Embedded Files
Trump will never be held accountable - for anything - July 1
Get used to it and get over it. Donald Trump will never be held accountable for any of his crimes, corruption, incompetence, or cruelty. Though justice will not catch up to Donald Trump, we need to ensure that the cancer of his presidency does not damage our country any more than it already has...a look at Trump's "highest crime" (the Big Lie and the Insurrection) and his greatest failure (the pandemic) and at what actions might be taken to prevent worse in the future...READ
SCOTUS completes its destruction of the Voting Rights Act - July 2
The Voting Rights Act of 1965 is one of the most important statutes ever passed by Congress. By outlawing discriminatory voting practices and enforcing the Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution, America finally became a multiracial democracy with universal suffrage. On Thursday, the conservative majority on the Supreme Court completed its gutting of that statute. In a 6-3 decision, the United States Supreme Court upheld two Arizona voting statutes that an appeals court had found discriminatory. The ruling Thursday voided the last remaining section of the law, which allowed people harmed by discriminatory voting practices to file suit and have the discriminatory legislation struck down by the courts. Voters now have no redress for discriminatory voting practices either before or after implementation...READ
The sputtering Iran nuclear talks - July 19
The talks to revive the JCPOA and bring Iran and the United States back into compliance with the original agreement are on hold and may be in trouble. If they fail, President Biden will only have himself to blame. The Administration has left the vast majority of the Trump-Pompeo sanctions in place, choosing to use them as bargaining chips. Sanctions are not bargaining chips. They are tools of war that impose collective punishment on innocent civilians. The continuation of US sanctions on Iran and other countries during the pandemic was and is a totally reprehensible act...Gen. Milley, Benjamin Netanyahu and the closing days of the Trump presidency...READ
Hypocrisy in action - July 23
Nowhere is the hypocrisy of America's foreign policy more evident than in the contrasting cases of Cuba and Israel. Nowhere has mainstream media bias and the power of lobbies been more detrimental to Americans' understanding the realities of the respective situations. The media coverage and the US official reaction to Cuba's handling of the protests compared to Israeli response to Palestinian protests illustrate the point. When Biden called Cuba a 'failed state' and imposed additional sanctions, he failed to acknowledge the role that the six-decade US embargo and the sanctions against the small island nation have had on bringing about the crisis there...READ
Preventing another deadly pandemic surge - July 28
The world is facing what may be the beginning of another pandemic surge. Here in the United States, getting on top of it will require countering the flow of anti-vax and coronavirus misinformation, mandating vaccinations and masking, increasing accessibility to the vaccine, and helping the vaccination-hesitant overcome their reluctance. We need to take these steps before September when children return to school. Why? Because the delta variant, which is behind the rise in cases and deaths, is rampant in un-vaccinated regions and because there are no vaccines approved yet for children under 12...READ
World News Briefs - August 6
Ethiopian conflict and humanitarian crisis, Myanmar junta, Amnesty International on police response to Colombia protests, Venezuela talks between government and opposition, US increasingly isolated stand against Cuba, Mexico's lawsuit against US gun manufacturers...READ
Biden's nuclear flip-flop, the South China Sea, and the coming Cold War - August 12
Biden's acquiescence in continuing the Trump nuclear arms buildup combined with his Administration's confrontational China policy may have started both a new nuclear arms race and a new Cold War. Having spent more than half my life during the Cold War era of "mutually assured destruction," I have no wish to see it happen again...what to do to prevent a nuclear arms race and a Cold War with China...READ
The Graveyard of Empires - August 20
Twenty years after the United States invasion, the Taliban are back in control of Afghanistan. The invasion of Afghanistan was the first step in the neocon's misguided and tragic "war on terror" that eventually destabilized the entire Middle East. All that followed - the invasion of Iraq, the rise of ISIS, the hundreds of thousands of deaths, the millions of refugees - began here...how the US war on terror fueled and excused right-wing extremism at home, weakened our democracy and led to the election of Trump...READ
A partisan Supreme Court's unprecedented foreign policy ruling - August 27
Donald Trump's January 6 coup may have failed, but the Federal courts, now packed with conservative justices, are ensuring his repugnant policies continue. In an unprecedented 6-3 decision, the conservative Supreme Court justices upheld a nationwide injunction issued by a lone Trump-appointed judge that compels the Biden administration to revive Trump’s “Remain in Mexico” policy. The SCOTUS decision is a direct challenge to the president’s authority to conduct foreign policy....READ
The costs of American imperialism - September 3
The cost of America's imperialism and militarism has been great. The loss of American lives and the drain on our resources have been enormous; the damage to the peoples of the world and to our nation's soul, incalculable. US support for right-wing military dictators and paramilitaries put the lie to the US wanting to advance democracy in its failed efforts at nation building and regime change...the Afghan withdrawal, Vietnam and other Cold War travesties, neocon forever wars, the military-political-industrial complex, the ineffectiveness of sanctions to achieve regime change...READ
World News Briefs - September 10
Ethiopia's civil war and humanitarian disaster, the stalled Iran nuclear talks, Afghan women protests, Bolsonaro's rallies and attacks on Brazil's democratic institutions, Venezuela government and opposition talks...READ
9/11 - September 14
The horrific tragedy of September 11, 2001, shook America to its core. The country and the world were united in their grief and compassion. At that moment, we could have forged a new world order based on co-operation, community and our highest democratic ideals. But we did not. In the ensuing months, the Bush Administration set the ground for endless war, deprived Americans of civil liberties, and saw us abandon our own democratic values and respect for human rights. The years following saw the invasion of Iraq, widespread Islamophobia, right-wing domestic terrorism, Donald Trump, and a rise in hate crimes. Some thoughts on how to repair "the hole in America's heart"...READ
The worker shortage, a living wage, and the racial unemployment gap - Sep 24
What is and isn't causing the worker shortage, where the most jobs will be created in the 2020s, the plight of the Federal minimum wage, and how to close the racial unemployment gap...READ
The Republican Party as absurdist theater - Sep 29
I have found a way to look at Republican politicians, their donors and supporters without feeling queasy or getting too upset. They are clearly practicing a 21st century American version of the Theater of the Absurd. Some of their positions and statements are so ludicrous that this appears to be as valid an explanation as any...GOP governors response to Covid, absurdities about the Insurrection, Trump's retirement approval surge, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Republican congressmembers criticizing Biden and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff...READ
Google Sites
Report abuse