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April 13, 2006
04.13.06 Immigrants Walk Out; USAmericans in Cuban Med Schools; Privatizing the Apocalypse
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April 13, 2006 Edition |
| "The Best of the Rest of the Web" |
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THiS WEEK: Tens of thousands participate in marches across the US to protest anti-immigrant legislation; a disturbing look at where your tax dollars go; Mike Davis has some customarily interesting things to say about slum ecology; Vegetarianism 101; debating the past and future of the environmental movement; fake news in your teevee; millions-strong demonstrations in France, driven primarily by students, force down a law that would have made it easier to fire young workers; USAmericans heading to Cuba for medical school; privatizing the apocalypse; superheroes, fictional and real; Zapatistas fight tourist resort on communal lands; possible scenarios for a US strike on Iran; and many other points of interest and/or amusement in this heavy and long-overdue batch of Media Picks.
This Week's Picks:
- PHOTO ESSAY | Nation of Immigrants
On April 10, following massive school walkouts across the US, tens of thousands participated in the National Day of Action for Immigrant Justice, leading marches in cities all over the country. The protestors demanded a stop to immigrant intimidation and, specifically, the now-notorious bill HR4437, which would turn an estimated 11.5 million illegal immigrants—and those who provide them with support of any kind—into felons.Los Angeles Times
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-041006immig-pg,0,3621967.photogallery?coll=la-home-headlines - PIE CHART | Where Your Income Tax Really Goes
War Resisters League
http://www.warresisters.org/piechart.htm - Slum Ecology
Avilla Miseria in Buenos Aires may have the worst feng shui in the world: it is built in a flood zone over a former lake, a toxic dump, and a cemetery.Mike Davis | Orion
http://www.oriononline.org/pages/om/06-2om/Davis.html - Assassination: a Primer
From "A Study of Assassination," a training manual written by the CIA and distributed to agents and operatives at the time of the agency's 1954 covert coup in Guatemala. - VIDEO | Vegetarian World
This 1982 documentary is a good (if fairly simple) overview of the merits of vegetarianism, but it's particularly interesting to see how the makers of this film thought of and presented vegetarianism, more than 20 years ago. William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy make appearances. While a lot of vegetarian documentaries focus heavily on morality and the atrocities of the slaughterhouse, The Vegetarian World is a rather tame introduction to the idea of vegetarianism which is good for all ages and all levels of sensitivity.Moving Images Archive (note: the smaller, 33Mb version of this is exceedingly poor quality; we recommend the larger, higher-res version to viewers).
http://www.archive.org/details/vegeworld - Movement Shakers
Two eco-leaders—one mainstream, one radical—debate the movement's past and future.Kathryn Schulz | Grist
http://www.grist.org/news/maindish/2006/03/29/schulz/ - VIDEO | Fake TV News: Widespread and Undisclosed
A new study being released today by the Center for Media and Democracy found at least 77 TV stations around the country have aired corporate-sponsored video news releases over the past 10 months. The report accuses the TV stations of actively disguising the content—which has been paid for by companies like General Motors, Panasonic and Pfizer—to make it appear to be their own reporting.Democracy Now!
VIDEO: http://play.rbn.com/?url=demnow/demnow/demand/2006/april/video/dnB20060406a.rm&proto=rtsp&start=10:39
AUDIO ONLY: http://www.archive.org/download/dn2006-0406/dn2006-0406-1_64kb.mp3 - AUDIO | Labor Victory in France
France has been in the grips of a momentous wave of social protest, uniting young people and labor in a way that harks back to May 1968. Millions have gone out into the streets to protest a law that would make it easy to fire young workers. But yesterday Chirac backed off from the law—a victory which, according to economist Rick Wolff, represents a larger triumph over the forces of neoliberalism.C.S. Soong | Against the Grain
http://www.againstthegrain.org/audio4.11.06.mp3 - India's Brave New World
Farm suicides in Vidharbha crossed 400 this week. The Sensex share index crossed the 11,000 mark. And Lakme Fashion Week issued over 500 media passes to journalists. All three are firsts. All happened the same week. And each captures in a brilliant if bizarre way a sense of where India's Brave New World is headed.P. Sainath | CounterPunch
http://www.counterpunch.org/sainath04012006.html - CARTOON | Crimes Against Humanity
Mr. Fish | Harper's
http://www.harpers.org/art/cartoons/mrfish/PalestinianBoy_350.jpg - Americans Attend Cuban Med School
At odds with the United States since 1959 and determined to hold his ground until the end, Fidel Castro's parting gift to a world fed up with America's superiority complex may well be batches of young Americans who survive medical school in Cuba.Patricia Johnson | New American Media
http://news.pacificnews.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=fba24d352e2cf6a94a61d88b46d5238d - Privatizing the Apocalypse
The long arm of privatization is reaching deep into an almost unimaginable place at the heart of the national security apparatus—the laboratory where scientists learned to harness the power of the atom more than 60 years ago and created weapons of apocalyptic proportions.Frida Berrigan | Tom Dispatch via Mother Jones
http://www.motherjones.com/commentary/columns/2006/03/privatizing_apocalypse.html - AUDIO | Superpowers
We answer the following questions about superpowers. Can superheroes be real people? (No.) Can real people become superheroes? (Maybe.) And which is better, flight or invisibility? (Depends who you ask.) Featuring Chris Ware, Wonder Woman, and a pair of Burmese twin teenagers who are also the leaders of a rebel separatist group.This American Life
http://www.thisamericanlife.org/pages/descriptions/01/178.html
Listen directly: http://www.thisamericanlife.org/ra/178.ram - Globalization's Unsung Martyrs
In same the week that ETA announced an indefinite ceasefire—after more than 40 years of terrorism and 817 deaths—Spanish police revealed that between 1000 and 1500 sub-Saharan Africans had died attempting to reach the Canary Islands in the last five months. Aspirant workers such as these risk their lives attempting to open up the markets of the First World.Jeremy Rose | ZNet
http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=30&ItemID=10064 - Zapatistas in Zirahuén
To shouts of "Zapata lives, the struggle continues!" and "Cárdenas, understand, our land is not for sale!" about 500 indigenous peasant farmers from the "Caracol in Rebellion of Lake Zirahuén" received Zapatista Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos with a march. They later expressed to him their determination to continue the struggle to defend their communal lands in the face of an ambitious tourism mega-project—a resort complex with casinos, five-star hotels, restaurants and various recreational centers, including a golf course, on top of some 3,020 acres of communal lands located on the shores of Lake Zirahuén.Bertha Rodríguez Santos | The Narco News
http://www.narconews.com/Issue41/article1719.html - Scenarios of an American strike
Anticipated scenarios of an American military strike against Iran depend on a reading of pre-emptive force and Washington's military experiences since the end of the Cold War, in addition to military and regional balances in the Middle East area.Mustafa El-Labbad | Al-Ahram Weekly
http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2006/788/special.htm
- Media Picks Contributing Editors: Adam Barker, Justin Park
- Media Picks compiled and edited by Erin
Wiegand and Brian Awehali
Posted by erin at April 13, 2006 09:26 AM