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Ritt Goldstein

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I am an American investigative political journalist living in Sweden, and have lived in Sweden since July 1997. My work has appeared fairly widely, including in America's Christian Science Monitor, Spain's El Mundo, Sweden's Aftonbladet, Austria's Wiener Zeitung, and a number of other global media outlets. I personally believe the news media's role includes the protection of Democracy, providing a nation's citizens with the facts they require to genuinely appreciate the circumstances surrounding them.

I have been particularly fortunate in that sometimes it's been apparent my efforts have made a difference. Under the proper circumstances, the revelation of an untold truth can provide a powerful tool in the arsenal of Justice.

In 2002, Wikipedia highlights I broke the news on a Bush administration program to recruit more Americans to be 'citizen spies' than the notorious East German Stasi had. The program, Operation TIPS, was fortunately killed within the week by then House Majority Leader Dick Armey. Following this, I had the honor of having one of my articles read in its entirety on the floor of Congress, an article revealing a drift towards martial law and internment camps. The article - titled "Foundations are in place for martial law in the US" and published in Australia's Sydney Morning Herald - was written at a time when, in retrospect, many of the decisions then taken by the Administration have since been regretted, its 'torture questions' not least among them.

On a daily basis, headlines shout the many problems we face, with my seeing a key job for us all in sorting the news that's 'real' from those many items which only serve to effectively distract us from it. As ever larger numbers of us increasingly feel the weight of those many unanswered questions we have for too long carried, be assured that the necessary truths, the answers, are out there.

From my own experience, I am too well aware of the tremendous injustice that our present circumstances can hold, but simply complaining about things won't change them. We, the people, were once the rationale for the creation of that great democratic experiment called The United States of America, and there's no avoiding that what happens to our Country is indeed yet up to us.

OpEd News Member for 781 week(s) and 3 day(s)

