Blackwater USA guards shot at Iraqi civilians as they tried to drive away from a Baghdad square on Sept. 16, according to a report compiled by the first U.S. soldiers to arrive at the scene, where they found no evidence that Iraqis had fired weapons.

“It appeared to me they were fleeing the scene when they were engaged. It had every indication of an excessive shooting,” said Lt. Col. Mike Tarsa.

U.S. Colonel: Blackwater “actually drew their weapons on U.S. soldiers.”

That the US military permitting stories like this to be released is an unmistakable sign of their increasing unhappiness with the loose cannon cowboys of Blackwater.

UN urges US to punish random-killing contractors.

Blackwater resigns from industry group after inquiries into shooting.

Blackwater may be tip of the iceberg. Gee, ya think? Maybe if the US stopped invading so many countries they wouldn’t need to contract out enormous amounts of work that used to be (and should be) done by the military.

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Cuba has sent three fugitives back to the US for prosecution.

Now that Raul Castro is in charge, and in what is viewed as a new indicator of cooperation with U.S. law enforcement, Cuba has been handing over wanted Americans.

However, Cuba has not turned over Black Liberation Army member Assata Shakur or rogue financier Robert Vesco.

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No War No Warming plans massive “nonviolent civil disobedience to take over Capitol Hill” in D.C. from Oct 21-23 and are linking antiwar and global warming.

STOP the war in Iraq and future resource wars by ending our addiction to fossil fuels.

SHIFT government funding to rebuild New Orleans and all communities suffering from racism and corporate greed.

GO green and promote environmental justice with new jobs in a clean energy economy.

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Richard Becker of PSL contrasts the US government’s response to Hurricane Katrina with their response to the subprime debacle. In the aftermath of Katrina, the poor and middle class were left to fend for themselves, yet in response to the subprime crisis, the Fed immediately cut interest rates, a move widely interpreted as bailing out investment banks.

Most of those in the relatively small section of the establishment that opposes corporate bail-outs fear that they will lead to a greater and deeper crisis further down the road. Their fears are well grounded. But for the typical corporate CEO, what matters is this year’s bottom line.

The latest bailout reaffirms that far from “free enterprise,” what we live under today is a system of state monopoly capitalism.

Meanwhile 1 in 5 working families, about 41 million people, can’t afford basic needs like health care and housing.

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