Putting Names and Ages to People Killed in Ongoing Israeli Attacks on Gaza

Silence from the mainstream media but at least Glenn Greenwald is reporting the truth. He tweeted that Sharon said in the Jerusalem Post:

"We need to flatten entire neighborhoods in Gaza. Flatten all of Gaza. The Americans didn’t stop with Hiroshima – the Japanese weren’t surrendering fast enough, so they hit Nagasaki, too.

"There should be no electricity in Gaza, no gasoline or moving vehicles, nothing."

And from Palestine From My Eyes

"Names and ages of killed people in the ongoing Israeli attacks on Gaza

Because we are NOT just numbers, keep following this post of the names and ages of murdered people who fell victim during the past days of Israeli attacks on Gaza since Wednesday. The number rises to 78 and still rising :( I hope that this battle will cost us no more souls. However, nothing will depress us, no matter how much Israel escalates its inhumanity and crimes. We’ll remain ready to pay any price for attaining of freedom and dignity. RIP!

1- Ahmad Al-Ja’bary, 52 years old.
2-Mohammed Al-hams, 28 years old.
3- Rinan Arafat, 7 years old.
4- Omar Al-Mashharawi, 11 moonths old.
5-Essam Abu-Alma’za, 20 years old.
6-Mohammed Al-qaseer, 20 years old.
7- Heba Al-Mashharawi, six-month pregnant, 19 years old.
8- Mahmoud Abu Sawawin, 65 years old.

9- Habis Hassan Mismih, 29 years old.
10- Wael Haidar Al-Ghalban, 31 years old.
11- Hehsam Mohammed Al-Ghalban, 31 years old.
12- Rani Hammad, 29 years old.
13- Khaled Abi Nasser, 27 year old.
14- Marwan Abu Al-Qumsan, 52 years old.
15- Walid Al-Abalda, 2 years old.
16- Hanin Tafesh, 10 months old.
17- Oday Jammal Nasser, 16 years old.
18- Fares Al-Basyouni, 11 years old.
19- Mohammed Sa’d Allah, 4 years old.
20- Ayman Abu Warda, 22 years old.
21- Tahrir Suliman, 20 years old.
22- Ismael Qandil, 24 years old.
23- younis Kamal Tafesh, 55 years old.
24- Mohammed Talal Suliman, 28 years old.
25- Amjad Mohammed Abu-Jalal, 32 years old.
26- Ziyad Farhan Abu-Jalal, 23 years old.
27- Ayman Mohammed Abu Jalal, 44 years old.
28- Hassan Salem Al-Heemla’, 27 years old.
29- Khaled Khalil Al-Shaer, 24 years old.
30- Ayman Rafeeq sleem, 26 years old.
31- Ahmad Abu Musamih, 32 years old.

At 8:20 am, as a result to an Israeli inhumane attack on Deel Al-Balah, central Gaza, three people were killed. The list of murdered victims goes longer>>>

32- Osama Abdejjawad
33- Ashraf Darwish
34- Ali Al-Mana’ma

At 8:45 am_ 9:00 am, warplanes attacked several places including Rafah, Khan-Younis, and Tal Al-Sultan, southern Gaza, leaving three killed>>

35`- Mukhlis Edwan
36- Mohammed Al-Loulhy, 24 years old.
37- Ahmad Al-Atrush

In a series of attacks on several places on central Gaza at noon, two more people fell victim:

38- Abderrahman Al-Masri

39- Awad Al-Nahhal
40- Ali Hassan Iseed, 25 years old, killed in an attack on his motorbike in Deer Al-Balah, central Gaza, at 8:10 pm, Novebmer 17.

IOF attack another motorbike in Deer Al-Balah at 8:20 pm, leaving two more killed:
41- Mohammed Sabry Al’weedat, 25 years old.
42- Osama Yousif Al-Qadi, 26 years old.

In an attack on central Gaza, to the west of Al-Masdar area, at 9:10 pm, two more people people killed:
43- Ahmad Ben Saeed, 42 years old.
44- Hani Bre’m, 31 years old.

At 9:40 pm, Israel attacked Qdeih family’s house in west Khan-Younis, Southern Gaza and a woman got killed.
45- Samaher Qdeih, 28 years old.
46- Tamer Al-Hamry, 26 years old, died after being seriously injured in an attack on Deer Al-Balah.

