Counterpunch.org archives December 2009
December 31, 2009
Winslow T. Wheeler
Eliminate the Senate
Patrick Cockburn
Touch Yemen, Get Burned
Mike Whitney
Lining Up for the Wall Street Gravy Train
Greg Moses
The Fear Stimulus
Ramzy Baroud
Egypt's Steel Wall
Ron Jacobs
Interventions R Us
Tom Stephens
"The System Worked"
Dave Zirin
The Man Who Would Reclaim Sports
Paul Richards
Tiger Max, Evel Denny, Buffalo Brian and Mini-Max Jon
Nick Egnatz
The Lesser Evil
Website of the Day
Roger Waters Blasts Israel's Siege of Gaza
December 30, 2009
Stephen Green
A Lawless Presidency
Thomas Mountain
What Did Angelina Jolie Pay for Her Baby?
Stewart J. Lawrence
Baluchistan and the Af/Pak War
Ray McGovern
Are Presidents Afraid of the CIA?
Jayne Lyn Stahl
Toys for Tots ... with Green Cards
Paul Craig Roberts
Israel Rules
Jeff Cohen
If It Was Wrong Under Bush, It's Wrong Under Obama
Binoy Kampmark
The Grand Placebo
Brenda Norrell
Hate and Death on the Border
Charles R. Larson
The Affluent Terrorist: Sexual Frustration and the Crotchbomber
Website of the Day
The Year in Coal
December 29, 2009
Gareth Porter
The Iranian Nuke Forgeries
Patrick Cockburn
Yemen Next
Steven Higgs Growing Up Toxic: Defeating Autism, Now
Susan Albulhawa /
Ramzy Baroud
Share the Land
Emily Ratner
Winding Our Way to Gaza
Dave Lindorff
Krugman's Health Care Sell-Out
David Macaray
Who is the Ideal Labor Leader?
Rev. William E. Alberts
Prince of Peace or Evangelistic Predator?
Deepak Tripathi
Compromised Domestic Policy, Militarized Foreign Policy
Walter Brasch / Rosemary Brasch
The Courage of Michael Vick: Dog Hanger as Model Citizen?
Website of the Day
Thinking Forward, Looking Back
December 28, 2009
Uri Avnery
Cast Lead II
Gary Leupp
Eyes on Yemen
Bouthaina Shaaban
Hearing is Not Like Seeing
Jayne Lyn Stahl
Decriminalize Political Speech
Sam Husseini
The Egyptian Puppet State
Greg Moses
Avatar's Jungle of Technology
Sonja Karkar
Gaza in Crisis
Patrick Bond
The Life and Death of Dennis Brutus
Michael Simmons
A Secret Masterpice: The Only Album "Bob Dylan" Ever Produced
David Michael Green
Good Riddance to the Devil's Decade
Alan McConnell
Who Will Organize the Organizers?
Website of the Day
Baucus: Shitfaced on the Senate Floor?
December 25-27, 2009
Alexander Cockburn
Disappointments in Samarra
Mark Rudd
What It Takes to Build a Movement
Ralph Nader
Read, Then Act: the Year's Best Books
Nicola Nasser
Palestinians on the Brink of Explosion
John Ross
Where the Holidays are a Cruel Hoax
Rannie Amiri
Jimmy Carter's Yuletide Apology
Christopher Brauchli
When Prosperity Comes to Bad Men
Shamus Cooke
Who Will Pay For the Economic Collapse?
Ramzy Baroud
Paying the Price for Europe's Identity Crisis
John Blair
My Moral Dilemma on Hydrofracking
Michael D. Yates
Fear and Loathing at St. Vincent College
David Macaray
The Gift Nobody Wanted
Charles R. Larson
Love in an Inhumane Country
David Yearsley
From the Little Ice Age, a Hot Christmas from Purcell
Kim Nicolini
Further on Down the Road
Poets' Basement
Four Poems by Gina Myers
Website of the Weekend
A Xmas Gift From Ray Charles
December 24, 2009
Carl Ginsburg
Cooing with Cash
Franklin C. Spinney For Better or Worse? the Afghan Escalation and Women's Rights
Nadia Hijab
The Jailing of Jamal Juma
Mike Whitney
Obama, Progressives and the Press: an Interview with Cindy Sheehan
Jayne Lyn Stahl
Reform in Name Only: Individual Mandates
William Loren Katz
Christmas Eve Freedom Fighters
Martha Rosenberg
First, Kill No Celebrities: New Year's Resolutions for the Drug Industry
Stephen Fleischman
A Pound of Flesh:
Interest and Profit
Anthony Papa
Chase Bank Says F-You to Students at Holiday Time
Dave Lindorff
An Afghan Christmas:
a Visit From St. Barack
Website of the Day
A Tale of Two Pigs
December 23, 2009
David Price
Hollywood's Human Terrain Avatars
Dean Baker
Bernanke and the Corruption of Washington Culture
Andy Worthington
The Afghan Four
Neve Gordon
Breaking Palestine's Peaceful Protests
Helen Redmond
Beware the Progressive Democrat
Debayni Kar
Can Migrants Save the Global Economy?
