Progressive news feed

The bear that recently killed a caretaker in a Cleveland suburb was the latest example of animal violence in a state that has some of the nation's weakest restrictions on exotic pets and among the highest number of injuries and deaths caused by them.

O n Dec. 30, 1970, Charlie Goodell, the man who had been appointed to Robert F. Kennedy's Senate seat and lost it to James Buckley two months earlier, spoke again, as he was often doing, about his opposition to the Vietnam War.

By PATRICK BOND - August 23, 2010

The two major civil service unions on strike against the South African government vow to intensify pressure in coming days, in a struggle pitting a million members of the middle and lower ranks of society against a confident government leadership fresh from hosting the World Cup...In several confrontations with police at town centers, clinics and schools...workers were shot with rubber bullets and water cannons.

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Wednesday, August 25, 2010

NEW ORLEANS, LA - In the chaotic days after Hurricane Katrina, an order circulated among New Orleans police authorizing officers to shoot looters, according to present and former members of the department.

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Candles are seen with photos of Neda Agha Soltan, shot dead at a rally in Tehran, at a rally in support of Iranian election protesters organized by Amnesty International June 26, 2009 in New York City.

Two New York-based civil liberties groups have sued the federal government, saying its targeted killings of U.S. citizens overseas is unconstitutional.

By Krystalline Kraus - August 30, 2010

In wake of the 73 G20-related charges dropped or settled in court, in an effort to shape public opinion, Toronto cops have released a so-called G20 Most Wanted list "Worst of the Worst".

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Canada's largest and most influential business organization has launched a lobbying campaign urging Canadian senators to kill legislation requiring the government to deliver a science-based plan to fight global warming and provide regular reports on its progress.

More evidence of a pariah Israeli state.

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By No One Is Illegal-Vancouver - August 29th, 2010

The mainstream corporate media has played a crucial role in stirring public frenzy by uncritically parroting government rhetoric such as “homegrown terrorists” and “Jihad generation” and that the suspects were “inspired by Al Qaeda”, without providing any evidence to substantiate such a claim. Such stigmatizing statements will have a permanent damaging effect on the men and their families and their “guilt” will surely continue even if the charges are dropped or the men are acquitted.

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By Neve Gordon - August 30, 2010

...[P]ersonal attacks are part of a much broader assault on Israeli higher education and its professors. Two recent incidents exemplify the protofascist logic that is being deployed to undermine the pillars of academic freedom in Israel, while also revealing that the assault on Israeli academe is being backed by neoconservative forces in the United States...Numerous forces in Israel are mobilizing in order to press forward an extreme-right political agenda.

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A Chinese AIDS activist jailed after a run-in with a hospital administrator is in poor health but has vowed to keep fighting for compensation after being infected by tainted blood during a childhood transfusion, his father said Monday.

We go to New Orleans to speak with poet and performer Sunni Patterson. She’s from the Lower Ninth Ward, but like thousands of the city’s residents has been forced to live outside and is now based in Houston, Texas. [includes rush transcript]

President Obama visited New Orleans on Sunday and praised the recovery of the city and the resilience of its people five years after Hurricane Katrina. We talk to lifelong New Orleans resident and civil rights attorney, Tracie Washington, and Jordan Flaherty, a community organizer and author of Floodlines: Community and Resistance from Katrina to the Jena Six. [includes rush transcript]

This Sunday marked the fifth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. Early on the morning of August 29th, 2005, the storm slammed into the Gulf Coast, just south of New Orleans. It ravaged the coasts of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama and left over 1,800 people dead. Eighty percent of the city of New Orleans was under water after the levees failed. We go back to 2005 to air some of the voices from New Orleans in the aftermath of the storm. [includes rush transcript]

On the fifth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, a new documentary, The Big Uneasy, argues that the destruction of New Orleans was an unnatural disaster and how it could have been prevented. We speak with the filmmaker: actor and satirist Harry Shearer. [includes rush transcript]

• Fire Set at Site of Future Mosque in Tennessee
• Mexican Mayor Killed in Border State
• FDA to Begin Inspections of Factory Egg Farms
• UN Report Accuses Rwandan Troops of Committing Genocide in the Congo
• Flooding Continue in Pakistan, a Month After Disaster Began
• Influential Israel Rabbi: Palestinians Should Perish with a Plague
• Glenn Beck Hosts Rally on Anniversary of MLK's March on Washington
• Youth Unemployment Reaches Record Level
• Heavily Armed Army Veteran Shot Dead in Utah

Charity predicts more food shortages in Africa because of EU target to produce 10% of all transport fuels from biofuels by 2020 Friends of the Earth says that biofuel crops, including sugar cane, 'are competing directly with food crops for fertile land'. Photograph: Juan Carlos Ulate/Reuters European Union countries must drop their biofuels targets ...

On Wednesday, about 50 people gathered outside of Penn State's Old Main to tell PSU President Graham Spanier that there are well-informed student activists who are alive and well at Penn State .

Hong Kong locals take to the streets to show their anger after the Manila bus hostage crisis.