If the Democratic Party and its presidential nominee, Joe Biden, have a weak spot, it is their general fondness –since the debacle of the Vietnam War– for military solutions and support, including […]
To be “liberal” is to be “open to new ideas” and “favourable to or respectful of individual rights and freedoms.” Given the above definition, can a true liberal be a promoter or […]
By Rumple Oxbridge, liberal lyricist It’s sad to see, the president said, knocking down our metal-molded racist generals green with age. Once such men were all the rage, killing to keep […]
By T.S. Swanky, an imaginary, confused conservative. Any resemblance to any actual person or conservative columnist, living or dead, is an astounding coincidence. I confess that I was one of the many conservative “Never […]
By John Frederick Kaufman So the United States suddenly felt the need to give our MOAB (“mother of all bombs”)–more officially known as GBU-43/B Massive Ordnance Air Blast–a try on Thursday in the […]
By Rumple Oxbridge (The Pacific’s unreal radical rhymer) How many mothers can it kill, this “mother of all bombs?” It’s only dropped on terrorists we’re certain have no wombs. What is the mother […]
The ongoing war in Syria is a vast catastrophe; what began as a peaceable resistance movement against the Assad regime, one among many in the “Arab Spring” of 2011, has devolved into a brutal […]
Must politicians and journalists succumb to the language of war? Or the flip side: Must we put words like “peace” on weapons of war? I’m thinking of the U.S. nuclear missiles called “peacekeepers.” The […]
First published February 17, 2017 in The Capital Times If there is any consolation to be found in the election of President Trump, it is the opportunity to make anti-war protest great […]
Talks are underway this week at the United Nations in New York on a possible global treaty to officially ban all nuclear weapons. More than 120 nations are participating, but not surprisingly […]
Surely it’s time to refute the great American myth our elected representatives in Washington, D.C. so believe in: an armed citizenry and war abroad will protect us from criminal and terrorist violence. There is a sort […]
One question not heard at last night’s Republican presidential debate in Milwaukee was anything about what we might call “Patriotgate.” This has nothing to do with deflated footballs but does include the New England Patriots, as […]
“These are people who had been working hard for months, non-stop for the past week. They had not gone home, they had not seen their families, they had just been working in […]
[From the Institute of Policy Studies via Common Dreams] By Phyllis Bennis The destruction of the Doctors Without Borders (MSF) hospital in Kunduz, with 22 dead so far, including doctors, other staff […]
Speaking of perpetual war, the NY Times is reporting that the U.S. war in Afghanistan, which, despite a major withdrawal of troops, was never entirely over, has erupted again as the U.S. launched […]
At present the “golden rule” of many in Congress is he who has the most gold is the most to be loved and pandered to, so it was no doubt a bit of a […]
(Photo in the public domain in the United States: Hulton Archive/Getty Images. “American actor Gloria Swanson (1899 – 1983) stands on tiptoes on the prow of a motorboat while Teddy the dog sits […]
Becoming Our Enemy Sometime we’ll have to risk Becoming our enemy. It will take some warming up, Eyes and teeth offered Shyly, arms unarmed. No words at first to blur The strange exchange, […]
The Poem to End All Cruelty For many years she wanted to write a poem To end all cruelty. But always she failed to start Or finish because she thought: Who am […]
By John Kaufman (Translated by Julia Dubnoff via The Divine Sappho) Some say an army of horsemen, some of footsoldiers, some of ships, is the fairest thing on the black earth, but […]
Torture and war are intimately related. Torture is a subset of war: brutality directed at an individual and justified in the name of “defense.” What was the justification across the Bush administration […]
Here are two poems by the 19th Century American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow who was, for the record, a Unitarian pacifist who reluctantly supported the Civil War as the only way of […]
The Atlantic
