Tomgram: Mattea Kramer, The Grief of Others and the Boasts of Candidates
photo above: An injured Afghan boy is put on a stretcher at a hospital in Jalalabad city, Afghanistan. Photograph: Nesar Ahmad Posted by Mattea Kramer at 7:01am, March 3, 2016. An excerpt from the introduction: Here’s a what-if that continues to haunt me. What if some disturbed “lone wolf,” “inspired” by the Islamic State’s online […]
Best of TomDispatch: Nick Turse, From the Missing Archives of a Lost War
Posted by Nick Turse and Tam Turse at 5:02pm, May 29, 2016. an excerpt from the introduction: On this Memorial Day weekend dedicated to remembering those who died in America’s wars, TomDispatch brings back a powerful 2008 Nick Turse piece about two civilians, two Vietnamese, who did not, in fact, die in the long ago […]
Tomgram: Andrew Bacevich, America’s Sinkhole Wars
an excerpt: We have it on highest authority: the recent killing of Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Muhammad Mansour by a U.S. drone strike in Pakistan marks “an important milestone.” So the president of the United States has declared, with that claim duly echoed and implicitly endorsed by media commentary — the New York Times reporting, […]
Tomgram: Michael Klare, The Oil World in Chaos
an excerpt from the introduction to the piece: Only one problem: climate change threatens to screw up the formula. That phenomenon has complicated weather coverage by inserting human (that is, fossil fuel) politics where only the periodically awesome destructive power of nature and raw human emotion once were. All too often, bad weather may now […]
God of the Depressed
by Stephen H. Webb 2. 19. 16 In that I’m given to depression, I greatly appreciated this theological reflection. an excerpt: Christians don’t talk enough about depression. Emotional pain, for one thing, can be hard to share. Despair can feel very physical for the sufferer, weighing heavily on the heart and clogging the brain, but […]
Will Canada Recognize Rights of Indigenous Peoples in Poor Countries?
photo above: Indigenous women and children in Guatemala are among those most impacted by Canadian mining companies’ destructive practices. (Photo: Danilo Valladares / IPS) an excerpt: It’s estimated that 75 percent of the world’s mining and exploration companies are based in Canada, and mining is one of Canada’s most economically powerful sectors. Activists say as […]
Jeremy Scahill: Corporations Are Making a Killing Off US Targeted Killing
Jeremy Scahill authored this recent book: , already covered in my blog here: The Assassination Complex. an excerpt from this most recent interview with the author: Laura Flanders: Let’s start with the meat of the matter, the book. It is based on a mountain of classified documents that you and your colleagues went through. Briefly, […]
US Officials Responsible for Torture Should Be Prosecuted Under Nuremberg Protocols
photo above: Congressional Republicans surround President George W. Bush as he signs the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building near the White House, in Washington, October 26, 2005. (Stephen Crowley / The New York Times) The article by Rebecca Gordon is an excerpt from the foreward of her […]
Interview With BDS Co-Founder Omar Barghouti: Banned by Israel From Traveling, Threatened With Worse
BDS – Boycott, Divest, Sanction – Israel an excerpt: Despite having lived in Israel for 22 years with no criminal record of any kind, Omar Barghouti (above) was this week denied the right to travel outside the country. As one of the pioneers of the increasingly powerful movement to impose boycotts, sanctions, and divestment measures […]
Donald Trump Defends Bullying to Megyn Kelly, Advising Her to “Fight Back” 10 Times Harder
By Mark Karlin, Editor of BuzzFlash at Truthout Further to Donald Trump and the United Stats as consummate bullies. (See Bully Culture.) an excerpt: In a new book Bully Nation: How the American Establishment Creates a Bullying Society, authors Charles Derber and Yale R. Magress incisively explain the prototype that has resulted in a surge […]
“Isolation Devastates the Brain”: The Neuroscience of Solitary Confinement
By Carol Schaeffer May 11, 2016 an excerpt: “Isolation devastates the brain. There is no question about that,” said Zigmund. “Without air, we will live minutes. Without water, we will live days. Without nutrition, we live weeks. Without physical activity, our lives are decreased by years. Social interaction is part of these basic elements of […]
