Atlantic Free Press was launched in September 2006 by Dutch-Canadian R.G.
Kastelein of V.O.F. Expathos, in the Netherlands and American Expatriate Chris Floyd of
Oxford, UK.
Brick Ogden, an American Expatriate in Amsterdam has been a key supporter of this project.
Assistant Editor Canadian Chris Cook hails from Victoria, British Columbia and Senior Writer Paul William Roberts is based in Toronto - but often on the road.
The mission of AF Press is simple: to dig out nuggets of truth from
the slag-heap of lies, ignorance and witless diversion that has buried
public discourse today. AF Press provides a new venue for
disseminating hard news and insightful, fact-based analysis of the
harsh realities too often ignored or distorted by the mainstream press.
Sharp increases in food prices have generated a new wave of anti-occupation and anti-U.S. sentiment in Fallujah.
"This is a country that was damned by the Americans the moment they stepped on our soil," Burhan Jassim, a farmer from Sichir village just outside Fallujah told IPS. "This is Iraqi land that has always been blessed by Allah with the best production in quality and quantity, but now see how it has been turned into a wasteland."
Fallujah faces this new crisis after much of the city was destroyed by U.S. military operations in 2004.
The area around Fallujah city, which lies 70 km west of Baghdad, has traditionally been one of the most agriculturally productive in Iraq. Farmers planted tomatoes and cucumbers north of Fallujah, others grew potatoes south of the city near Amiriya. Both areas had plenty of date palm trees and small fruit plantations. Now production is down to a fraction of what it was.
In the lower Chouf village of Choufeit with its panoramic view of Beirut's closed airport (which will likely stay closed for 4 or 5 more days as a Hezbollah pressure point on the Bush administration to achieve a settlement that it views as fair and just), Dahiyeh, Sabra, Shatila and Burj Barajneh Palestinian Refugee Camps; Pentecost Sunday started in a somber mood for the few remaining Christians and dominant Druze population of this picturesque, rugged, hilly and ancient village.
The reason was that virtually the whole village was in attendance at a 9 a.m. memorial service for two supporters of the Druze Lebanese Democratic Party, 18 year old ____ and 22 year old _____ (names withheld at the request of family pending notification of family members living outside Lebanon) who were probably shot as they drove too fast through a newly setup check-point on May 10th. (The exact circumstances and who exactly was responsible are not clear given the myriad explanations one receives depending on who one talks to in this tight-knit village.
Perhaps only in American black communities has this observer witnessed such a large turnout by the local population at funerals for a neighborhood member who was felled by violence. Parked cars snaked for nearly one mile in all directions alongside the winding roads. Hundreds of Druze women dressed in black with white scarves around their necks and some men in traditional black baggy Druze garb with knitted white caps mournfully gathered along their former enemies, the Christian population.
Once more, a Mt. Lebanon village united in mourning at dawn would be killing the neighbors sitting next to them at a memorial service hours later in the afternoon. Choufeit has never been more split than it is this morning. "If Jumblatt ever comes to Choufeit we will kill him," said a town butcher from the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) who fought hard for 5 hours yesterday against Jumblatt's Progressive Socialist Party (PSP).
The killing of these two Druze young men did not directly cause yesterday's intense violence in Choufeit but it definitely affected the tenseness and ferocity of their revenge seeking friends, family and community.
Led by Dick Cheney, Bush administration neocons want war on Iran. So does the Israeli Lobby, but it doesn't mean they'll get it. Powerful forces in Washington and the Pentagon are opposed and so far have prevailed. Nonetheless, worrisome recent events increase the possibility and must be closely watched.
Recall George Bush's January 10, 2007 address to the nation. He announced the 20,000 troop "surge" and more. "Succeeding in Iraq," he said, "also requires defending its territorial integrity and stabilizing the region in the face of extremist challenges. This begins with addressing Iran and Syria. These two regimes are allowing 'terrorists' and 'insurgents' to use their territory to move in and out of Iraq. Iran is providing material support for attacks on American troops. We will disrupt (those) attacks....we will seek out and destroy the networks providing advanced weaponry and training to our enemies in Iraq."