On November 18, the fifth day of the Israeli ongoing aggression on Gaza:

Israeli warplanes shelled the house of Abu-Alfoul family in northern Gaza, killing two children and injuring at 13 at least, mostly children and women.

47- Gumana Salamah Abu Sufyan, 1 year old.

48- Tamer Salamah Abu Sufyan, 3 years old.

An Israeli warplanes fired missiles at a house that belongs to the family of Abu Nuqira in Rafah killing one person:

49- Muhamed Abu Nuqira

An Israeli war plane fired a missile at a house in an agricultural land east of Bureij camp, in the Central Gaza Strip, killing one child and injuring 2 other children:

50- Eyad Abu Khusa, 18 months old.

Two people were killed, one of them a child, when an Israeli missile hit a beachfront refugee camp in Gaza City:

51- Tasneem Zuheir Al-Nahhal, 13 years old.

52- Ahmad Essam Al-Nahhal, 25 years old.

Medics also reported finding the body of woman under the rubble of a house in eastern Gaza City who had been killed in a strike earlier in the morning.

53- Nawal Abdelaal, 52 years old.

At 3:10 pm, November 18, Israel rocked a house belongs to Al-Dalou family in Sheikh-Redwan area, west Gaza, killing at least 10 people, including 4 women and 4 children.
54- Mohammed Jamal Al-Dalou, the father.
55- Ranin Mohammed Jamal Al-Dalou, 5 years old.
56- Jamal Mohammed Jamal Al-Dalou, 7 year old.
57- Yousef Mohammed Jamal Al-Dalou, 10 years old.
58- Ibrahim Mohammed Jamal Al-Dalou, 1 year old.
59- Jamal Al-Dalou, the grandfather.
60- Sulafa Al Dalou, 46 years old
61- Samah Al-Dalou, 25 years old
62- Tahani Al-Dalou, 50 years old
63- Ameina Matar Al-Mzanner, 83 years old.
64- Abdallah Mohammed Al-Mzanner, 23 years old.

Soon after Al-Dalou massacre, 2 more were killed, including a child, in an attack on a car for water supply in northern Gaza.
65- Suheil Hamada

66-Mo’men Hamada

In an airstrike that targeted Nussairat camp after that two people were murdered and 10 at least got injured

67- Atiyya Mubarak.

68- Hussam Abu Shaweish,

69- Samy Al-Ghfeir, 22 years old, killed in an attack on Shijaiyya area, west Gaza.

70- Mohammed Bakr Al-Of, 24 years old, killed in an attack on Al-Yarmouk st. in Gaza city.

At 8:00 pm, November 18, the ministry of health in Gaza has reported that Israel has risen the death toll in Gaza to 69, including 20 children, 8 women, and 9 elderly people. Moreover, Over 660 person got injured since Wednesday, including 224 children, 113 women, and 50 elderly people.
At 10:00 pm, November 18, an Israeli warplane attacked a motorbike near the ministry of finance roundabout, west Gaza, killing a father and his son:
71- Ahmad Abu Amra
72- Nabil Ahmad Abu Amra
At 10:10 pm, November 18, an Israeli warplane rocked a house belong to Nasser family near Abu-Sharekh crossroad in northern Gaza, killing a child and his father.
73- Hussein Jalal Nasser, 8 years old.

74- Jalal Nasser

On November 19, the sixth day of the Israeli ongoing aggression on Gaza:

At 12:10 am, an Israeli warplane attacked Mahmoud Al-Hashash house in Rafah killing one woman.

75- Sabha Al-Hashash, 60 years old.

At 1:00 am, an Israeli warplane rocked a car in Rafah killing two people:

76- Saif Al-Deen Sadeq

77- Ahmad Hussein Al-Agha.

78- Emad Abu Hamda, 30 years old, killed after being seriously injured in as a drone fired a rocket at Beach camp, west Gaza.

79- Mohammed Jindiyya, mentally disabled, killed in an attack on Helles roundabout in Shijaiyya, west Gaza.

