Don't Let Frances Newton Die
The state of Texas is scheduled to execute Frances Newton on Dec. 1 for the April 1987 murders of her husband, Adrian Newton and children Alton and Farah Newton in Harris County. If executed, Newton would be the first African-American woman Texas has put to death since the state resumed executions in 1982.
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Free-market Religion or Ignorance?
Eduardo Porter, writing in the Sunday (11/21/04) New York Times, seeks to explain the theory that religion is so popular in the US due to supply-side economics. Just like any commodity competition the commodity of religion is so wide spread due to the competition between its suppliers. This is a new view, Porter says, replacing the older view that the more educated the more secular a country becomes.
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American Elections: Bad News and Good
The election of George Bush for a second term in the White House is a big setback for democratic forces, not alone in the United States itself but right across the globe. George Bush is nothing more than a puppet for the most bellicose forces centred around the giant corporations in what is known as the military-industrial complex.
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Major battles await new Congress
Although hopes to wrest the House and Senate from right-wing Republican control were not realized on Nov. 2, the Bush administration may find some stumbling blocks in pushing their agenda through Congress. The stage is set for major battles, given majority public opinion in opposition to privatization of Social Security, tax breaks for the wealthy, the war on Iraq, and appointment of extremist judges.
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The New York Times and I
Political Affairs contributing editor Norman Markowitz corresponds with the New York Times, the major ruling class newspaper in the country and, even though they advertise that they publish 'all the news that’s fit to print' they never see fit to print his letters. These are some recent letters on topics that PA readers may find interesting.
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Rice Appointment Signals Hard Right Turn
Did George W. Bush actually mean the comparatively encouraging comments he recently made about a possible Israeli-Palestinian peace deal — when Bush said he wanted to use his political 'capital' to create a democratic Palestinian state during his second four-year term — or had only said this to help out his buddy, Tony Blair.
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Gonzales’ Appointment is a Danger to Human Rights
As Bush prepares to send his nomination of Alberto Gonzales for Attorney General to the Senate, let’s recall who Gonzales is and what his enduring imprint on history may be. Gonzales authored the infamous August 2002 torture memo that provided arguments for discarding the Geneva Conventions. This appointment affirms Bush’s rejection of international oversight of human rights and signals a dramatic right wing shift.
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International Perspectives on the US Election, Part 2
The reelection of the President of the United States, George W. Bush, goes against humankind’s perspectives and the hopes of millions of men and women that long for justice and peace in the world, both impossible in a scenario characterized by the prevalence of an aggressive policy of a superpower that views ruling the planet as its raison d’etre.
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No Mandate, No Surrender
Several months ago most pollsters predicted that the margin of difference between Kerry and Bush would be razor thin. I can’t recall anyone projecting a landslide for either candidate, let alone a major political realignment nationwide. Guess what? They were more right than wrong.
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The Red Menace
Many liberals think that a new 'Red Menace' is facing America – not that there ever was an old one. Waking up Wednesday morning (Nov. 3) and seeing the map of the red versus the blue states was pretty depressing. If there were any election the Democrats should have swept to victory in it was the 2004 election.
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