Will we remember the crimes and complicity in the war in Bosnia?

By Danny Schechter

Editor, Mediachannel.org

In the TV business we speak of a “getting “a get” as in booking a big name for a highly rated TV appearance. It took nearly ten years to “get” Osama bin Laden although, in his case, his views were not wanted; he made more news, and generated more popular satisfaction, as a target of a possibly illegal liquidation.

He won’t be giving any more interviews, that’s for sure.

The world waited sixteen years for the Bosnian Serb General Ratko Mladic to be taken into custody.

It seems clear that the Serbian authorities knew where he was but didn’t want to upset the volatile and violent extreme nationalists still in their midst who backed the wars he led, and excused the massacres he carried out against the country’s Muslims and all citizens who believed in multi-ethnic states.

Mladic will now face overdue war crimes charges in The Hague.

In the week of his arrest, Serbian State television finally apologized for its role in inciting the barbaric war though misinformation,  deception and propaganda disguised as news,.

AP reported, “Radio Television of Serbia, or RTS, said in a statement posted on its website yesterday that the station’s program was “almost constantly and heavily abused’’ by Milosevic’s regime with the aim of discrediting his political and ethnic opponents and spreading official propaganda.

http://www.grist.org/coal/2011-05-27-down-with-coal-the-grassroots-anti-coal-movement-goes-global

Ted Nace – 27 May 2011

The article was coauthored by Bob Burton (CoalSwarm, Australia), Christine Shearer (CoalSwarm, U.S.), Cynthia Ong (LEAP, Malaysia), Jamie Henn (350.org, U.S.), John Hepburn (Greenpeace, Australia), Joshua Frank (CoalSwarm, U.S.), Justin Guay (Sierra Club, U.S.), Kate Hoshour (International Accountability Project, U.S.), and Mark Wakeham (Environment Victoria, Australia).

In Thailand, 10,000 people call on their government to quit coal.Photo: Athit Perawongmetha of GreenpeaceIn the United States and Europe, the triple whammy of recession, cheap alternatives, and aggressive anti-coal campaigning has helped halt the expansion of coal use. Since 2004, plans to build more than 150 coal plants in the U.S. have been abandoned. In fact, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), a government agency that analyzes energy-related statistics, predicts continued stagnation or decline in coal-fired electricity generation in the U.S. and the European Union over the coming decades.

Facing resistance to its longstanding rule in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries, King Coal has redoubled ambitions elsewhere. According to 2010 projections by the EIA, coal consumption in the non-OECD world will increase by 23 quadrillion BTUs between 2007 and 2020. That’s roughly the equivalent of today’s entire U.S. coal-mining and coal-power sector, or approximately a thousand coal-fired generators, each 300 megawatts (MW) in size, spewing toxic chemicals into the environments and lungs of surrounding communities, and an equal number of million-ton-per-year coal mines.

http://www.grist.org/pollution/2011-05-25-cancer-now-leading-cause-of-death-in-china 

by Earth Policy Institute  - 27 May 2011

As China’s pollution soars, so do rates of cancer. This post was written by Janet Larsen, director of research for the Earth Policy Institute. Additional resources at www.earth-policy.org.

Cancer is now the leading cause of death in China. Chinese Ministry of Health data implicate cancer in close to a quarter of all deaths countrywide. As is common with many countries as they industrialize, the usual plagues of poverty — infectious diseases and high infant mortality — have given way to diseases more often associated with affluence, such as heart disease, stroke, and cancer.

While this might be expected in China’s richer cities, where bicycles are fast being traded in for cars and meat consumption is climbing, it also holds true in rural areas. In fact, reports from the countryside reveal a dangerous epidemic of “cancer villages” linked to pollution from some of the very industries propelling China’s explosive economy. By pursuing economic growth above all else, China is sacrificing the health of its people, ultimately risking future prosperity.

Lung cancer is the most common cancer in China. Deaths from this typically fatal disease have shot up nearly fivefold since the 1970s. In China’s rapidly growing cities, like Shanghai and Beijing, where particulates in the air are often four times higher than in New York City, nearly 30 percent of cancer deaths are from lung cancer.