27 Articles, 13 Quick Links, 105 Comments, 0 Diaries, 0 Polls

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(12 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Sunday, November 20, 2011
Occupy Evictions: Has War Been Declared? There have been brutal police attacks on Occupy protesters in New York, Seattle, UC Davis, and elsewhere. Has a 'war on dissent' truly been declared, one where Occupy is allegedly 'the enemy'? Recalling the 1970 shooting deaths of four student protesters by the National Guard at Ohio's Kent State University, the Kent State Massacre, today do we increasingly face the question of 'how far will our government's violence go?'
(20 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Sunday, November 6, 2011
Occupy Facing 'Cloaked' Counterattacks When one can't win a battle legitimately, there are always 'dirty tricks', and it seems Occupy is the target of some ongoing ones.
Stockholm, Sverige, From ImagesAttr
(1 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Monday, December 26, 2011
Sweden and its dark side, Stieg Larsson, and Hollywood's 'The girl with the dragon tattoo' Hollywood's version of Stieg Larsson's 'The girl with the dragon tattoo' opened in America just days ago, with Larsson's fiction revealing some decidedly uncomfortable facts. More than just a novelist, Larsson provides a glimpse at 'the dark side' of Sweden.
(3 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Monday, November 26, 2012
Sandy, Toxic Mold, and (at last) a theory potentially explaining 'Sick Building Syndrome' For the last several decades, researchers have puzzled over the physical mechanisms for what's often termed 'Sick Building Syndrome'. With Superstorm Sandy leaving toxic mold problems of epidemic proportions in its wake, it seems well past time that this article's information be brought to light.
(3 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Friday, October 14, 2011
Occupy Wall Street and the 'Crime' of Non-violent Dissent Recent police action against Occupy participants has demonstrated that too many view legitimate, non-violent dissent as effectively criminal. The implications of that, and a video window on such justice questions, emphasize the imperatives before us, the vital need for change that we face.
From Images
(6 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Wednesday, November 14, 2012
New York City Subways: Do you believe in Magic? Within days of Superstorm Sandy, New York's subways were again running, as if by 'Magic', this despite Bloomerg News' early report that "New York Subway System Faces Weeks to Recover From Storm". The Bloomberg article's prediction cited safety concerns as limiting the subway recovery's pace, and experience often has shown that if something seems too good to be true, it usually is.
From ImagesAttr
(6 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Thursday, October 31, 2013
UN Old Age Report: Sweden best! But what life do pensioners, the elderly, actually have? In early October, a UN report on the aged found Sweden to be the world's best country to be elderly in. But, the reality is far from a pensioner's paradise, only this June it being reported that a third of Swedish pensioners are 'living below the poverty line', disturbing headlines highlighting what 'senior life at its best' has come to be about. But, if Sweden is indeed the 'world's best' for seniors...
(6 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Friday, April 10, 2009
Floods, Mold, Cancer, and the Politics of Public Health A powerful exposé of the politics behind Public Health.
(8 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Sunday, November 13, 2011
Cities' Occupy Evictions A 'Set-Up'? It's reported that the Occupy evictions were 'coordinated' through conference calls by city mayors, questions of who organized these calls remaining. What's also known is that 'the troubled' were encouraged by authorities to join Occupy, with many seizing upon the outcome of this as the 'manufactured pretext' for the recent nationwide sweeps.
From ImagesAttr
(7 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Monday, January 7, 2013
Politics, the US and Sweden, and a 'Laboratory for Rightwing Radicalism' What if political tactics that were tried and tested abroad were perhaps arguably to be used by the GOP in its efforts with Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid? And what if Republican strategist Karl Rove were to have a link to some folks abroad, folks that might possibly be perceived by some as having been using such tactics?
(5 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Friday, October 28, 2011
Occupy, The 'Battles Of Oakland', And The Face Of US Police Abuse We have seen the current 'Battle of Oakland', but this wasn't the first such 'battle' the City's police have waged on peaceful protesters. In a democratic society, one would hope it's 'a crime' if those exercising their constitutionally guaranteed right to dissent become targeted as 'the enemy', effective 'war' waged upon them.
Falun, Sweden - Cars burned in Dalarna too., From ImagesAttr
(2 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Thursday, June 13, 2013
Swedish Riots: An Exclusionary Economy, "Daily Racism," and Politics of the 1930s? This journalist was warned about Swedish rioting in March, two months before it occurred. Given Sweden's status as something of a political icon, the startling truths revealed here are indeed worth reading.
From ImagesAttr
(3 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Friday, November 2, 2012
New York City 'Frankenstorm'...Much Could Have Been Avoided New York City was warned that unless it invested in storm-surge control technology, a disaster -- such as the present -- could indeed occur. It would seem the price of inaction has been high, particularly for the storm's many victims.
(17 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Friday, July 16, 2010
POLICE ABUSE: BLAME THE VICTIMS! IT'S REASSURING Police abuse is a crime not that dissimilar to rape, a nightmarish violation of ones person at the heart of both. Victims of both also face a certain 'stigma', not to mention difficulties in seeking justice. Worse still, in both crimes victims themselves are too often blamed. But for those who believe it madness to 'blame the victims', the psychology in play suggests you're right.
From Images
(14 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Saturday, December 8, 2012
Refugees In Sweden...Frozen? Frozen Out? While Sweden is frozen in winter's grip, 'record breaking' cold and blizzards just having made headlines here, a group of refugees was found to have been enduring the season without winter clothes, sockless and in flip-flops.
(4 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Friday, October 11, 2013
Sweden: Roma, Racism, Denial, and a 'Dangerous Wind' Recent revelations in Sweden have led to comparisons with the Nazi-era being printed in mainstream media, concerns over 'a dangerous xenophobic wind' further emphasizing questions of a disturbing societal malaise.
(12 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Sunday, June 13, 2010
IS NUCLEAR POWER THE GULF TRAGEDY'S 'OTHER SHOE'? It's human to make mistakes, but while today's Gulf Oil Spill is bad, a nuclear power accident could prove far worse.
SHARE More Sharing        Monday, August 15, 2011
Sweden: Living with the far-right Sweden has long been a model for good governance globally, but today a party with widely known neo-Nazi roots is in Parliament. Perhaps more telling still, only the week of August 8th headlines revealed that a young boy's parents had reported a swastika tatoo was found enclosed in their child's "fast-food meal". And I have personally witnessed events that I can only describe as defying belief.
Falun, Sweden, From ImagesAttr
(1 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Monday, September 2, 2013
Sweden, Martin Luther King, and a letter to President Obama On 4 September President Obama will be arriving in Sweden, a country where a recent headline read 'The country we called Sweden no longer exists'. However, reports upon discrimination and 'local corruption' do exist, and -- as an American that received asylum here in 2006 -- there seemed much to say in an open-letter to the President.
From ImagesAttr
(4 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Tuesday, February 26, 2013
Some Vital History, Revisited - 'Welcome to the 1930s' Hindsight is easy, but facing the reality one later discovers can be far different. It was a decade ago when I wrote an article described as a "chilling commentary upon the growth of contemporary fascism", with events that have since transpired arguably, and profoundly, emphasizing the issues then raised.
(6 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Monday, December 27, 2010
'It's a wonderful life', or is it really? In recent decades, America has changed, and not for the better. Many of our once seemingly endless reasons for boundless optimism and national pride have been taken from us, the question being how to secure their return.
Greek Election Rally, From ImagesAttr
(1 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Monday, May 7, 2012
Greek Election: the limitations of today's 'Democracy' and the feeding of Fascism? There's an old slogan, 'If elections could change things, they'd be illegal.' With so-called austerity and economic reform, the malignant climate created has only succeeded in nourishing a far-right renaissance and growing hardship. Democracy and politics have been redefined, the meaning of 'social justice' along with them. If Democracy is to survive, it won't be in a society of the people, but by and for an elite.
From ImagesAttr
(1 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Friday, June 15, 2012
Sweden, Twitter, and when a Progressive icon becomes the darling of the Right Once idyllic Sweden has changed, changed so much that it's today being heralded as an icon for America's Right. Recent controversy upon the nation's official Twitter account 'Tweeting' questionable comments upon Jews and Gays may have just made headlines, but the real story is far more disturbing.
(14 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Wednesday, May 8, 2013
Sweden, Russia, Nato, and the Military-Industrial Complex Show? How would America react if every major print, radio and TV network ran simultaneous coverage suggesting an alleged Russian threat? Well, that's what's arguably happened in Sweden.
From ImagesAttr
(2 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Sunday, August 19, 2012
Report: A tale of two very different Swedens Sweden is increasingly being seen as a model by the political Right in the US and the UK. Sweden already has a voucher system for education and healthcare, but it also has the anger of those many Swedes that feel increasingly pressed by the shortcomings of such programs. Of course, when many are angry they look for someone to blame, 'outsiders' making the easiest targets...and more than Julian Assange have had problems here.
From ImagesAttr
(3 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Friday, February 15, 2013
American empire, policing, and 'a corrosive madness'? The shockwaves of Christopher Dorner's one-man war will be long felt... the questions in his 'manifesto', the questions of 'extrajudicial killing' and his fiery end. But, as significant as such questions are, what of the context from which they've emerged, and what really is the 'State of the Union'?
From Images
(4 comments) SHARE More Sharing        Wednesday, January 16, 2013
Aaron Swartz, Activism, and the 'Rewards of Courage'? The circumstances surrounding recent revelations upon Occupy highlight what some see as the 'criminalization' of political efforts. It's too late to stop the tragedy of Aaron Swartz, but what has been happening, what does it mean?

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