Back in 2016, while campaigning for president, Donald Trump discovered a useful tactic for drawing the votes of disgruntled blue-collar workers: denouncing the loss of U.S. manufacturing jobs and promising to restore them. At a rally in hard-hit Ohio, he assailed the Democrats and assured his listeners that he would turn the state into a “manufacturing behemoth.”
Troops Out of Germany and Down a Rabbit Hole
I read this nightmare fantasy in the Financial Times:
“Of course, a second term for Mr Trump would have a wholly different impact on US-German relations than would a Joe Biden presidency. It is conceivable that a victorious Mr Trump would push hard to end US wars in Afghanistan and the Middle East, and take American troops out of Europe. He might even hope to make an ally of Russia against China. It would almost certainly be the end of Nato.”
Of course, virtually anything is “conceivable,”
Tomgram: Rajan Menon, The Nightmare That Joe Could Inherit
This article originally appeared at TomDispatch.com. To receive TomDispatch in your inbox three times a week, click here.
Okay, I admit it, I’ve been worried — and no surprise there. In this world from hell, it’s not hard to worry about untold numbers of things going wrong. Let me, however, lay out my own large-scale version of worry about this America of ours. What if Joe Biden does win? The world — at least the world I know and read and watch and talk to — has one giant
Talk Nation Radio: Yes, the U.S. Worked to Start the Soviet War on Afghanistan
This week on Talk Nation Radio, as we begin year number 20 of the U.S. war on Afghanistan that Obama pretended to end, Trump promised to end, and it seems every U.S. presidential candidate from here on out (including Trump again) will promise to end, we look at how exactly destroying Afghanistan got started over 40 years ago. Our guests are Paul Fitzgerald and Elizabeth Gould, whose article at World Beyond War dot org is called “President
50th country ratifies UN treaty banning nuclear weapons: Effective January 1, 2020 Nuclear Weapons Will Be Illegal
By Dave Lindorff
Flash! Nuclear bombs and warheads have just joined landmines, germ and chemical bombs and fragmentation bombs as illegal weapons under international law, as on Oct. 24 a 50th nation, the Central American country of Honduras, ratified and signed a UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.
Of course, the reality is that despite this outlawing of landmines and fragmentation bombs by the UN, the US still uses them routinely and sells them to other
There Are Anti-War Candidates
I don’t have any use for PEP politicians (progressive except on the Pentagon), but there are going to be serious members of the U.S. Congress next year who aren’t afraid of flags and war songs. There are going to be a lot more than (AOC+3) four of them.
CORI BUSH
One is going to be Cori Bush from St. Louis who won her primary against a long-time incumbent. She’s recently tweeted the following:
“If you’re having a bad day, just think of all the social services we’re going to fund after
Speaking Truth to Empire
“Speaking Truth to Empire” on KFCF 88.1 FM independently owned and locally operated since 1975 in Fresno. Dan Yaseen interviews Jim W. Dean, Managing Editor of Veterans Today (www.veteranstoday.com), a popular alternative media website, founded in 2004 by Gordon Duff, a disabled Vietnam veteran, accredited diplomat and global intelligence specialist who worked on veterans and POW issues for
Tomgram: Ariel Dorfman, Trump’s Divine Fate
This article originally appeared at TomDispatch.com. To receive TomDispatch in your inbox three times a week, click here.
In case you hadn’t noticed, they wear masks in hell. I didn’t know that myself until this year. On the best evidence around, however, like most Americans, I’m now in a circle of hell. I feel it particularly when I’m out on streets that are starting to chill down, not heat up, as winter arrives (however
Guess Who Arms Both Azerbaijan and Armenia
As with many wars around the world, the current war between Azerbaijan and Armenia is a war between militaries armed and trained by the United States. And in the view of some experts, the level of weapons purchased by Azerbaijan is a key cause of the war. Before anybody proposes shipping more weapons to Armenia as the ideal solution, there is another possibility.
Of course, Azerbaijan has an extremely oppressive government, so the arming of that government by the U.S. government has to be explained
Tomgram: Rebecca Gordon, Campaigning on Planet A
This article originally appeared at TomDispatch.com. To receive TomDispatch in your inbox three times a week, click here.
Since I came of age (long ago in another century), I’ve never missed voting in a presidential election. And I guarantee you one thing — barring a health disaster — I won’t miss this one either. I’m not in need of one of the movingly committed people TomDispatch