That was then; this is now. On May 3, Andrew Cockburn wrote on CounterPunch: "Six weeks ago, President Bush signed a secret 'finding' authorizing a covert offensive against the Iranian regime that, according to those familiar with its contents, (is) 'unprecedented in its scope.' " The directive permits a range of actions across a broad area costing hundreds of millions with an initial $300 million for starters. Elements of the scheme include:
— targeted assassinations;
— funding Iranian opposition groups; among them - Mujahedin-e-Khalq that the State Department designates a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO); Jundullah, the "army of god militant Sunni group in Iranian Baluchistan; Iranian Kurdish nationalists; and Ahwazi arabs in southwest Iran;
— destabilizing Syria and Hezbollah; the current Lebanon turbulence raises the stakes;
— putting a hawkish commander in charge; more on that below; and
— kicking off things at the earliest possible time.
The editors of USA Today, as they do every day, had to decide what to make its “Cover Story.”
The death toll from the cyclone in Myanmar was approaching 25,000, with about almost a million homeless, and the ruling military junta was still refusing to accept foreign assistance.
A Pentagon report revealed that about 43,000 medically unfit troops were sent into combat.
In Philadelphia, six police officers were under investigation for beating suspects. And, in Russia a new president was inaugurated.
What the editors chose to dominate the front page was a three-column head photo of presidential daughter Jenna Bush and a story about her forthcoming non-public private wedding. The only reason USA Today didn’t run the story on its front pages Saturday and Sunday is because it doesn’t publish on weekends. But, just about every other news medium gave the wedding heavy play.
In the chaotic “west” it is often difficult to gain the attention of the public, but one must be committed to trying due to the severity of our current existential crisis. We are psychotic as a society, we have become so dumb and manipulable that we are truly being led towards digging our own grave and smiling while working. We cannot go on like this. We cannot pretend that we are a decent society with good intentions any longer. We are not! The “west” as a civilization is corrupt and decrepit, “we” are not the bearers of morality in the eyes of the “other” peoples. We are not an exemplary civilization which people admire and adulate. We are too arrogant and ignorant to realize, that we are seen by the “others” like the enemy, because “we” are.
As a collective of people, the “west” believes itself to be the holder of the truth, the one which understands what is good for the world. This “west” doesn’t exist however, it is a figment of our imagination, a division which has been indoctrinated to make us feel we are superior. Through “our” education systems, “our” media, “our” governments, “our” corporations, “our” art. We are so indoctrinated in industrialized information societies, that we regurgitate to each other the propaganda which is fed to us on a daily basis. This situation must change, because we are collapsing and it can only be reversed by the collective strength of the whole population. Otherwise we will be bombed out of our homes by those we so love to call terrorists. They are terrorists, but terror is what “we” are bringing to their lands and their homes, and that is why they are terrorizing “us”.
“To misunderstand the nature and threat of evil is to risk being blindsided by it . . . An evil unchecked is the prelude to genocide.”
- Dr. Mordechai: The Ezekiel Option
There are over 70 million human beings living in Iran, 17.5 million of whom are under the age of fifteen. Hillary Clinton vowed to attack Iran and “totally obliterate” the majority of the Persian race in a furnace of primordial fire should the Iranian government attack Israel with nuclear weapons, which they do not now possess or are likely to for some time — if ever.
Hillary’s “final solution” to the Persian problem bests Adolf Hitler by a magnitude of ten.
Missing in Clinton’s campaign trail pandering to America’s pro-Israel lobbies and the mushrooming evangelical Christian Zionist movement is the “inconvenient truth” that Israel has the most modern and most deadly army in the Middle East thanks to an annual $3.5 billion in American aid — one third of the U.S. aid budget.
A day of violence, fraud and a “grand rebellion” against the Santa Cruz oligarchy.
This is how Bolivian president, Evo Morales Ayma, described the result of the unconstitutional May 4 “autonomy” referendum organised by the authorities in Santa Cruz — which many feared was aimed at dividing Bolivia.
