Leigh M. Smith

Unsurprisingly, the U.S. Office of the Secretary of Defence (Donald Rumsfeld) has found that no evidence remained on the Australian Guantanamo Bay detainees that could be not denied as torture or abuse after allegations by Hick’s lawyer, parents and British detainees.

In a welcome move, some corporate Australian media is openly questioning the imminent military trial of David Hicks, one of the first four detainees to appear before U.S. military tribunal, after being illegally held at Guantanamo Bay for over 2 years without charge and allegedly tortured.

Pratap Chatterjee has an insightful article at AlterNet (who have also produced an excellent guide to anti-RNC activities) on the degree of waste in the reconstruction of Iraq and the fact that only 2% of the money appropriated for reconstruction has been spent, while much of the oil-for-food fund has actually been handed out to…

The Republicans are coming! The Republicans are coming! The first signs of the impending “big bang” created by the collision of New York City irreverent art and political protest around the Republican National Convention began last night with The Vomitorium, a reflection of the gorge-fests of the empire of ancient Rome with the new American…

Courtesy of discourse.net, GQ have a must-read article on the persecution of the Abu Ghraib whistle blower which illuminates how little the public has been informed about the wilfulness of the torture – particularly that several of the soldiers in the pictures should not have even been in the cellblock. The extent of the cover…

Going out on a limb, could there be any correlation between Chavez winning the referendum in Venezuela, with the U.S. backed opposition vowing to contest the result and Bush beginning the return of 70,000 troops from Germany and South Korea, many to the U.S?

Courtesy of Michael Moore, Porter Goss, the proposed director of the CIA, replacing George Tenet describes just how qualified he is for the job.

Courtesy of War in Context, the Center for Public Integrity has a very detailed report on those corporations most benefiting from post-war contracts. Interesting to note the second highest earning contractor, Parson’s Corporation, well behind Kellogg Brown and Root, who “just happen” to be the subsidiary of Halliburton, VP Cheney’s company (who still pays him).