By NICHOLAS BAKALAR - New York Times

The rapid rise in tuberculosis cases in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union is strongly associated with the receipt of loans from the International Monetary Fund, a new study has found...[T]hey found that the increase in tuberculosis mortality followed the lending; each 1 percent increase in credit was associated with a 0.9 percent increase in mortality. And when a country left an I.M.F. loan program, mortality rates dropped by an average of 31 percent.

By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS - Counterpunch

I say this as a person who has done as much for the Republican Party as anyone...If I could have looked into a crystal ball and seen that under a free trade banner, Republicans would enable corporate executives to pay themselves millions of dollars in “performance pay” for deserting their American work forces...I never would have helped the Republicans...Republicans have run roughshod over the US Constitution, Congress, the courts and civil liberties...Republican disregard for human rights ranks with that of history’s great tyrants...The Republicans have put in place the foundation for a police state...We must get the Republicans totally out of power, or we will have no country left for the Democrats to mess up.

By Justin Podur - July 14, 2008

Most societies seem to combine both irrationality and hypocrisy in their drug policies. These serve those who profit from the drug war, the monies, the weapons, and the pretexts that it provides. They do not serve addicts, users, or farmers. An end to prohibition and an end to the drug war would take a powerful weapon away from the war on terror.

"I think the subject which will be of most importance politically is mass psychology. Mass psychology is, scientifically speaking, not a very advanced study... This study is immensely useful to practical men, whether they wish to become rich or to acquire the government. It is, of course, as a science, founded upon individual psychology, but hitherto it has employed rule-of-thumb methods which were based upon a kind of intuitive common sense. Its importance has been enormously increased by the growth of modern methods of propaganda. Of these the most influential is what is called 'education'. Religion plays a part, though a diminishing one; the Press, the cinema and the radio play an increasing part." - Bertrand Russell, 1952 (p40)

The Indigenous people of the Americas have been under siege since 1492 or better know[n] as "First Contact". Upon closer examination it would appear Indigenous people on a much grander scale [have] been under siege as well[,] [t]he culprit, lusting for natural resources.

America's darkest hour under George W. Bush.

Canadian Dimension July/Aug In recent months major international banks, financial newspapers and mass media have been forced to recognize that there is a major food crisis and that hundreds of millions of people face hunger, malnutrition and outright starvation.

By Jerry White

Barry Steinhardt, director of the ACLU’s Technology and Liberty Program, said, “America’s new million record watch list is a perfect symbol for what’s wrong with this administration’s approach to security: it’s unfair, out-of-control, a waste of resources, treats the rights of the innocent as an afterthought, and is a very real impediment in the lives of millions of travelers in this country. It must be fixed without delay.

WASHINGTON - A federal appeals court on Tuesday ruled that President George W. Bush has the power to keep a terrorist suspect jailed indefinitely, but that the detainee has the right to challenge his detention as an “enemy combatant.”

from: Ruthless Criticism [Translated from Socialistische Gruppe]

I. Elections – authorization of state representatives by the ruled
II. The conversion of criticism of state rule into democratic anti-criticism
III. The democratic "maturity" of a nation
IV. The democratic seal of quality: quality leadership
V. Backing up the exercise of state rule

By Toni Solo - July, 16 2008

It may well be time to start taking NATO's role as an aspiring global enforcer of Western Bloc economic strategy more seriously. However true it may be to argue that it is still the United States government that makes the running, the US is less and less able to do so without the willing support of its allies. Their joint global military activity can well be interpreted as an effort to compensate for the growing discomfort they feel at the increasing power and influence of other countries like China and Russia, globally, and Iran and Venezuela regionally.

"Education in a scientific society may, I think, be best conceived after the analogy of the education provided by the Jesuits. The Jesuits provided one sort of education for the boys who were to become ordinary men of the world, and another for those who were to become members of the Society of Jesus. In like manner, the scientific rulers will provide one kind of education for ordinary men and women, and another for those who are to become holders of scientific power. Ordinary men and women will be expected to be docile, industrious, punctual, thoughtless, and contented. Of these qualities probably contentment will be considered the most important. In order to produce it, all the researches of psycho-analysis, behaviourism, and biochemistry will be brought into play."

By John Pilger - Znet

An...imposing wall of silence ensures that the British public remains largely unaware of the industrial killing of civilians in Britain's modern colonial wars...[T]his is in keeping [with] what the Americans call "the national security state", which seeks the control of domestic dissent while pursuing military aggression abroad.