These are the stories I recommend reading for July 25th 2010 through July 26th 2010:
- Secret CIA Paramilitaries’ Role in Civilian Deaths: The Guardian – US and allied commanders frequently deny allegations of mass civilian casualties, claiming they are Taliban propaganda or ploys to get compensation, which are contradicted by facts known to the military. But the logs demonstrate how much of the contemporaneous US internal reporting of air strikes is simply false. – afghanistan military CIA obama
- Kabul War Diary: Wikileaks – The Afghan War Diary is the most significant archive about the reality of war to have ever been released during the course of a war. The deaths of tens of thousands is normally only a statistic but the archive reveals the locations and the key events behind each most of these deaths. We hope its release will lead to a comprehensive understanding of the war in Afghanistan and provide the raw ingredients necessary to change its course. – afghanistan military obama
- View Is Bleaker Than Official Portrayal of War in Afghanistan: NY Times – A six-year archive of classified military documents made public on Sunday offers an unvarnished, ground-level picture of the war in Afghanistan that is in many respects more grim than the official portrayal. The secret documents, released on the Internet by an organization called WikiLeaks, are a daily diary of an American-led force often starved for resources and attention as it struggled against an insurgency that grew larger, better coordinated and more deadly each year. – afghanistan military obama
- WikiLeaks and the War: New Yorker – This stash will be compared to the Pentagon Papers, and in some ways that’s right—WikiLeaks, like Daniel Ellsberg, has been accused of ignoring the national interest. (An unfair charge, unless by “national interest” one means the political interests of a particular Administration.) But the Pentagon Papers were a synthetic analysis, a history of the war in Vietnam. WikiLeaks has given us research materials for a history of the war in Afghanistan. To make full use of them, we will, again, have to think hard about what we are trying to learn: Is it what we are doing, day to day, on the ground in Afghanistan, and how we could do it better? Or what we are doing in Afghanistan at all? – afghanistan military obama
- No to Oligarchy: Sen. Bernie Sanders – While the middle class disappears and poverty increases the wealthiest people in our country are not only doing extremely well, they are using their wealth and political power to protect and expand their very privileged status at the expense of everyone else. – economy taxes wealth sanders
- November Props Pros & Cons: Capital Notes – Unusual alliances… pointed and sometimes personal arguments… and independent analysis — all can be found in the newly released draft documents for this November statewide ballot guide. Voters are facing a pretty sizable fall ballot — ten measures in all – campaigns 2010 california
- Intelligence Nominee’s Contractor Ties May Come Under Scrutiny: LA Times – Four months after James R. Clapper left his federal job as head of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency in June 2006, he joined the boards of three government contractors, two of which had been doing business with his agency while he was there.<br />
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It was not the only revolving door entered by Clapper, who is now President Obama’s nominee to be director of national intelligence. – intelligence CIA lobbying obama - Portugal Turns to Angola to Grow: NY Times – Portugal, one of Europe’s ailing economies, is increasingly placing its hopes of recovery on Angola, a former colony that has established itself as one of the strongest economies in sub-Saharan Africa — thanks largely to oil and diamonds. The shift comes as competition is getting stiffer in Brazil, another booming former colony, and as Portugal’s traditional European trading partners, led by Spain, struggle under a mountain of debt and soaring joblessness. – angola
- Court Under Roberts Is Most Conservative in Decades: NY Times – In those five years, the court not only moved to the right but also became the most conservative one in living memory, based on an analysis of four sets of political science data. – supremecourt
- Governor: Freezing AB32 ‘Would Be Devastating’: SF Chronicle – Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger says political candidates and forces in his own party who argue for the suspension of the state’s climate change law are “trying to pull the wool over people’s eyes” and have “the intention of eliminating” the landmark climate change bill he signed in 2006. – california climatechange 2010 campaigns
- Dueling Desalination Measures Might End Up On November Ballot: Marin IJ – The controversy over desalination will come into focus Monday when the Marin Municipal Water District looks at dueling measures that could both end up on November’s ballot. – marin desalination 2010 campaigns
