Story Archives - Page 600 of 661

Just Wait and See

Sheri Herndon June 28, 2005 Sheri Herndon

Sustainability requires thinking – and dreaming – about what happens between events

In 1995, I was sitting in board meetings with Earth On-the-Air Independent Media, which had an award-winning environmental radio program distributed across the country. I said, we need a public media center in Seattle, and the reply was, "Yeah, sure." Well, in 1999 we proved them wrong.

The vision behind the IMC is to create a global communications network that will not just be something "on the side," but will actually eclipse the commercial and corporate communication system, which doesn’t represent people or their struggles. It’s truly time for us to reclaim that globally. read more

Here Comes the Revolution

Manse Jacobi June 28, 2005 Manse Jacobi

How the Internet is redefining the way people work together

November 30, 1999, was an historic day, and not only because it marked the largest active civil disobedience in the United States since the 1960s. Indeed, it showed the level of brutality that defenders of capitalism are willing to use to preserve that system. But amidst the tear gas and the brutality and the jailed protesters during the World Trade Organization meeting in Seattle, a revolution was underway — a media paradigm revolution — and it was happening a few blocks from the Convention Center at the Independent Media Center. It was the culmination of an effort that began a few months earlier with a handful of media activists who wanted to break the corporate information blockade. read more

Organ Snatchers 5/04

ALBERT HUEBNER June 23, 2005 ALBERT HUEBNER

Human body parts have become a new cash crop

In a world where the wealthy set the rules of trade, it was only a matter of time until parts of the human body became a hot cash crop. Not only can the rich afford to buy organs from the desperately poor, they also can use “free market” logic to defend the purchases as ethical. From this perspective, it’s a win-win situation in which allegedly equal participants come together. The buyer gets a healthy organ, the seller some needed cash. The roles of the organ brokers and the surgeons are defined as benign, if not downright humane. read more

Ready-Made Misery 5/04

RON CHEPESIUK June 23, 2005 RON CHEPESIUK

A TF investigation of South Asia’s garment industry chronicles
globalization’s race to the bottom

Each day, 20-year-old Farida leaves her home in the slums of Dhaka, Bangladesh’s capital (population 13 million), and walks an hour to her job at the Dalia Garment Factory. She works from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., sometimes as much as two hours more, and often seven days a week. Like many garment workers interviewed for this article, she didn’t want her real name used for fear of losing her job. For her labor, the young worker earns the equivalent of about $18 per month. At night, she must walk through the pitch black and dangerous streets of a city notorious for its crime rate. read more

Deconstructing Powell 10/03

RON CHEPESIUK June 23, 2005 RON CHEPESIUK

Bush’s "Teflon" secretary has built his career on playing it safe

In the controversy over the half truths and outright lies about Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction, one top US official has remained above the fray. Yet, it was Secretary of State Colin Powell, darling of the US media, who made the key February 5 presentation to the United Nations that most persuasively outlined the US argument for war.

Then came the revelation: the Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR), the State Department’s Intelligence Analysis Unit, along with experts from the Department of Energy, had advised Powell that the evidence he planned to use, supposedly proving that Saddam Hussein intended to re-start a nuclear weapons program, was "questionable." The ever dutiful servant of power proceeded away, making the dubious case for invasion. read more

From Misery to Hope 3/03

DAVE DELLINGER June 23, 2005 DAVE DELLINGER

A new anthology diagnoses the disease and explores the possibilities

In its lengthy introduction, Alternatives to Economic Globalization: A Better World Is Possible is described as an offshoot of dialogue among associates of the International Forum of Globalization (IFG). “The immediate priority is to frame the issues,” say the editors, “recognizing that to arrive at a consensus among even a few people – let alone millions – is a far more complex and difficult task than building agreement on what we oppose.” read more