Ear to the Ground

Catholic Church Slashes Offers, Ups Burden of Proof in Abuse Cases

Staff / Truthdig Dec 31, 2005 In negotiating with a second wave of sexual abuse victims, the Catholic Church has "reverted to the bare-knuckles tactics it had long used to silence or marginalize them," critics tell the New York Times, "largely because public attention to the scandals had abated." Read the story. Dig deeper ( 1 Min. Read )

UK Gov’t. Tries To Cover Up Its Use Of Torture-Stained Intel

Staff / Truthdig Dec 30, 2005 As Daily Kos puts it, "The British government is trying to prevent the publication of memos which detail how information procured by torture in Uzbekistan is being used by the US and the UK." The Independent has the story. Dig deeper ( 1 Min. Read )

The Big Scandal of 2006

Staff / Truthdig Dec 29, 2005 Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff will destroy the GOP with what promises to be the biggest congressional corruption scandal in years. Dig deeper ( 1 Min. Read )

Chalabi Zeros Out

Staff / Truthdig Dec 27, 2005 The slate headed by Ahmed Chalabi, a man the Pentagon once packaged as the George Washington of Iraq, may not get a single seat in the new Iraqi legislature. Dig deeper ( 1 Min. Read )

Why Iraq Invasion Will Prove a Disaster For Israel

Staff / Truthdig Dec 26, 2005 As argued elsewhere on this site by Juan Cole and Robert Scheer, one big cost of our invasion of Iraq is that Bush must now cozy up to the militants in control of Iran Now the top pro-Israel lobby accuses Bush of selling out its opposition to Iran's nuclear weapons program. Dig deeper ( 1 Min. Read )

More Outrageous Opinions From Our Next Justice

Staff / Truthdig Dec 23, 2005 Why is Samuel Alito expected to sail through Senate confirmation when his views are so outrageous? The Associated Press reports that he defended domestic wiretap protections when he worked for the Reagan Justice Department. Dig deeper ( 1 Min. Read )

America’s Best Reviewer Lauds Controversial Film

Staff / Truthdig Dec 23, 2005 The Los Angeles Times' Kenneth Turan says "Munich" is a movie that demands to be seen as much for its place in the world as for whether it succeeds He calls it " the most questioning, provocative film [Spielberg's] ever made" . Dig deeper ( 1 Min. Read )

Senate Dems Block Arctic Refuge Drilling

Staff / Truthdig Dec 21, 2005 The threat of a filibuster holds up as Republicans fail to get enough votes to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling Sen Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) tried to force the measure through Congress as part of a must-have defense spending bill See our coverage to find out what was at stake: Rep Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) filed a report after the House passed the measure earlier this week See the related story by Robert Collier and the photo essay by Deddeda Stemler to learn more. Dig deeper ( 3 Min. Read )

Iran’s Victory in Iraq

Robert Scheer / Truthdig Dec 21, 2005 For the Bush White House, the good news from Iraq just never stops. But the joy that President Bush has expressed over the country's latest election, though more restrained than his infamous "Mission Accomplished" speech, will similarly come back to haunt him. Dig deeper ( 3 Min. Read )

Intelligent Ruling on Intelligent Design

Robert Scheer / Truthdig Dec 21, 2005 It's good to know that some of our judges are standing up to the fundamentalists A federal judge in Pennsylvania ruled today that a public school district can't require the inclusion of "intelligent design" in biology classes as an alternative to evolution See story. Dig deeper ( 1 Min. Read )

The Wonderful World of Outsourced Torture

Robert Scheer / Truthdig Dec 14, 2005 The more we learn of the Bush administration's pervasive outsourcing of torture, the more sensible it seems as a policy. Evidently, our intelligence people, tainted as they are by the squeamish morality of Western civilization, are just not fully up to the task of getting prisoners to tell us what the administration wants us to hear. Dig deeper ( 3 Min. Read )

Propaganda? What Propaganda?

Robert Scheer / Truthdig Dec 13, 2005 "There is no U.S. footprint" is the proud boast of one of the Pentagon's propaganda contractors, and it prompts the questions: Why not? What are they ashamed of? One thing is that most of us in this democracy did not know we were paying for this vast official propaganda operation until we read it in Jeff Gerth's excellent investigative piece in The New York Times. A truly free press is our most valuable export, and its reputation should not be undermined by the Bushies' addiction to government propaganda. Dig deeper ( 1 Min. Read )