Countries such as Chile may finally come out from under the control of the corporate-owned U.S. government; Americans are aware of the contents of the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement only thanks to WikiLeaks; and are zodiac signs effective indicators of disease? These discoveries and more below.

On a regular basis, Truthdig brings you the news items and odds and ends that have found their way to Larry Gross, director of the USC Annenberg School for Communication. A specialist in media and culture, art and communication, visual communication and media portrayals of minorities, Gross helped found the field of gay and lesbian studies.

Will the Chilean People Save the U.S. by Electing Michelle Bachelet? The effort by corporate CEOs to dominate the global economy and global government is reaching the end-game stage.

Israel to Return Palestinian Body Parts Remember back to 2009, when there was a huge row over allegations in the Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet that Israel had been secretly harvesting body parts from Palestinians in the occupied territories.

Measuring Internet Activity: A (Selective) Review of Methods and Metrics Internet Monitor is delighted to announce the publication of “Measuring Internet Activity: A (Selective) Review of Methods and Metrics,” the second in a series of special reports that focus on key events and new developments in Internet freedom, incorporating technical, legal, social, and political analyses.

Your Zodiac Sign, Your Health Many doctors used to take astrology seriously—and season of birth has been linked to increased risk for a number of serious diseases. Can modern medicine actually learn from stars and seasonality?

CBS’s Benghazi Report Was a Hoax, Not a Mistake Lara Logan’s story was not a mere journalistic mistake, but a hoax comparable to such legendary frauds as Life magazine’s purchase of the billionaire Howard Hughes’s nonexistent “autobiography” in the seventies and Rupert Murdoch’s similarly extravagant embrace of the bogus Hitler “diaries” in the eighties.

How China’s One-Child Policy Has Affected the Boy-Girl Breakdown The ratio among Chinese newborns is 120 boys for every 100 girls—the highest in the world.

Dispatch From Philadelphia: The Brutal End of Public Education Othella Stanback could very well be a Philadelphia public school success story in the making.

Why Do We The People Have To Read TPP On Wikileaks? We the People finally get to read one chapter of the 29-chapter Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) “trade” agreement.

Judge Hands Google a Big Victory in Lengthy Book-Scanning Case Google has won a major victory in the long legal fight over its scanning and searching of millions of books.

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