Click here to view this and past newsletters online. Please add "messenger@truthout.org" to your email contacts to ensure delivery.

Wednesday 6 June 2012

Greece and the Euro: Fifty Ways to Leave Your Lover
Ellen Brown, Truthout: "The euro zone is proving to be a marriage of incompatible partners.... For the Greeks, the euro love affair is over, but breaking up is hard to do. Defaulting on their debts will force them out of the euro zone and back to issuing drachmas, which could get brutally devalued by speculators as soon as they are traded on foreign exchange markets. Fortunately, there are alternatives to an ugly divorce."
Read the Article

Fracking Fatalities: Organized Labor Implores Federal Agencies to Stop the Killings
Mike Elk, In These Times: "According to one study by the CDC National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), workers in the oil and natural gas industries are seven times as likely to die on the job as workers in other industries. In a letter sent last week, the AFL-CIO, the United Steelworkers union and the United Mine Workers complain that the Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA) and the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) are not doing enough to regulate the potential hazards that harm fracking workers."
Read the Article

Election Countdown 2012: "Politics Ain't Beanbag"
Lambert Strether, NakedCapitalism: "In today's Election Countdown 2012 segment: In Quebec, it's not the fees, it's the debt; Walker's win smacks Wisconsin protesters who started recall; a map shows half the nation returning to past employment levels and the other half not, and more."
Read the Article

A Guantanamo Connection? Documents Show CIA Stockpiled Antimalaria Drugs as "Incapacitating Agents"
Jeffrey Kaye, Truthout: "A Truthout analysis of historical records concerning government research and nonmedical use of antimalarial medications has revealed that such drugs were the objects of experimental research under the CIA's MKULTRA program. Even more, one of these drugs, cinchonine, was illegally stockpiled by the CIA as an 'incapacitating agent' ... Such interest gains contemporary significance in the light of actions taken by the Department of Defense (DoD) in the 'war on terror.'"
Read the Article

Hunger Strikers at Virginia Supermax Face Retaliation for Protest Against Torturous Conditions
Rania Khalek, Truthout: "Dozens of inmates at Red Onion State Prison, Virginia's only supermax facility, have been on a hunger strike since Tuesday, May 22, in what supporters say is a protest against inhumane conditions. Since its opening, Red Onion has been plagued by scandals of abuse and torture. Supporters are accusing prison officials of deliberately blocking all forms of communication, making it nearly impossible for outsiders to know what's actually happening."
Read the Article

Walker Wins Recall, Democrats Win Control of the Senate, Halting Right-Wing Agenda
Brendan Fischer, PR Watch: "After a 16-month long fight, an astonishing $63.5 million spent, and a people's uprising that attracted international attention and laid the groundwork for a movement that will last for years to come, Governor Scott Walker will keep his seat after Tuesday's recall election, winning 53-46 over challenger Tom Barrett.... Two-thirds of Walker's money came from out-of-state, versus only one-fourth of Barrett's money coming from outside Wisconsin."
Read the Article

US Rejected 2005 Iranian Offer Ensuring No Nuclear Weapons
Gareth Porter, Inter Press Service News: "France and Germany were prepared in spring 2005 to negotiate on an Iranian proposal to convert all of its enriched uranium to fuel rods, making it impossible to use it for nuclear weapons, but Britain vetoed the deal at the insistence of the United States, according to a new account by a former top Iranian nuclear negotiator.... The reason that offer was rejected was that the George W. Bush administration refused to countenance any Iranian enrichment capability, regardless of the circumstances."
Read the Article

Five Things to Consider in the Walker Recall Vote
Robert Borosage, Campaign for America's Future: "That Scott Walker survived the recall in Wisconsin is a tragic setback for the stunning citizen's movement that challenged his extremist agenda in Wisconsin. Its implications are likely to be exaggerated by the right, and underplayed by progressives. Here are some thoughts on its meaning."
Read the Article

On the News With Thom Hartmann: Florida Gov. Rick Scott Will Push Ahead With Rigging the November Election, and More
In today's On the News segment: Florida Gov. Rick Scott will push ahead with rigging the November election, a Republican filibuster obstructs the Paycheck Fairness Act, evidence that cap and trade works, and more.
Watch the Video and Read the Transcript

Robert Reich | The Big-Lie Coup d'Etat
Robert Reich, RobertReich.org: "JP Morgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, BP, Chevron, WalMart, and billionaires Charles and David Koch are launching a multi-million dollar TV ad buy Tuesday blasting President Obama over the national debt. Actually, I don't know who's behind this ad because there's no way to know. And that's a big problem."
Read the Article

Raw Video: Police Drag Occupy DC Activists to Break Home Eviction Blockade
Mike Ludwig, Truthout: "An effort to prevent a home eviction in Washington, DC, Tuesday turned ugly when US Marshals and local police officers armed with guns and riot shields forcefully removed members of Occupy DC who sat on the front steps of the property to prevent an eviction team from entering the home. Occupy DC activists chanted, 'Homes not banks' as officers dragged apparently peaceful protesters off the property."
Read the Article and Watch the Video

Freedom, Openness and Creativity in the Digital Economy
Michael A. Peters, Truthout: "Every aspect of culture and economy is transforming through a process of digitization that creates new systems of archives, representations and reproduction technologies that portend a Web 3.0 and Web 4.0, where all production - material and immaterial - will be digitally designed and coordinated through distributed information systems.... The Internet is a dynamic, open ecosystem that progressively changes its nature towards greater computing power, interactivity, inclusiveness, mobility, scale, and peer governance."
Read the Article

Before It's Too Late in the Arctic
Subhankar Banerjee, Climate Story Tellers: "What do Arctic drilling and drone killing have in common? They are both being decided by Barack Obama without public debate.... Obama got personally involved and fast-tracked Shell's drilling permits. According to Foreign Policy magazine, 'Barack Obama has become George W. Bush on steroids.' The article makes this reference with regard to Obama's drone killing, but perhaps a similar thing could be said about his Arctic drilling that we must condemn."
Read the Article

Click here for more Truthout articles

Movements Representing Principles and Values Should Steer Clear of Political Parties
Mark Karlin, BuzzFlash at Truthout: "The progressive movement in America has been in search of direction ever since they elected Obama thinking that he was the leader of a movement, but really he became a conventional member of the ruling elite as president: better than the Republicans, but hardly representative of any movement. Indeed, Obama and the White House steadfastly ignored the uprising in Wisconsin and subsequent recall efforts like the plague."
Read the BuzzFlash Commentary

John Nichols: The Wisconsin Result Shows That Big Money Matters More Than It Ever Has
Read the Article at The Nation

Joseph E. Stiglitz: The 1 Percent's Problem
Read the Article at Vanity Fair

The Tumultuous Journey of Proposition 8
Read the Article at The San Francisco Chronicle

Paycheck Fairness Act Is Defeated in the Senate
Read the Article at The Hill

BP Demands Scientist Emails in Gulf Oil Spill Lawsuit
Read the Article at Wired

Why Working-Class People Vote Conservative
Read the Article at The Guardian UK

Our Most Widely Ignored Public Intellectuals
Read the Article at The American Prospect

Click here for more BuzzFlash headlines

To ensure you receive our messages please add the following address to your email address book: messenger@truthout.org

Click here to Subscribe
Our Privacy Policy
Click here to Unsubscribe