Category: Uncategorized

By David Swanson, World BEYOND War, January 31, 2024

For a couple of decades now, the very worst people in Washington, D.C., have pushed hard for a war on Iran. Some high points have come in 2007, 2015, 2017, and 2024. Each time it has been absolutely critical to attack Iran at once. There could be no delay. Dominoes would fall. Terrorism would prevail. Credibility would be sqandered. And yet, each time, the threatened war has not been launched, and the world has gone on just the same.

We’ve seen read more

I didn’t actually think the author of The Shock Doctrine could write a less than wonderful book but I really wasn’t interested in a book about people confusing her (Naomi Klein) with Naomi Wolf, or any other Naomi for that matter. Then I read Dave Zirin’s review of Doppelganger and realized that of course it was about something more than twins, body doubles, and avatars — and literary references thereto.

Doppelganger is actually about, among other things, the situation we’re read more

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Nick Turse’s first piece for TomDispatch focused on, as I put it at the time, “how fully the worlds of toy-making and war-making, of toy companies, video-game outfits, movie studios, and the Pentagon have meshed.” That was in October 2003, only read more

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

Yes, if you’re looking for it, you can find the information on the grim heating up of this planet. Still, remarkably little of it has been headline-making news the way Donald Trump is, almost any day of the week, no matter what he talks about, including his acuity when it comes to whales.

Last June through December read more

By David Swanson, World BEYOND War, January 28, 2024

Remarks on January 28, 2024, in Oakland, California.

Photos and videos here.

War is a top cause in the world of death, of injury, of destruction, of trauma, and of course far and away the leading cause of homelessness. And if you start looking at the long-term damage — the people who die a year later, the people who grow up believing in violent vengeance, the water and soil that have been poisoned forever, the economies that are not restored read more

By David Swanson, World BEYOND War, January 26, 2024

The International Court of Justice has ruled that Israel must cease its warmaking in Gaza — cease committing and inciting genocidal acts — and that the case charging Israel with genocide must proceed.

DETAILS OF THE RULING:

1. By 15-2: Israel shall take all measures within its power to prevent all acts within the scope of Genocide Convention article 2
2. 15-2: Israel must immediately ensure that its military does not commit acts within the scope of GC.2
3. 16-1: Direct and punish all members of the public who engage in the incitement of genocide against Palestinians
4. 16-1: Ensure provision of urgently needed basic services, humanitarian aid
5. 15-2: Prevent the destruction of and ensure the preservation of evidence to allegation of acts of GC.2
6. 15-2: Israel will submit report as to how they’re adhering to these orders to the ICJ within 1 month

This is Article 2 of the Genocide Convention:

In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as read more

By David Swanson, World BEYOND War, January 25, 2024

The 2020 Democratic Party Platform said that Democrats would reduce military spending: “We can maintain a strong defense and protect our safety and security for less.” Right on! Get out the vote!

Then a Democratic president proposed an increase each of the next three years, just as his Republic predecessor had done each year. And Congress not only went along but went over and above the proposed increases, with more bipartisan harmony than read more

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

I was uptown in New York City on September 11, 2001, but I still remember the distant smoke that you could see over the Hudson River. If you had told me then that, thanks to those four hijacked planes and a tiny group of al-Qaeda operatives, my country would launch a 20-plus-year “Global War on Terror” — with two full-scale disastrous invasions of distant lands — and read more

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

It’s bad enough here in the U.S. Yes, unlike Donald Trump (“Drill, drill, drill!“), Joe Biden has attempted to do something read more