"New Obama Campaign Co-Chair: 'The President Is Wrong'." By Amy Goodman

"New Obama Campaign Co-Chair: 'The President Is Wrong'." By Amy Goodman
“The president is wrong.” So says one of the newly appointed co-chairs of President Barack Obama’s re-election campaign.

Those four words headline the website of the organization Progressives United, founded by former U.S. Sen., and now Obama campaign adviser, Russ Feingold. He is referring to Obama’s recent announcement that he will accept super PAC funds for his re-election campaign. Feingold writes: “The President is wrong to embrace the corrupt corporate politics of Citizens United through the use of super PACs — organizations that raise unlimited amounts of money from corporations and the richest individuals, sometimes in total secrecy. It’s not just bad policy; it’s also dumb strategy.” And, he says, it’s “dancing with the devil.”

In 1905, President Theodore Roosevelt said to Congress, “All contributions by corporations to any political committee or for any political purpose should be forbidden by law.” He signed a bill into law banning such contributions in 1907. In 2012, this hundred-year history of campaign-finance controls died, thanks to five U.S. Supreme Court justices who decided, in the 2010 Citizens United case, that corporations can use their money to express free speech, most notably in their efforts to influence federal elections.

After 18 years representing Wisconsin in the U.S. Senate, Feingold lost his re-election to self-funded Republican multimillionaire and tea-party favorite Ron Johnson. Since then, Feingold has been teaching law, started Progressives United and, while supporting the effort to recall Wisconsin’s embattled Gov. Scott Walker, has steadfastly refused to run against him or for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by retiring Democratic Sen. Herb Kohl.

NYPD Commissioner Defends Mass Surveillance of Muslims -- News from Antiwar.com

NYPD Commissioner Defends Mass Surveillance of Muslims -- News from Antiwar.comSpeaking today in an interview on AM radio, New York Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly defended revelations that the NYPD has been conducting massive surveillance of random Muslim citizens in and around New York, saying that the critics of the program “have short memories as to what happened here in 2001.”

Transforming Finkelstein BDS attack into opportunity

Transforming Finkelstein BDS attack into opportunityThere have been a number of thoughtful and incisive rebuttals to the recent video interview in which Norman Finkelstein absurdly calls the growing boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement against apartheid Israel a “cult,” and admonishes Palestinians to limit their struggle to the “two-state solution” (“Video: Arguing the boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign with Norman Finkelstein (interviewed by Frank Barat),” 9 February 2012).

However, Finkelstein’s attack on the BDS movement is not, as some of his critics have suggested, merely an indication of personal demoralization, faulty legal analysis, or political shortsightedness. Rather, it reflects a stubborn attempt to rationalize his rejection of Palestinian demands — especially full equality and refugee rights — that challenge the legitimacy of a “Jewish state.”

Israel Approves Construction of 695 Housing Units in West Bank -- News from Antiwar.com

Israel Approves Construction of 695 Housing Units in West Bank -- News from Antiwar.comIsrael on Wednesday approved the construction of 695 new housing units in and around the West Bank settlement of Shiloh, north-east of Ramallah.

Up to 121 of the housing units already exist – 93 of them without government authorization. These Israel retroactively “legalized.” The remaining 574 units have yet to be built.

The United Nations special coordinator for the Middle East peace process, Robert Serry, called the decision “deplorable and moves us further away from the goal of a two-state solution.”

Settlements on Palestinian territory and the related destruction of Palestinian homes has been constantly recognized as illegal by the international community. The United Nations recently called on Israel to immediately halt the destruction of Palestinian homes in the West Bank, as it also violates international law. Israeli forces destroyed 622 Palestinian homes in the West Bank in 2011, forcibly displacing over 1,100 people, over half of them children.

“The current policy and practice of demolitions cause extensive human suffering and should end,” said UN humanitarian coordinator for the occupied Palestinian territories, Maxwell Gaylard.

A recent report from the European Union warned that “if current trends are not stopped and reversed, the establishment of a viable Palestinian state within pre-1967 borders seem more remote than ever.” And that, indeed, seems to be the intention.

The EU report explained how “a combination of house and farm building demolitions; a prohibitive planning regime; relentless settlement expansion; the military’s separation barrier; obstacles to free movement; and denial of access to vital natural resources, including land and water, is eroding Palestinian tenure of the large tract of the West Bank on which hopes of a contiguous Palestinian state depend.”

