September 25, 2008 Global Exchange
	Twenty Years of Fun and Struggle with Global Exchange -- As the two police officers dragged my wife, Medea Benjamin, out the front doors of the Seattle Convention Center, I was stumbling along right behind them with an officer on either side of me vice-gripping my arms. We had taken the stage at the opening session of the World Trade Organization (WTO) meeting in Seattle on November 30, 1999, and the authorities didn’t like the appeal we were making for more diverse representation in international trade negotiations.
September 25, 2008 Global Exchange
	Who Makes the Rules Where You Live—Communities or Corporations? -- On a hot, sticky night in August 2006, more than 200 residents of the rural township of East Brunswick, PA (population 1300) squeezed into local physician, Dr. Glenn Freed’s skeletal frame barn to talk about…sludge. Despite sewage sludge’s high toxicity, waste corporations have spun it as an environmentally friendly fertilizer, that they are paid handsomely to “gift” to farmers.
September 25, 2008 Global Exchange
	Free Public Transit For All -- Global Exchange’s Freedom From Oil campaign is delighted to highlight the following article in which award-winning author and activist, Bill McKibben, explores a bold move communities can take to meet the climate challenge locally. Following McKibben’s article, Global Exchange shares a brief report on our current exciting campaign in San Francisco to address global warming and strengthen the local economy.
August 25, 2008 Global Exchange
	Elections, Migration, and North America’s Jobs -- In January 2009, the new president will take office with the hopes and expectations of the American people behind him, and an array of messy unfinished business left by the departing Bush Administration in front.
May 05, 2008 Global Exchange
	Jalisco’s Revolution: An alternative development model to keep people home -- Jalisco, Mexico—The barren cornfields appear startled absent the hands that have tilled it for thousands of years. In the little rancho of Ojo de Agua, hidden in the mountains northeast of Guadalajara, Maria points with pride at the Virgin Mary holograms on her adobe wall, gifts from her four sons now working as busboys in Los Angeles.
May 05, 2008 Global Exchange
	Is Cuba at a turning point, or are we? -- So what is changing in Cuba, and what are the forces behind it? And given the impending U.S. elections, what will change mean for relations between the two nations, and for the possibilities of lifting the travel ban?
December 01, 2007 Global Exchange
	Plan Mexico and the Peru NAFTA Expansion: Guns and Money. -- For decades after the Second World War, the United States helped military dictators take and remain in power across Latin America. Now, despite an age of electoral democracies across the region little has changed with U.S. foreign policy. Military donations to armies with rancid human rights records and trade rules displacing millions of small farmers into the current of labor migration—all aimed at retaining military and economic control—remain the order of the day. Two of the Bush Administration’s high-priority policy initiatives last fall, Plan Mexico and the Peru NAFTA Expansion, illustrate the continued focus on leveraging guns and money to exert U.S. influence in the region, ignoring the fallout from decades of similar failed policies.
December 01, 2007 Global Exchange
	Antiwar Challenge for 2008: Peace in the Primaries -- As the antiwar movement gears up for 2008, it may be useful to remind ourselves of two great lessons from the anti-Vietnam War movement. One: It is very difficult to stop the U.S. government from waging war. Two: Combining passion for peace with strategic savvy, we will succeed anyway.
December 01, 2007 Global Exchange
	An Ideology of Endless War: Is Iran Next? -- For the past year, as chaos has ensued in Iraq, the Administration has turned its attention on Iran, advancing a fear-mongering foreign policy that has stripped international diplomacy of its substance and replaced it with a farcical re-enactment of the Iraq war build-up. In the year before the Iraq war, the Bush Administration manufactured justification for a criminal and ineffective war—what will go down in history as the WMD con. But, no one expected the Bush Administration’s doctrine for pre-emptive war to be employed again so soon.
August 28, 2007 Kate Raven
	Humanitarian Crisis: A Summer in the Borderlands -- Since 1998, the combination of failed trade policies, like NAFTA, raising migration rates, and the growing militarization of the border diverting the flow of migrants into increasingly dangerous terrain has led to the deaths of over 2500 migrants. Kate Raven, from Global Exchange's Speakers Bureau, shares some painful stories of migration from her summer on the US-Mexico border, demanding justice and compassion from the US government in its anti-immigration policies.
August 28, 2007 Medea Benjamin
	CODEPINK Breathes New Life into Beltway Organizing -- We not only bring a flash of hot pink to the sea of drab gray and black Congressional suits, but we are busting through the inside-the-beltway politics with a refreshing dash of people power.
