TV News LIES

Edelman, America’s biggest public relations firm, has for the first time formally declared it will not take on campaigns that deny global warming, in response to an investigation by the Guardian. However it is unclear on its commitment to existing clients that have been involved in spreading doubt about climate change and fighting regulations to cut carbon pollution.

The explicit rejection comes in response to a story earlier this week that saw a number of top firms in the industry – but not Edelman – declare as a matter of company policy that they viewed climate change as a threat, and that they would not take on clients or campaigns that deny climate change.

Former U.S. president and international peace activist Jimmy Carter co-authored an op-ed along condemning Israel's military actions in Gaza as war crimes and urging the United States to recognize Hamas as a legitimate political force.

The piece, published Tuesday in the Guardian, was written along with Mary Robinson, the former president of Ireland. Both Carter and Robinson are members of The Elders, an international non-governmental organization formed in 2007 by the late Nelson Mandela comprised of elder statesmen, peace activists, and humanitarian advocates who describe themselves as "independent global leaders working together for peace and human rights."

On Monday, August 6, 1945, after six months of intense firebombing of 67 other Japanese cities, the United States  dropped a nuclear weapon nicknamed "Little Boy" on the city of Hiroshima , Japan.  This attack was followed on August 9 by the detonation of the "Fat Man" nuclear bomb over the Japanese city of Nagasaki. To date, these are the only attacks with nuclear weapons in the history of warfare.

In Remembrance of Hiroshima and Nagasaki

When the bombs were dropped I was very happy. The war would be over now, they said, and I was very happy. The boys would be coming home very soon they said, and I was very happy. We showed ‘em, they said, and I was very happy. They told us that the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki had been destroyed, and I was very happy. But in August of 1945 I was only ten years old, and I was very, very happy.

All governments lie, as I.F. Stone pointed out, including Israel and Hamas. But Israel engages in the kinds of jaw-dropping lies that characterize despotic and totalitarian regimes. It does not deform the truth; it inverts it. It routinely paints a picture for the outside world that is diametrically opposed to reality.

And all of us reporters who have covered the occupied territories have run into Israel’s Alice-in-Wonderland narratives, which we dutifully insert into our stories—required under the rules of American journalism—although we know they are untrue.

Israel eavesdropped on the US secretary of state, John Kerry, during doomed peace talks with the Palestinians last year, the German news weekly Der Spiegel reported on Sunday.

The article said the Israelis and at least one other secret service listened in on Kerry’s conversations as he tried to mediate, in a development that Der Spiegel said was likely to further strain ties between Israel and the United States.

Kerry regularly spoke by telephone with high-ranking officials throughout the Middle East during the negotiations that finally collapsed earlier this year.

Richard Eiker has worked for McDonald's for 25 years. For the last 18 he has been at the same Kansas City restaurant working in maintenance, mopping floors, cleaning bathrooms, scrubbing grease out of the deep fat fryers. He has no illusions about who he works for: McDonald's. The burger chain begs to differ.

Over the last 30 years fast food jobs have come to take an ever larger part of the US labour market. In 2013 3.6 million people worked for fast food restaurants in the US. But most – 76% – worked for franchisees and not directly for the companies whose logos adorn the restaurants. Wages, hours, benefits – increasingly hot topics in this low-paying industry – have to be negotiated with the franchisee. That may be about to change.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) got unanimous consent in the Senate Friday for legislation to give Israel emergency funding for its Iron Dome missile defense system.

“This is a good example of us putting aside partisan considerations,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said after passage.

Israel has been battling the terrorist group Hamas for weeks and the conflict continued Friday after Hamas broke the latest cease-fire agreement.

Israel said Thursday it has called up another 16,000 reservists, allowing it to potentially widen its Gaza offensive against the territory's Hamas rulers in a three-week-old war that has killed more than 1,300 Palestinians and more than 50 Israelis.

The new call-up follows another day of intensive fighting, in which tank shells struck a U.N. school where Palestinians were sheltering and an airstrike tore through a crowded Gaza shopping area. At least 116 Palestinians and three Israeli soldiers were killed Wednesday alone.