Dirty air is associated with not only a number of cancers, but also heart disease, stroke, and respiratory disease, which together account for over 80 percent of deaths countrywide. According to the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, the burning of coal is responsible for 70 percent of the emissions of soot that clouds out the sun in so much of China; 85 percent of sulfur dioxide, which causes acid rain and smog; and 67 percent of nitrogen oxide, a precursor to harmful ground level ozone. Coal burning is also a major emitter of carcinogens and mercury, a potent neurotoxin. Coal ash, which contains radioactive material and heavy metals, including chromium, arsenic, lead, cadmium, and mercury, is China’s No. 1 source of solid industrial waste. The toxic ash that is not otherwise used in infrastructure or manufacturing is stored in impoundments, where it can be caught by air currents or leach contaminants into the groundwater.

http://www.grist.org/list#item-2011-05-27-how-the-arab-spring-makes-the-massive-desertec-solar-project-in- by Christopher Mims 27 May 2011 Desertec is a massive project to to build solar thermal plants in the deserts of North Africa — you know, the same North Africa that had all the revolutions just now. But proponents are saying there’s no reason to put the project on hold …

http://www.grist.org/list#item-2011-05-27-how-the-arab-spring-makes-the-massive-desertec-solar-project-in- by Christopher Mims 27 May 2011 Desertec is a massive project to to build solar thermal plants in the deserts of North Africa — you know, the same North Africa that had all the revolutions just now. But proponents are saying there’s no reason to put the project on hold …

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/05/28-3

Published on Saturday, May 28, 2011 by CommonDreams.org

by Tim Karr

If you were around in the 80s, you might be experiencing a horrible flashback right about now.

No, it’s not because legwarmers and spandex are in style again. It’s because AT&T, that monopoly that once lorded over your rotary phone, has resurfaced with a scheme to rule your mobile phone as well.

Back in the 80s, AT&T’s power was near absolute. That’s why antitrust authorities stepped in to break up the monopoly and protect the American people against abuse.

Now, with AT&T’s planned $39 billion takeover of T-Mobile, we’re reaching the danger point again. And this time control over one of the most vital forms of communication is at stake.

If regulators allow AT&T’s takeover of T-Mobile, we would be left with a wireless market that is far more consolidated than the markets for oil, banking, automobiles and air travel.

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/05/29-1

Published on Sunday, May 29, 2011 by OtherWords

Obama is thinking about issuing an executive order that would mitigate some of the damage done to our democracy by the Supreme Court’s dastardly Citizens United edict.

by Jim Hightower

Come on, Obama, do it. Stand up, stand tall, stand firm. Yes, you can!

President Barack Obama is thinking about issuing an executive order that would mitigate some of the damage done to our democracy by the Supreme Court’s dastardly Citizens United edict, which unleashes unlimited amounts of secret corporate cash to pervert America’s elections.

Obama’s idea is simply to require that those corporations trying to get federal contracts disclose all of their campaign donations for the previous two years, including money they launder through such front groups as the Chamber of Commerce.

This approach says to those giants who are sucking up billions of our tax dollars for endless war, the privatization of public services, etc.: You’re still free to shove trainloads of your shareholders’ money into congressional and presidential races, but — hey, just tell the public how much you’re giving and to whom.

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/05/29

Published on Sunday, May 29, 2011 by CommonDreams.org

by Robert Naiman

There was a slogan on the streets of Seattle: “This is what democracy looks like.” You can’t love democracy and denigrate protest, because protest is part of democracy. It’s a package deal.

Likewise, you can’t claim solidarity with Egyptian protesters when they take down a dictator, but act horrified that the resulting government in Egypt, more accountable to Egyptian public opinion, is more engaged in supporting Palestinian rights. It’s a package deal.

On Saturday, at long last, the Egyptian government “permanently opened” the Egypt-Gaza passenger crossing at Rafah. A big part of the credit for this long-awaited development belongs to Tahrir. It was the Tahrir uprising that brought about an Egyptian government more accountable to public opinion, and it was inevitable that an Egyptian government more accountable to public opinion would open Rafah, because public opinion in Egypt bitterly opposed Egyptian participation in the blockade on Gaza.

In addition, opening Rafah was a provision of the Fatah-Hamas reconciliation accord brokered by the Egyptian government – an achievement facilitated by the fact that the post-Tahrir Egyptian government was more flexible in the negotiations with Hamas that led to the accord.