WAR CRIMES & WIKILEAKS

{col. writ. 1/2/11] (c) '11 Mumia Abu-Jamal

Among the maniac right, calls have come for the assassination of Julian Assange, of Wikileaks fame. Some have called for his quick arrest, prosecution and conviction for alleged violations of U.S. anti spying laws (despite the fact that he's not a U.S. citizen.)

Although the din may've died down somewhat, U.S. government officials are livid with the Australian, with some issuing dark and foreboding threats.

if Wikileaks is guilty of anything, it's failing to abide by the unwritten rules of the corporate press, that of keeping state secrets secret.

The catcalls for Assange's prosecution are startling given the seas of silence on the prosecution of U.S. government officials for war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan. ..

From A World To Win News Service

Israel and the U.S.: who is whose tool?

28 June 2010. A World to Win News Service. The American international policy professors John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt, who are critical of U.S. support for Israeli settlement expansion and its attacks on Lebanon and Gaza, argue that "the unmatched power of the Israel lobby" distorts U.S. foreign policy. Many people outraged by these crimes have been influenced by their still widely circulated article "The Israel Lobby" that first appeared in The London Review of Books in 2006 (available at lrb.co.uk) and was later expanded into a book published in 21 countries.

(at VVAWAI we've been grappling with the relationship between U.S. imperialism and Israel for a long time.  This article is very helpful-- Anton, VVAWAI)

Read on…  http://revcom.us/a/207/AWTWNS-Israel-en.html

Oil on the Waters

[col. writ. 4/30/10] (c) '10 Mumia Abu-Jamal

As dark blobs of oil seep from the underwater wells of an exploded oil

platform, the shoals and shores of the Gulf of Mexico become exhibit A of

our doomed petro-economy, and its impact on the natural world.

Not since the infamous spillage of the Exxon Valdez on Alaska's coast in

1989 have we seen such a disaster, and it comes, ironically, within days of

the Obama Administration's announcement supporting increased off shore oil

drilling along the Atlantic coast.

It's been decades since the grounding of the Exxon Valdez, and the lands

despoiled by it are still not clean, and may not be for many a year.

The environmental damage will in turn cause economic damage, as

generations of fishing communities on the Southern coast find that fish

stocks, shrimp and crab beds have been poisoned by thousands and thousands

of gallons of toxic crude.  Such sea life, not to mention avian life, will

be devastated.

As politicians, paying back their campaign contributors with policies

and licenses which cause environmental wreckage, pursue short term

interests, the impacts of such policies will last for generations, long

beyond their terms.

In time, the leaking well will be forgotten; the oil slicks will be

forgotten; the devastation will be forgotten - especially if you don't live

in the Gulf coast region.

But the damage will be long lived and profound.

But we'll not think of it -- until it happens again.

--(c) '10 maj