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POPSTen Ways to Make Sure That Peace Stays Dead Too many people on each side see the other as wholly culpable. Too many people on each side see themselves as wholly innocent, wholly victimized, ill-served by the well-meaning, abandoned by former allies, betrayed by the media, misunderstood by people who should know better, forgotten by the world. Too many people on each side see only the suffering that has been caused them. Too many people have learned to wall themselves off from the suffering that they have caused.
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POPSRead this clip and try not to say WTF!! I mean, are you kidding me!? Rachel Ray and Dunkin Donuts were offering "symbolic support for Muslim extremism and terrorism" because she was wearing a black and white scarf. After this one, it's going to take a whole to shock me :) Honestly, i just tagged this clip dunkin donuts, rachel ray and terrorism - WTF indeed!!
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POPSThe Biggest Threat to the West Lies Within Itself, Not with Islam Simon Jenkins on threats to peace and democracy. This defeatism led the American Congress to allow its president to authorise torture and detention without trial in what Senator Robert Byrd called “the slow unravelling of the people’s liberties”. It enabled a British Home Office to curb free speech and habeas corpus. It arms police, fortifies buildings and impedes the free movement of citizens. It makes every Christian suspicious of every Muslim.
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POPSBush's America: LESS Safe, LESS Free. In a new book, "Less Safe, Less Free: Why America Is Losing the War on Terror," law professors David Cole and Jules Lobel argue that the problem lies in the aggressive "preventive paradigm" the Bush administration adopted in the wake of 9/11.
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POPS President above the law, Nominee for US Attorney General says
This warmongering White House just keeps unraveling our Constitution, our principle, our ideals, our society and our politics day after day. A common idea we use to have, for example, was that "No man is above the law." But apparently this nominee thinks the President is above the law. And the talk is still how he's suppose to be approved!? Screw him. Screw any politician who votes for him. Of course in the real world we all know that the rich, if not 'above the law,' normally have a 'better,' law, better results with the law, better lawyers, special consideration. So too big names, celebrities, Hollywood stars. Most of US prisons, for example, are overpopulated with the poor, the least educated and the minorities. (The USA has the biggest prison populations in the world, BTW, by %) The audaciousness of these warmongers. Theyshoot you in the face and expect/get the victim to apologize for being there (a Cheney factual example). Well...no longer a good country. Hopefully
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POPSThe Assasination of Benazir Bhutto When in power, corruption hemmed in around her, and her visions were stalemated by the reality of bureaucratic government. She was at her best when she was disenfranchised, chiding those in control. In power she was a bureaucrat, but in opposition she was an icon. Now she has died as icons die, as opposition leaders die, in an explosive annihilation of waves of humanity. ...at the back gate of a park after a speech, on the eve of her comeback.
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POPSDouble Standards What do you call it when just over 3 thousand people were killed in the September 11 attack on the US? – An atrocity. What do you call it when nearly 5 million people were killed in the Vietnam war? – A mistake. What do you call it when very rich people exploit poor people? – Greed and selfishness. What do you call it when very rich countries exploit poor countries? – Globalization. What do you call it when someone carrying a gun enters your house and steals your valuable possessions? – An armed robbery. What do you call it when a multinational corporation supported by armed forces enters your country and steals your valuable possessions? – Free trade. What do you call someone who steals from the rich and gives to the poor? – Robin Hood. What do you call someone who steals from the poor and gives to the rich? – The US government.
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POPSU.S. Ranked 36th Freest Press in the World 
Who Controls the U.S. Media? For the most part, the media spreads a lot of misinformation and corporate propaganda. This is not at all surprising considering that Time Warner, Disney, Murdoch's News Corporation, Bertelsmann of Germany, Viacom (formerly CBS) and General Electric's NBC are the top owners of the entire media industry, which includes everything you read and hear in newspapers, magazines, TV and radio stations, books, records, movies, videos, wire services and photo agencies. In the last 15 years alone, your sources for news have shrunk drastically. Whereas in 1983, 50 corporations ruled the U.S. news media, by 2004 this number decreased to a minuscule six corporations! As you might imagine, with just six corporations deciding what’s worthy of news and what’s not, you end up with sensationalized tragedies, celebrity features, and anything else that will capture people’s attention. There is virtually no competition in the media market today whatsoever, and this s
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POPSAnti-Terrorism Cartoons in the Arab Press "The Arab press recently published more cartoons condemning terrorism. These cartoons presented terrorism as an indiscriminately destructive force striking everything in its path, and mocked the terrorists for blindly pursuing the promise of the virgins of Paradise. "The cartoons also expressed criticism of extremists who entice the youth, indoctrinating them to embrace extremist ideas."
