Orwell returns to Spain

The state aims to criminalize protest with a troubling ‘citizens’ security’ law

Sean Penn, Michael Moore and Oliver Stone pay tribute to Hugo Chávez

Hollywood liberals Sean Penn, Michael Moore and Oliver Stone have paid tribute to Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez, who died on 5 March after a long battle with cancer, at the age of 58.

German Minister: 'US Operating Without any Kind of Boundaries'

In an interview, German Interior Minister Thomas de Maizière, 60, warns that American spying has become "boundless" and expresses sorrow that approval ratings for the United States have plummeted in Germany.

America's Coup Machine: Destroying Democracy Since 1953

Soon after the 2004 U.S. coup to depose President Jean-Bertrand Aristide of Haiti, I heard Aristide's lawyer Ira Kurzban speaking in Miami. He began his talk with a riddle: "Why has there never been a coup in Washington D.C.?" The answer: "Because there is no U.S. Embassy in Washington D.C." This introduction was greeted with wild applause by a mostly Haitian-American audience who understood it only too well.

The murderous history of USAID, the US Government agency behind Cuba’s fake Twitter clone

Not that this is news to PandoDaily readers, of course: Earlier this year, we broke the story about USAID co-investing with Omidyar Network in Ukraine NGOs that organized and led the Maidan revolution in Kiev, resulting in the overthrow of President Viktor Yanukovych. That revolution hasn’t turned out so well — thanks to the “success” of the USAID-Omidyar-funded revolution, there’s talk of the West going to war with nuclear-armed Russia, Ukraine is losing entire chunks of territory like the proverbial leper on a waterslide, Kiev is run by a coalition of costume-party fascists and a handful of billionaire Mafia dons—and Vladimir Putin has never been more popular, or more tyrannical.

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The truth is, USAID’s role in a covert ops and subversion should be common knowledge—it’s not like the record is that hard to find. Either USAID has developed those Men In Black memory-zappers, or else—maybe we don’t want to remember.

This selective amnesia doesn’t do anyone else any good however, so I figured it might be useful to offer a brief look back at some of USAID’s darkest, ugliest moments. It’s important to note that not everything USAID does is patently evil — in fact, there are many programs that could even be described as good. But USAID, as with any agency of American power, is fully capable of and will continue to be an instrument of geopolitical and corporate force.

As Big Tech becomes increasingly intertwined with USAID’s missions around the world — particularly as USAID’s programs and language merge with the lexicon and interests of Silicon Valley (such as “Global Development Lab,” USAID’s new “DARPA-like” research arm) — now’s a good time to refresh our memories about USAID’s dark past.

Reality check: How costly wars overwhelmed the US empire beyond salvation

In Syria, Libya, Egypt, the Ukraine, and most recently in Palestine and Israel, too many calamitous scenarios have exposed the fault lines of US foreign policy.

Barack Obama pulls a George W. Bush: Lies, misinformation and chemical weapons

Remember the almost-war in Syria last year? An amazing new report -- which our media won't touch -- is a must read

When Is a Putsch a Putsch? (The US False Narrative about Ukraine Continues)

News of a Russian arms buildup next to Ukraine is part of the propaganda war

Any report about Ukraine these torrid days needs to come with a political health warning, even if that report originates from what might be called "our own" side. This includes the latest revelation from Nato about Russian troop deployments on the borders of eastern Ukraine.

Over the past six months, but especially since the collapse of Viktor Yanukovych's government in February and his circuitous flight from Kiev, there has been as much of a propaganda war as – potentially – a real war between Russia and the west. Two distinct, and for the most part mutually exclusive, versions of the truth have been put about, and have found receptive audiences on either side.

US pays $8 million a month to have its private armies deployed in Ukraine - British press

Reflections on Ukraine and Regime Change

This disruption is something we have seen in numerous other countries—at this very time from Venezuela to Thailand. The goal of these western-financed attacks has been to make the world safe for the 1%, the global super rich. Ukraine citizens who think they are fighting for democracy will eventually discover that they are really serving the western plutocracy. They will be left with a new government filled with old intentions. Ukrainians will end up with nothing to show for their efforts except a still more depressed and more corrupt economy, an enormous IMF debt, a worsening of social services, and an empty “democracy,” led by corrupt opportunists like Tymoshenko.

Greenwald returns to US first time since Snowden leaks: Will Obama arrest him?

