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Binu

California Pension Funds Close To Bankruptcy
By Kevin Martinez
www.countercurrents.org/martinez300109.htm
The two largest pension funds in California, the California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS) and the California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS), have lost billions of dollars in value. Hundreds of thousands of retiring state employees and teachers now face the stark choice of accepting much reduced pension checks or working past their retirement age

2.5 Million Protest Government Response To Global Economic Crisis In France On ‘Black Thursday’
By Michael Galvin
www.countercurrents.org/galvin300109.htm
If only more around the world would take notice of the French example, stop their daily routine, and take action against neoliberal government bail-outs giving billions in public funds to the prime capitalist offenders, we would actually be able to construct a new and better world in the ruins of unjust and imperialist capitalist one

Why Barkha Dutt Should Walk The Talk?
By Binu Karunakaran
www.countercurrents.org/karun300109.htm
The Netherlands based Indian blogger Chyetanya Kunte had to retract comments made on his/her blog ckunte.com in the post titled ‘Shoddy journalism’ against the NDTV Ltd and Barkha Dutt and tender an unconditional apology, presumably because of a threatening legal memo

Iraq: A Capped Volcano Of Suffering
By Dahr Jamail
www.countercurrents.org/jamail300109.htm
Baghdad today, on the eve of provincial elections, feels like it has emerged from several years of horrendous violence, but do not be misled. Every Iraqi I’ve spoken with feels it is tenuous, the still-fragile lull too young to trust

Threat Of Violence Looms Again Over Fallujah
By Dahr Jamail
www.countercurrents.org/jamail300109A.htm
The threat of violence hangs over Fallujah again as leaders of the Awakening Council fight for political power through the elections Jan. 31

Will Obama Policies Bring Real Change For The Muslim World?
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali
www.countercurrents.org/ghazali300109.htm
Obama’s election has aroused optimism in the Muslim world that he would reverse the Bush administration policies that created negative image of America and fomented anti-American feelings throughout the world. President Obama said in his Al-Arabiya interview that ultimately, people are going to judge me not by my words but by my actions and my administration’s actions. Let us hope that his policies will bring peace to all

Were Chickens Firing Rockets?
By Sameh A. Habeeb
www.countercurrents.org/habeeb300109.htm
I continued touring farms in the area where the smell of death filled the air. Surviving chickens roamed around surrounded by thousands of their dead kin. It was an overwhelming scene leaving one to ask only: why?

Tough Love And The Brutal Truth
By Eeileen Fleming
www.countercurrents.org/fleming300109.htm
Jerry Levin, Author and a former CNN Mid East Bureau Chief in Lebanon, delivered the following statement to the Muslim Students Association at University of Alabama, Birmingham

No Innocent Bystanders
By Gregory Elich
www.countercurrents.org/elich300109.htm
An interview with Mickey Z

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