Author: David Swanson

U.S. poster from 1953.

Excerpted from Leaving World War II Behind

Hitler was clearly preparing for war long before he started it. Hitler remilitarized the Rhineland, annexed Austria, and threatened Czechoslovakia. High-ranking officials in the German military and “intelligence” plotted a coup. But Hitler gained popularity with every step he took, and the lack of any sort of opposition from Britain or France surprised and demoralized the coup plotters. The British government was aware of the read more

The vast majority of people who experience war directly, first-hand, rather than through Hollywood movies or politicians’ speeches, are the people who live where wars are waged. In wars involving distant wealthy nations on one-side, some 95% of those killed or injured or traumatized, and 100% of those bombed out of their homes are people against whom war is waged, most of them civilians and the rest of them people doing exactly what any Hollywood movie or politician would tell them — have read more

Photo by Jack Gilroy, Great Bend, Penn., September 28, 2020.

If you do a web search for images of “Nazi salute” you find old photos from Germany and recent photos from the United States. But if you search for images of “Bellamy salute” you find countless black-and-white photographs of U.S. children and adults with their right arms raised stiffly out in front of them in what will strike most people as a Nazi salute. From the early 1890s through 1942 the United States used the Bellamy salute read more

Excerpted and modified from Leaving World War II Behind

“One day President Roosevelt told me that he was asking publicly for suggestions about what the war should be called. I said at once, ‘The Unnecessary War.’ There never was a war more easy to stop than that which has just wrecked what was left of the world from the previous struggle.” —Winston Churchill[i]

World War II grew out of World War I, and almost nobody tries to argue that World War I was just or glorious. By behaving more read more

Donald Trump and Joe Biden were athletes who got deferments and dubious medical-based exemptions to participating in the mass slaughter of Vietnamese, Laotian, and Cambodian men, women, and children.

The common criticism of one or the other of them, based on partisan loyalty, is that he should have participated in mass murder. Questioning this notion results, most often, in ad hominem attacks against the questioner: but you weren’t there, you can’t know what you would have done, etc.

But we read more

Source: here and here.

Over half of the money that Congress decides what to do with every year is for wars and war preparations, year after year.

When you add in police and prisons, and the militarization of police and prisons — and of borders and airports — and the Veterans Administration, you’re talking about two-thirds of the money.

So the big question is, of course, why do I hate Veterans?

Oh, go Dick Cheney yourself. I support universal free healthcare and education and guaranteed retirement read more

I know the common story is that the Supreme Court vacancy is a matter for the U.S. Senate. But if you read this recent memo on what the Democrats could do if they really wanted to prevent packing the Court with rightwingers, something may jump out at you: The House also has control over this matter.

Here’s why:

Donald Trump came into office openly violating both emoluments clauses, threatening to wage wars to steal oil and kill people’s families, promising to discriminate in immigration on the read more

The greatest impediment to doing anything, for homo sapiens, is often that it hasn’t already been done. “Well, sure, that sounds easy enough, but I just don’t know. I’ve never seen it done and my cousin’s friend heard it was impossible.”

The greatest means of smashing through that impediment is for the thing that needs doing to have already happened. “Impossible or not, we just did it 3 feet from where you are standing, while you were standing there. Here’s the video.”

The best read more

Lisa Savage is a longtime educator from Solon, Maine, currently running for U.S. Senate. In a life dedicated to public service, Savage has worked to make Maine and the United states more equitable, more peaceful, and more aware of the looming climate crisis.

Total run time: 29:00
Host: David Swanson.
Producer: David Swanson.
Music by Duke Ellington.

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By David Swanson, excerpted from Leaving World War II Behind.

 If you were to listen to people justifying WWII today, and using WWII to justify the subsequent 75 years of wars and war preparations, the first thing you would expect to find in reading about what WWII actually was would be a war motivated by the need to save Jews from mass murder. There would be old photographs of posters with Uncle Sam pointing his finger, saying “I want you to save the Jews!”

In reality, the U.S. and British read more