Fred Gardner
The Calender Girl Conspiracy: Could Pot Have Saved Marilyn?
Brian Tokar
What Really Happened in Copenhagen?
Dave Zirin
More Than a Sportswriter
Randall Amster
Et Tu, Barack?
Website of the Day
How Einstein Divided America's Jews
December 22, 2009
Paul Craig Roberts
Relocating Guantanamo
Dave Lindorff
A Longer, Deeper Recession Looms
Ralph Nader
Obama in the Shark Tank
David Rosen
Sexual Politics in the Age of Obama
Laurie Kirby
Woodstock's Dirty Secret
Ron Jacobs
The Best Way to Stop a War
Dick J. Reavis
Insurance Reform, in Brief
Manuel Garcia, Jr.
Palestine's Gift of Christmas
Norman Solomon
Flares in the Darkness
Rannie Amiri
The Death of the Grand Ayatollah Montazeri
Website of the Day
Nader: From W. to Obama: a Seamless Transition on the War
December 21, 2009
Alan Farago
Destroying the Everglades at 25 Cents Per Ton
Marjorie Cohn
Why the Af/Pak War is Illegal
Uri Avnery
Bordering on the Ridiculous: "Oybama" in Oslo
Mike Whitney
Bernanke Tightens the Noose
Mary Lynn Cramer
The Medicare Murder Mystery
Mark Scaramella
The Fate of California's Forests
Walter Brasch
Law & Order in Pennsylvania: Corruption, Murder and Race Hate
David Michael Green
Now, I'm Really Getting Pissed Off
Ingmar Lee
Why I Climbed the Flagpole
Farzana Versey
Whose Euthanasia Is It, Anyway?
Binoy Kampmark
The Conservative Dissident
Website of the Day
My Father Was a Freedom Fighter
December 18-20, 2009
Alexander Cockburn
Turning Tricks, Cashing In on Fear
Michael Colby
The Health Care Charade: Bernie the Quitter Fools Us Again
Jeremy Scahill
Stunning Statistics About the War That Everyone Should Know
Stewart J. Lawrence
Pakistan's Refugee Disaster: Symptom of a Deeper Malady
Mike Whitney
Chavez's Venezuela
Andy Worthington
The Case of the Unwilling Yemeni Recruit
James Ridgeway
How Health Reform was Killed by Triangulation
Saul Landau
Almost Year One: an Assessment
John Ross
Tragicomedy in Ixtapalapa
Danny Weil
Race to the Slop
Rannie Amiri
Year 1431: Off to a Rocky Start in the Middle East
Franklin Lamb
Life in Lebanon
Steve Early
Green Mountain Mustering for the War at Home or Abroad?
Liaquat Ali Khan
The Sovereignty of Muslim Nations: a Casualty of U.S. Foreign Policy
Fred Gardner
Pot Specialists Plan to Study New Strains
D. K. Wilson
Tiger Woods: Lessons Not Learned ... Again
Missy Beattie
It Takes a Conscience
Jim Goodman
Hope is Dead: the Ongoing Tragedy of Rural Health Care
George Wuerthner
Turning Montana Into the Nation's Woodbox
Charles R. Larson
Windows Into Non-Western Cultures
Lorenzo Wolff
Recession Punks
David Yearsley
That Nauseating Peace Concert
Ben Sonnenberg Lordura di Napoli: the Best DVDs of the Year
Wajahat Ali
Invading Eden: James Cameron's "Avatar"
Poets' Basement
Taylor, Pommy Vega and Cirino
Website of the Weekend
Rage Against the Machine: Uncensored for Xmas
December 17, 2009
Steven Higgs
Heavy Metal Kids
Barbara Koeppel
How Banks Prey on the Unemployed
Dave Lindorff
Abort the Democratic Health Care Bill
Ramzy Baroud
The Lobby Within
Ron Jacobs
Selling a "Just" War: From Panama to Afghanistan
Shamus Cooke
The Democrats' Faux Fight Against the Banks
Christopher Brauchli
Suffer Little Children
Binoy Kampmark
The "Inevitable" War?
