Another Angle 25 - February - 2006

ANOTHER ANGLE
News others won't tell you



NATIONAL:



Venezuelan-Owned Citgo Faces Congressional Inquiry For Offering Discounted Oil to U.S. Poor
Republican Congressman Joe Barton of Texas has launched an investigation into one of the world’s major oil companies. But he is not investigating whether any of the oil giants are engaging in price gouging at a time when gasoline and heating oil casts are skyrocketing. Instead Barton has set his sights on the only oil company that actually dared to lower its prices last year - at least for the poorest Americans.



Katherine Harris got illegal donations
A defense contractor who pleaded guilty Friday to bribing a California congressman told federal authorities he also funneled illegal campaign contributions to U.S. Rep. Katherine Harris of Longboat Key, who's running for the U.S. Senate.



Dubai's NY Port: Ties to bin Laden, Taliban
No matter what Bush and his supporters say, there is indisputable evidence of tight connections between the United Arab Emirates and leadership of both the Taliban and Al Qaeda. The country is the center of financial activity in the Persian Gulf, and has next to no laws controlling money laundering. It remains a key center of operations for Victor Bout, the notorious arms dealer, with ties to Taliban and Al Qaeda. There were also ties to the infamous BCCI.



Bush's Mysterious 'New Programs'
The combination of the Bush administration’s expansive reading of its own power and its insistence on extraordinary secrecy has raised the alarm of civil libertarians when contemplating how far the Pentagon might go in involving itself in domestic matters.
'Apologies of a Bush voter'



Olympian Shani Davis: Soul on Ice
For the record, Davis is not the first black to win a gold medal at the Winter Olympics. In the 2002 Games in Salt Lake City, Vonetta Flowers won as part of a two-woman bobsled team and Jerome Iginla, a black Canadian, was a member of the gold-winning Canadian hockey team. Davis is the first black to win an individual gold medal.



A Coverup Under Two Presidents: The Unsolved Mystery of the Oklahoma City Bombing
The 1995 bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building—at the time the worst peacetime atrocity committed on U.S. soil, with 168 dead and hundreds more injured—has been largely overshadowed by the destruction of the World Trade Center and all that has followed. But the storyline is nevertheless unnervingly familiar.



The Miseducation of the White Man
When white students don't get to read the writings of Langston Hughes and James Baldwin, they miss out on a part of American History. When white students don't get the whole story about slavery and the real causes of it, the results of it, they really don't know how to interpret what people are talking about when February comes around. And some Blacks are so confused and have "arrived" at such a level, they think that Black History is History.



INTERNATIONAL:



Shell told to pay Nigeria $1.5bn
The Ijaw have been fighting since 2000 for compensation for environmental degradation in the oil-rich region. They took the case to court after Shell refused to make the payment ordered by Nigeria's parliament. Ijaw militants have staged a spate of attacks against Shell facilities recently and are holding seven foreign oil workers hostage.



Ghana to host US military base?
The United States of America is seriously considering the establishment of a military base in Ghana for the sole purpose of protecting its access to West African oil reports the Insight newspaper.



Aristide can return, Haiti's president-elect says
But Preval, who has been told directly by Washington that it opposes the deposed president's return, said the decision should be made by Aristide himself.


Iran: Hit us, we'll hit Israeli nuke site
Dr. Abasi, an advisor to Iran's Revolutionary Guard, said Tehran would respond to an American attack with strikes on the Dimona nuclear reactor and other strategic Israeli sites such as the port city of Haifa and the Zakhariya area.



Iran leader faces Holocaust case
Although Mr Ahmadinejad did not deny the Holocaust on German soil, a law passed in 2005 permits the filing of international cases in German courts.



Yemen rejects US arrest demand
The Yemeni government has asked Washington to provide proof of its accusations against Shaikh al-Zindani in order to take judicial measures.



IRAQ:



Juan Cole: Sistani threatens to turn to Militia
Sistani seems to be threatening to deploy his own militia, Ansar Sistani, if the Iraqi government doesn't do a better job of protecting Shiites and their holy sites. One lesson Sistani will have taken from the bombing of the Askariyah shrine in Samarra is that he is not very secure in Najaf, either.



Golden Mosque Bombing - Who Benefits?
The most important question to ask regarding the bombings of the Golden Mosque in Samarra on the 22nd is: who benefits? Prior to asking this question, let us note the timing of the bombing. The last weeks in Iraq have been a PR disaster for the occupiers.