August 28, 2007 Kevin Danaher, Shannon Biggs and Jason Mark
	Electing the Antidote -- The ebb and flow of democracy is influenced by the constant push and pull of culture, which determines the direction democracy points toward. Here in the US, that direction is highly contested—there is a culture war underway in our country. No, not the culture war involving abortion rights and gay marriage. The cultural contest we see is not arranged along the now very tired labels of “conservative” and “liberal.” Rather, the culture war we perceive goes much deeper, for it touches on the question of our place on this planet.
April 12, 2007 Global Exchange
	What an Attack on Iran Would Look Like -- Yet again, the Bush administration is stoking public fear and skewing public perception with a smoke and mirror campaign that aims to pepper the American public for a preemptive strike in the name of international security and regional stability. Yet again, the Bush administration tries to hide its interest in Mid East power dynamics and resources. But focusing pressure on Iran is a naked attempt to control a major geo-political stronghold with rising regional influence and a wealth of indigenous resources.
March 15, 2007 Global Exchange
	Needed: Trade Activism in 2007 -- President Bush may have conceded that his party was “thumped” in the 2006 mid-term election, but that doesn’t mean the Bush administration plans to change its agenda. The approach to global trade is a case in point. During the next six months, the Bush administration will likely send three new trade agreements to Congress that are modeled almost exactly on NAFTA (the North American Free Trade Agreement), the trade deal that’s wreaked havoc on the US and Mexican economies. The Bush administration will also push for a renewal of Fast Track legislation before it expires in June, which for the past five years has taken away Congress’ ability to thoroughly evaluate and meaningfully amend trade pacts.
December 15, 2006 Global Exchange
	Congress' Mandate for Peace -- The peace majority spoke out loud and clear on November 7th. Coming on the heels of a month when more than 100 US soldiers were killed in the Iraq war – the deadliest month this year for US troops in Iraq – voters took control of the House and Senate away from the architects of the war and issued a mandate for peace.
December 15, 2006 Global Exchange
	The Tar Sands -- The Alberta tar (oil) sands are the world's most expensive, most polluting source of oil under large-scale production. Yet Alberta's tar sands are positioned to be the main supply of “domestic” oil to the United States for the next century. The sands hold proven reserves of 175 billion barrels, second only to Saudi Arabia.
December 15, 2006 Global Exchange
	Business Unusual -- The growth of the green economy—embraced by corporations, heralded by politicians—marks something of an IQ test for the progressive movement. How can we at once celebrate companies that move toward better practices while acknowledging how much farther they need to go?
September 01, 2006 Global Exchange Newsletter
	Unprecedented Meeting Between US Peace Movement and Iraqi Leaders -- When Global Exchange joined CODEPINK in launching a fast on July 4 called Troops Home Fast, our goal was to push forward a peace process in Iraq that included the withdrawal of US troops. Over 5,000 people around the country participated in the fast, some for a day, some for a week, some organizing a rolling fast in their communities with each person taking a day, and some of us committing to a long-term fast.
September 01, 2006 Global Exchange Newsletter
	Kerala, India Kicks Out Coke and Pepsi -- Coca Cola and PepsiCo, two of the worlds largest transnational corporations, have been banned in the southern Indian state of Kerala! Neither of the two soft drink manufacturers can now produce, distribute or sell their soft drinks in that state.
September 01, 2006 Global Exchange Newsletter
	Ben Namakin Speaks Out on Climate Change -- 26-year old Ben Namakin grew up on the Pacific islands of Kiribati and Micronesia. He works as an environmental educator with the Conservation Society of Pohnpei and is a featured speaker in Global Exchange’s upcoming speaking tour, Oil and Global Warming Today: Voices from the Front Lines.
September 01, 2006 Global Exchange Newsletter
	Mexico Election Shakeup -- Just before the July 2nd Mexican presidential election, Pedro Martin of US Embassy political section told Global Exchange election observers that he expected the July 2nd vote to constitute Mexico’s first truly democratic election. He was confident that despite a close and heated race, the contest between Felipe Calderon of the ruling National Action Party (PAN) and Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador of the opposition Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) was fair and would run smoothly.