Norm Kent
Death by Baggie
Patrick Bond
Green Market Punks
Website of the Day
Grayson: End the War Now
December 16, 2009
James Bovard
How Bush Redefined American Freedom
Gregory V. Button
The TVA Ash Spill One Year Later
Dan Schiller
It's a Wired World: the Communications Revolution
Gareth Porter
The Taliban's Offer
Farrah Hassen
The Cairo Detour
Nicola Nasser
U.S. Creates Its Antithesis in Iraq
Daniel C. Maguire
Why Obama Flunks the "Just War" Test
Martha Rosenberg
The Sex Scandal No One Wants to Talk About
David Macaray
Education's Dismal Cycle
Ellen Brown
An EU / IMF Revolt
Robert Bryce
The Copenhagen Conundrum
Website of the Day
Double Trouble for Polar Bears
December 15, 2009
Ellen Cantarow
Resistance in Bethlehem's Villages
Chris Floyd
Blair, Obama and the Narcissist's Defense
Anthony DiMaggio
Larry Summers and the Jobless Recovery
Dean Baker
Financial Transaction Tax:
Easy and Fun Money
Andy Worthington
Tortured in the "Dark Prison"
Mike Whitney
Malalai Joya Among Warlords
Jayne Lyn Stahl
How About a War Rebate?
Jeff Ballinger
Advocating Sweatshops: NPR, NYT and Nick Kristof
Raymond Lawrence
Tiger's Fix
David Rovics
Report From Cop-enhagen
Science, Politics and Salmon
December 14, 2009
Daniel Wolff
Styling: the Charter School Look
Bill Quigley
Why ACORN Won
Patrick Cockburn
The Rush for Iraq's Oil
Michael Hudson
The Problem with Paul Samuelson
Paul Craig Roberts
The Israeli Stranglehold
Rob Stone, MD
Fighting the Health Care Blues: a Shareholder Resolution for Universal Care
Dr. Susan Block
Tiger Woods Syndrome
Pervez Hoodbhoy
The Confessions of a Groveling Pakistani Native Orientalist
Mike Whitney
Battered Berlusconi
Shepherd Bliss
A Tribute to Fallen Leaves
Bill Moyers /
Michael Winship
The Land Mines Obama Won't Touch
Julien Mercille
The Poppy Pretext: Why the War on Drugs is Really a War on the Taliban
Brian Cloughley
Who Cares About Gaza?
Benjamin Dangl
Democracy in Honduras: Chronicle of a Death Foretold
Conn Hallinan
An Af-Pak Train Wreck
Christopher Brauchli
Blackwater's Second Act
Fred Gardner
Stigma Strikes Out:
Tim Lincecum's Pot Bust
David Macaray
Cindy Sheehan's Lesson
Limone Tatatjavy
Madoff's Verdant Suckers
Joseph Shansky
Latin America in the Age of Obama
Belén Fernández
Superficial Reality in Honduras
Ingmar Lee
The Silence of the North: When the Tailings Ponds Let Go
Ron Jacobs
Democracy on Its Deathbed
Brenda Norrell
Leave It in the Ground: a Message to Copenhagen From Big Mountain
Farzana Versey
Hawks and Hawkers
Ramzi Kysia
A Pacifist Critique of Obama's Nobel Lecture
Missy Beattie
The American Pathology
Charles R. Larson
Banned and Forbidden in Saudi Arabia
David Yearsley
Haydn, Hsu and the Baryton
Poets' Basement
Orloski and Corseri
Website of the Weekend
Pacific Wild
December 10, 2009
William Blum
Yeswecanistan
John Ross
Loose in Obamalandia
Björn Kumm
Welcome to Norway: Where Peace, Like Obama, is Two-Faced
Jonathan Cook
Israel's Notorious Hannibal Procedure
Mike Whitney
Showdown in Athens
Jayne Lyn Stahl
Selective Subpoenas
Gareth Porter
Iran: the Road to Diplomatic Failure
Rannie Amiri
Why You Should Know About Ali Sibat
Norman Solomon
War is Not Peace
James Faris
On Population: Why the Climate Change Malthusians are Wrong
Website of the Day
Suckers!Kevin Alexander Gray
Obama and Black America
Joe Bageant
The Devil and Mr. Obama
Stephen Soldz
The "Ethical Interrogation"?
Anthony DiMaggio
The Politics of Cynicism
David Swanson
Being Jay Bybee
Dave Zirin
The People Speak
Thomas Power
Clarifying the Tester Bill: Is It About Wilderness or Logging?
Martha Rosenberg
How to Kill a Carp
Susie Day
America Crashes the White House
US Peace Groups
On Obama's Peace Prize: an Open Letter to the Nobel Committee
Website of the Day
Logging TruthsDecember 8, 2009
Andrew Cockburn
Wall Street Snaps Its Fingers
Mike Whitney
Obama's "We Got No Money" Rap
Brendan Cooney
Obama and Honduras: The Man Who Wasn't There
Stephanie McMillian
The Buying and Selling of Jared Diamond
Ron Jacobs
The Baghdad Bombings
Benjamin Dangl
The Speed of Change in Bolivia
Kevin Mink
Religious Intolerance in Israel:
Through the State Department Looking Glass
Dave Lindorff
Obama's Shameful War
Helen Redmond
Yes, This Health Care Bill Really is Worse Than Nothing
David Macaray
The Double Standard is Alive and Well
Franklin Lamb
Washington's New Lebanon Policy: a Christmas Guide
December 7, 2009
Margot Kidder
Ax Max
Patrick Cockburn
The March of Folly
Gareth Porter
The Taliban - Al Qaeda Schism
Marshall Auerback
Is the Government Out of Money or is Obama Out of His Mind?