At 4:10 am, Israel committed another atrocious crime shelling a house belong to Azzam family that is full of children. 3 people were killed in this attack and at least 40 injured. Medics said that more than 15 children have arrived Shifaa hospital, three of them are in a very critical condition.

80- Mohammed Iyad Abu Zour, 5 years old.

81- Nisma Abu Zour, 19 years old.

82- Ahed Al-Qattaty, 38 years old.

List will be updated at #GazaUnderAttack

Read more...

US Policy of Terror: Attack Rescuers and the Grieving.

Many of us have asked why the Germans didn't stand up to Hitler. Why they allowed him to get away with the unspeakable. Well, here we are, almost 75 years later, and the elite's military industrial complex wages illegal war after illegal war, killing hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of innocent civilians, based on nothing but packs of lies, in order to guarantee their massive power and profit. But what about us? The 99%.

What explains the lack of outrage and discourse regarding this insane and immoral policy? What explains the apathy? How long before the terrorism and crimes against humanity, starting with the Native Americans, and African Americans, that we've inflicted on others visits upon us?

Glenn Greenwald reports on the slaughter of grieving friends and family, and the murder of first responders.

In February, the Bureau of Investigative Journalism documented that after the U.S. kills people with drones in Pakistan, it then targets for death those who show up at the scene to rescue the survivors and retrieve the bodies, as well as those who gather to mourn the dead at funerals: “the CIA’s drone campaign in Pakistan has killed dozens of civilians who had gone to help rescue victims or were attending funerals.” As The New York Times summarized those findings: “at least 50 civilians had been killed in follow-up strikes after they rushed to help those hit by a drone-fired missile” while “the bureau counted more than 20 other civilians killed in strikes on funerals.”

This repellent practice continues. Over the last three days, the U.S. has launched three separate drone strikes in Pakistan: one on each day. As The Guardian reports, the U.S. has killed between 20 and 30 people in these strikes, the last of which, early this morning, killed between 8 and 15. It was the second strike, on Sunday, that targeted mourners gathered to grieve those killed in the first strike

At the time of the attack, suspected militants had gathered to offer condolences to the brother of a militant commander killed during another US unmanned drone attack on Saturday. The brother was one of those who died in the Sunday morning attack. The Pakistani officials said two of the dead were foreigners and the rest were Pakistani.

Note that there is no suggestion, even from the “officials” on which these media reports (as usual) rely, that the dead man was a Terrorist or even a “militant.” He was simply receiving condolences for his dead brother. But pursuant to the standards embraced by President Obama, the brother — without knowing anything about him — is inherently deemed a “combatant” and therefore a legitimate target for death solely by virtue of being a “military-age male in a strike zone.” Of course, killing family members of bombing targets is nothing new for this President: let’s recall the still-unresolved question of why Anwar Awlaki’s 16-year-old American son, Abdulrahman, was killed by a U.S. drone attack in Yemen two weeks after his father was killed.

I ask this sincerely: what kind of country targets rescuers, funeral attendees, and people gathered to mourn? If a Hollywood film featured a villainous King ordering lethal attacks on rescuers, funerals and mourners — those medically attending to or grieving his initial victims — any decent audience member would, by design, seethe with contempt for such an inhumane tyrant. But this is the standard policy and practice under President Obama and it continues through today. Recall the outrage that was sparked when WikiLeaks released its Collateral Murder video showing a U.S. Apache helicopter during the Bush era firing on unarmed rescuers, who had arrived to retrieve the initial victims who had been shot and were laying wounded on the ground. That tactic continues under President Obama, although it is now expanded to include the targeting of grieving rituals.

The War Prayer. By Mark Twain

It was a time of great and exalting excitement. The country was up in arms, the war was on, in every breast burned the holy fire of patriotism; the drums were beating, the bands playing, the toy pistols popping, the bunched firecrackers hissing and sputtering; on every hand and far down the receding and fading spreads of roofs and balconies a fluttering wilderness of flags flashed in the sun; daily the young volunteers marched down the wide avenue gay and fine in their new uniforms, the proud fathers and mothers and sisters and sweethearts cheering them with voices choked with happy emotion as they swung by; nightly the packed mass meetings listened, panting, to patriot oratory which stirred the deepest deeps of their hearts and which they interrupted at briefest intervals with cyclones of applause, the tears running down their cheeks the while; in the churches the pastors preached devotion to flag and country and invoked the God of Battles, beseeching His aid in our good cause in outpouring of fervid eloquence which moved every listener.

