Back in the dark days of the Soviet Union, dissidents risked being locked up – but not, officially at least, on the grounds that they had committed a political crime. In the Soviet regime’s imagination, treason and mental illness were often two sides of the same coin. Here’s a brief description from Wikipedia of the…

The House of Representatives has stripped new Georgia official Marjorie Taylor Greene from two committees over her history of promoting conspiracy theories. Congress took the highly unusual step today in voting 230 to 199 in favor of removing her from the education and budget committees, limiting her abilities and powers. In response, the 46-year-old freshman…

Welcome to MintCast, the official MintPress News podcast hosted by Mnar Muhawesh. MintCast is an interview podcast featuring dissenting voices, independent researchers and journalists the establishment would rather silence. In this episode, we are joined by Aaron Mate —  investigative journalist, contributor to The Nation and host of “Pushback” on The Grayzone. Mate has spent…

(Analysis) — Destination Afghanistan was known as the big easy back in the halcyon days of the late 1960s. Hippies from throughout the affluent West hitchhiked to the capital, Kabul, where crash pads and hashish were cheap, and the locals were tolerant. Life appeared to be mellow in the scenic shadow of the Hindu Kush…

MintCast hosts Alan MacLeod and Whitney Webb discuss the latest current events including how U.S. political reactions to Trump’s Iran policy reveal the true motivations behind the Russiagate scandal and how big tech firms are teaming up with government players to suppress and intimidate journalists around the world. Also discussed is the U.S.’ secretive military…

In early May, MSNBC news host Rachel Maddow — known as one of the top promoters of the new Cold War and Russiagate in American media — emphatically endorsed regime change in Venezuela after she claimed that President Donald Trump’s hawkishness towards the South American country had changed, all because of a single phone call…

Here are three important lessons for the progressive left to consider now that it is clear the inquiry by Special Counsel Robert Mueller into Russia-gate is never going to uncover collusion between Donald Trump’s camp and the Kremlin in the 2016 presidential election.   No. 1: Painting the Pig’s face The left never had a dog in…

WASHINGTON – Friday marked the end of months of speculation, as Special Counsel and former FBI Director Robert Mueller delivered his report into alleged Russian interference in the 2016 election to the attorney general. The headline conclusion of Mueller’s report was reported far and wide: there would be no new indictments for collusion. As the…

Grayzone Project — On December 17, two reports detailing ongoing Russian interference operations commissioned by the Senate Intelligence Committee were made public. They generated a week’s worth of headlines and sent members of Congress and cable news pundits into a Cold War frenzy. According to the report, everything from the Green Party’s Jill Stein to Instagram to Pokemon Go to…

Could global warming pose the greatest threat to the future of life on the planet?  Quite possibly, if we believe the international (and scientific) consensus, despite a widening stratum of debunkers, deniers, and skeptics.  What about the prospects of thermonuclear war between the United States and Russia, two countries armed to the max and seemingly…

The Resistance is steering so much of the left into a hard-right turn — including even Pacifica’s KPFA Radio-Berkeley. On July 22 this year, nearly two years after Trump’s election and the rise of “The Resistance,” I tuned in to KPFA-Berkeley’s Sunday Show and heard host Philip Maldari speaking to The Nation’s national affairs correspondent John Nichols: Philip Maldari:…

A Chinese-owned firm with operations in Washington D.C. hacked Hillary Clinton’s private server “throughout her term as secretary of state and obtained nearly all her emails,” reports the Daily Caller‘s Richard Pollock. The Chinese firm obtained Clinton’s emails in real time as she sent and received communications and documents through her personal server, according to the sources, who said…