Action Point with Cynthia Black 11-04-2007: The Reference Shelf

Today's article and item links:

• From the Giuliani File: Councilman Gioia "I will do everything in my power to get answers, to get the truth"

  "...we have been working with the good folks at Brave New Films to get the New York City Council to investigate the way the administration of Rudy Giuliani handled the replacement and deployment of the FDNY radios that proved to be such a source of tragedy on 9/11. We delivered a petition urging action with almost 20,000 signatures to Councilman Eric Gioia on Monday and were very pleased at his initial reaction. Today we have even more video of the Councilman stating in very strong terms that he not only supports such an inquiry but is doing all he can to get the ball rolling.

• MUST READ: Bush Threatens to Veto Aid to Workers Harmed by Outsourcing: another excellent piece from David Sirota:

  At the same time the White House is pushing to vastly expand the job-killing, wage-destroying NAFTA trade model, we get this from
  Bloomberg News (full story attached below):
  "President George W. Bush may veto legislation to expand benefits for
  workers harmed by international trade because it would cover more
  workers than necessary

• Framing the Debate: The Real Meaning of 'Free Press': from Jeffrey Feldman,
  

• From the "I Think I'm Gonna Scream Now" File: Theocracy Now! Max Blumenthal keeps his eye on the wackadoodles so you don't have to...

• Update to The Andrew Meyers File: Don't Tase Me 'Bro Student Won't Be Charged: and his future with Greg Palast!

• Foreign Policy File: Putting the 'Israel Lobby' in Perspective and from Iran Nuclear Watch: Another Letter to the President on Iran

• FASCISM WATCH: Debt and Development, Presidential-Style: in the not-too-distant past Greg Palast and I discussed just this topic:

  "Co-reported alongside the news that Hunt Oil Company of Dallas had entered into an oil development contract in Iraqi Kurdistan was the fact that Hunt Oil's head honcho was a multi-million dollar contributor to the planned George W. Bush Presidential Library project."

• No Explanation Needed: Scholar links Bush's US and Hirohito:

  A top US scholar of wartime Japan said Wednesday that the Bush administration's "war on terror" bore close parallels to Japan's past militarism through a defiance of international law.
  
  Herbert Bix, who won the Pulitzer Prize in 2001 for his landmark biography of wartime emperor Hirohito, said he believed US aerial bombings and alleged use of torture in Afghanistan and Iraq constituted war crimes.
  
  "The current American rampage in Iraq and elsewhere, not to mention the Bush administration's threats of war against Iran, so clearly replicates Imperial Japan during the period when its leaders willfully disregarded international law and pursued the diplomacy of force," Bix said during a visit to Tokyo.

Top Democrats Selling Out Unions, Environment and Human Rights? RECALL!!!

If top Democrats insist on selling out their constituents, recall. If recall is not an option in those states, bring pressure on them through the spotlight. The day of weak-kneed Dems should be over. If not, make it so.

David Sirota: "Thursday, May 10th was a whirlwind day on the political frontlines in the War on the Middle Class, as a handful of senior congressional Democrats and the White House - cheered on by K Street lobbyists - joined forces today to announce a 'deal' on a package of trade agreements that could impact millions of American workers and potentially calls into question the entire election mandate of 2006 (I say potentially because the full details are still being concealed by both Democrats and the White House). You'll notice the irony of the deal with just a glance at the front of the New York Times business section (screen captured above) - the deal was agreed to (though its details have still not been made public) on the very same day the U.S. government reported another widening of America's job-destroying trade deficit."