It was indeed a glad and gracious time, and the half dozen rash spirits that ventured to disapprove of the war and cast a doubt upon its righteousness straightway got such a stern and angry warning that for their personal safety's sake they quickly shrank out of sight and offended no more in that way.

Sunday morning came-next day the battalions would leave for the front; the church was filled; the volunteers were there, their faces alight with material dreams-visions of a stern advance, the gathering momentum, the rushing charge, the flashing sabers, the flight of the foe, the tumult, the enveloping smoke, the fierce pursuit, the surrender!-then home from the war, bronzed heros, welcomed, adored, submerged in golden seas of glory! With the volunteers sat their dear ones, proud, happy, and envied by the neighbors and friends who had no sons and brothers to send forth to the field of honor, there to win for the flag or, failing, die the noblest of noble deaths. The service proceeded; a war chapter from the Old Testament was read; the first prayer was said; it was followed by an organ burst that shook the building, and with one impulse the house rose, with glowing eyes and beating hearts, and poured out that tremendous invocation -- "God the all-terrible! Thou who ordainest, Thunder thy clarion and lightning thy sword!"

Then came the "long" prayer. None could remember the like of it for passionate pleading and moving and beautiful language. The burden of its supplication was that an ever--merciful and benignant Father of us all would watch over our noble young soldiers and aid, comfort, and encourage them in their patriotic work; bless them, shield them in His mighty hand, make them strong and confident, invincible in the bloody onset; help them to crush the foe, grant to them and to their flag and country imperishable honor and glory -

An aged stranger entered and moved with slow and noiseless step up the main aisle, his eyes fixed upon the minister, his long body clothed in a robe that reached to his feet, his head bare, his white hair descending in a frothy cataract to his shoulders, his seamy face unnaturally pale, pale even to ghastliness. With all eyes following him and wondering, he made his silent way; without pausing, he ascended to the preacher's side and stood there, waiting.

With shut lids the preacher, unconscious of his presence, continued his moving prayer, and at last finished it with the words, uttered in fervent appeal,"Bless our arms, grant us the victory, O Lord our God, Father and Protector of our land and flag!"

The stranger touched his arm, motioned him to step aside -- which the startled minister did -- and took his place. During some moments he surveyed the spellbound audience with solemn eyes in which burned an uncanny light; then in a deep voice he said

"I come from the Throne-bearing a message from Almighty God!" The words smote the house with a shock; if the stranger perceived it he gave no attention. "He has heard the prayer of His servant your shepherd and grant it if such shall be your desire after I, His messenger, shall have explained to you its import-that is to say, its full import. For it is like unto many of the prayers of men, in that it asks for more than he who utters it is aware of-except he pause and think.

"God's servant and yours has prayed his prayer. Has he paused and taken thought? Is it one prayer? No, it is two- one uttered, the other not. Both have reached the ear of His Who hearth all supplications, the spoken and the unspoken. Ponder this-keep it in mind. If you beseech a blessing upon yourself, beware! lest without intent you invoke a curse upon a neighbor at the same time. If you pray for the blessing of rain upon your crop which needs it, by that act you are possibly praying for a curse upon some neighbor's crop which may not need rain and can be injured by it.

"You have heard your servant's prayer-the uttered part of it. I am commissioned by God to put into words the other part of it-that part which the pastor, and also you in your hearts, fervently prayed silently. And ignorantly and unthinkingly? God grant that it was so! You heard these words: 'Grant us the victory, O Lord our God!' That is sufficient. The whole of the uttered prayer is compact into those pregnant words. Elaborations were not necessary. When you have prayed for victory you have prayed for many unmentioned results which follow victory-must follow it, cannot help but follow it. Upon the listening spirit of God the Father fell also the unspoken part of the prayer. He commandeth me to put it into words. Listen!

"O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle-be Thou near them! With them, in spirit, we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with their little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee for the refuge of the grave and denied it-for our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet! We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen.

(After a pause)

"Ye have prayed it; if ye still desire it, speak! The messenger of the Most High waits."

