October 2009
14 posts
WatchThe Rachel Maddow Show covered the meeting of the mercenary trade group, the International Peace Operations Association. In this segment, I suggest a new, softer name for the organization…
Stand Down! End Human Rights Abuses by Military...
if you are in the Washington DC area, come out to this event!:
A Panel Discussion on the Private Military Industry in Iraq, Afghanistan and Africa
October 27, 2009, 6 pm
True Reformer Building: 1200 U Street, NW, Washington, DC
6pm: The Detainee Project photo exhibit by Chris Bartlett
6:30pm: Panel discussion begins
Despite grave human rights abuses at the hands of U.S. private...
WatchVideo from my brief appearance Friday morning on Democracy Now! discussing my story for The Nation: Judge Refuses to Dismiss War Crimes Case Against Blackwater
Iraq Embassy Scandal Expands: Contractor May Have...
A new State Department audit zeroes in on a politically-connected Kuwaiti company over shoddy work in constructing the world’s largest embassy By Jeremy Scahill The extent of the massive waste and abuse surrounding the construction of the monstrous US embassy in Baghdad continues to expand. The State Department has just released another audit of the embassy’s construction and...
Pentagon Instructs Officials to Cancel Contracts...
While the DoD targets a community group that does no business with the Pentagon, actual corporate crooks go un-confronted and continue to rake in $ billions in contracts.
By Jeremy Scahill
On Tuesday night, US Undersecretary of Defense Shay Assad, the Pentagon’s top contracting official, sent a memo to the commanders and directors of all branches of the military instructing them to cease...
Hillary Clinton Gives "Shameless Pitch" for...
Aerospace giant Boeing is a recidivist corporate crook, yet in a visit to Moscow, Clinton acted like a Boeing spokesperson.
By Jeremy Scahill
On a recent visit to Moscow, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said she was there to deliver a “shameless pitch” to the start-up Russian airline Rosavia to sign a major contract with Boeing to purchase a new fleet of aircraft from the US...
Cindy McCain Bankrolled Conference That Called for...
The ‘McCain Conference on Ethics and Military Leadership’ appears to be ahead of the senator when it comes to the US use of mercenary forces.
By Jeremy Scahill A little-publicized US Naval Academy conference named after Senator John McCain and bankrolled by his wealthy wife, Cindy, issued a call earlier this year for the US government to ban the use of armed private security...
The ACORN Standard →
From my latest article in The Nation:
The nonpartisan Project on Government Oversight and Reform recently revealed that the top 100 government contractors made nearly $300 billion from federal contracts in 2007 alone. Since 1995 these same contractors have been involved with 676 cases of “misconduct” and paid $26 billion in fines to settle cases stemming from fraud, waste or abuse....
WatchThis video, “Return of the Warlords”: Afghan Elections Marred by Fraud, Warlord Dominance,” was just produced by my great friend Rick Rowley of BigNoise Films. He is simply the best un-embedded journalist in the field today. If we had a sane nation with a democratic media, Rick’s reporting would appear on network news in the US and not just on Al Jazeera. Rick’s story will appear...
Tonight: NYC Event on Afghan War Anniversary
ENDING OBAMA’S WAR: SOLIDARITY WITH THE PEOPLE OF AFGHANISTAN AND PAKISTAN Wednesday, October 7, 2009 at 7:00pm Proshansky Auditorium, The Graduate Center, CUNY 365 Fifth Ave at 34th Street [BDFV & NQRW trains to 34th St, 6 train to 33]
October 7th marks the eighth anniversary of the launch of the US led “War on Terror” in Afghanistan. Defending it as a “war of necessity,” the Obama...
An ACORN Amendment for Pfizer →
From my new article in The Nation:
In the wake of the Congressional witch hunt against the community organization ACORN, initiated by Republican minority leader John Boehner and supported by all but seventy-five Democrats in the House and ten in the Senate (Independent Bernie Sanders also voted no), a small number of Democratic lawmakers are pushing back. Last week, in response to the Defund...
NY Times Whines That 'Rethink Afghanistan' Film is...
The ‘paper of record’ also complains that Robert Greenwald’s film has no ‘sympathy’ for pro-war views.
By Jeremy Scahill
Perhaps more than any other major corporate news outlet, The New York Times played a central role in promoting the Bush administration’s fraudulent case for the invasion and occupation of Iraq. The “reporting” of Judith Miller...
Bizarro World: Karl Rove Blasts Obama for...
Rove blasting anyone for outsourcing anything is like David Vitter lecturing the losers exiting a strip club about the evils of prostitution.
By Jeremy Scahill
Now this just simply could not be made up in that Frankenstein laboratory where the cuckoos on the right wing cook up their witches brew of batshit crazy allegations to levy against Barack Obama. There are scores upon scores of issues...
WatchHere is the full video of Salon’s Glenn Greenwald, the constant thorn in the side of white shoe media personalities, and I discussing the elite media culture in the US, the ideologically embedded press and the nexus between powerful politicians and corporate “journalists.”