The US hated Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez with a passion and supported an attempted coup against him in 2002 that was foiled. When he died recently, the US was openly cheering for the opposition leader in the election to replace him. When Chavez’s successor Nicolas Maduro won the April 15 election with a surprisingly narrow margin of just 1.6%, hopes were raised in the US that the result might be overturned and the US-backed candidate Henrique Capriles become leader. The US media repeatedly dwelt on supposed irregularities in the elections even though former US president Jimmy Carter has said in September 2012 that of the 92 elections he has monitored, the “election process in Venezuela is the best in the world”. [Read more…]

During much of the 20th century, many people bore the label of feminism proudly, as the movement for gender equality became seen as an important struggle that we should all support. But for some reason, the label seems to have fallen into some disfavor recently, with even people who strongly believe in the goals of the feminist movement shying away from calling themselves that. [Read more…]

The US government has become so blatantly shameless in its hypocrisy that people have largely stopped even noticing it, treating such behavior as the new normal. For example, who even bothers to comment anymore when the US warns other countries against ‘interfering’ in Iraq when it had actually invaded that country and maintained tens of thousands of troop there? The mindset is that the US essentially considered the whole world its territory. [Read more…]

The US has made a fine art of portraying the leaders of countries that it dislikes and seeks to overthrow or even invade as irrational and aggressive people with whom it is no use talking and that the only thing they understand is force and sanctions and threats. We have seen this time and again, with Iran being the latest target, though Syria has also emerged as a new enemy. [Read more…]

There is an interesting development in China where economic inequality has also exploded in recent years, making a mockery of the country’s official egalitarian philosophy. Ordinary people, fed up with this hypocrisy and the high-life being lived especially by Communist party officials, have taken to crashing lavish private parties hosted by officials and taking photographs and videos of the expensive food and drink and posting them online, enraging the public. [Read more…]

It was initially announced that Bradley Manning would be one of the honorary Grand Marshalls at San Francisco’s annual LGBT Pride parade on June 29-30, with Daniel Ellsberg standing in for him since Manning is still in jail. But there were protests and The Guardian has an article that says that the parade leadership summarily reversed course. [Read more…]

This past week saw the opening of the George W. Bush library in Texas, with great pomp and ceremony. This business of presidential libraries baffles me. What is it with presidents having their own libraries after they leave office? Who goes to visit such things? Does any other country in the world do this? [Read more…]