The Hamilton Round Table on Poverty spent almost five hours making presentation to City Hall on Friday February 10th, but the whole morning's worth of words were summed up pretty succinctly by three speakers that "presented a face" to poverty. Gloria Wade is a mom who, after losing her son to multiple illnesses, turned advocate. She saw first hand how much was wrong with our social services. She saw first hand how the disabled don't have a voice. And she knows from personal experience that the income levels for those on Disability are so woefully under the poverty line that they actually cause more poverty and illness.

Full article text and audio from City Hall

more audio

This piece is a 71 minute audio interview with author William Engdahl first broadcast on "Financial Sense Newshour".

Engdahl, an economist by training, is an author, and commentator, on economic and geo-political issues. His work is published widely in the corporate and financial press, where he is seen as "outspoken", but clearly writing from within the dominant point of view.

Audio from Noam Chomsky's Lecture at University College Dublin, recorded Jan. 19 2006.

"These are detestable murderers and scumbags. I'll tell you that right up front... They want to break our society. I actually believe that... It doesn't matter whether we are in Afghanistan or any place in the world. We are going to be a target in their sights. They detest our freedoms. They detest our society. They detest our liberties... We're not going to let those radical murderers and killers rob from others and we're certainly not going to let them rob from Canada...We're not the public service of Canada, we're not just another department. We are the Canadian Forces and our job is to be able to kill people..."

(Canada's highest ranking military officer, Lt. Gen. Rick Hillier, Chief of the Defense Staff, speaking on Canada's role in Afghanistan, wire service interview, July 14 2005)

In less than a month from now, at the end of January 2006, approximately 2,000 Canadian soldiers will depart from their bases in western Canada for the Kandahar region of southern Afghanistan. Their mission includes engaging in combat, under American command, with groups of Islamist fighters active in the region, as part of "Operation Enduring Freedom", the Pentagon's description of America's so called "War on Terror".

Although Canadian forces have been on the ground in Afghanistan since early in 2002 this new deployment is significantly larger and potentially more violent than in the past. It is arguably the most significant use of the Canadian military in combat (i.e. non "peacekeeping" missions) since the Korean war of the mid 1950's.


This story will consist of three parts. In the first I'll review the official positions of the government, and the parties running for office in the current election, the second will examine the details of the upcoming Canadian mission, what they and the other countries engaged in the war in the Kandahar region are likely to be doing. The final segment will examine the relationship of this operation to oil, empire, and the global heroin trade.

We need to go to law school. Seriously. As activists, we are absolutely dependent on an industry of law that we know very little about and have very little influence in. Prison is serious stuff and to have so little available help within our own ranks is not acceptable or safe. Our friends and lovers are shuffled around in a system that leaves them wondering what they were actually charged with and/or convicted of and what exactly the evidence against them was. Our families are left in utter darkness about procedures and are reduced to begging for legal information from attorneys paid $200 an hour. I seriously believe we need more activist attorneys. NOW.