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DOJ Will Not Prosecute Agents Who Murdered Anastasio Hernández Rojas

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By Southern Borders Community Coalition

In a shocking turn of events in the case of Anastasio Hernández Rojas, the Department of Justice (DOJ) announced Friday that they will not prosecute the agents involved in his death.

The DOJ cited a lack of evidence to meet the standard for federal criminal prosecution. Despite eyewitness testimony and video, DOJ concluded they were unable to prove, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the agents committed homicide or civil rights violations.

Following are statements from the family of Anastasio Hernández Rojas along with representatives from the Southern Border Communities Coalition.   [Read more…]

Donald Trump Is Right About One Thing. GW Bush Did Not Keep Us Safe Before 9/11

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The Donald just doesn’t know how to back up his statement with the actual facts, that’s all. Richard Clarke, the CIA’s National Coordinator for Counterterrorism, was running around with his hair on fire trying to get George W Bush to listen to him about the imminence of an attack by bin Ladin.

Bush blew him off and then demoted him so that he didn’t report directly to the President as he had under the Clinton and George H W Bush administrations. Now he had to go through Condoleeza Rice and her deputy who also blew him off. Bush simply was not interested in terrorism; he was only interested in getting the goods on Saddam so he would have some kind of rationale for invading Iraq. He wanted to invade Iraq the worst way so he went about manufacturing evidence that would justify his doing so. In the meantime, he totally ignored terrorism and the advice he should have heeded about an imminent attack.   [Read more…]

Reflections on Palestine: Symbols of Homeland

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By Pedro Rios

As I traveled throughout the occupied Palestinian territories, it was evident to me that life under Israeli occupation means that Palestinians must live under a constant stage of siege.  Israeli military and police forces use violence to enforce apartheid-style policies to control every aspect of Palestinian life. I heard many stories about how the Israeli government flagrantly violates international human rights conventions and agreements, and witnessed examples of how Palestinians live with unreasonable restrictions that are meant to humiliate and demean an entire people.

In spite of this, there were natural resources that have become symbols in Palestinian life that call for a dignified homeland. These symbols – water, olive trees, and cactus plants – all are palpable objects that transcend the callousness of occupation because they represent long-lasting survival, in spite of what appears to be a permanent occupation. Below, I offer my brief reflections on each.  I believe they each merit a more just and thorough contemplation for what they’ve come to mean to Palestinians.   [Read more…]

What Clinton Gets Wrong About Snowden

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By  / OtherWords

Hillary Clinton is wrong about Edward Snowden. Again.

The presidential candidate and former secretary of state insisted during the recent Democratic debate that Snowden should have remained in the United States to voice his concerns about government spying on U.S. citizens. Instead, she claimed, he “endangered U.S. secrets by fleeing to Russia.”

After accusing Snowden of stealing “very important information that has fallen into the wrong hands,” she added: “He should not be brought home without facing the music.”   [Read more…]

Reflections on Palestine: The Madness of Occupation in Hebron

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In September 2015, Pedro Rios joined colleagues from around the country on a delegation to the Occupied Palestinian Territories to meet with farmers, business people, politicians, and activists, in order to learn about how Israeli occupation impacts daily life for Palestinians living in the occupied territories. The delegation visited the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, and Jerusalem. This is one in a series of articles on his reflections of his visit to Palestine.

By Pedro Rios

A Palestinian child, no more than 10 years old, stood in the middle of the street near the checkpoint leading to the entrance of the Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron. In his hands he held a flute similar to those Palestinian merchants sell to the few tourists that make their way into the deserted streets of Ghost Town.

The boy blew into it until he was almost out of breath, standing his ground, and blowing a second time with as much fervor.   [Read more…]

Readers Write: Grim Prospect of Hundred Years War

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Bush’s War is thirteen years old and counting. It is increasingly evident that none of the participants in this expanding global tragedy knows how, nor it seems, has anyone the will, to put an end to war.

