Mahler's Prodigal Son

The message from an orthodox Jew in Israel, Jerry Haber, is clear and simple... . "For some time I have had a dream about a community, a coalition, a big tent that includes within it all those constituencies who cry out to end the occupation now. Yes, I know, there already is a US Campaign to End the Occupation, and they do good work. Read about them here. But I am thinking of something else I am thinking of people of all colors, races, creeds, ethnicities, sexual orientation – and of varying, even opposing ideologies. Under this tent are committed anti-Zionists who believe that a Jewish ethnic state is a bad thing; others who don’t think that Jews have right to national self-determination in Palestine; Palestinians who would, if they could, liberate all of Palestine from Zionist hegemony, and liberal Zionists, who believe that Israel, for all its flaws, offers promise to the Jewish people, the world, and, yes, even to the Palestinians. What unites these constituencies is the con...

News comes today that Rebekah Brooks , of News Limited has resigned at last - not with any acknowledgement of wrong-doing on her part mind you. All part of the Murdoch camp's way of bluffing its way through things and obfuscating the truth and reality. An example us old man Murdoch's "interview" with his own newspaper, The Wall Street Journal. "Just when we were beginning to wonder when The Wall Street Journal would actually start to cover the meltdown at its proprietor’s company with all the zest that the world’s best business newspaper ought to muster for the world’s biggest business story, Rupert Murdoch picked up the phone to his own paper and gave it an exclusive interview. In the interview with the Journal’s London bureau chief, Murdoch made the revelation that he would establish an independent committee, to be led by a “distinguished nonemployee ” to “investigate every charge of improper conduct” that has been swirling around News Corp. in recen...

The man is said to be smart. Yet, just about at every turn Obama stumbles or is indecisive or caves in to sectional interests, especially those with money. Then, Obama has seemingly surrounded himself with advisors who have already left the White House or ought not to have favoured with a position in the first place. Even on the international stage, where there were high hopes for Obama when he swept into office, he has squandered the goodwill that was there for both him and the USA . "The hope that the Arab world had not long ago put in the United States and President Obama has all but evaporated. Two and a half years after Obama came to office, raising expectations for change among many in the Arab world, favorable ratings of the United States have plummeted in the Middle East, according to a new poll conducted by IBOPE Zogby International for the Arab American Institute Foundation. In most countries surveyed, favorable attitudes toward the United States dropped to leve...

Why anyone would want to waste their time watching Fox News, let alone Bill O'Reilly, is anyone's guess. The man is crass, a loudmouth and appalling all in one breath. He is also a bully and the accuracy and validity of what he says is questionable. So, FAIR has looked at O'Reilly on the subject of hacking - something his employers at News Limited know all about big time, as we have come to discover the last days. "The explosive allegations about widespread illegal voicemail hacking by British tabloids owned by Rupert Murdoch are getting very little coverage on Murdoch's Fox News Channel (TVNewser, 7/12/11). But Fox's top host took a very different view when a Republican politician's email account was hacked, calling for the prosecution of the website that published the emails. When Sarah Palin's email account was hacked during the 2008 presidential campaign, Fox host Bill O'Reilly was outraged that anyone could publish such material. On Sep...

If there be bloggers out there envious of anyone, that envy would have to be directed toward Arianna Huffington , the founder of The Huffington Post, the most widely read blog in the USA. Here is one blogger who has made it, really big time! But who is this woman who has gained such notoriety ? "She's as forceful and charismatic as you'd expect a woman on every top-10 media list in the US to be, with a humorous glint in her eye."

This is scary stuff! Here is Obama engaged in what one retired Lt. Colonel has described as an "almost industrial-scale counterterrorism killing machine ". "Although President's Obama's partial Afghan troop withdrawal announcement has received more attention, his June 29 "National Strategy for Counterterrorism" is of far greater long-term significance. This remarkable document states that the U.S. government intends to "disrupt, dismantle, and eventually defeat al-Qa'ida and its affiliates and adherents," in the following "areas of focus": "The Homeland, South Asia, Arabian Peninsula, East Africa,Europe, Iraq, Maghreb and Sahel, Southeast Asia (and) Central Asia." This assassination strategy is already operational in six Muslim countries with a combined population of 280 million: Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq, Yemen, Somalia and Libya, which has become a laboratory experiment for urban drone assassinations. The London S...

The BBC has over the years developed a reputation for accuracy and proper and appropriate reporting. That reputation has been more than a tad tarnished of late. MediaLens highlights BBC reporting which was incorrect, and simply wrong , to say the least - even if the topic, of and in itself, wasn't such an important one. "It is not only when death is being inflicted by Western firepower that the BBC can be expected to conform to state doctrine. It applies most definitely to events of state pomp and ceremony: royal weddings, Trooping the Colour, Armed Forces Day, anniversaries of D-Day, and on and on. Indeed, the BBC distinguishes itself by setting its 'patriotism' volume control to eleven on such occasions. Reporting on President Obama’s state visit to the UK, BBC political editor Nick Robinson gushed happily on the News at Ten: ‘There was never any doubt that Britain was in love with Obama.’ (May 25, 2011) Robinson was seemingly unaware of the slippery step where...