U.S.-Backed Bahraini Forces Arrest and Deport Two American Peace Activists Acting as Human Rights Observers

U.S.-Backed Bahraini Forces Arrest and Deport Two American Peace Activists Acting as Human Rights ObserversOn Saturday, Bahrain arrested and deported two U.S. human rights lawyers, Huwaida Arraf and Radhika Sainath, for their role in recent protests. They were deported Sunday and returned to New York last night. Both Arraf and Sainath are human rights lawyers and members of the Witness Bahrain initiative, which places international observers in the country in the hopes of preventing violence by security forces. Their arrest comes just ahead of the one-year anniversary of the popular uprising against the U.S.-backed monarchy. In the past year, Bahraini security forces have killed dozens of demonstrators, and hundreds more have been arrested or fired from their jobs. "[We] also were getting reports of journalists and human rights organization representatives being denied entry into the country in the lead-up to the first anniversary of the Bahrain revolution. And this caused great alarm, that the government was planning to escalate its oppression of the people," says Huwaida Arraf. [includes rush transcript]

Banks Avoid Liability In 49-State Foreclosure Fraud Settlement

Banks Avoid Liability In 49-State Foreclosure Fraud SettlementFebruary 09, 2012 "FDL" --  Forty-nine states, every one but Oklahoma, as well as federal regulators will participate in a foreclosure fraud settlement that will release the five biggest banks (Wells Fargo, Citi, Ally/GMAC, JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America) and their mortgage servicing units from liability for robo-signing and other forms of servicer abuse, in exchange for $25 billion in funding for legal aid, refinancing, short sales, restitution for wrongful foreclosures and principal reduction for underwater borrowers. The announcement will be made on Thursday.

Israel Teams With Terror Group to Kill Iran's Nuclear Scientists, U.S. officials tell NBC News

Israel Teams With Terror Group to Kill Iran's Nuclear Scientists, U.S. officials tell NBC NewsFebruary 09, 2012 "NBC" -- Deadly attacks on Iranian nuclear scientists are being carried out by an Iranian dissident group that is financed, trained and armed by Israel’s secret service, U.S. officials tell NBC News, confirming charges leveled by Iran’s leaders.

The group, the People’s Mujahedin of Iran, has long been designated as a terrorist group by the United States, accused of killing American servicemen and contractors in the 1970s and supporting the takeover of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran before breaking with the Iranian mullahs in 1980.

The attacks, which have killed five Iranian nuclear scientists since 2007 and may have destroyed a missile research and development site, have been carried out in dramatic fashion, with motorcycle-borne assailants often attaching small magnetic bombs to the exterior of the victims’ cars.

U.S. officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the Obama administration is aware of the assassination campaign but has no direct involvement.

The Iranians have no doubt who is responsible – Israel and the People’s Mujahedin of Iran, known by various acronyms, including MEK, MKO and PMI.

BDS victory: Cat Power cancels show in Tel Aviv

BDS victory: Cat Power cancels show in Tel AvivHer announcement came after she sent out a few tweets asking her fans to “find a show in Ramallah … for the people of Palestine.” However, it is against the Palestinian-led BDS call to support an artist seeking to mitigate the apartheid policy by “balancing” their performance in Tel Aviv with a performance in the occupied West Bank.

Regardless of her attempt to find a venue, Cat Power ended up canceling her gig in Tel Aviv anyway. Cat Power joins a growing list of artists, musicians and performers who have canceled their appearances for audiences in Israel, and should be commended for her action.

Likud leaders to go to Al-Aqsa, call for "cleansing" Jerusalem and building Jewish temple on mosque's "ruins"

Likud leaders to go to Al-Aqsa, call for "cleansing" Jerusalem and building Jewish temple on mosque's "ruins"Leaders and members of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud Party are leading an incursion and rally into the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound – which Israel calls the “Temple Mount” – in eastern occupied Jerusalem this Sunday to call for its destruction and building a Jewish Temple on its “ruins.”

Top Official: Drone Critics are Al Qaeda Enablers

Top Official: Drone Critics are Al Qaeda EnablersA senior American counterterrorism official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, questioned the report’s findings, saying “targeting decisions are the product of intensive intelligence collection and observation.” The official added: “One must wonder why an effort that has so carefully gone after terrorists who plot to kill civilians has been subjected to so much misinformation. Let’s be under no illusions — there are a number of elements who would like nothing more than to malign these efforts and help Al Qaeda succeed.”

British Terror Plot: Four ‘Islamists’ Planned to Try to Blow Up a Toilet -- News from Antiwar.com

British Terror Plot: Four ‘Islamists’ Planned to Try to Blow Up a Toilet -- News from Antiwar.comFour British citizens, referred to as Islamists by some reports, have confessed to making vague plans to blow up a toilet at the London Stock Exchange (LSE). The four reportedly got the idea from Inspire Magazine, released online by al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP).

ACLU Sues for Records on Assassination of US Citizens -- News from Antiwar.com

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has filed a lawsuit today in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York, complaining that the Obama Administration failed to respond to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests relating to the assassinations of three US citizens in Yemen.