It was believed afterward that the man was a lunatic, because there was no sense in what he said.

Read more...

The Myth of Humanitarian Wars.

Republicans sell fear - often times creating whatever it is to be feared - in order to go to war. Democrats sell "humanitarianism" in order to go to war. Both are lies.

 Glenn Greenwald (below) spoke at the University of Chicago at an event entitled "Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Empire: Humanitarian Intervention and Neo-Orientalism."  His speech focused on the myth of "humanitarian wars", clearly an oxymoron, no?

Greenwald contextualizes the use of international law and humanitarian intervention to justify U.S. involvement in foreign countries, especially in the Middle East, as well as advancing U.S. geo-political strategy in the post-Cold War Era.

Read more...

The Truth Does Not Fear Investigation

Question the authorities today, and you are labeled a conspiracy theorist...too mentally ill to function, as is stated in the CBC's documentary, Conspiracy Rising (it appears Stephen Harper has made great inroads in co-opting the Canadian mainstream media).

Here's the thing. There is no need to theorize about conspiracy. Given the available data - even from the mainstream news media - it's very simple to formulate very reasonable opinions by asking a few simple questions. For instance, President Obama's Cabinet appointments.  He plucked them from straight from the crew who caused the economic crash! Hello? Is the fox guarding the hen house, or what?

Here's another one. As economic circumstances progressively worsen for the masses,economic circumstances progressively improve for the elite - the perpetrators. Hello? Happy coincidence? I think not. Not to mention, the convergence of an unprecedented era of legal immunity for the elite, during the four decades that the incarceration rate for ordinary Americans - especially, the underclass - increased five-fold, from 93 per 100,000 in 1972 to 491 per 100,000 in 2007. Basically, the destruction of the rule of law, according to Glenn Greenwald, in his new book, With Liberty and Justice for Some: How the Law Is Used to Destroy Equality and Protect the Powerful.

“Not all ‘conspiracies’ are created equal. The government did kill JFK, and they lied about it. That does not mean there was never a Holocaust, or that the world is run by the Illuminati.” - John Judge

The lawful definition of conspiracy is the collusion of two or more people pursuing illegal means to effect some illegal or immoral end. How can anyone make the claim, in this era of rampant corruption, that this never happens?

So, let's forget about the word, conspiracy, as we've been programmed to associate lunacy with that term. Let's talk about deep politics, the political practices, habits, customs, undertakings, in which every effort is made to prevent publication.

Read more...

In the Name of National Security Emerges the Bizarre Orwellian Police State That Is the U.S.

Occupy Wall Street protesters in Phoenix

Never mind that there are well over 2 million Americans in jail, mostly for non-violent "offenses".

Never mind that the US has the world's highest incarceration rate, surpassing Russia and China, and the world's largest prison population.

Never mind that with less than 5% of the world's population, the US now has one-third of the world's prisoners.

Never mind that there are six times as many Americans behind bars as are imprisoned in the 12 countries making up the entire European Union, even though those countries have 100 million more citizens than the US.

Never mind the countless impossible-to-follow laws and regulations.

If those aren't enough to constitute a police state, in the name of national security, there are no legal limits as to what the state can do: warrantless searches and wiretapping, national ID cards, free speech zones, frisking of children, militarized police departments, the ability of the federal government to declare individuals, whether or not they are citizens, to be official enemies with whom the United States is at war, the legal power to confiscate anything and everything that you own, etc. In other words, the state can do anything it wants with impunity.

So, in the spirit of the United States Police State, the TSA, an agency of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security - the third largest Cabinet department with over 200,000 employees after the Departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs - that exercises authority over the safety and security of the traveling public in the US is trying to expand its horizons beyond the airport.  The Visible Intermodal Prevention Response (VIPR) team, which is a division of the TSA, comprised of federal air marshals, surface transportation security inspectors, transportation security officers, behavior detection officers and explosives detection canine teams were conducting random searches on Tennessee highways.

Earlier this year, the TSA was temporarily kicked out of Amtrak stations when it screened passengers coming off a train, including patting down a 9-year-old boy.

"I see 1st, 4th, and 5th amendments as a privilege that is a public safety issue," -- TSA head John Pistole, Congressional Quarterly, 2010

Links:

The US Is Fast Becoming a Third World Police State

Read more...