The referendum was the first in a series of proposed referendums to be held in the departments of the so-called Half Moon — Santa Cruz plus Pando, Beni and Tarija, resource-rich departments in Bolivia’s east. The Half Moon remains dominated by the white oligarchy despite the coming to power nationally of Morales, Bolivia’s first indigenous president, on the back of a mass movement against neoliberalism led by the indigenous majority.
Illegal vote
While the National Electoral Court had ruled that the autonomy referendum — which the government had proposed be held simultaneously with a referendum to approve the new constitution — could not go ahead on May 4 due to lack of time and suitable political conditions, the prefecture and civic committee of Santa Cruz, backed by the Santa Cruz Electoral Court, decided to go ahead with what was an illegal referendum.
“What this means is that corporations and those who run them cannot stop exploiting resources and amassing wealth until they have… .I cannot finish this sentence, because the truth is that can never stop; like cancer, they can only continue to expand until they kill the host.”
–Derrick Jensen
(Perhaps my profane words will offend, but in light of the fact that we are in a race to eradicate capitalism before it renders the Earth uninhabitable, I don’t give a fuck).
Yes. It’s another anti-capitalist rant by Jason Miller. Big surprise! I’m the associate editor for Cyrano’s Journal Online, the anti-capitalist tool. We’re not big fans of free market ideology and its tacit socioeconomic license to rape, pillage and plunder.
Here’s a novel idea—if you don’t like my diatribes against the predominatingly rotten-to the-core system that ensures the most despicable human beings wield the most power, don’t read them! And you relentless “keepers of the faith,” dazzle us with more of your intellectually dishonest arguments supporting capitalism. I’m quite familiar with the mental gymnastics you do to buttress a heinous system that rationalizes and “legitimizes” your greed, ruthlessness, selfishness, speciesism, hyper-individualism, exploitative and abusive tendencies, and the wholesale commodification of the Earth and its sentient inhabitants. It is obvious to all but the most self-deluded that capitalism is destroying the planet and us. So go ahead and jerk us off with your inane apologetics “validating” capitalism.
Nothing seems to work right for Senator Hilary Rodham Clinton in her attempts to once more dwell in the White House. Senator Barack Obama, despite inflated controversies continued his glide to the Democratic nomination with a landslide victory and a marginal defeat in the North Carolina and Indiana primaries, respectively.
According to the Associated Press count, as of May 7, a day after Tuesday’s primaries, Obama commands an overall lead of 1,846.5 delegates, while Clinton trails behind at 1,696 delegates. To win the Democratic Party nomination for presidency, Obama or Clinton is required to obtain 2,025 delegates. To catch up with Obama, beleaguered Clinton must acquire at least 63 percent of the remaining votes, nearly impossible considering her poor performance as of late. Obama is just 178.5 delegates shy from the threshold of nomination.
Analysts contest that neither candidate is likely to obtain the required votes, but Obama looks like a more attractive option, as Clinton’s negative campaigning is reaching the point of hampering the credibility and overall appeal of the Democratic Party, as it gears for a heated battle against Republican Senator John McCain next November. US filmmaker and outspoken political critic Michael Moore has equated a possible McCain presidency, in a recent interview with CNN’s Larry King, as a third term for George W. Bush. Moore’s assessment cannot be any more accurate.
Hilary Clinton’s campaign lost momentum soon after its launch. Early numbers showing a wide lead over other Democratic opponents soon faltered, as her failure to present herself as the clear alternative to the archetypal Washington politician became palpable. Although Obama’s ‘moral flexibility’ too became obvious, he held an advantage over his stubborn opponent: he could speak as an outsider to the ‘establishment’, a fact that is consistent with his oratory charges about the need for change, unity and hope. Clinton, despite her claim to the contrary, was the typical Washington politician, self-serving, opportunistic and an aficionado of partisan politics.
