NATO “Youth Summit” Tells Viewers to Get Ready for War

By David Swanson, World BEYOND War, May 20, 2024

The recent NATO “Youth Summit,” even on double speed, is over an hour and a half on Youtube. I couldn’t watch it all, as it just made me feel old — so old that I can remember when people could feel shame about profiteering from mass killing or promoting world wars likely to end in nuclear apocalypse.

The summit’s “youth” participants appear to have met some requirement of being roughly younger than either Biden OR Trump — and there read more

Donald Trump’s Assault on the Wages of American Workers

Although Donald Trump, as president, proclaimed in his 2020 State of the Union address that he had produced a “blue-collar boom” in workers’ wages, the reality was quite different.  Using his control of the executive branch of the U.S. government, Trump repeatedly undermined the wages of American workers by blocking raises and imposing wage reductions.

Only the preceding year, Trump derailed vital wage legislation.  In July 2019―with the pathetically low federal minimum wage stuck at read more

Nuclear War Will Only Kill People Already Impacted By Nuclear Weapons. That’s Everyone.

By David Swanson, World BEYOND War, May 18, 2024

In the photo above, World BEYOND War Board Member and Treasurer John Reuwer, a physician, at right, supports downwinders impacted by nuclear weapons testing, demanding restitution from the U.S. government that has experimented on and lied to people for decades. John commented:

“I often think the two reasons most otherwise good people support war is they don’t count all the costs, and they don’t know the alternatives to protecting read more

Speaking Truth to Empire

On Speaking Truth to Empire on KFCF 88.1 FM independently owned and locally operated since 1975 in Fresno, Dan Yaseen interviews Bruce Gagnon, who serves as Secretary/Coordinator of the Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space. He has been working on space issues for the past 30 years and helped create the Global Network in 1992. For 15 years, 1983 thru 1998, he coordinated the Florida Coalition for Peace & Justice. He was trained as an read more

How to Avoid Reporting That a University Is Lying About Police Violence

I’m old enough to remember a video of a New York Times reporter who let slip that she’d been instructed never to say the president of the United States had lied, even if he (George W. Bush) was just blatantly lying. Not that she objected to the policy. It made perfect sense to her. Now I can’t find that video because the internet is so weighted down with accounts of Trump and Biden lying.

But I was quite pleasantly surprised when the only local daily here in Charlottesville, the read more

Tomgram: Andrea Mazzarino, Anger and the MAGA Movement

This article originally appeared at TomDispatch.com. To receive TomDispatch in your inbox three times a week, click here.

When some government program fails utterly, you’d think top officials would consider transferring at least part of the taxpayer funds they’re spending on it to programs that might actually do some good. When it comes to the U.S. military, however, as TomDispatch regular Andrea Mazzarino makes all too clear today, no such luck. And really, it just couldn’t be stranger.

At read more

NATO Spreads Nuclear Weapons, Energy, and Risk

By David Swanson, World BEYOND War, May 15, 2024

Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty declares that NATO members will assist another member if attacked by “taking action as it deems necessary, including the use of armed force.” But the UN Charter does not say anywhere that warmaking is authorized for whoever jumps in on the appropriate side.

The North Atlantic Treaty’s authors may have been aware that they were on dubious legal ground because they went on twice to claim otherwise, first read more