Trump Card: The Bully Who Exposes Our Bully Nation
By Charles Derber and Yale Magrass photo above: by Karolina Grabowska from Pexels WN: There is much on this website about America’s–and the West’s concomitant–“militarized capitalism.” None of it is good news . . . an excerpt: The mainstream media and party establishments say, “Isn’t it terrible that Trump is such a bully?” Many ordinary people say […]
CIA Torture Is Out in the Open – but Guantanamo Bay Detainees Are Still Going Nowhere
By Rebecca Cordell This article is a bit dated, but the realities remain the same. an excerpt: The recent release of a US Senate committee’s report on CIA interrogation methods during the War on Terror has sent shockwaves around the world. Detailing the extent and sheer brutality of the enhanced interrogation techniques used during the […]
Archbishop’s – Rowan Williams – address to the Synod of Bishops in Rome
Wednesday 10th October 2012 In the first address by an Archbishop of Canterbury to the Synod of Bishops in Rome, Archbishop Rowan Williams spoke about the profound connection between contemplation and the task of evangelisation, saying it “must be rooted in a profound confidence that we have a distinctive human destiny to show and share […]
US Army Chaplain Resigns in Opposition to Use of Assassin Drones by the United States
If only hundreds more U.S. army chaplains would do this! an excerpt: [US Army Reserve Chaplain Captain Christopher John] Antal wrote, “We have sanitized killing and condoned extrajudicial assassinations … war made easy without due process, protecting ourselves from the human cost of war. We have deceived ourselves … denying the colossal misery our wars […]
Snowden interview: Why the media isn’t doing its job
The Tow Center for Digital Journalism’s Emily Bell spoke to Edward Snowden over a secure channel about his experiences working with journalists and his perspective on the shifting media world. This is an excerpt of that conversation, conducted in December 2015. It will appear in a forthcoming book: Journalism After Snowden: The Future of the […]
In Washington, Why Is Militarism the Only Option?
by Tom Engelhardt This is a brilliant, devastating piece that presents militarism in the United States as their current “drug of choice” worldwide, with devastating results for the global community: the very inverse of human rights, freedom, and democracy. And Obama was once awarded the Nobel Peace Prize?! How ridiculous is that? What a crazy […]
The Untold History of US War Crimes
(Photo: atomic cloud over Nagasaki, August 9, 1945. (Photo: Hiromichi Matsuda) An interview with Professor (of History) Peter Kuznick It is a truism that the United States has been committing war crimes almost since its inception. This interview looks at U.S. war crimes during and since World War II. An excerpt: As a freshman in […]
Nonviolence and the Book of Revelation with an Annotated Bibliography
by Paul Nuechterlein an excerpt: When I wrote the first draft of this page (May 2007), I was wondering if one of the most popular phenomenons of our time would be on the side of this way of nonviolent love. I believed J. K. Rowling to be presenting us with the choice between Lord Voldemort’s […]
Re-Sacralizing Violence in the Left Behind Books
by Paul Nuechterlein An excerpt: From the perspective of mimetic theory, the most serious problem with the Left Behind series of novels, by Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins,(1[ Published by Tyndale in twelve volumes, 1995-2004.]) is their re-sacralization of violence. Their version of Jesus is no longer the Lamb slain but the same beastly […]
Inside the Assassination Complex: Whistle-blowing Is Not Just Leaking – It’s an Act of Political Resistance
by Edward Snowden in the foreword to The Assassination Complex: Inside the Government’s Secret Drone Warfare (see the previous blog article) an excerpt: The individuals who make these disclosures feel so strongly about what they have seen that they’re willing to risk their lives and their freedom. They know that we, the people, are ultimately […]
Jeremy Scahill and Glenn Greenwald Probe Secret US Drone Wars in New Book
The United States is a world-wide assassin. Plain and simple. They act with impunity as judge, jury, and executioner. They slaughter countless innocent civilians in their assassinations wake. It is morally utterly deplorable, with no end in sight. The book highlighted here is one of the exposés. An excerpt: Major revelations about the US government’s […]