[APR-news] February 17, 2006

Fri Feb 17 13:37:59 PST 2006

Alternative Press Review - Your Guide Beyond the Mainstream
www.altpr.org - February 17, 2006
"Magazine of the Year" -  2005 Press Action Award

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http://www.altpr.org/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=603&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0
ABC's Primetime Fakery: The "Teen Sex Slave" Scams
By Debbie Nathan

"Tonight our cameras take you into a dark world you've never seen," intoned 
John Quinones darkly on last week's edition of ABC Primetime. "American 
girls being snatched right off Main Street USA. And they could be your very 
own daughters." Shocking! The program went on to tell about two Arizona 
teens; both white and girl-next-door cute, who purportedly were minding 
their own business before being snatched from home and coerced into 
prostitution. Or "trafficking," as Primetime put it. That was the show's 
point: We already know that impoverished immigrants from the Eastern Europe 
and Mexico are enslaved here, but now we've got a new problem, the 
trafficking of our own, middle-class girls. Shocking! The show was full of 
dire warnings by government officials. Not surprising, since the Bush 
Administration's mission to find foreign "sex trafficking" victims has gone 
belly up since it began in 2001. Almost no victims have been located, but 
the feds want to keep their law and rhetoric afloat and broaden it to other 
areas, including the culture wars. For ballast, they're trolling for a 
domestic demographic, warning that kids and prostitution is a new 
"trafficking" problem. But the claim is specious.

http://www.altpr.org/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=601&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0
"At Some Point We Have to Take Seriously the Idea of Putting a Very Large
Wrench Into the Gears of This War Machine"

I agree with you that our fast/vigil/sit-ins won't affect the criminals 
waging the war. We certainly want to call people's attention to the crimes 
they are committing, but we know we won't change their behavior by our small 
presence in Washington over the next month. What will change their behavior 
(and hopefully impeach and imprison them) however, is if every person in the 
U.S. who opposes this war will stop and think for a moment about what they 
can do to up the ante. Those are the people whose hearts we need to reach. 
We can all do more-every one of us-no matter what our job or station in 
life. And if every person mad as hell that this war continues will think 
about what more they can do for peace it will indeed make a difference...and 
more than just "make a difference" in some abstract way. It will throw a 
wrench into the gears of the war machine and grind it to a halt.

http://www.altpr.org/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=602&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0
Latin Swingers: What Shift to the Left in Latin America?

Over the pond in Latin America it appears that White House Inc. has been too 
bogged down in the Middle East-sucking the region dry of its black gold for 
the shareholding buddies of the Bush-Cheney Junta-to notice the 
radicalisation of some of its Southern neighbours. With experience of a US 
foreign policy which has overthrown the democratic regimes of almost every 
Latin American country over the past century, the continent is strangely 
bereft of coups and dictatorships at the moment. There's been a lot of talk 
of 'left-wing resurgences' in the region, but is it all as positive as it 
sounds? Increasingly some of the 'new left' leaders have been showing their 
true colours: a love for power, money and a tendency to shaft the more 
radical groups they relied on to win office in the first place. At the same 
time though, the upsurge in support for left wing presidents has created a 
demilitarised space for some community groups to come together to tackle the 
common misery which affects the lives of half the continent's population: 
poverty. This is, after all, a region where military dictatorship, 
repression, 'disappearance' and torture of activists have been the norm for 
most of the last 100 years.

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Other articles of interest

http://blackcommentator.com/171/171_freedom_rider_halliburton_detention_centers.html
Halliburton Detention Centers
Margaret Kimberley, Black Commentator

What sort of national emergency requires detention centers? America has 
plenty of prisons. More of our population is behind bars than in any country 
on earth. There are detention centers for immigration in existence already. 
As for helping in case of a natural disaster, hurricane Katrina proved that 
saving American lives is not on the Bush agenda. When the word detention 
comes up, hairs should rise on the back of every neck. Thanks to the Patriot 
Act and the creation of "enemy combatants" these detention centers can be 
used to lock up anyone for any reason for any length of time that Uncle Sam 
wishes.

