Update about the Government’s New War on Peace
In the first of 20 some rallies being conducted outside FBI offices in cities around the country, a few hundred peace and civil liberties activists gathered yesterday in Lake Wobegon Minneapolis. Some of last week’s victims of FBI raids and grand jury subpoenas spoke out: The Minnesotans who had gathered ...
CIA hires Xe, formerly Blackwater, to guard facilities in Afghanistan, elsewhere
The CIA has hired Xe Services, the private security firm formerly known as Blackwater Worldwide, to guard its facilities in Afghanistan and elsewhere, according to an industry source. The previously undisclosed CIA contract is worth about $100 million, said the source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss ...
Blackwater founder slams big gov't in Mich. speech
HOLLAND, Mich. — Blackwater Worldwide founder Erik Prince said Wednesday his values of hard work and personal responsibility "have gotten me a few detractors along the way, and I'm OK with that." Prince returned to his hometown of Holland to give a speech criticizing government spending and regulation that drew ...
Senator warns against $1B deal with Blackwater
WASHINGTON — A senior Senate Democrat said Thursday the Pentagon should consider barring Blackwater, now called Xe Services, from a new $1 billion deal to train Afghan police because of "serious questions" about the contractor's conduct. The comments by Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin suggests thinning patience in ...
2 ex-employees say Blackwater billed government for prostitute
Two former employees of Blackwater Worldwide have accused the private security contractor of defrauding the government for years with phony billing, including charging for a prostitute, alcohol and spa trips. In newly unsealed court records, a husband and wife who once worked for Blackwater said they had personal knowledge of ...
Iraq orders former Blackwater security guards out
BAGHDAD -- Iraq has ordered hundreds of private security guards linked to Blackwater Worldwide to leave the country within seven days or face possible arrest on visa violations, the interior minister said Wednesday. The order comes in the wake of a U.S. judge's dismissal of criminal charges against five Blackwater ...
U.S. contractor abducted in Iraq
The Pentagon has acknowledged that an American contractor for the Defense Department is missing in Baghdad, an apparent confirmation of a Shiite militant group's claim last week that it abducted an American in Baghdad in January.The case marks the first reported kidnapping of an American citizen in Iraq in more ...
The Expanding US War in Pakistan
Three US special forces soldiers were killed in northwest Pakistan this week, confirming that the US military is more deeply engaged on the ground in Pakistan than previously acknowledged by the White House and Pentagon (see " The Secret US War in Pakistan," November 23, 2009). The soldiers died Wednesday ...
Every detail of September 16, 2007, is burned in Mohammed Kinani's memory. Shortly after 9 am he was preparing to leave his house for work at his family's auto parts business in Baghdad when he got a call from his sister, Jenan, who asked him to pick her and her ...
Charged contractors had checkered military pasts
A pair of former Blackwater contractors charged with murdering two people in Afghanistan had checkered pasts with the military before getting hired to work overseas, according to service records disclosed in recent U.S. court hearings. The troubled backgrounds of the two men — including instances of violence, drug use and ...
Reviled by Democrats, Xe (formerly Blackwater) aims to be part of Obama's Afghanistan strategy
WASHINGTON — Blackwater Worldwide's legal woes haven't dimmed its prospects in Afghanistan, where the company is a contender to be a key part of President Barack Obama's strategy for stabilizing the country. Now called Xe Services, the company is in the running for a Pentagon contract potentially worth $1 billion ...
Former guards with US security firm charged in Afghanistan deaths
Two former guards with the security company Blackwater have been charged in the US with the murder of Afghan civilians in a case likely to reinforce accusations that the firm ran a rogue militia that showed a reckless disregard for human life. The charges follow the collapse of a case ...
Ex-SEAL killed in suicide attack was Xe employee
Jeremy Wise, the former Navy SEAL killed in a suicide bomber's attack on a CIA base in Afghanistan last week, was working for Xe, the Moyock, N.C.-based security company previously known as Blackwater. Wise's Xe affiliation is disclosed in an obituary published in today's Virginian-Pilot. Wise was one of eight ...
Germany knows nothing of alleged CIA murder plot
BERLIN (Reuters) - The German government said on Monday it knew nothing about a magazine report that the CIA had planned a secret operation to kill a German-Syrian in Hamburg linked to the September 11 attacks on U.S. targets. The U.S. magazine Vanity Fair had reported that the CIA had ...
Expecting justice, Iraqis get bitter shock as judge throws out Blackwater shooting case
BAGHDAD — Iraqis seeking justice for 17 people shot dead at a Baghdad intersection responded with bitterness and outrage Friday at a U.S. judge's decision to throw out a case against a Blackwater security team accused in the killings. The Iraqi government vowed to pursue the case, which became a ...
Iraq threatens action after Blackwater case collapses
Iraqi officials and relatives of 17 Iraqis who were killed in a crowded Baghdad square in September 2007 in an allegedly unprovoked shooting spree by Blackwater private security guards reacted with fury today to the decision by a US federal judge to dismiss all charges against five of the guards.A ...
Blackwater, Already On The Ground In Afghanistan, Now Gunning For More Contracts
It looks like the Obama Administration just can't quit the company formerly known as Blackwater. A Xe official told the Commission on Wartime Contracting Friday that the company has contracts for security as well as for training Afghan police and a "drug interdiction unit." Xe is also in the running ...
Private guards ‘took part in raids on al-Qaeda militants’
Mercenaries have been taking part in American raids on al-Qaeda militants in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to newspaper reports that will intensify pressure on Congress to curtail the use of private security guards in war zones. The disclosure that former Navy Seals and other US special forces soldiers employed by ...