Clancy Sigal
Obama's Mother and Mine
Jeffrey Blankfort
What the U.S. Elite Really Thinks About Israel
Jonathan Cook
Israel's Bedouins Denied Right to Elections
Brian McKenna
Even If Obama Passed Single Payer, Primary Care Doctors Still Wouldn't Get It
Bouthaina Shaaban
Burqa Committees and Minaret Referenda
Charlotte Laws
In Praise of Gate-Crashing
Harry Browne
Conspiracy, Blood and Filth
Website of the Day
Help Save Coal Country for Christmas
December 4-6, 2009
Alexander Cockburn
War Cries From a Defeated Man
Ishmael Reed
The Selling of "Precious": Hollywood's Enduring Myth of the Black Male Sexual Predator
Paul Craig Roberts
The Twin Frauds of Obama
Vijay Prashad
Children Afraid of the Night: the Regional Alternative to Escalation in Afghanistan
Muhammad Idrees Ahmad
Pakistan Creates Its Own Enemy
Linn Washington, Jr.
Juvenile Injustice in a Philly Suburb
Eamonn McCann
The Rape of Irish Children
Rannie Amiri Lebanon: an End to Sectarian Politics?
David Rosen
Top Sports Sex Scandals
Benjamin Dangl
Turning Activists Into Voters in Uruguay
Dave Lindorff
The Epicenter of Mendacity
Dan Meek
The Assault on Campaign Finance Reform
Geoff Berne
Barbarians at the Schoolhouse
Todd Alan Price
Milwaukee League Comes to the Defense of Public Schools
Frank Green
Slim Turnout at World Peace March
John Halle
Run, Ralph, Run
Brian Tokar
Repackaging Copenhagen
Brian M. Downing
Escalation and Exit in Afghanistan
Jim Goodman
The Trail of Broken Promises
Bruce E. Levine
Are Americans Too Broken for the Truth to Set Us Free?
Charles R. Larson
Obsession With Objects: Pamuk's Dazzling New Novel
Kim Nicolini
Fantastic Mr. Fox:
Filming the Imagination
David Yearsley
A Mighty Fortress is Our Bach
Lorenzo Wolff
Owl City:
From MySpace to the Billboard Charts
Poets' Basement
Three Poems by Greg Keeler
Website of the Weekend
Banana Land Campaign
December 3, 2009
Jeff Ballinger
Helping Dicatators Look Good
Paul Fitzgerald / Elizabeth Gould
What are We Fighting for in Afghanistan?
Christopher Brauchli
Innocent Dead Men Walking
Laura Flanders
All-Too-Familiar Line on Afghanistan
Franklin Lamb
Hezbollah's New Manifesto
Mark Weisbrot
Unavoidable Differences: Brazil vs. Washington
Gary Leupp
Obama's Tortured Rationale
Stephen Fleischman
Envisioning an Exit Strategy?
Bill Christison
Obama's Unjust Iran Policy
December 2, 2009
Paul Craig Roberts
The Obama Puppet
Gareth Porter
The Power Struggle Behind Obama's Speech
Zoltan Grossman
Afghanistan: the Roach Motel of Empires
Mike Whitney
The Path to Full Employment: an Interview with Marshall Auerback
Ron Jacobs
The Escalation Begins: an Exchange with Anand Gopal
M. Shahid Alam
The Groveling of Pakistani Elites
D.K. Wilson
Is Tiger Woods Black Enemy Number One?
Fran Shor
Obama and the Dying Empire
Susan Galleymore
African Realities in the Wake of World AIDS Day
Jayne Lyn Stahl
Caught in the Cross Fire
Website of the Day
Rebel Without a Conscience
December 1, 2009
David Price
Human Terrain Systems, Anthropologists and the War in Afghanistan
Afshin Rattansi
The Dubai Disaster: a Familiar Fall
Carlos Benemann
Dubai FUBAR
Dean Baker
Is "Helping Homeowners" Washingtonspeak for Bailing Out the Banks?
Bouthaina Shaaban Rejecting Westocentrism
David Rosen
America's Failing Sexual Health
Susan Galleymore
Global Connections and the Arc of War
David Macaray
Labor's Beating Heart
Miriam Pemberton
Bush-Style Military Spending Not Over Yet
Farzana Versey
Condoms, Hunks and the AIDS Celebrity Circus
Website of the Day
The Story of Cap and Trade