Chelsea Manning: Seeing Victims of US War As ‘People’ – Not ‘Statistics’ – Compelled Leaks

by Andrea Germanos, staff writer

Common Dreams | June 09, 2017

“I stopped seeing just statistics and information, and I started seeing people,” Manning said. (Image: ABC News)

U.S. Army whistleblower Chelsea Manning has given her first interview since being released from prison last month in which she explains her motivations for making public thousands of military documents.

Excerpts of her interview with ABC‘s “Nightline” co-anchor Juju Chang aired Friday on the network’s “Good Morning America.”

Asked about why she leaked the trove of documents, she says, “I have a responsibility to the public … we all have a responsibility.”

NAFTA’s Dirty Secret: It Lets U.S. Control Canada’s Oil

by Linda McQuaig

the star | June 08, 2017

In the wake of Donald Trump’s fiery threats to end the trade deal between the U.S., Canada and Mexico, the subject of NAFTA has become much more interesting to Canadians than before, when it mostly consisted of talk about softwood lumber and the dairy industry. Boring.

In fact, Trump or no Trump, NAFTA has always been a potential firecracker of an issue, if only the public knew what was in the deal.

But for more than 20 years, Canadian politicians have largely managed to keep the focus on lumber and cows, distracting us from the truly outrageous aspects of NAFTA: the surrender of Canadian sovereignty in a couple of key areas.

CHOICE Act Would Make Future Financial Crises More Likely

Statement by Josh Bivens, Director of Research

Economic Policy Institute | June 08, 2017

WASHINGTON – Today’s passage of the Financial CHOICE Act is a terrible decision by the House of Representatives. If it were to be passed by the Senate and become law, this bill would make future financial crises more likely and more damaging. It would strip away protections against American households being swindled again by the worst actors in the financial sector. It would roll back the sorely needed “fiduciary rule” that requires financial advisers act in the best interest of their clients rather than lining their pockets with the hard-earned savings of the people who turned to those very financial professionals for help with their retirement investments. Finally, it would lead to a less transparent and less democratically accountable Federal Reserve, and would mandate the Fed follow policy rules that would predictably lead to higher unemployment and less ability to fight deep recessions. It’s hard to imagine a bill that could do more broad-based damage to the future economic security of America’s working families.

Qatar-Saudi Arabia spat over ‘terrorism’ has too many plot holes

The Dawn, Karachi | June 12, 2017

KARACHI: The Saudi-Qatari spat is getting uglier by the day; one stark manifestation of this emerged last week when, in a joint statement released by Saudi Arabia and its allies Egypt, the UAE and Bahrain, the countries announced they were placing 59 individuals and 12 organisations linked to Qatar on a “terror list”.

Anyone aware of the nature of Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) politics will vouch for the fact that this move is unprecedented in the over three-decade-old history of the six-nation bloc of Gulf monarchies. While behind-the-scenes sniping and leg-pulling are nothing new, such harsh measures targeted at one of their own reflects major tension between the Arab potentates of the Gulf. The battle lines within the GCC have been drawn: Saudi Arabia, along with the UAE and Bahrain, are intent on isolating Qatar, while Kuwait and Oman, the other members of the GCC, watch uneasily from the margins.

The Washington Post’s Reporting on Disability Is Giving Trump Cover for Disability Cuts

by  Rebecca Vallas

talk poverty | June 02, 2017

(AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais, File)

The Washington Post is out with the second in a series of articles pushing the nastiest of myths about Social Security disability benefits and the people who rely on them.

Their latest article, titled “Generations, disabled,” doubles down on seriously flawed reporting that The Post began in March. This time the author, Terrence McCoy, profiles a family in Missouri struggling with poverty and health-related challenges. McCoy takes aim at many aspects of their lives, but the one he reserves the most scorn for—the fact that more than one person in the family receives disability benefits—mirrors the same disability cuts Trump called for in last week’s budget proposal.

The political defeat of the Venezuelan right-wing

by Guillermo Cieza

The Dawn News | June 07, 2017

Photo credit: Cuba Debate

After over 60 days of street violence, after over 60 murders, the Venezuelan right is being politically defeated.

Some telling numbers back this affirmation:

• Yesterday, the protest convened by the opposition’s Democratic Unity Roundtable (MUD) in 15 spots around Caracas was a resounding failure. Less than a hundred people showed up at each spot.
• A poll by the Democratic Action party asked people whether they think the government is right in saying that the opposition’s protests are led by terrorists showed that over 70% of Venezuelans think that is correct.
• Yesterday, the municipal police of Lechería, a district governed by a member of the opposition, shot a group of opposition protesters, wounding two.

The ‘Truth’ Of The Matter

by Sheshu Babu

Countercurrents.org | June 10, 2017

Lies in heart!
Lies in brain!
Lies everywhere
Truth rarely seen!

News reports are lies!
Political statements…lies!
Growth statistics are lies
Future predictions lies!

Where mobs Lynch people
Talks of welfare state are lies!
Communal forces omnipresence
Proves talks of harmony lies!

‘Aadhar ‘ for everyone
Surveillance on everyone
Speak of fundamental rights
No! All damn lies!

Chemical weapons in Syria
US elections connection with Russia
Reducing carbon emissions
Little truth! Lot lies!

The standing Rock struggle
The Chhattisgarh adivasis protest
The Aussies anti- coal mine movement
Are not at all lies!

Lies propagated as truths
Half – truths and ‘ post truths’
Cannot, for long, hide reality
From vast humanity

Notes

Aadhar …. Unique identification number (aadhar gets new security features … Hindustan times, June 9 )

Syria denies using chemical weapons in Idlib — Al Jazeera ( April 6 2017)

US elections connection with Russia ..Julian assange speaks about US elections and Russian involvement ( you tube 15 – 12 – 2016)

Standing Rock … Protests DAPL

 Sheshu Babu is a writer from anywhere and everywhere and who wants to foster the world

Wherever this Canadian mining company goes in Congo, violence seems to follow 67

by Yves Engler

 Pambazuka News | June 08, 2017

Northern Miner

Banro operates in a region that has seen incredible violence over the past two decades and the secretive company has been accused of fuelling the conflict. In 1996 Banro paid $3.5 million for 47 mining concessions that covered more than one million hectares of land in Congo’s North and South Kivu.

 

Last week a police officer and a soldier were killed at a Banro Corporation-run mine in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo. One “assailant” was also killed at the Toronto-based company’s Namoya mine.

In February three police officers were killed at another Banro mine about 200 km to the southwest. An “assailant” was also killed at Twangiza in what the gold mining firm labeled an attempted robbery.

The dark side of infrastructure investment in Africa

by Various

Pambazuka News | June 08, 2017

Elkana Jacob

A position paper by the African Forum and Network on Debt and Development (Harare),  European Network on Debt and Development (Brussels) and Jubilee Germany (Düsseldorf)

The need to invest in infrastructure is very much a consensus among all parties concerned with African development. There is also broad consensus that conditions to actually implement development efforts need to improve. However, the discussion about potential risks of such an investment initiative is limited to the risks for the investors and, therefore, only the improvement of investment conditions in African countries is discussed, so that (institutional) investors from industrial countries feel save to invest. There is no discussion about the risks to the debt sustainability of receiving countries. The German G20 presidency entirely ignores that rising debt levels are the inevitable downside of any loan push into the Global South.