The Huffington Post is reporting that Glenn Greenwald and Laura Poitras, two US journalists who have played prominent roles in the series of reporting about the classified National Security Agency documents leaked by Edward Snowden, will be in the US on Friday, the first time since the news about NSA surveillance programs first broke in the international media.

The two journalists met with Snowden and interviewed him in Hong Kong in June 2013 and helped with breaking the news of the leaks.

Journalists who got Snowden docs arrive in US for first time in months

Glenn Greenwald says he wasn't 100 percent sure he wouldn't be arrested.

Back to the coalition agreement: data retention laws should not be revived

In 2010, the coalition announced that they would roll back the surveillance state including the “Ending of storage of internet and email records without good reason”. The coalition is on the threshold of fulfilling that pledge - at least in relation to data held by ISPs. ISPs meanwhile need to clarify what they are doing now that the law is gone.

Facebook receives nearly 2,000 data requests from UK police

Social network says more than 70% of requests in second half of 2013 in connection with criminal cases led to release of content

Dropbox Developers Finally Fix Ubuntu Indicator Bug in New Release

Dropbox 2.7.50 Experimental Version Released with Fixes and Improvements

Spy-happy Condoleezza Rice joins Dropbox board as privacy adviser

Dropbox has been hit with a firestorm of criticism after announcing that Iraq war architect Condoleezza Rice has joined its board.

The cloud-based file-sharing service said it was "honored to be adding someone as brilliant and accomplished as Dr. Rice to our team".

However, the internet has lit up with anger over the decision, with many Dropbox users threatening to stop using its services – "Drop Dropbox" in other words.

Condoleezza Rice, surveillance and torture fan, joins Dropbox board

Rice joining Dropbox is the insult, not the injury, which is in the firm's DNA: customer privacy as a feature, not a principle.

After 16 years, CIA declassifies new portions of "KUBARK" interrogation manual

While President Obama forbid via executive order the use of torture techniques such as waterboarding, or confinement in a small box or coffin, the same executive order cemented the use of isolation, forms of sensory deprivation, use of drugs, and sleep deprivation in the Department of Defense’s Army Field Manual 2-22.3, which is now the U.S. standard for interrogation. In that sense, irrespective of the controversies over waterboarding and the post-9/11 “enhanced interrogation” program approved by John Yoo and other Bush-era government attorneys, much of what was KUBARK lives on.

Scathing Report Cites ‘Excessive Force’ by Albuquerque Police

L.A. deputies shoot, kill the wrong man, age 30

Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies mistakenly shot to death a hostage who was fleeing from a knife-wielding attacker at a West Hollywood apartment, authorities announced Thursday.

John Winkler, 30, an aspiring television producer, died at a hospital following Monday night's confrontation.

"Taking the life of an innocent person is a police officer's greatest nightmare," Interim Sheriff John Scott said at a news conference.

Judge says prosecutors should follow the law. Prosecutors revolt.

Receipt clears Brooklyn man after 24 years in jail for murder

Jonathan Fleming (center) talks with reporters after exiting a courtroom in New York on April 8. Fleming, who spent almost a quarter-century behind bars for murder, was freed on Tuesday and cleared of a killing that happened when he was 1,100 miles away on a Disney World vacation.

Weev Is Free to Troll Again After Appeals Court Tosses Out Conviction

Hoards of internet enthusiasts crowed in unison, when Andrew "Weev" Auernheimer was convicted of computer fraud in 2012 and later sentenced to 3.5 years in prison. And on Friday, those cries were justified. A federal appeals panel just overturned the conviction but not for the reasons some activists might've hoped for.

Weev Is Free

Andrew “weev” Auernheimer is set to be released from federal prison, following a federal appeals court decision to reverse and vacate his conviction and sentence.

“I’m going to prison for arithmetic,” Weev declared last March. Shortly after, he was incarcerated in the federal prison system, charged with violating the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, the same law that federal prosecutors were invoking against the late Aaron Swartz — a close friend of weev.

There Are 10 Times More Mentally Ill People Behind Bars Than in State Hospitals

Greece: Golden Dawn Mob Threatens NGO for Treating Migrants in Perama Clinic

A neo-Nazi mob affiliated to the Greek Golden Dawn party has intimidated a polyclinic of the human rights organisation Medecins du Monde (Doctors of the World) because it was providing healthcare services and medication to immigrants.