News Inc

Today, American journalism is replete with incestuous relationships between government, industry, and academia, thanks to a few of the largest Fortune 500 corporations that own and operate news organizations. What we call mainstream "news" is now a bottom-line serving propaganda machine, riddled with conflicts of interest. Moreover, mainstream "journalists" have morphed into strategic communication professionals.And authentic investigative journalism does not exist, if it ever really existed in the mainstream media when you take into account all that the Internet has unearthed from as far back as the 1930s. However, it seems, whatever the situation was, it may be far worse now.

Because of the incestuous "working relationship" government and corporate media enjoy, average Americans receive not only a censored version of reality, but also many times, a fabricated version of reality. The fourth estate, the press, rather than acting as watchdog of American democracy, is now an instrument of the growing corpocracy that is in the process of transforming America from a Constitutional Republic to an oligarchy.

Glenn Greenwald, a former constitutional law and civil rights litigator and author of two New York Times Bestselling books: "How Would a Patriot Act?", "A Tragic Legacy" and most recently, "Great American Hypocrites", eloquently depicts the corporatized mainstream media as he analyzes and describes his own experience in his recent article: The merger of journalists and government officials

"...Over the last month, I've done many television and radio segments about WikiLeaks and what always strikes me is how indistinguishable -- identical -- are the political figures and the journalists. There's just no difference in how they think, what their values and priorities are, how completely they've ingested and how eagerly they recite the same anti-WikiLeaks, "Assange = Saddam" script. So absolute is the WikiLeaks-is-Evil bipartisan orthodoxy among the Beltway political and media class (forever cemented by the joint Biden/McConnell decree that Assange is a "high-tech Terrorist,") that you're viewed as being from another planet if you don't spout it. It's the equivalent of questioning Saddam's WMD stockpile in early 2003.

It's not news that establishment journalists identify with, are merged into, serve as spokespeople for, the political class: that's what makes them establishment journalists. But even knowing that, it's just amazing, to me at least, how so many of these "debates" I've done involving one anti-WikiLeaks political figure and one ostensibly "neutral" journalist -- on MSNBC with The Washington Post's Jonathan Capehart and former GOP Congresswoman Susan Molinari, on NPR with The New York Times' John Burns and former Clinton State Department official James Rubin, and last night on CNN with Yellin and Townsend -- entail no daylight at all between the "journalists" and the political figures. They don't even bother any longer with the pretense that they're distinct or play different assigned roles. I'm not complaining here -- Yellin was perfectly fair and gave me ample time -- but merely observing how inseparable are most American journalists from the political officials they "cover."

(2) From the start of the WikiLeaks controversy, the most striking aspect for me has been that the ones who are leading the crusade against the transparency brought about by WikiLeaks -- the ones most enraged about the leaks and the subversion of government secrecy -- have been . . . America's intrepid Watchdog journalists. What illustrates how warped our political and media culture is as potently as that? It just never seems to dawn on them -- even when you explain it -- that the transparency and undermining of the secrecy regime against which they are angrily railing is supposed to be . . . what they do.

What an astounding feat to train a nation's journalist class to despise above all else those who shine a light on what the most powerful factions do in the dark and who expose their corruption and deceit, and to have journalists -- of all people -- lead the way in calling for the head of anyone who exposes the secrets of the powerful. Most ruling classes -- from all eras and all cultures -- could only fantasize about having a journalist class that thinks that way, but most political leaders would have to dismiss that fantasy as too extreme, too implausible, to pursue. After all, how could you ever get journalists -- of all people -- to loathe those who bring about transparency and disclosure of secrets? But, with a few noble exceptions, that's exactly the journalist class we have.

There will always be a soft spot in my heart for Jessica Yellin because of that time when she unwittingly (though still bravely) admitted on air that -- when she worked at MSNBC -- NBC's corporate executives constantly pressured the network's journalists to make their reporting favorable to George Bush and the Iraq War (I say "unwittingly" because she quickly walked back that confession after I and others wrote about it and a controversy ensued). But, as Yellin herself revealed in that moment of rare TV self-exposure, that's the government-subservient corporate culture in which these journalists are trained and molded...."

Read more...