Reflecting on the Dawn of Everything

By David Swanson, World BEYOND War, November 30, 2021

The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity by David Graeber and David Wengrow is, I think, a terrific contribution to human knowledge and guide to pursuing more of the same — as well as a notable accomplishment for the Davids of the world, who have perhaps been falling a bit short lately. A few of the points it documents and persuades of are:

Neither Hobbes nor Rousseau was right, nor ever claimed to be, not in the sense of describing read more

Talk World Radio: Alfred McCoy on Empire and the Supposed Rule-Based Order that He Claims China Threatens

Talk World Radio is recorded as audio and video on Riverside.fm. Here is this week’s video and all the videos on Youtube. We’re using only the guest video and not the host this week, because Riverside is getting them out of synch when combining.

Alfred W. McCoy is the author of a tremendous new book called To Govern the Globe: World Orders and Catastrophic Change. He also holds the Harrington Chair in History at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. After earning his Ph.D. in read more

Talk World Radio: Chris Gelardi on Guam Resisting Empire

Talk World Radio is recorded as audio and video on Riverside.fm. Here is this week’s video and all the videos on Youtube. We’re using only the guest video and not the host this week, because Riverside is getting them out of synch when combining.

This week on Talk World Radio, the U.S. colony of Guam. Our guest, Chris Gelardi is a New York City-based journalist. His work appears in The Nation, The Intercept, and The Appeal, among other publications. His recent article read more

What Would Have Worked Better Than Building Back Anything

The most well-known problem with lesser-evil, two-party, winner-take-all elections, at least in a system of legalized bribery and corporate-state media, is the absence of virtually any really good candidates. Naturally this results in (or is at least one major cause of) the tendency of many to not vote at all — with the United States claiming a lower voter turnout than many other countries it loves to look down on.

But the most serious problem is the tendency of those voters who do vote to nonetheless read more

Conscientious Objection: A Right and a Duty

By David Swanson, World BEYOND War, November 16, 2021

I want to recommend a new film and a new book. The film is called The Boys Who Said NO! There’s more courage and moral integrity in this documentary than in any fictional blockbuster. With the wars now underway and threatened being as unjust as those 50 years ago (and with women now being added to U.S. draft registration) we need more saying No! We also need to recognize, as read more

The Persistence of Pinkerism

By David Swanson, World BEYOND War, November 12, 2021

I’m old enough to remember when you couldn’t do a speaking event related to war and peace without being asked numerous reasonable and not so reasonable questions about 9/11 (each accompanied by a stack of DVDs and flyers presented to you as a revelation from on high). There was a long period when you could count on the inevitable question about “peak oil.” I’ve been around enough to know that you can’t talk to peace-oriented people read more

Feel Like NPR Is Spewing Corrupt Propaganda? Here’s Why.

NPR posted a story called “Feel like you don’t fit in either political party? Here’s why.” Of course I knew why. Neither party supports anything remotely close to my views on government budgets, climate, environment, taxation, militarism, healthcare, retirement, housing, education, transportation, or any other significant policy area.

But NPR’s story was about a Pew poll that asked 16 questions read more

Talk World Radio Debate: Reform War or Abolish It?

Talk World Radio is recorded as audio and video on Riverside.fm (except when it doesn’t work, and then Zoom is used). Here is this week’s video and all the videos on Youtube.

This week on Talk World Radio, we’re going to hold a bit of a respectful and civil debate. I’m going to take the position that we should be focused on preventing wars and defunding militaries even at the expense of working to reform wars. My guest, Leonard Rubenstein’s position includes support read more