June 01, 2006 Global Exchange
	A Ten-Step Prorgam to Energy Independence -- The one-two-punch of rising gas prices and increased deaths and turbulence in oil-producing countries, like Iraq and Nigeria, has led many Americans to question our dependence on oil. With Independence Day right around the corner, what better time to declare our Independence from Oil? With thanks to our friends at the Rainforest Action Network, let’s begin with a10-step program for energy independence:
June 01, 2006 Global Exchange
	Fair Immigration Means Fair Trade -- March 20, the first day of massive nationwide immigrants rights mobilizations, marked the beginning of a tremendous national surge in civic engagement. From high school students walking out of public school classrooms to dock workers shutting down ports, the spirit, energy and sheer numbers of this movement are inspiring. Even immigrant rights organizations were surprised by this unprecedented wave of public demonstrations. Is this a new civil rights movement? What challenges—and opportunities—will this pose to the peace movement or to the African-American struggle for racial justice? And how will the masses of Latinos, U.S. citizens, and documented and undocumented immigrants impact the U.S. political landscape in the years to come? Questions like these have been occupying private and public discussion for months. But one angle that has so far been missing from this dialogue is the role of U.S. corporate-led globalization in causing immigration.
June 01, 2006 Global Exchange
	Cooling It With Iran -- The U.S.'s long troubled relationship with Iran has taken a dangerous turn, as the Bush administration escalates rhetoric about Iran’s nuclear industry and Iran stiffens its posture in response to U.S. threats. Published leaks by Seymour Hersch of advanced Pentagon planning for tactical nuclear strikes and covert forays into Iran have pushed tensions even higher. The immediate challenge for the peace movement, and all concerned Americans, is to help de-escalate the immediate threats of U.S. aggression and to force the administration to renounce its aggressive, illegal and disastrous doctrine of “preventive war.”
April 01, 2006 Global Exchange
	Lessons from Ecuador: How to Challenge Big Oil and Free Trade -- As its name implies, Ecuador is a land where North meets South—literally. Thanks to the Ecuadorian Indigenous movement and resistance to big oil, the South is teaching the North a few lessons about trade justice, human and environmental rights, and how to bring down big energy corporations.
April 01, 2006 Global Exchange
	Faiza Al-Araji - An Iraqi Woman’s Perspective -- Faiza Al-Araji is a civil engineer, blogger (www.afamilyinbaghdad.blogspot.com), and mother of three from Baghdad. After her son Khalid was kidnapped, the family had to pay ransom to secure his release and then fled to Jordan. In March 2006, Al-Araji traveled to the United States with a delegation of Iraqi women to tell Americans about the reality of life in Iraq. The GX Speakers Bureau asked her to share her views with our readers.
April 01, 2006 Global Exchange
	Until We Have a Clean, Green Car -- In his State of the Union address, President Bush announced that he wanted to end America’s oil dependence—and then increased subsidies to oil and gas companies. Clearly, real solutions to the country’s energy needs are not forthcoming from those who benefit from the status quo. Many of us are searching for real solutions to America’s oil addiction. Global Exchange’s solution is to target the US auto industry, which consumes one out of every seven barrels of oil on the planet. But what is the technology available for changing the auto industry, and how does one go about separating the corporate hype about fuel cells and ethanol from the real energy alternatives?
January 03, 2006 Global Exchange Newsletter
	Reaping the Whirlwind -- Mother Nature finally punched back. Hurricane Katrina’s destruction of New Orleans marks the arrival of climate change on US shores; it is the first—but sadly not likely to be the last—global warming-related cataclysm to hit North America in the 21st century. The storm’s horrific devastation can be read as a parable of warning, a caution against the arrogant idea that we can go on harming the earth’s vital ecosystems without also harming ourselves. The flood’s message should be clear enough: Continued reckless exploitation of our natural resources—and especially tinkering with the planet’s complex atmosphere—will not occur without some dreadful consequences.
January 03, 2006 Global Exchange Newsletter
	The GX Interview: Andy Grossman, Executive Director of Wal-Mart Watch -- Wal-Mart is the biggest corporation in the world. It is the maker of the new business paradigm of driving down costs in a ruthless way as a means of making profit. It’s destructive to American community life, to American workers and their families, not just because of what Wal-Mart pays and how Wal-Mart operates in those towns, but because it provides a model for other businesses to be successful as the biggest and best business.
January 03, 2006 Global Exchange Newsletter
	Global Exchange Expands Reality Tours Venezuela Program -- In 2006, Global Exchange will more than double the number of delegations we send to Venezuela and add specific theme-based tours to our offerings. These new programs will kick off at the World Social Forum in Caracas in late January, where our participants will make people-to-people connections with Venezuelans as well as social justice activists from all over the globe. We also already have seven customized delegations planned in 2006 for foundations, high schools, and universities. Last but not least, we will be opening a Spanish Language School and immersion program in Venezuela in June.