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2006/feb2006/abug-f17.shtml
The Abu Ghraib photos and the anti-Muslim "free speech" fraud
David Walsh, WSWS

What do the noble campaigners for 'free speech' have to say about the 
suppression by the US military, the Bush administration, Congress, the 
Republican and Democratic parties of the Abu Ghraib images? Since the 
existence of the photos and videos became public knowledge in April 2004, 
the Pentagon and the Bush administration have fiercely resisted releasing 
them.

http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/susler140206.html
FBI Commits Domestic Terrorism on Independence Movement in Puerto Rico
Jan Susler, MR Zine

In a move reminiscent of a U.S. Marine invasion of a foreign country, the 
FBI descended in droves on Puerto Rico on February 10.  Without breathing a 
word of the invasion to either the colonial governor or the chief of police, 
heavily armed, militarized units of the FBI, including the Special Weapons 
and Tactics Unit from Miami, hit six different spots throughout the island. 
Their purpose, they claimed, was to execute search warrants on six 
independence activists they identified as suspected leaders of the 
clandestine independence organization, Ejercito Popular Boricua/Macheteros, 
the same organization whose legendary leader, Filiberto Ojeda Ríos, who the 
FBI assassinated five months earlier.  Their true purpose was widely 
understood as other: with their show of force, to continue their long 
campaign to intimidate and criminalize those who support independence for 
Puerto Rico, particularly in this moment of the resurgence of the left 
throughout Latin America; and, of course, to detract from their own criminal 
conduct in taking Ojeda's life.

http://gnn.tv/articles/2116/Celluloid_Subversives_Is_Clooney_Our_Brando
Celluloid Subversives: Is Clooney Our Brando?
Mickey Z, GNN

I was genuinely glad to see George Clooney, one of the few Hollywood 
zillionaires taking any chances, get nominated for three Academy Awards this 
year. His cinematic output (whether acting, writing, or directing) in 2005 - 
"Syriana" and "Good Night, and Good Luck" - reminded me of the best 
consciousness raising efforts Tinsel Town has put forth in the past. It also 
reminded me that long before he became an easy punch line on late night talk 
shows, it was Marlon Brando who set the bar for radical chic.

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NewsWire

http://mediachannel.org/blog/node/3328
Three journalists face jail for revealing existence of secret CIA prisons in 
Europe

http://salon.com/news/feature/2006/02/16/abu_ghraib/
Exclusive: Never-published photos, and an internal Army report, show more 
Iraqi prisoner abuse -- evidence the government is fighting to hide

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060216/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/un_guantanamo_12
UN: Guantanamo is US torture camp

http://www.antiwar.com/roberts/?articleid=8558
Our leader über alles: CPAC signals the transformation of American 
conservatism into brownshirtism

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11386597/
Brownshirts on the march: Senate overwhelmingly backs Führer's Patriot Act

http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/february2006/160206privatehomes.htm
The age of Orwell: Houston police chief wants surveillance cameras in 
private homes

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/opinion/2002810282_ryan17.html
Orwell wrote Bush's script

http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Feb06/Leopold16.htm
Gonzales withholding Plame emails

http://news.ft.com/cms/s/ecf74b6c-9f15-11da-ba48-0000779e2340.html
Iraq economy falls below pre-war levels

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/4723076.stm
Nigerian militant commander declaring "total war" on all foreign oil 
interests

http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,,1710639,00.html
Bush plans huge propaganda campaign in Iran

http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/article345926.ece
Greenland ice cap breaking up at twice the rate it was five years ago, says 
scientist Bush tried to gag

http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Ancient_Climate_Studies_Suggest_Earth_On_Fast_Track_To_Global_Warming.html
Human activities releasing greenhouse gases more than 30 times faster than 
rate of emissions that triggered period of extreme global warming in Earth's 
past

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-2044465,00.html
Waterworld: how life on Earth will look 1,000 years from now

http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/article345927.ece
Sea levels rising much faster than predicted

http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/stories/s1569599.htm
Censorship of climate scientists just the 'tip of iceberg'

http://www.safehaven.com/article-4627.htm
Peak water?

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-2043236,00.html
Elephants never forget. and never forgive

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/02/16/MNG2KH9P4767.DTL
SF anti-consumer group provokes: "People seem very threatened by it"

http://survival-international.org/news.php?id=1385
Pilger and Simpson urge journalists to drop 'stone age' and 'primitive'

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