Democracy Now! Monday, April 14, 2008

Today's Headlines

• Iraq Fighting Worsens with Killing of Top Sadr Aide
• Iraq Dismisses 1,300 Troops Over Basra Desertion
• US Suffers Deadliest Week of 2008
• Bush Admin: Iran Poses “Primary Threat” to Iraq
• Iraq OKs 35 Firms for Oil Bids
• Bush Admits Knowledge of White House Meetings on Interrogation Techniques
• Haiti Announces Rice Subsidy as PM Removed
• World Bank Launches Emergency Food Plan
• 2 Women Journalists Slain in Oaxaca
• Dalai Lama: Protest, But Don’t Boycott, Beijing Olympics
• 14 Palestinians Killed in Week of Israeli Attacks
• Outgoing HUD Secretary Accused of Ignoring Housing Crisis
• 2007 Record Year for Lobbying in US
• Jailed Professor Sami al-Arian Moved to Solitary Confinement Days Before Scheduled Release

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  Black Ops on Green Groups: Private Security Firm Run by Fmr. Secret Service Officers Spied on Environmental Orgs for Corporate Clients

  A private security firm spied on Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth and several other environmental organizations from the late 1990s until at least the year 2000, according a new investigation by Mother Jones magazine. The security firm was run by former Secret Service officers who infiltrated environmental groups, collected their phone records and confidential internal documents, and even went through their trash. The information was then passed on to public relations firms and corporations involved in environmental controversies. We speak with the reporter who broke the story, James Ridgeway. [includes rush transcript–partial]

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  Did Burger King Target and Spy On Tomato Pickers Rights Groups?

  In Florida, groups organizing for tomato pickers’ rights say they might have been spied on and villifed online by the fast-food conglomerate Burger King. The Fort Myers News Press traced threatening emails directed at the Coalition of Immokalee Workers and the Student / Farmworker Alliance to Burger King’s corporate headquarters in Miami, Florida. We speak with the reporter who broke the story and with the coordinator of the Student/Farmworker Alliance who says he received a call from the owner of a private security company posing as a student.

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  Forty Years After Founding Seattle Black Panther Chapter, Aaron Dixon Still at Forefront of Struggle for Racial Equality

  Forty years ago this month, the Black Panther Party formed one of its first chapters outside of its Oakland headquarters in Seattle, Washington. Aaron Dixon was just 19 at the time and he became the captain of the Seattle chapter for its first four years. Today, Dixon is a well-known community and civil rights activist. Dixon joins us as we broadcast from Seattle for a conversation on the struggle for racial equality then and now.