TV News LIES

Six years after the U.S. invaded Iraq, 36 percent of Baghdad's drinking water is unsafe, according to the Iraqi Environment Ministry - in a good month. In a bad month, it's 90 percent. Cholera broke out last summer, and officials fear another outbreak this year.

The U.S. bombing campaign that forced Iraq to withdraw from Kuwait damaged the water system and cut the resources needed to fix it.

A decade of international economic sanctions impoverished Iraq, and the water got worse. The U.S.-led invasion six years ago led to wide looting of offices and the abandonment of purification systems.

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The Australian communications regulator says it will fine people who hyperlink to sites on its blacklist, which has been further expanded to include several pages on the anonymous whistleblower site Wikileaks.

Wikileaks was added to the blacklist for publishing a leaked document containing Denmark's list of banned websites.

ACMA's blacklist does not have a significant impact on web browsing by Australians today but sites contained on it will be blocked for everyone if the Federal Government implements its mandatory internet filtering censorship scheme.

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During Operation Cast Lead, Israeli forces killed Palestinian civilians under permissive rules of engagement and intentionally destroyed their property, say soldiers who fought in the offensive.

The soldiers are graduates of the Yitzhak Rabin pre-military preparatory course at Oranim Academic College in Tivon. Some of their statements made on Feb. 13 will appear Thursday and Friday in Haaretz.

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The government yesterday bowed to growing pressure over allegations of Britain's complicity in torture by promising to draw up and publish new guidelines for the security and intelligence agencies when they are involved in interrogating detainees abroad.

Announcing the unexpected move to MPs, Gordon Brown said he condemned torture "absolutely" but had asked the intelligence and security committee (ISC) to help draw up new guidelines "in order to have systems that are robust".

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In early 1919, Germany put in place a new government to begin rebuilding the country after its crushing defeat in World War I. But the right-wing forces that had led the country into the War and lost the War conspired even before it was over to destroy the new government, the "Weimar Republic." They succeeded.

The U.S. faces a similar "Weimar Moment." The devastating collapse of the economy after eight years of Republican rule has left the leadership, policies, and ideology of the right utterly discredited. But, as was the case with Germany in 1919, Republicans do not intend to allow the new government to succeed. They will do everything they can to undermine it. If they are successful, the U.S. may yet go the way of Weimar Germany.

A 29-year-old former Bush administration aide was sentenced today to 2 1/2 years in federal prison for stealing nearly $600,000 from a nonprofit group that promotes democracy in Cuba.

Felipe E. Sixto of Miami pleaded guilty last year in U.S. District Court in the District to stealing from a federally funded program. Today, U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton called the crime an "elaborate scheme" that badly damaged the nonprofit group, the Center for a Free Cuba, where Sixto worked from 2003 through July 2007.

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TVNL Comment:  Under present day drug laws, the penalty for selling 2 ounces of an illegal drug in NY is a minimum of 8 years to life in prison.  Where's the justice?  Just asking....

In his interview with CNN's John King -- his first television interview since leaving the vice presidency -- Cheney revealed a view of federal power that is incoherent and hypocritical.

According to recently released legal memos from the Bush-Cheney administration, the former vice president believes that the federal government can ignore the First Amendment and suppress free speech and freedom of the press as part of its "war on terror."