OpEdNews - Diary: Robert Parry | THE GOP's $3 BILLION PROPAGANDA ORGAN

"The American Right achieved its political dominance in Washington over the past quarter century with the help of more than $3 billion spent by Korean cult leader Sun Myung Moon on a daily propaganda organ, the Washington Times, according to a 21-year veteran of the newspaper."

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DIANE'S NEWS CLIPS begins here :)~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~> IF LINK DOESN'T WORK, THEN PASTE ARTICLE LINK(S) INTO YOUR BROWSER -- OR GO DIRECTLY TO >> http://www.truthout.org Robert Parry | THE GOP's $3 BILLION PROPAGANDA ORGAN http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/122706A.shtml Robert Parry writes: "The American Right achieved its political dominance in Washington over the past quarter century with the help of more than $3 billion spent by Korean cult leader Sun Myung Moon on a daily propaganda organ, the Washington Times, according to a 21-year veteran of the newspaper." --- Norman Solomon | Announcing the P.U.-litzer Prizes for 2006 http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/122706O.shtml Norman Solomon writes: "Competition has been fierce this year for the fifteenth annual P.U.-litzer Prizes. Many can plausibly lay claim to stinky media performances, but only a few can win a P.U.-litzer. As the judges for this uncoveted award, Jeff Cohen and I have deliberated with due care. And now, the winners of the P.U.-litzer Prizes for 2006 ..." --- Interior, Pentagon Faulted in Audit http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/122706N.shtml The Defense Department paid two procurement operations at the Department of the Interior to arrange for Pentagon purchases totaling $1.7 billion that resulted in excessive fees and tens of millions of dollars in waste, documents show. --- Bush Hires Lawyers to Prepare for Congressional Probes http://snipurl.com/15w13 --- Hussein Execution: Baath Party Threatens to Retaliate http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/122706B.shtml Saddam Hussein's Baath Party threatened Wednesday to retaliate if the ousted Iraqi leader is executed, warning in an Internet posting it would target US interests anywhere. --- Reservist Due for Iraq Is Killed in Standoff With Police http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/122706L.shtml Army Reservist James E. Dean had already served 18 months in Afghanistan when he was notified three weeks ago that he would be deployed to Iraq later this month. The prospect of returning to war sent Dean into a spiral of depression and on Christmas, Dean barricaded himself inside his father's home with several weapons, threatening to kill himself. After a 14-hour standoff with authorities, Dean was killed yesterday by a police officer after he aimed a gun at another officer. --- Democrats Seek to Use Oil Cash for Renewables http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/122706M.shtml House Democrats, in the first weeks of the new Congress, plan to establish a dedicated fund to promote renewable energy and conservation, using money from oil companies. --- David Swanson | New Year's Utopianism Needed Fast http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/122706D.shtml David Swanson writes: "Unbeknownst to many Americans, there is overwhelming consensus among scientists that we are very close to reaching a point of no turning back on global warming, which is caused by the burning of fossil fuels. We are approaching a point at which all of the following will become unavoidable: massive desertification, rising sea level, explosive growth of insect populations, widespread habitat destruction, mass extinctions, mass migrations (including of humans), the disappearance of sea life, and in all likelihood wars over drinking water that will make the wars over oil look civilized." --- Robert Scheer | Ike Was Right http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/122706F.shtml Robert Scheer writes: "It's not primarily about the oil; it's much more about the military-industrial complex, the label employed by President Dwight D. Eisenhower 45 years ago when he warned of the dangers of 'a permanent arms industry of vast proportions.'" --- SEC Gives Holiday Present to Corporate America http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/121306H.shtml A change in the way grants of stock options are to be explained to investors is a victory for corporations that had opposed the rule when it was issued in July, and a defeat for institutional investors that had backed the SEC's original rule. --- Democrats Will Soon Get a Say on Iraq http://snipurl.com/15wl4 --- Le Monde | The European Wager http://snipurl.com/15wla --- Michael McClennen | Somalia: Tragedy and Opportunity http://snipurl.com/15xec --- UN Envoy Calls Somalia Situation Grim http://snipurl.com/15xef --- FDA Steps Up Warnings on Popular Pain Relievers http://www.truthout.org/issues_06/122706HA.shtml Federal health officials on Tuesday cautioned the tens of millions of Americans who take popular over-the-counter pain pills about their potentially serious side effects and released planned label changes intended to warn of the sometimes deadly risks. --- Polar Bears May Be Listed as Threatened http://www.truthout.org/issues_06/122706EA.shtml The Bush administration, under legal pressure from three environmental groups, will propose listing polar bears as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. --- Two Timber Firms Pretending to Be "Green," Groups Allege http://snipurl.com/15xel --- The New York Times | Meat and the Planet http://snipurl.com/15xep --- Judith Bell | Prosperity's Potholes http://www.truthout.org/issues_06/122706LA.shtml [snip] ... a new report by the Brookings Institution shows, poverty is now increasingly a major problem on the brightly lit lanes of our nation's suburbs, not just in the urban areas. For the first time ever, there are now more people living in poverty in America's suburbs than in her cities." --- William Fisher | Where Are the Christians? http://snipurl.com/15w0y _________________________________ mailing@gregpalast.com Buzzflash Interviews Greg Palast: New Orleans -- One Year Later -- Nothing Much Has Happened ... A Buzzflash Interview ... http://buzzflash.com "The White House knew [the levees broke] because the Army Corps of Engineers sent them photographs. Again, I want to emphasize that the White House had the photographs of the levees breaking, and didn't tell state and local officials who had stopped the evacuation because the hurricane missed New Orleans. Everyone thought they dodged a bullet, but the White House didn't tell anybody the levees broke and were drowning the city." -- Greg Palast ................snip...................... But let me read you this from the Washington Post from December 7th: "Public housing officials decided Thursday to proceed with the demolition of more than 4,500 government apartments here, brushing aside an outcry from residents displaced by Hurricane Katrina who said the move was intended to reduce the ability of poor black people to repopulate the city." Read the Washington Post Article > http://snipurl.com/15vqd _________________________________ Palestinians Stranded in Egypt Israel shut its last border crossing with Egypt, keeping hundreds of thousands of Palestinians stranded and penned like cattle, unable to move freely in and out of their own land. Last week, I awoke to the persistent stammering of my 2-year-old son Yousuf: "I think today the crossing will open mama!" After we had waited at the border for over two weeks, Yousuf's prediction came true. Israel finally opened the border for a few hours. Amidst chaotic crowds of thousands of stranded travelers, my son and I managed to squeeze through Gaza's Rafah crossing from Egypt to reach our home in the Gaza Strip. http://snipurl.com/15uvr _________________________________ [NEWSDISSECTOR] The Despair At Year's End http://www.newsdissector.com/blog/2006/12/27/the-despair-at-years-end/ _________________________________ .ron corvuswire@verizon.net : Sounds like pro-Israelis v. The Facts. You know what anti-Semitism is? ... It's whatever Zionists say it is. .ron The truth is as follows: 1. Israel is the most prolific violator of U.N. resolutions, with a whopping 71 U.N. resolutions violated since 1955; http://www.uscrusade.com/forum/config.pl/noframes/read/1372 2. Israel has been illegally occupying Palestine for almost forty years now; http://www.twnside.org.sg/title/2411.htm 3. Israel has systematically executed state-run genocide against the Palestinian people for decades; http://www.mediamonitors.net/francis1.html 4. Israel uses our American-made and provided weapons in an offensive capacity, in violation of U.S. law, i.e., U.S. Arms Export Control Act; http://www.corvuswire.com/clusterbombs.htm http://www.antiwar.com/ips/deen.php?articleid=9325 5. Israel has unlawfully imprisoned over 9,000 Muslims, including over 300 children,some for as long as 20 years. These are the Muslims that Muslims are trying to rescue from Israel; click here | http://www.albalagh.net/kids/current_affairs/aqsa.shtml 6. Israel has effectively stolen the Lebanese and Palestinian water supply; http://rwor.org/a/055/israelunjust-en.html http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_new/english/reports/details.asp?name=14626 http://www.palestine-pmc.com/details.asp?cat=3&id=1035 7. Israel has built a 30 foot wall INSIDE Palestine - not near any Israeli border - to further 'imprison' Palestinians. Americans need to see the videos available that SHOW HOW THE ISRAELIS TREAT PALESTINIANS! Palestinians are literally on 24-hr. a day lockdown, and can be shot just going to the store by Israeli soldiers; http://www.corvusworld.com/israelkills10women.wmv 8. Israel routinely and systematically bulldozes Palestinian homes at will. http://www.rachelcorrie.org 9. Israel has ignored U.N. resolution 242 ordering Israel out of Palestine, for decades now - yet not a word out of U.S. politicians - except for President Carter. 10. Israel refuses to allow U.N. weapons inspectors into Israel to inspect Israel's illegal arsenal of nuclear weapons; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel_and_weapons_of_mass_destruction http://www.harpers.org/UnitedNations.html 11. Israeli-Americans inside the Bush administration created and fomented the lies Bush used to justify going to war in Iraq - such as Stephen Hadley, who happens to be President Bush's current national security advisor. He's the guy who inserted the "yellowcake uranium" lie into Bush's 2003 State of the Union speech. http://www.corvuswire.com/hadley.htm | http://www.corvuswire.com/cleanbreak.htm http://www.corvuswire.com/feith.htm As long as our Congress continues to fund and arm Israel's illegal occupation of Palestine, that's how long America will continue to be the target of terrorism. It's sad and pitiful how American victims of Zionist broadcast media support criminal nation Israel. I view them as victims of sorts, save for the