Okinawa: A Small Island Resists U.S. Military's "Pivot to Asia"

Christine Ahn Foreign Policy in Focus
With the election of Takeshi Onaga as the new governor of Okinawa, the Okinawa people have once again expressed in clear terms their opposition to the attempts by the U.S. and Japan to turn their already militarized island into "the largest concentration of land, sea, and air military power in East Asia." Okinawa is key to the U.S. military's "Pivot to Asia", but 1.4 million Okinawans are continuing to demand the removal of all U.S. military bases there.

War Is Peace Doublespeak: Selling Peace Groups on U.S. Wars

Margaret Sarfehjooy and Coleen Rowley ConsortiumNews
Since the massive anti-war protests against the war in Vietnam, the U.S. government's war machine has made “perception management” a high priority, feeding the U.S. people a steady diet of propaganda, even getting peace groups to buy into “pro-democracy” wars. The Minnesota experience with the Committee of Solidarity with the People of Syria is an example of these efforts made to enlist peace and social justice groups into supporting U.S. wars.

Friday Nite Videos -- Singing Out 2014

Portside
Hong Kong Ode to Joy Flash Mob. Stevie Wonder: 'Hard Time Mississippi.' Handel's Messiah: A Random Act of Culture. Pete Seeger -- Waist Deep in the Big Muddy. Mary Poppins Really Needs a Raise.

Hong Kong: Ode to Joy Flashmob

The Hong Kong Festival Orchestra gives a flashmob performance of Beethoven's Ode to Joy in 2013. A spiritual prelude to Occupy Hong Kong and the Democracy Encampments? 

Handel's Messiah: A Random Act of Culture

The Opera Company of Philadelphia Chorus, together with singers from a cross section of community groups, infiltrate a department store as shoppers and burst into a pop-up rendition of the Hallelujah Chorus from Handel's "Messiah," in one of 1,000 Random Acts of Culture. Watch the performers, delighted children, spontaneous videographers, and the entire public within earshot together "create culture."

Pete Seeger -- Waist Deep in the Big Muddy

For a biographical account of America in song, look to Pete Seeger (1919-2014). This song of Pete's is the one he chose to sing on national TV in 1968, ending his more than decade-long blacklist, and showing that he hadn't made peace with war and injustice.

The Demise of Dr. Oz

Peter Janiszewski Public Library of Science
After some suave marketers used clips from Oz's TV show to sell bogus products, he faced a grilling from a panel of U.S. senators about his weight loss product claims. Oz then invited his Twitter audience, "What is your biggest question for me? Reply with #OzsInbox." Unfortunately for Oz, this strategy backfired. Horrendously. Immediately after Oz asked the question, Twitter gave Dr. Oz a hilarious slap across the face.