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POPSA Tragic Legacy And the president who vowed to lead the war for freedom and democracy has made torture, rendition, abductions, lawless detentions of even our own citizens, secret "black site" prisons, Abu Ghraib dog leashes, and orange Guantánamo jumpsuits the strange, new symbols of America around the world. New essay by Glenn Greenwald on the future legacy of America's reaction to 9/11.
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POPSJudges With Guts Rule! :) "The concept of preemptive imprisonment, like that of preemptive war, should have no place in an open society."
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POPS"Go Kill Liberals" James Adkisson is sentenced to life in prison for opening fire on a Unitarian congregation and murdering 2 human beings. Many intuited that Adkisson's rampage was exactly the kind of rancid fruit that would inevitably take root in an American countryside thickly composted with two decades of hate radio bullshit. That suspicion was verified in the days that followed, when police searched Adkisson's apartment and found it filled with books and newsletters penned by Bill O'Reilly, Sean Hannity, and other right-wing hate talkers. Our radio hate talkers incited a man to commit an act of terrorism. Just sit a minute and take that in. And it doesn't sound all that dissimilar to a rant (minus the death threat) directed at me recently for posting a clip challenging conservative orthodoxy: "You and your socialist friends are America’s main enemy, more so than Al Qaeda."
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POPSThe ultimate reaping of what one sows: right-wing edition From the article: When you cheer on a Surveillance State, you have no grounds to complain when it turns its eyes on you. If you create a massive and wildly empowered domestic surveillance apparatus, it's going to monitor and investigate domestic political activity. That's its nature. I'd love to know how many of the participants in today's right-wing self-victim orgy uttered a peep of protest about any of this, from 2005:
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POPSNORTHCOM Plans 5 Day Martial Law Exercise There is no question that Vigilant Shield 08 is either government preparation for the implementation of martial law or a way for criminal elements within the government to distract emergency responders in order to conduct a false flag terror attack as a pretext to actually implement martial law and engage in foreign war. Hmm... I don't like the sound of this, but as my S.O. always says: "Hope for the best, but expect the worst".
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POPSUS ranks 36th on press freedom list "fight against terrorism" cause for steep decline in press freedoms worldwide. We tied with Bosnia and Herzegovina. Ghana, Slovenia, Trinidad and Tobago, Surinam, Jamaica all rank higher in press freedom than the USA.
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POPSA Fallen American Soldier continued; his father, Feroze Khan, told the Gannett News Service in a story printed shortly after his death. "He looked at it that he's American and he has a job to do." Powell framed the entire "Obama is a Muslim" debate in striking terms with his reference to this fallen American soldier. "Is there something wrong with being Muslim in America? No, that's not America," he said. "He was 14 years old at the time of 9/11, and he waited until he could go serve his country, and he gave his life," Mr. Powell said. "Now, we have got to stop polarizing ourselves in this way." The highly charged rhetoric used by McCain and Palin to tie Obama to terrorism and Islam is once again an affront to all Muslim Americans. We saw this type of fear and backlash just after 9/11. We see it also in the McCarthy-like invocations of Michele Bachmann. I challenge Michele Bachmann and Sarah Palin to tell this grieving mother that her son is anti-American because of his faith.
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POPSForget Terrorism The underlying message of the news, the implication hammered deeper home with every replay of the towers collapsing, was that whatever we little people did, world history, and therefore real life, was out of our hands. The trivial little games activists and communities had been playing were irrelevant; no one would pay attention any longer, let alone join in. This was not necessarily true, of course. But it was news because it was on the news, and because it was news it made itself true
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POPSThe Answer Terrifies Them Foreign terrorism against Americans would disappear along with the need for a "war on terror." Civil liberties that were suspended could be restored. A sense of balance and harmony could return to our lives. Ending interventionism would mean that the era of big government in foreign affairs could be brought to an end.
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POPSThe Moral Blindness of Nationalism From George Orwell's 1945 essay, Notes on Nationalism . I was inspired to come out of brief clip retirement by the state of the world we find ourselves in and by Ouyangwulong's inspiring comment . (New clippers, also consider this clip , which, like Orwell's quote, is depressingly apropos yet again.)
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