“Bring no more vain oblations; incense is an abomination unto me: the new moons and Sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot away with; it is iniquity, even the solemn meeting. Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hateth. They are a trouble to me; I am weary to bear them; and when ye spread forth your hands I will hide mine eyes from you. Yea! When ye make many prayers, I will not hear. YOUR HANDS ARE FULL OF BLOOD; cease to do evil, learn to do well; seek judgment; relieve the oppressed; judge for the fatherless; plead for the widow.” (Isaiah 1:13-17)
A nation cannot be born in torture and terror and be born whole; it is a deformity of humankind, an abomination that must be cleansed through repentance and reconciliation if it is to join the civilized world. Israel, like the United States before it, will be haunted by its past as the living literature that enshrines it captures the hypocrisy of its public statements even as the truth is unearthed beneath the parks, towns and cities that hide the memories of those it devastated to build a mock nation. The world will see eventually how the public relations and tourism firms gloss the reality of its aborted birth, the tearing of the womb that erupted from the blood of the defeated that were powerless against the terrorist forces that defied the British authorities and the United Nations, a nation conceived in terror and executed in blood as its founders Weizmann and Ben- Gurion promised: “If further action was taken against them (by the British Mandate Government) … to destroy Zionism, then there would be a ‘blood bath’. Nothing could prevent it. … Nobody would be safe in Palestine.” (July 12, 1946, Rhodes Archive Documents). “If need be, we shall take the country by force. If Palestine proves too small — her frontiers will have to be extended” (Ben Gurion, Appendix LVc).
Focused on issues or trivia, US media giants continue to revel in election politics. Three US senators have been busily campaigning for nominations for the US presidency.
Whether it's Hillary Clinton trying to be more macho than her male opponents, or John McCain attempting to display more chutzpah than G W Bush, or Barak Obama disowning the mentor he should be praising, the whole process is a sideshow on demand.
The "on demand" part of the sideshow comes from the American public. If the republicans wanted brains at the helm rather than a Bush clone, they would have nominated Ron Paul, a candidate whose foreign policy would keep America from pre-emptive and presumptive wars.
Paul wouldn't be spending his time in Florida trying to convince voters there, as McCain has, that the democratic candidates would jeopardize Israel's security and that the US should bomb Iran.
If the democrats didn’t believe that change can only be made by electing either a woman or a black American, they might have nominated Dennis Kucinich, the only candidate with the brains and the integrity to bring about real change. Kucinich wouldn't be threatening, as Hillary Clinton has, to "totally obliterate" Iran.
To his credit, Obama had enough sense to reject that sort of saber-rattling when he told Tim Russert of MSNBC it's "important that we use language that sends a signal to the world community that we're shifting from the sort of cowboy diplomacy, or lack of diplomacy, that we've seen out of George Bush. And this kind of language is not helpful."
The P5+1 — the permanent members of the U.N. Security Council and Germany — will present Tehran with a secret incentive package in the next few days to convince Iran to suspend its enrichment programme and enter negotiations.
There is little doubt that Tehran will reject the offer since it crosses its red line — suspension of enrichment — but the question is why such an offer is being made at this time, even though reinvigorating talks is in and of itself much needed.
The nuclear offer coincides with an escalation of rhetoric between Washington and Tehran over allegations of Iranian meddling in Iraq. Following several stark comments by high-ranking U.S. military officials, the new buzz in the beltway is that Iran "is killing American soldiers" — a clear casus belli if proven true.
From Senate staffers to think tank pundits, fear of a military confrontation between Iran and the U.S. is quickly rising once more.
General David Petreus, the new head of CENTCOM, is reportedly preparing a presentation of evidence showcasing Iran's direct involvement in the violence in Iraq. Well aware of their lack of credibility, George W. Bush administration officials are keeping a low profile and letting military officials take the rhetorical lead against Tehran.
Already climate change — in the form of a changing pattern of global rainfall — seems to be affecting the planet in significant ways. Take the massive, almost decade-long drought in Australia's wheat-growing heartland, which has been a significant factor in sending flour prices, and so bread prices, soaring globally, leading to desperation and food riots across the planet.
A report from the Bureau of Meteorology in Australia makes clear that, despite recent heavy rains in the eastern Australian breadbasket, years of above normal rainfall would be needed "to remove the very long-term [water] deficits" in the region. The report then adds this ominous note: "The combination of record heat and widespread drought during the past five to 10 years over large parts of southern and eastern Australia is without historical precedent and is, at least partly, a result of climate change."
