Feature Items Read the JP Blog (frequent posts) Take our readers survey Iraq Palestine Jackson weather Who we are Letters to Editor Email us Archives Interesting Political Links Afghanistan Pages Mississippi Politics Trade (NAFTA/GATT/WTO) Links about the WTO Community Travel International Environment Colombia Integrity in Government Economics/Welfare Health Food and Politics Kosovo Pages Law enforcement/ Prison industry School Violence Mokhiber/Weissman Fiction/Poetry/Essays Business East Timor Civil Liberties Social Security Tools Letters to Editor (old) News and Arts Top stories   Arts and culture news	Interview With Author Ramzy Baroud 11/17/2007 — Ramzy Baroud, veteran Palestinian-American journalist and Editor-in-Chief of the Palestine Chronicle, recently completed a speaking tour of the United States’ East Coast to promote his second book, The Second Palestinian Intifada: A Chronicle of a People’s Struggle (Pluto Press, 2006). The Second Palestinian Intifada is a far-reaching account of key events of the past five years that transformed the political landscape not only of Palestine and Israel, but of the entire Middle East. With a critical eye, Baroud takes the most controversial issues head-on: the alarming escalation in suicide bombings, the construction of the Separation Wall, the devastating hunger and unemployment in the Occupied Territories, the brutality of the Israeli army, the political surprise of the Palestinian elections. On November 12, 2007, Baroud was interviewed by June Rugh, a freelance writer, in Seattle, Washington.   . If I'm Elected Governor Here's How I Would Like Things to be Different When I Leave Office 5/9/2007 - The author has been asking candidates for years the question:  If you are elected governor, how do you expect the State of Mississippi to be different when you leave the office four or eight years from now? Having never received a satisfactory answer, the author assumes the role of a candidate and answers the question himself. Read the article. Marable: The Iraq War and American Economic Imperialism 12/29/2006 - The incredible disaster that is the Iraq War is not an accident, according to Dr. Marable. On the contrary, it is the entirely predictable result of neoliberialism and the corporatocracy that dominate the U. S. and its foreign policy. Read the column. Brasch: The Bush Magical Mystery Political Capital Tour 9/27/2006 - A totally failed and vicious administration is invoking the horror of 9/11in an attempt to restore its political fortunes. Read the column. Joshua Frank: The Trouble with Big Greens: Trapped Inside the DC Beltway 4/14/2006 - Why are the major players in the environmental movement ineffective? Why have both Democratic and Republican administrations passed environmentally irresponsible legislation upon which the big greens had almost no influence? Frank believes it's because they have followed the doctrine of lesser evil. Read the column. Marable: Erasing Dr. King's Real Legacy 3/14/2006 - The powers that be, while doing their best to obscure Dr. King's real message of non-violence and democracy are systematically dismantling King's legacy. Read the column Mokhiber & Weissman: Of Snowboarding and Corporations 2/7/2006 - Natural people, that is, people that live and breathe and love, as opposed to legal persons like corporations, are regularly put away for negligent homicide. It's rare, however, that corporations are even prosecuted for crimes, let alone convicted. What does this mean for us? Read the column. Brasch: This Column Doesn't Exist 2/6/2006 - Rosemary and Walter Brasch hypothesize what it would be like if politicians didn't have a media with which to propagandize the public. Read the column. Al Gore's MLK Day Speech 1/16/2006 - In a speech in Constitution Hall, Washington, D.C., Al Gore delivered a stemwinder of a speech on the dangers the nation faces from the Bush Administration. It's a shame he didn't have the fervor back in 2000. Read the speech. Joshua Frank: War With Iran: It's More Than Nuclear 1/24/2006 - Columnist and author Joshua Frank explores the geopolitics of the Bush Administration's current campaign to demonize Iran. Read the column. On Civil Liberties Myopia: Bush Didn’t Start the War on the Bill of Rights 12/21/2005 --Joshua Frank and M.C. point out some facts that many of us don't wish to hear: our civil liberties have been under assault far longer than George W. Bush has been president. The major legislative milestones in the decline of freedom have been supported by Democrats as well as Republicans. Clinton signed into law the Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act, for instance, which severely limited the ability of prisoners condemned to death to appeal their convictions and sentences. As this publication has pointed out, many of the Democrats now in Congress voted for those measures then. What have they got to offer different from the Republicans? Read the article. Walter Brasch: Justice DeLayed 12/21/2005--Columnist Walter Brasch reviews the sorry history of the former majority leader of the U. S. House of Representatives. Read the column. Joshua Frank: Federal Food Policies: Organic Inconsistencies 12/18/2005- Columnist Joshua Frank explores the watering-down of organ food regulations by the FDA under the influence of agribusiness lobby. It is a disturbing story of how something that seems beyond debate--the definition of organic food--can be distorted by the profit motive into nearly the opposite of its original meaning. Read the article. Walter Brasch: The FEMA Scheme-A; Or, the Unrepentent Consultant 11/28/2005--Michael Brown, the disgraced former head of FEMA has gone into the consultant business. What is he consulting about? Emergency preparedness.  Disasters like hurricanes. Read all about it. Kosovo: Many options but independence 10/27/2005--This basic conclusion of the long-awaited report by UN special envoy Kai Eide was approved by the UN secretary general Kofi Annan and fully supported by the EU and the US, but it fails to demystify the paradox. Only two a half years ago, the international community had charged that talks on status could not start before a set of basic human rights standards was achieved. Since then, however, as it became clearer that the Kosovo Albanian majority was unwilling to meet the criteria and the UN unable to enforce them, there was a permanent watering down of prerequisites, until the proclaimed policy of "standards before status" was finally buried with Mr. Eide's report.  Read the article. Thom Hartmann: "You Can't Govern if You Don't Believe in Government" 9/11/2005--The JP Blog has an article by Thom Hartman that is worth reading. Read the Article posted on September 11, 2005. Howard Zinn: Against Discouragement 6/3/2005 -- In 1963, historian Howard Zinn was fired from Spelman College, where he was chair of the History Department, because of his civil rights activities. This year, he was invited back to give the commencement address. Here is the text of that speech, given on May 15, 2005. Book Review: John Taylor Gatto's The Underground History of American Education 5/30/2005 -- A retired teacher from New York City relates the history of compulsory schooling in America from its beginnings and explains why the public schools are failing our children. His surprising conclusion is that schools were deliberately designed that way and are quite successful in fulfilling their purpose. Read the Review and ponder. A Letter to Clarence: Environmental Wackos 3/14/2005--Clarence is taken to task for using the term "environmental wackos" in his sermon and shown how he has been conditioned by an intense propaganda campaign to ridicule environmentalists and to belittle the warnings of environmental science. Read the letter. A Letter to Clarence: John the Baptist 2/21/2005--A letter from a Mississippian to his nephew Clarence, who has recently become pastor of a bible church. The writer discusses one of Clarence's sermons available on the church's website. Read the letter. Wendell Berry: Compromise, Hell! 10/12/2004 -- Poet, farmer, and author Wendell Berry writes such a sonorous, urgent, and compelling message, that one longs for a major presidential candidate to address our present condition with the same passion and eloquence. We know deep in our souls that Berry is right and that economic weapons of mass destruction are being employed this very day in the name of profit to destroy our fields, our towns and our society. Read, weep and then act. This is a link to Orion Magazine.
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