How to Truly ‘Build Back Better’ on Climate
The Build Back Better program isn’t just inadequate on climate—it may be a disaster. Here’s what movements are demanding next.
Biden’s AUKUS Alliance is Taking the World to the Brink of a New Cold War
Given the 20 years of disastrous warfare during the “war on terror,” what business does Washington have building a new military alliance in Asia?
Can We Avoid a War with China?
The cold war in the Taiwan Strait threatens to turn hot.
Our Future vs. Neoliberalism
Bolivia is leading the way in channeling public discontent with neoliberalism into progressive alternatives.
Arab Spring, Israeli Isolation
With the Arab uprisings gradually reconfiguring the regional political landscape, Israel is finding itself increasingly isolated. For at least a decade, Israel has identified Iran as its main strategic nemesis, but the Arab spring has rekindled simmering tensions between Israel on one hand, and Arab states as well as Turkey on the other.
Iran Alleged Assassination Plot: Emboldened by Nuke Program?
Uber think-tanker suggests Iran doesn’t fear American retaliation for its alleged assassination plot because it thinks its nuclear program will deter us.
Is Iran’s Alleged Cash-for-Assassinations Plot Too Implausible to Be True?
Will Operation Red Coalition eclipse or compound problems created by Operations Fast and Furious?
Poets Stand Up
In Paris, poets staged a flash mob outside the Louvre Museum. In North Carolina, they sent poems to their state legislators, calling on them to restore arts education funding to the decimated state budget. In Vancouver, BC, poets cleaned up a beach before their reading. There was a reading in solidarity with the people of Tibet in Pasadena, California, events throughout Mexico City demanding an end to violence, and “an exorcism of fear and helplessness” in Norman, Oklahoma. Poets gathered in Fez, Morocco, and Jalalabad, Afghanistan and Sharjah, United Arab Emirates.
War on Roaches
Set up the four cuts
cut support cut food cut water cut communications
still see stray guerilla roaches, though all food including edible trash
carefully removed or wrapped
in plastic.
The Real Nuclear Threat From Iran May Not Be Nuclear Weapons
Unsafe construction practices may have been used to build Iran’s first nuclear energy facility, Bushehr.
Wall Street (Unlike)
Tyrants are ruthless. They throw people in jail, execute them without trial, suppress the press. They can rule for decades. They can attempt to set up dynasties. But in the modern age, tyrants have a shelf life. We live in an age of activism, and tyrants are always looking over the shoulder to make sure the military is behind them, the human rights community isn’t breathing down their neck, or their “adoring masses” aren’t camped out in the public square demanding their exit from history.
Our leaders in the United States aren’t tyrants. Instead, we face the tyranny of “business as usual.”
Ten Years and One Month Later
When I look back on the news cycle over the last two months, I think of 9/11 and floods. On the morning of August 28, I turned on the television and watched as the local newscaster showed the Hudson River lapping against the top of the concrete bulkhead, threatening to rush into the streets of Battery Park in Lower Manhattan. This spot was just a few blocks away from Ground Zero, where, as the scene shifted, we could see the site being prepared for the upcoming memorial event. As the storm waters receded, news outlets fixed their attention on this scene, and we found ourselves awash in a sea of commentary on the anniversary and the impact of 9/11 over the last decade.
Hawks Used Test Ban Treaty as Justification for Expanding Nukes
In the original Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty negotiations, the nuclear weapons complex made the case that, absent testing, extravagant virtual testing facilities would be needed to maintain the nuclear weapons arsenal without testing.
An Alternative Eulogy for Steve Jobs
Jobs may have been an exceptional designer, but when it comes to the multifaceted corporate malfeasance that has come to characterize the global electronics industry, Apple is exceptional for its profit margins alone.