Surfing the Web With Big Brother

NEW YORK - Is the U.S. government spying on its citizens' e-mail and Web surfing habits? The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), a group that defends civil liberties on the Internet, believes the answer is probably "yes." Earlier this month, the San...

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Nuclear Heat Grows Over Iran

JERUSALEM – When Israel dispatched F-16 bombers almost 24 years ago to destroy Saddam Hussein's nuclear reactor in Osirak, the pilots knew they only had to hit a single target. Were Israeli or U.S. planes to be sent today to neutralize Iran's nuclear program, the...

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Judge Vindicates Gitmo Criticisms

A U.S. federal court judge has ruled that military tribunals initiated by the Pentagon to determine the status of terrorist suspects held at the naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, are unconstitutional because they do not satisfy minimal due process requirements. The...

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Let the Israelis Do It?

Hours before his "ratification" inaugural, Vice President Dick Cheney was chatting with Don Imus on MSNBC about Iraqi and Iranian "nuclear programs." Now, Cheney appears to know the difference between a "nuclear program" and a...

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Resisting the Homeland Security State

Okay, under the rubric of "the war on terror" (which turns out to be just so versatile, so useful for so many much-desired but once back-burner policies, programs, and products), the military is having a grand old time protecting us from the Enemy up close and...

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Kurds Make a Strong Showing in Relative Safety

ARBIL - It is 8:30 in the morning, and the roads of Arbil appear for a moment to be eerily silent. Most cars have been banned from the streets of this Kurdish city of 800,000. Roadblocks are up all over town. But the city is hardly abandoned. The local peshmerga...

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The Iraqi Ballot, Translated

I had the opportunity to participate in the long-awaited Iraqi elections this weekend. Contrary to popular belief, this was not the first time my opinion has mattered to the Iraqi state. It was actually the third. Saddam Hussein had asked us Iraqis in both 1995 and...

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Iraq Election: Sistani’s Triumph

The man most responsible for Iraq's election didn't vote because he wasn't eligible. No, not George W. Bush – I mean the Grand Ayatollah Ali al Husseini al-Sistani, the man who single-handedly faced down the Americans, demanded direct elections rather than the...

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This Democracy Could Be Paper-Thin

ARBIL, Northern Iraq, (IPS) – Many Kurds in Northern Iraq are facing new threats – and they do not come from masked Arab terrorists. They come from the two main Kurdish parties doing all they can to gain strength in the election Sunday, independent local...

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Backtalk, January 29, 2005

My Husband Is Defending DemocracyMonica Benderman and her husband are practicing their faith in the truest sense of the word. Those like George Bush who profess to be Christians but persist in breaking the commandments are demonstrating what many of us reject: false...

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