimal adverse environmental effects" according to federal regulation. Coal companies then also must seek individual "authorizations" from the Corps for the projects for which they have received a general permit.
According to the Bush Administration, the federal judge who blocked the streamline permitting of new mountaintop removal coal mines has overstepped his authority. Lawyers for the Army Corps of Engineers asked a federal appeals court to overturn the July 2004 ruling by US District Judge Joseph R. Goodwin. Industry lawyers criticized Goodwin's decision as the "latest unwarranted and impermissible dismantling" of mountaintop removal regulations by federal judges in Southern West Virginia.
Update by John Conner: The destructions of highland watersheds are a crime against the very future. The Appalachian Mountains are some of the most diverse in the world. Areas incredibly rich in biodiversity are being turned into the biological equivalent of parking lots. It is the final solution for 200 million-year-old mountains. Since dynamite is cheaper than people, MTR has broken the back of the mining unions in West Virginia, massive sediment dams threaten to bury entire communities, water tables are destroyed, and wells dry up. It is a form of cultural genocide driving a mountain people from their hills - then destroying the hills themselves.
There has been a direct impact on Marsh Fork Elementary, where a massive sediment dam looms above the elementary school. Over 18 people have been arrested for non-violent civil disobedience trying to protect the children of that school. Additionally, Mountain Justice Summer has begun a campaign modeled on Redwood and Mississippi Summers, where folks from all over North America have come to our region to help us defend our mountains.
When the Martin County coal impoundment burst, it released more than 20 times the waste volume into a community than the Exxon Valdez spill - yet the coal industry successfully suppressed the story. The coal industry is incredibly powerful, and there exists a glass ceiling on how far our stories go. The story of the folks committing civil disobedience for the first time in history in West Virginia to resist Mountain Top Removal was placed on the AP - but virtually no outlets outside of West Virginia picked it up.
People can get more information on this issue at mountainjusticesummer.org.
This site has everything - links, pictures, and state-by-state activities. From there you can sign yourself up for our electronic newsletter and find out what is going on in all the states under attack by Mountain Top Removal.
Notes:
1. Inside Energy with Federal lands, February 7, 2005,"Environmentalists Sue to Block Process for KY Mountaintop Mining Operations."
2. Associated Press, February 11, 2005, "Federal Agencies Will Work Together to Speed Up Mining Permits."
3. Charleston Gazette (West Virginia), March 22, 2005, Tuesday, "Bush, Industry Seek Reversal of Mining Ruling."
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You're kidding me right? o.O |
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Ragman
Joined: 26 Nov 2005
Posts: 1
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| Posted: Sun Nov 27, 2005 3:25 am Post subject: |
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| DaMasta wrote: | | OMFG!!! What is it with you and the U.S.? From what I'm told you don't live here So why do you feel the need to complain about it all day? You have a problem with everything we do!! Why does our politics and Econemy matter so much to you? And everything to you is bush's or some other guys fault! Well maybe you didn't know this but do you know what Immigrents like people from Mexico, Europe, Asia and other places do to our econemy.... It fucken KILLS IT!!! You don't mention that somone from china who makes less than a 50 cents an hour Busting there asses can come here and make 6 dollars an hour for Easier work. America is the world power and they have to make decisions that some times aren't fair But what do you think Europe would do with that power?? It would be much worst. You make as if you live in iraq and U.S. soldiers were affecting you in some way. Why don't you complain about how france is burning down or something. STOP BITCHING ABOUT THE U. Fucken S. of A. |
I think it's laughable that you seem to think all criticism towards America comes from outside of it's borders. Just because not everyone shares your fervent patriotism does not mean they're all foreigners who don't know what they are talking about. And your economy and politics interest the rest of the world because you are a (not the, a) world power. And it will effect the rest of the world outside of America and Iraq.
| DaMasta wrote: | | Well maybe you didn't know this but do you know what Immigrents like people from Mexico, Europe, Asia and other places do to our econemy.... It fucken KILLS IT!!! |
No, actually it doesn't. And if we add this quote to the mix:
| DaMasta wrote: | | But what do you think Europe would do with that power?? It would be much worst. |
You might even say we should look at people outside of the US for a well thought out and unbiased opinion. Although I do agree that there are too many people, even outside of America, that jump on the whole "Rargh bush sucks, american idiot"-bandwagon and critisize the US without knowing what they are talking about. |
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DarkfnTempla
Joined: 02 Mar 2005
Posts: 119
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| Posted: Sun Nov 27, 2005 9:58 am Post subject: |
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| I am sorry for Da Masta's comments. Not all of us are in the KKK. |
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bravesirobin
Joined: 24 Mar 2005
Posts: 129
Location: Camalot
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| Posted: Mon Nov 28, 2005 12:35 pm Post subject: |
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yah......Dahmaster is blind to Problems that arise in the United states and doesn't understand the US's role in world affiars...thats easy to see. 1. He doesn't understand that immigrents is why the US is the way it is 2. he doesn't understand thats its not immigrents but illegal immigrents and the lack of enforcement of laws dealing with them 3. he doesn't understand its not welfare/medicare/medicade thats the problem but the manipulation of the systems allowing for people to leach of them and take money away from people who needs the money. Also who knows what the EU/europe would do with the power. They probably won't ever have the same infulence as the US and the Middle east do ever again, but eh who knows. but As for the fritening things that are going on in the white house all you have to do is look to who we have in power. Bush is a right winger we all know that, unfortunatly what people forget is that being right wing means you like big business usually. That is whats happening. Also for the love of some celestral being...Look to who the hell you guys are quoting this stuff from...Almost all of "articals" Come from a blatently biesed source of Information. I am not going to say that should dismiss these statments but come on.... American policy has diffintly made some mistakes, chances are though the democrats will win the next election these issues will probably fade, and new ones will emerge that will be essencally the same problem. Ah the cycle of democracy.
And now too the Americans are idiots thing. Well isn't that anti climatic, people start making some decenct argument then its the "you a idiot" card. Assuming an entire population is "dullwhited" is more idiotic then voting for bush or kerry. The fact is america essencally had 2 chocies in the last election A. Bush who might not be the most intelligent person but atleast is giving us some kind of decription of what his plan is and B. Kerry a guy who says he can solve all these problems But....never tells us what is plan is example claimed he can fix S.S and Welfare but never wanted to even give an example how to. Some one voiceing thier opionion isn
't stupid, its stupid to encourage people to conform to your opinion because you believe from you point of view your correct. That and Taking song quoutes and politcal idea's from music artists, actors, and bad movie directors who had to drop of MSU for the love of god isn't a good thing. But thats my opinion |
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