hardened Zionists out there. It's human for one to be brainwashed by slick Zionist media programming, spread out over a lifetime, but it seems inhuman for someone to learn the truth about Israel and yet continue to support Israeli government actions. There is no nice way to tell someone they're the victim of a lifetime of Zionist TV programming. You can only hope they hear the message and understand. .ron corvus http://www.corvuswire.com/israel.htm | http://www.corvuswire.com _________________________________ Excerpted from: http://www.WantToKnow.info/061226newsarticles FDA MAY CLEAR CLONED FOOD, BUT PUBLIC HAS LITTLE APPETITE December 25, 2006, Washington Post http://snipurl.com/15xfb Consumer advocates and others have complained bitterly in recent years that the Food and Drug Administration has veered from its scientific roots. Later this week, the agency is expected to release a formal recommendation that milk and meat from cloned animals should be allowed on grocery store shelves. The long-awaited decision comes as polling data to be released this week show that the public continues to have little appetite for such food, ...[snip] .............snip............. America's Double Standard on Democracy in the Middle East December 22, 2006, Time Magazine What's good for Beirut is not good for Gaza, according to Washington's playbook. And that discrepancy undermines the credibility of U.S. claims to be promoting democracy in the region. In Lebanon as in Gaza, democratically elected governments are being challenged by political opponents demanding fresh elections - and in each place, the standoff threatens to spark a civil war. Yet, the response of the U.S. and Britain to each crisis has been so different as to provoke accusations of double-standards and questions about the West's commitment to democracy in the Arab world. Despite Hamas's democratic victory at the polls in January, the West has imposed a blockade on financial aid to the Palestinian Authority because Hamas refuses to recognize Israel. This apparent double-standard in the West's stances on Lebanon and on Gaza has not gone unnoticed by Arab commentators. "How could the U.S. support the democratically elected government in Lebanon and do just the opposite in Palestine?" asked Talal Salman, the publisher of Lebanon's As-Safir newspaper. Promoting democracy in the Arab world has ostensibly been a cornerstone of Bush Administration policy. [Yet] the focus of the democratization drive has always been on Washington's regional enemies - Iraq, Iran and Syria - rather than on autocratic friends. So, while the Bush Administration continues ... talk of promoting democracy in the Middle East, many in the Arab world have a jaundiced view of Washington's intentions: Democracy, yes, but only when the outcome serves the interests of the U.S. http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1572574,00.html _________________________________ Australian researchers suggest that compounds isolated from mangoes may be helpful in protecting the body against metabolic disorders like diabetes and high cholesterol. Researchers said that some mango components act on the same pathways that diabetes and cholesterol drugs target, reported Rediff.com. Full Story >> http://in.rediff.com/news/2006/nov/27mango.htm _________________________________ EASY & DELICIOUS RECIPES from Alicia's Kitchen http://www.aliciasrecipes.com _________________________________ http://www.theheadlines.org | http://www.dailykos.com | http://www.tnr.com _________________________________ ....................Fly through Google Maps I'm a big fan of Google's mapping site. It's a great way to find driving directions and the location of businesses. But, the real draw for me is the satellite imagery. You can zoom in on countries and cities all over the globe. Fortunately for us, Google lets other sites use its mapping software, along with its satellite images. Take Goggles, for example. It's a flight simulation game. It may be simple in its design there aren't a lot of complicated controls. But it is fun to fly a plane over London, the moon or even Mars. I had a lot of fun exploring cities across the world by taking an aerial tour. I'm sure you'll find this game as fun as I did! TO VISIT TODAY'S COOL SITE, GO HERE: http://www.isoma.net Be sure to listen to me Monday through Friday. Use my map to find me near you http://www.komando.com/listen/index.aspx _________________________________ eHEALTHY NEWS New Method Proves Successful For 6 Heart Disease Risk Factors - Use this new version of acupressure to gain important improvements in six heart disease risk factors. http://snipurl.com/15w2t --- Do You Have Diabetes And Not Even Know It? - One-third of the diabetics in America do not realize that they have diabetes. How can you find out if you are one of the 25 million Americans with it? http://snipurl.com/15w2z _________________________________ VIDEO: Sparks - Perfume 03:42 http://www.pawky.com/video/60cb3F18E20F _________________________________ NationalGeographic.com http://lava.nationalgeographic.com/pod/ _________________________________ NASA Astronomy picture of the day http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html _________________________________ CHRISTMAS STAMPS A woman goes to the post office to buy stamps for her Christmas cards. She says to the clerk, "May I have 50 Christmas stamps?" The clerk says, "What denomination?" The woman says, "God help us. Has it come to this? Give me 6 Catholic, 12 Presbyterian, 10 Lutheran and 22 Baptists ; o