Anthony Weiner aims his sarcasm at do-nothing Republicans

NPR is fighting hard to keep it's sliver of federal funding. On the Hill, Anthony Weiner aims his arrows at the Republicans. And at least one Republican, Ron Paul, understands that our Nation's (destructive) money pit is Afghanistan, not NPR. Every week we spend four times more on our military adventure in Afghanistan than we spend for one year on funding domestic public media (we spend a lot more on propaganda devoted for international audiences than we spend on domestic programming).

Continue ReadingAnthony Weiner aims his sarcasm at do-nothing Republicans

Fertilizing democracy at home

What follows is utterly precious, needing no further comment. Here's the opening sentence of some extraordinary information provided by the U.K. Guardian:

The US military is developing software that will let it secretly manipulate social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter by using fake online personas to influence internet conversations and spread pro-American propaganda.

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Humanitarian crisis vs. ulterior motives

Indonesia invaded East Timor in 1975, after which followed decades of brutal repression and violence directed at the Timorese people. Hundreds of thousands of Timorese have died as a result of the conflict, whether killed outright or as a result of disease and hunger. In one incident alone, known as the Dili Massacre, hundreds of people agitating for independence for East Timor were massacred as Indonesian soldiers opened fire. There was no intervention by the United States, and in fact, we continued to sell weapons and train the Indonesian military. There are no known oil reserves credited to East Timor, according to the Energy Information Administration (EIA). Whatever resources do exist are mired in competing claims with Australia.

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Who cares about Egypt when we can talk about war?

You won't find headlines regarding Egypt in the American mass media anymore, because the much easier to take gawk-worthy videos and pictures demonstrating conflict and violence in Libya. And further, it would take some real work to produce serious stories regarding Egypt's fledgling democracy. Bonus points for covering Libya instead: Reporters can simultaneously discuss U.S. military intervention. Bring on those retired generals! America's itchy aircraft-bomb-dropping finger is already on the hair trigger! We are indisputably the land of War Made Easy and Conflict Pornography.

Continue ReadingWho cares about Egypt when we can talk about war?