Project Censored has released its much awaited list of the Top 25 censored news stories of the past year. Complete with links – check it out!
North Korea to ditch ‘nuclear aims’ in exchange for U.S. energy, security
Iran is defending their use of nuclear energy, and North Korea has agreed to scrap their nuclear program in conjunction with China, Japan, and South Korea.
The Far East is keeping this in perspective and the U.S. should follow suit. Iran’s announcement to continue pursuing atomic energy projects appears troublesome. Reuters reports from Beijing that the real work lies ahead.
North Korea’s neighbors, S. Korea and Japan, received the news cautiously Monday.
BBCNews published a timeline of events since N. Korea first publicized its secret nuclear program in October 2002.
Monday’s papers report that the U.S. is pleased with the situation in Iraq despite the fact that over 250 civilians have been killed in suicide terrorist attacks in the past five days.
On Judith Miller and Jose Padilla
Let us not lose sight of the Jose Padilla and Judith Miller cases. It is probably that both infringe dangerously on the constitutional rights of all American citizens.
Jose Padilla, an American citizen has been detained for three years without proper access to litigation and without being officially charged. Last week the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of the Bush Administration, keeping Padilla unlawfully locked away, and setting a dangerous precedent.
San Franciso Bay View examines this verdict in “Jose Padilla and the death to personal liberty.”
FindLaw.com finds the detention unjust, and compares it to the recent Hamdi v. Rumsfeld ruling.
A recent Washington Post editorial asks for the U.S. Government to at least apply some criminal charge to Padilla to make his containment appear lawful, however the recent decision changes nothing in the way the U.S. government has dealth with potential terrorist of American citizenry.
Whatever Became of Judith Miller? asks Patt Morrisson in the Huffington Post. She’s been in jail since JULY in the case of the Valerie Plame name-dropping. Meanwhile, it appears that the media has forgotten that the leak may have originated with Karl Rove via Robert Novak.
Editor and Publisher reports that a visitor’s list has been released and John Bolton, the new US Ambassador to the UN’s name appears on it. In addition to a hundred or so other guests, Tom Brokaw, film director Irwin Winkler, Richard Clarke and two of his former aides, Iraqi weapons hunter Charles Duelfer, Bob Dole, publisher Mort Zuckerman, and Sen. Arlen Spector all paid a visit to the imprisoned New York Times reporter.
Miller’s imprisonment is comparable to Chinese government sanctions on journalists, according to a September 19 editorial in the New York Times.
The September 15 Christian Science Monitor asks for the U.S. to set a global example in regards to protection and freedom of the press by passing a federal shield law.
It is important that these stories continue to be covered while the media has gathered the impetus to bring a variety of social and cultural concerns to the forefront in light of the Hurricane Katrina disaster.
Meanwhile, Novak was last scene filing new stories from “unconfirmed White House sources” detailing President Bush’s desire to fill Sandra Day O’Connor’s Supreme Court seat with an ultra-conservative federal appellate judge from Austin, TX named Priscilla Owen.
In a more recent report filed Saturday, Novak reports that Sen. Harry Reid will filibuster an appointment of Judge Owen
Iranian President announces plans to potentially use nukes
New Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad convinced skeptical allies that Iran may, in fact, use its nuclear energy program to build atomic bombs at the U.N. conference this weekend.
The Washington Post declares it a diplomatic disaster that no U.S. official could convince the world of this and now Iran is in position to maintain control of its nuclear stockpiles.
“In the face of U.S. provocation,” he told the General Assembly, “we will reconsider our entire approach to the nuclear issue.”
In defending Iran’s right to a nuclear program, Ahmadinejad expressed doubt that the deadly attacks against the United States on Sept. 11, 2001, were really carried out by terrorists. He said Americans had brought the devastation of Hurricane Katrina upon themselves and that the U.S. military was purposely poisoning its own troops in Iraq according to the Washington Post article.
Tehran declared victory shortly afterward when the IAEA board decided against reporting the country’s nuclear program to the Security Council.