Think a bit about that phrase — "without historical precedent." Except when it comes to technological invention, it hasn't been much part of our lives these last many centuries. Without historical precedent. Brace yourselves, it's about to become a commonplace in our vocabulary. The southeastern United States, for instance, was, for the last couple of years, locked in a drought — which is finally easing — "without historical precedent." In other words, there was nothing (repeat, nothing) in the historical record that provided a guide to what might happen next.
Saturday Afternoon May 10 2008 witnessed a pronounced easing of tension.
Is a solution at hand?
Based on a US Congressional source, the Siniora government is reportedly able, with US approval, to offer the following face-saving proposal to Hezbollah to end the current crisis:
1. Hezbollah can keep its landline optic telecommunication cables for use in its Resistance struggle against Israel. But they should be put under "State Control". Translation: Hezbollah controls them exclusively same as now and no one else will touch them. But 'officially' they will be under 'State' control, i.e. not State control.
2. Concerning the other major issue regarding the head of Beirut Airport Security, General Wafiq Shouqair gets reassigned but Hezbollah gets to name his replacement. Translation: Wafiq stays in office, keeps his authority and puts his deputy's name card slipped over his on the office nameplate.
It is my understanding that the government now plans to collect DNA from anyone who is arrested by federal law enforcement, and that the samples will be stored in an effort to reduce violence in our society. Moreover, the U.S. government reportedly now intends to take a cheek swab from foreigners we detain, whether they've been charged or not.
While Congress may have authorized Justice to expand DNA outreach, as citizens, and taxpayers, we're entitled to know what your intentions are.
The concept of DNA collection is, in itself, not a heinous thing. Indeed, if science were to be used to combat wrongful conviction instead of setting up a blueprint for pursuing future incarceration, then I would be a strong proponent of taking DNA samples from everyone who is arrested, and storingthe samples.
The data provided in the US State Department's annual terrorism report for 2007 points to some interesting if puzzling conclusions. The much publicised document, made available 30 April via the State Department's website, makes no secret of the fact that Al-Qaeda is back, strong as ever. It also suggests that violence worldwide is nowhere near subsiding, despite President Bush's repeated assurances regarding the success of his "war on terror".
Will the report inspire serious reflection on the US's detrimental foreign policy and its role in the current situation?
Let's look at some of the data. To start with, take Pakistan. Al-Qaeda or Al-Qaeda-inspired attacks in the country more than doubled (from 375 to 877) between 2006 and 2007. These attacks have claimed the lives of 1,335 people, compared to 335 in a previous report. That is a jump of almost 300 per cent.
Then there's Afghanistan, which was supposedly "liberated" shortly after 11 September 2001. The number of attacks reported there increased a sharp 16 per cent in 2007. Some 1,127 violent incidents killing 1,966 people represent a significant surge in violence compared to 2006's 1,257 deaths.
There have also been many other violent incidents around the world, including but not limited to North Africa, the terrorist bombings in Algeria in particular.
But this is barely half the story -- or 40 per cent of it, if we want to be as specific as the terrorism report. Iraq accounted for 60 per cent of worldwide terrorism fatalities.
This general election more than most will test the courage of voters to avoid lesser-evil strategic voting that has propped up our two-party plutocracy. People with intelligence and conscience must resist peer pressure and the temptation to vote against John McCain by voting for Barack Obama.
Of course, a McCain presidency that pursues much of the same policies and values of the totally inept and morally bankrupt Bush administration is something to loathe. But lesser-evil voting sustains our corrupt political system.
Many say they are voting for Barack Obama in a most enthusiastic and positive way. For me, this does not work. I see no compelling evidence in Obama's history that he has what it takes to be a true, solid reformer. All I see is a young, inexperienced terrific talker that has used slick rhetoric to sell himself. With intellectual and ideological elitism and an aura of superiority and academic smugness, he has successfully fooled millions of people who are so disillusioned with our corrupt political system that they have let themselves be manipulated by poetic promises of change. In reality, he is just another super-ambitious, lying mainstream politician that has taken considerable money and support from all sorts of corporate and other special interests.
