Democracy Now Report Card
by Ronald Bleier

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The Reason for this blog
Whats wrong with PC

Wednesday, December 18, 2002 -- Grade: A
Comments: --terrific program

1) At the top of the show, an interview with Andreas Zumach of the German newspaper Die Zietung which is publishing the parts of the Iraqi report on nuclear weapons, confiscated by the U.S. that may be embarrassing to the permanent member nations. The newspaper reports coming out of Germany published reports from Germany will include names and details of businesses especially from the U.S. and Germany which contributed to Iraq’s nuclear and biological/chemical weapons program before the first Gulf War.

This is an especially critical report because unless this gets media traction, Pacifica may be one of the rare outlets for this information in the United States.

2) Taking its cue from a NYT story (12.17.02) on registration of foreign nationals from selected Middle Eastern and African countries like Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Sudan, etc, DN conducted an informative discussion with immigration advocates and notably including a justice department spokesperson which helped expose how shoddily this this program is being conducted, especially in two areas: a) no sufficient outreach to the affected communities, b) incarceration of nationals for minor visa violations.

3) Time was reserved time at the end for Cheri Hunkala from the Kensington Welfare Rights Union who made good points on how U.S. money is going for war but not for social welfare.