by Margaret Kimberley, Black Agenda Report
Former Alaska Sen. Mike Gravel is right to be scared of most of the Democratic field of presidential candidates. Except for Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich, the contenders jockey for the title of most-likely-to-attack-Iran. Impeachment "is the only way to discredit Republicans enough to insure a Democratic victory in 2008," but House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will hear none of that. Even if the Democrats somehow triumph, nothing much will change, because the frontrunners are all beholden to Big Money and enthralled with war.
During the first Democratic presidential debate a little known candidate, former Alaska Senator Mike Gravel, ended up with one of the most memorable lines of the evening:
"And I got to tell you, after standing up with them, some of these people frighten me - they frighten me. When you have mainline candidates that turn around and say that there's nothing off the table with respect to Iran, that's code for using nukes, nuclear devices.
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The picture in the ad immediately caught my attention. The photo was of a very dignified older African American man looking into the camera, very determined and equally pensive. Underneath his photo was a caption giving his name—T. Willard Fair—and the fact that he was the veteran of 40 years of struggle in the Civil Rights Movement.
This was certainly enough to pique my interest.
Beneath the caption was a statement declaring that the alleged threat to African Americans comes from documented and undocumented immigrants. He went on to suggest that any notion of legalizing undocumented workers was a slap in the face of African Americans. The ad is associated with a group called the “Coalition for the Future American Worker.â€
Fair’s attack is not surprising, although the virulence and historical nature of it is very unsettling, particularly because it is bound to strike a chord among many African Americans.
Black America has been taking a prolonged economic hit since the mid 1970s. The economic reorganization which many people call de-industrialization has had a devastating impact on the (more...)
by Carol Pagaduan-Araullo, Phillipines
After the May 14 elections, are we any closer to the democratic society that our grade school textbooks proudly proclaim the Philippines to be? Unfortunately, the general picture emerging from the stories and the images that have so far dominated the tri-media and ordinary people’s accounts is that of a nightmarish elections and post-elections situation that has confirmed our worse fears. The farcical nature of the electoral process in this country has been laid bare, much worse than even our most dire predictions.
There was widespread disenfranchisement, vote buying, “flying voters†and innumerable delays, disruption and even failure of elections due to outright grabbing of election paraphernalia, bombing of polling places and terrorizing of poll officials and the voters themselves.
The Commission on Elections (COMELEC) has been flagrantly pro-administration. This is proven by the 
by Carol Pagaduan-Araullo, Philippines
It doesn’t take a political scientist to tell us that this mid-term elections for 12 senators, 275 congress persons and scores of local government officials epitomizes what is so rotten and undemocratic in our postcolonial electoral system. The signs and symptoms of a sick and dying traditional political order are everywhere; its inevitable moribund convulsions are threatening to wreak havoc before a new and truly democratic alternative can take its place.
Ever since independence from US colonial rule in 1946, periodic elections in this country have been touted as the single, most visible proof that representative democracy is alive and well: the people of the Philippines could choose their leaders when the time came -- wisely or foolishly, for good or ill. There was the presumed sanctity of the ballot that withstood generally accepted levels of cheating and violence that accompanied any and all electoral exercises; in this country, anyway.
In time it became clear that not much choice was ever given the electorate since the only ones who stood for office or could mount serious campaigns necessary to win were members of the same old socio-economic elite or their favored political 
by Anton Caputo
Playing equal parts visionary, cheerleader and comedian, Al Gore brought his message of how to fight global warming to a capacity crowd of receptive architects Saturday in San Antonio.
The former vice president referred continually to a "new way of thinking" that is emerging in the country and offered hope in the battle to control the effects global warming will have on the planet.
"It's in part a spiritual crisis," Gore told the crowd in the Convention Center at the American Institute of Architects 
by Daphne Wysham
As the Kyoto Protocol comes into force this month, a carbon rush is gaining steam in the financial industry. Investors predict that carbon could become one of the largest markets in the world, with a trading volume of $60 billion to $250 billion by 2008.
Supporters assert emissions trading allows the invisible hand of the market to do what the “command and control†approach to regulation of greenhouse gas emissions can not; that is, meet and even exceed expectations of emissions reductions.
Critics charge that carbon trading is a smokescreen: At best, it will represent a 
by Jerry Harris, SolidarityEconomy.net
.US hegemony rapidly disappearing
US economic and political hegemony has degraded further in the rapidly globalizing world. At the World Bank Paul Wolfowitz has lost control through his own corrupt crony capitalism. But his problems stem as much from Iraq as his current missteps. Globalists who fill the bureaucracy at the World Bank never were comfortable with the US unilateralist coming to their home and Wolfowitz opened the door for their attacks. That the US can no longer control the internal politics at the World Bank is a good indicator of how far its political influence has fallen. 