Robert Scheer
Los Angeles Times

What does it mean that a whopping 70% of Americans, according to a recent New York Times-CBS News poll, believe that mass culture is responsible for debasing our moral values? It means, if the poll is accurate, that we are a nation of lascivious hypocrites. In fact, the lure of sin, as represented by Hollywood and the entertainment industry, is as tempting to Americans today as apples ever were to Adam and Eve.

Whether in Utah, Georgia or New York, the TV ratings show that we are choosing the equivalent of fast-food entertainment ...   more »

by Tom Regan | csmonitor.com

Late on the Wednesday afternoon before the Thanksgiving holiday, the US Defense Department released a report by the Defense Science Board that is highly critical of the administration's efforts in the war on terror and in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

'Muslims do not hate our freedom, but rather they hate our policies [the report says]...   more »

Paul Waldman
The Gadflyer

In the latest of his analyses of the press' performance on the Iraq war, Michael Massing includes this rather incredible statement:

"At the moment, there's real sensitivity about the perceived political nature of every story coming out of Iraq," a Baghdad correspondent for a large US paper told me in mid-October. "Every story from Iraq is by definition an assessment as to whether things are going well or badly." In reality, he said, the situation in Iraq was a catastrophe, a view "almost unanimously" shared by his colleagues. But, he added, "Editors are hypersensitive about ...   more »

By Georgie Anne Geyer

… Dan Rather announced that he would leave the anchor chair in March…

Where were all the top men at CBS who, as with all the networks over the last 20 years, worked to downgrade serious news and to champion the competitive, ratings-driven stories such as the one Dan Rather pursued? Would it not have been more appropriate for them to resign?

And the still-nameless Marine in Fallujah? Perhaps I'm making excuses for him, but given the chaos of battle, it is not difficult to see how something like this could have happened. A man afraid, ...   more »

BERLIN (Reuters) - Lawyers acting for a U.S. advocacy group will Tuesday file war crimes charges in Germany against senior U.S. administration officials for their alleged role in torture at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.

"German law in this area is leading the world," Peter Weiss, vice president of the New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), a human rights group, was quoted as saying in Frankfurter Rundschau newspaper's Tuesday edition.

According to the group, German law allows war criminals to be investigated wherever they may be living…

Full article

From the CCR website:

… The U. S. officials charged include Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, Former CIA Director George Tenet, Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence Dr. Steven Cambone, Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchez, Major General Walter Wojdakowski, Major General Geoffrey Miller, Brigadier General Janis L. Karpinski, Lieutenant Colonel Jerry L. Phillabaum, Colonel Thomas Pappas, and Lieutenant Colonel Stephen L. Jordan…

Full article

(Is it at all possible that the two stories below are related?)

Nearly a Month Later, Ohio Fight Goes On

AP via Yahoo! News - Nov 29 3:18 PM

Nearly a month after John Kerry conceded Ohio to President Bush, complaints and challenges about the balloting are mounting as activists including the Rev. Jesse Jackson demand closer scrutiny to ensure the votes are being counted on the up-and-up.

NLPC Files Shareholder Proposal To End PepsiCo's Support of Jesse Jackson

[Press Release] U.S. Newswire via Yahoo! News - Nov 29 7:08 AM

Peter Flaherty, president of the National Legal and Policy Center (NLPC), today announced that NLPC has submitted a shareholder resolution to PepsiCo, Inc. (NYSE: PEP) for consideration at its 2005 annual meeting. The proposal and supporting statement read