Children born in the Middle East and children born in the United States at the time of our ill advised incursion into the affairs of a foreign country are now about thirteen years old. They know of no time of no war.   [Read more…]

A Dark and Dirty Shadow Falls Over California Plastic Bag Ban

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By Doug Porter

Efforts to eliminate the use of plastic grocery bags in California face all-out opposition via two well-funded industry campaigns in 2016. Hilex Poly, Superbag Corp, Advance Polybag and Formosa Plastics Corporation are expected to cough up most of the probable $55.3 million price tag for the efforts.

An estimated $38.1 million war chest will back a November referendum aimed at SB270, State Senator Alex Padilla’s bill banning the use of plastic bags. The measure was suspended following a $3.2 million signature-gathering campaign funded by the American Progressive Bag Alliance.

And just to make sure they get their way, industry proponents are spending an estimated $4 million qualifying a second ballot measure innocuously titled the Environmental Fee Protection Act. It’s likely they’ll spend $17.2 million selling this bit of misdirection, according to Forward Observer.com.   [Read more…]

It’s Time to Abolish Columbus Day

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By Bill Bigelow / Common Dreams

Once again this year many schools will pause to commemorate Christopher Columbus. Given everything we know about who Columbus was and what he launched in the Americas, this needs to stop.

Columbus initiated the trans-Atlantic slave trade, in early February 1494, first sending several dozen enslaved Taínos to Spain. Columbus described those he enslaved as “well made and of very good intelligence,” and recommended to King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella that taxing slave shipments could help pay for supplies needed in the Indies.

A year later, Columbus intensified his efforts to enslave Indigenous people in the Caribbean. He ordered 1,600 Taínos rounded up—people whom Columbus had earlier described as “so full of love and without greed”—and had 550 of the “best males and females,” according to one witness, Michele de Cuneo, chained and sent as slaves to Spain. “Of the rest who were left,” de Cuneo writes, “the announcement went around that whoever wanted them could take as many as he pleased; and this was done.”   [Read more…]

Foreign Interventions in the Middle East: More Havoc, Nuclear Weapons, Less Order

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By Frank Thomas

Middle Eastern states are breaking down in an endless escalation of civil wars where Syria, Libya, Yemen, Iraq are collapsing. The resulting power vacuums exploited by rebel factions and demonic jihadist Islamic state are threatening the Middle East. The ancient, ongoing Sunni-Shiite mutual hatreds are afire.

U.S. foreign regime change interventions – by military engagement, funding, training insurgency groups, supporting coups d’etats, protecting regional dictatorships – have boosted instability and mayhem in Syria, Iraq, Libya, Yemen, Egypt, etc. Emerging unscathed in these interventions, the U.S. departs leaving the wreckage behind to go on to the next trouble-spot.   [Read more…]

Killer Robots: Coming Soon to a Battlefield Near You

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“If there is not a pre-emptive ban on the high-level autonomous weapons then once the genie is out of the bottle it will be extremely difficult to get it back in.”

By Nadia Prupis / Common Dreams

The U.S. and UK are undermining attempts by the United Nations to negotiate over the future of autonomous weapons—or “killer robots”—talks which, if delayed further, could come too late to prevent so-called “robot wars.”

Technology and human rights experts have been pushing for the UN to preemptively ban machines that can kill on the battlefield without human operators, citing a greater risk to civilian life and a broader lack of accountability for military officials. But Christof Heyns, UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary, or arbitrary executions, said Tuesday that the negotiation process is in danger of getting “stuck.”   [Read more…]

US Bombing of Afghan Hospital Called a War Crime by Doctors Without Borders

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By Nadia Prupis / Common Dreams

Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) on Sunday called the U.S. military’s Saturday airstrike on its charity hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan a war crime and announced it was withdrawing all staff from the beleaguered area.

MSF said 22 people, including medical workers and patients, were killed in the bombing, which occurred around 2:10 am local time and reportedly lasted for at least half an hour.

“Under the clear presumption that a war crime has been committed, MSF demands that a full and transparent investigation into the event be conducted by an independent international body,” said MSF general director Christopher Stokes in a statement on Sunday.   [Read more…]

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