Just released by Metropolitan Books, based on classified documents and first person interviews, “Kill Anything That Moves” by author Nick Turse, is a startling history of the American war on Vietnamese civilians. From the book jacket: Americans have long been taught that events such as the notorious My Lai massacre were isolated incidents in the Vietnam War, carried out by ...
From Stephanie Woodard, for Indian Country Today Media Network: “On the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation, tribal members who’ve lost family to suicide heal by grieving together… [Native] youngsters kill themselves at a rate at least triple the United States average… ‘American Indian and Alaska Native youth have the highest suicide rates in the country,’ said Richard McKeon, chief of the suicide ...
The Texas Tribune has launched an online database that allows citizens to investigate their legislators’ financial interests. “The Lawmaker Explorer is a first-of-its-kind interactive tool that gives Texans a window into the personal interests of the state legislators elected to represent them. The Explorer, a nine-month research endeavor, is the linchpin of the Tribune’s Bidness as Usual project, a session-long look at ethics ...
Freelance journalist Heather Smathers reports that progress on a Chinese solar power manufacturing project in Nevada is slow-going. “The company [ENN Group of Langfang, China] is still working on obtaining its power purchase agreement, which is needed before the land can transfer..” “Failure to secure a power purchase agreement with a qualified buyer could make the deal null and void. ENN ...
Isaiah Thompson, reporting for the Philadelphia City Paper, exposes how law enforcement authorities seize money from innocent people. Here is an excerpt: “By way of a process known as “civil asset forfeiture,” carried out in Philly by the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office, the DA may sue to take ownership of confiscated property and, if successful, keep it. The law’s intent is ...
Barbara Moran, reporting for the Connecticut Health I-Team, discovers a toxic, overlooked environmental concern in industrial laundry facilities. An excerpt: Laundering shop and print towels, which are cloths used to wipe oil, solvent and other chemicals off machinery can fuel the release of VOCs (volatile organic compounds) above federal limits. The use and processing of shop towels is largely under-regulated, despite ...
From Sierra Leone, Paige McClanahan and Felicity Thompson report for the Christian Science Monitor on the conflict between preserving nature and developing the economy through an environmentally risky gold mining operation. In this impoverished nation, gold wins. “Tax revenue from the export of all of that gold could mean more money for schools, roads, hospitals, and the meager power grid in this infrastructure-poor country…. “But ...
Reporting for Indian Country Today, 100Reporters.com, and NBC.com, Stephanie Woodard begins a series on young Native Americans who commit suicide, and the efforts to prevent those deaths. “Native teens and twenty-somethings are killing themselves at an alarming pace. For those 15 to 24, the rate is 3.5 times that of other Americans and rising, according to the Indian Health Service (IHS). ...
Writing for Mother Jones, and the Dallas Morning News, Ian Shearn and Laird Townsend report on a legal case with broad implications for human rights, involving American companies that conduct business in foreign lands. A Supreme Court ruling could open the door for ExxonMobil and other multi-national companies to face trial on human rights allegations. Shearn and Townsend report: “As the Supreme Court grapples ...
Reporting for Witness LA, Matthew Fleisher investigates campaign fundraisers that seem to influence assignments and upper level promotions in the Sheriff’s Department. “This summer, I received a phone call from a source in the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department who said he had information about Undersheriff Paul Tanaka’s pay-to-play scheme. “Pay-to-play exists in the LA Sheriff’s Department,” he said. “I know because I paid.” ...