Blackwater tied to clandestine CIA raids
Highly trained personnel employed with the private security firm formerly known as Blackwater Worldwide sometimes operated side by side with CIA field officers in Iraq and Afghanistan as the agency undertook missions to kill or capture members of insurgent groups in those countries, according to a former government official and ...
Is Erik Prince 'Graymailing' the US Government?
The in-depth Vanity Fair profile of the infamous owner of Blackwater, Erik Prince, is remarkable on many levels--not least among them that Prince appeared to give the story's author, former CIA lawyer Adam Ciralsky, unprecedented access to information about sensitive, classified and lethal operations not only of Prince's forces, but ...
Blackwater's Secret War in Pakistan
At a covert forward operating base run by the US Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) in the Pakistani port city of Karachi, members of an elite division of Blackwater are at the center of a secret program in which they plan targeted assassinations of suspected Taliban and Al Qaeda operatives, ...
Report: Blackwater OK'd $1M plan to pay off Iraqis
Former top executives at Blackwater Worldwide say the U.S. security contractor sent about $1 million to its Iraq office with the intention of paying off officials in the country who were angry about the fatal shootings of 17 civilians by Blackwater employees, The New York Times reported Tuesday. Four former ...
US eyes private guards for bases in Afghanistan
By Richard Larnder / Associated PressWASHINGTON — U.S. military authorities in Afghanistan may hire a private contractor to provide around-the-clock security at dozens of bases and protect vehicle convoys moving throughout the country. The possibility of awarding a security contract comes as the Obama administration is sending thousands of more ...
I'll pass on George Bush's 4th of July speech ...by John Scripsick
Norman Transcript It's good to see that Woodward, OK invited George W. Bush to their 4th of July celebration. Some days I feel sorry for this poor lonely man. His dream of being rich and famous took him to be the leader of our great nation. My satisfaction as a ...
Slain Iraqi's family sues Blackwater
ALEXANDRIA, Va., June 8 (UPI) -- U.S. security contractor Blackwater USA and its founder Erik Prince have been named in a lawsuit alleging a war crime in Iraq, documents indicate. The suit, filed in U.S. District Court in Alexandria, Va., accuses Blackwater, now known as Xe, and Prince of allowing ...
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March 23rd, 2013
This evening is going be a big moment in turning our country around on the issue of gun violence. That's why I desperately want you ...
March 21st, 2013
I am hosting a nationwide series of house parties this Saturday night where tens of thousands of people will gather together in living rooms to ...
March 15th, 2013
The response to my Newtown letter this week has been overwhelming. It is so very clear to everyone that the majority of Americans have had ...
March 13th, 2013
America, You Must Not Look Away (How to Finish Off the NRA)
The year was 1955. Emmett Till was a young African American boy from Chicago visiting relatives in Mississippi. One day Emmett was seen "flirting" with ...
February 26th, 2013
My Final Word on Buzzfeed and Emad Burnat's Detention at LAX
Thanks to everyone for bearing with me as I spend so much time on what happened to Emad Burnat. It's important to me because he's ...
February 26th, 2013
Michael Moore Responds to Buzzfeed Story on '5 Broken Cameras' Co-Director Emad Burnat
On Tuesday, February 19th, Emad Burnat, the Palestianian co-director of the Oscar-nominated documentary '5 Broken Cameras,' was detained with his wife and son at Los ...
February 20th, 2013
Last night was the Motion Picture Academy-sponsored dinner in Beverly Hills honoring the directors and producers of this year's five nominated films for Best Documentary. ...
September 11th, 2010
If the 'Mosque' Isn't Built, This Is No Longer America
OpenMike 9/11/10 Michael Moore's daily blog I am opposed to the building of the "mosque" two blocks from Ground Zero. I want it built on ...
December 14th, 2010
Why I'm Posting Bail Money for Julian Assange
Yesterday, in the Westminster Magistrates Court in London, the lawyers for WikiLeaks co-founder Julian Assange presented to the judge a document from me stating that ...
May 12th, 2011
Some Final Thoughts on the Death of Osama bin Laden
"The Nazis killed tens of MILLIONS. They got a trial. Why? Because we're not like them. We're Americans. We roll different." – Michael Moore in ...
November 22nd, 2011
Where Does Occupy Wall Street Go From Here?
This past weekend I participated in a four-hour meeting of Occupy Wall Street activists whose job it is to come up with the vision and ...
September 22nd, 2011
A STATEMENT FROM MICHAEL MOORE ON THE EXECUTION OF TROY DAVIS
I encourage everyone I know to never travel to Georgia, never buy anything made in Georgia, to never do business in Georgia. I will ask ...
December 16th, 2010
Dear Swedish Government: Hi there -- or as you all say, Hallå! You know, all of us here in the U.S. love your country. Your ...
November 2nd, 2010
This letter contains (almost) no criticisms of how the Democrats have brought this day of reckoning upon themselves. That -- and where to go from ...
'Dirty Wars' by Jeremy Scahill
Why have you started a comedy festival in northern Michigan in the middle of winter?
Because if you were here in the dead of winter in the middle of nowhere (which is actually somewhere to us), you'd need a few laughs too ... Continue Reading
Michael Moore on MSNBC with Michael Eric Dyson, 3/22/13
Michael Moore on Democracy Now!, 6/28/12
Michael Moore on the Rachel Maddow Show, 5/11/12
Michael Moore on MSNBC, Super Tuesday, 3/6/12
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Michael Moore on the Rachel Maddow Show, 2/27/12