EXCLUSIVE: Al Jazeera Reporters Give Bloody First Hand Account of April ’04 U.S. Siege of Fallujah:
Please be warned some of the images you are about to see are graphic.
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Video Iraq : The Reckoning
Peter Oborne, political editor of the Spectator, reports on the West's exit strategy for Iraq. He believes the invasion of Iraq is proving to be the greatest foreign policy failure since Munich. Oborne argues that the plan to transform Iraq into a unified liberal democracy, a beacon of hope in the Middle East, is pure fantasy.


BUSH CRIME FAMILY:



UAE gave $1 million to Bush library
A sheik from the United Arab Emirates contributed at least $1 million to the Bush Library Foundation, which established the George Bush Presidential Library at Texas A&M University in College Station. The UAE owns Dubai Port Co., which is taking operations from London-based Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Co.



Dubai and The Bush Dynasty Deal with the Devil
"Few have looked at the facts of the family's rise, but just as important, commentators have neglected the thread -- not the mere occasion -- of special interests, biases, scandals (especially those related to arms dealing), and blatant business cronyism. The evidence that accumulates over four generations [of the Bush family dynasty] is really quite damning."



Knoxville Mayor Victor "Victoria" Ashe Named by Kitty Kelly Book as Cop-Killer George Bush Jr's Skull & Boner Boytoy
It relates to George W. Bush's homosexual relationsip, since about puberty, with Victor Ashe, long-time Mayor of Knoxvillle. When some in Congress began inquiries in the fall of 2003, Ashe in December, 2003, gave up being Knoxville Mayor and was appointed by George W. Bush, the occupant and resident of the White House, as the U.S. Ambassador to Poland. That is, getting Ashe out of the U.S. jurisdiction, not available to nosey Congressmen.



Bush insists outsourcing to India has its benefits
To people in Silicon Valley and around the country concerned about the outsourcing of jobs to India, President Bush on Wednesday offered something to make the practice more palatable. Pizza.



Cheney was 'drunk'
According to Doug Thompson, a written report from a secret service agent guarding Dick Cheney, the Veep was "clearly inebriated" at the time of the shooting. What other cause for delay in reporting the incident if not time to sober up?



ECONOMY:



Norwegian Bourse Director wants oil bourse - priced in euros
With all the speculation regarding an Iranian oil bourse priced in euros - the prospect of a Norwegian oil bourse somehow slipped through the cracks. As far as we know, this is the first time it has been reported in any english language publication.



OP-ED:



Whose Bombs were They
The belief that the attack was the work of American and Israeli covert-operations (Black-ops) is widespread throughout the region as well as among leftist political-analysts in the United States. Journalist Kurt Nimmo sees the bombing as a means of realizing “a plan sketched out in Oded Yinon’s “A Strategy for Israel in the Nineteen Eighties” (the balkanization of Arab and Muslim society and culture.)



Rewarding our Friends and Punishing our Enemies
Black folks have it all wrong; we reward our enemies and punish our friends. We complain, demonstrate, and protest the same people we give our money to, in what amounts to payment for our own oppression.



SCIENCE&TECHNOLOGY:



US conducts subcritical nuclear test
Anti-nuclear groups have criticised and continue to urge Washington to stop the tests, saying they are undermining the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty on nuclear weapons.



FOOD&DRINK:



MU SHU IN MOMENTS
Better than anything you can get at your local takeout joint, this way of making the Chinese classic can be done in record time.



REVIEWS/INTERVIEWS:



Pianist William Chapman Nyaho: Dett, Bonds
Seattle-based pianist William Chapman Nyaho joins Performance Today for a Black History Month celebration. A native of Ghana, he specializes in keyboard music written by composers of the African Diaspora. Nyaho chats with NPR's Fred Child and plays two movements from Nathaniel Dett's Suite "In the Bottoms:" "His Song," and "Honey: Humoresque." He follows with Margaret Bonds' spiritual "Troubled Water."



Twilight for Black Farms
A new book of photographs captures a portrait of America's black farmers as their numbers dwindle. Photographer John Ficara and NPR's Juan Williams, who wrote an essay for the book, talk about the black families who still work on American family farms, despite decades of tough times. "The black farmer, working hard for his own, became the living symbol of the strong, independent black man," Williams writes. "Farming also allowed black families to move into other businesses, from funeral homes to preaching to construction, and thus served as the bedrock of all black wealth in America."



HUMOR?:



"Destroyer Dick"