Blogs
House Afghanistan Debate: What Kucinich Accomplished
This is the debate that should have been held - at least - last fall when the Administration was considering sending more U.S.
Immigration Opponents Take a Turn for the Worse
As grassroots support for the pro-immigration reform March for America grows, anti-immigration groups and their allies are trying to use racial tension to stop the momentum. Opposition groups like NumbersUSA and the Americans for Legal Immigration PAC announced plans this week to partner with Tea Party activists in response to the event, which is expected to draw as many as 100,000 people to the National Mall on March 21.
Recognizing Female Personhood
I'm delighted that Rep. Bart Stupak (D-USCCB) is getting a pro-choice primary challenger, Connie Saltonstall, to take him to task for shafting his constituents on health care in order to shaft the nation's entire female population on the question of their autonomy.
Palestinians Should Declare Statehood
The unceasing building of settlements on Palestinian land underscores the need for Palestinians to take a more definite action regarding their future and their rightful desire to have their own state. They should declare statehood.
The Dangers of Deficit Reduction
NEW YORK - A wave of fiscal austerity is rushing over Europe and America. The magnitude of budget deficits -- like the magnitude of the downturn -- has taken many by surprise. But despite protests by yesterday's proponents of deregulation, who would like the government to remain passive, most economists believe that government spending has made a difference, helping to avert another Great Depression.
How Your Twitter Account Could Land You in Jail
On the afternoon of September 24, 2009, Pennsylvania State Troopers, their guns drawn, broke down the door of room 238 of the CareFree Inn on the outskirts of Pittsburgh. The troopers were acting on a search warrant related to protests planned for the G20 summit-a meeting of the heads of state of the world's major economies. Thousands of protesters had descended on the city, presenting demands ranging from curbs on carbon emissions to the outright abolition of capitalism.
Macroeconomic Policy: The Elephant in the Room
International conferences on poverty and the environment come and go. There's always a big pachyderm in the meeting room. It's got the words "macroeconomic policy" written on its forehead. Nobody wants to talk about it.
Inside Alan Greenspan's Nightmare
Alan Greenspan had a dream, or rather a nightmare. Greenspan seems to have woken up in a cold sweat one morning in fear that the period of "disinflationary pressures" that had kept inflation low since the 1990s was about to end.
Breaking the Silence on War in Our Schools
When the World Trade Center was attacked, the international crisis reverberated in schools all over the United States. In kindergarten through high school classrooms, teachers struggled to figure out age-appropriate ways to talk about the violence.
Schooling in Orange Jumpsuits
The image that flashed into my mind was: schools in orange jumpsuits.
Something has broken apart in our society - an unspoken agreement about sanity, a truce between play and order. The authoritarian strain, always present, of course, has been ratcheting up to ever more absurd levels for a decade now.
War in a Box
GE's Dirty Green Jobs
In 2005 General Electric launched their "EcoMagination" campaign, a marketing effort built around selling products that help solve environmental problems and create green jobs.
According to GE's CEO Jeffery Immelt "Our Ecomagination initiative has created tens of thousands of jobs at GE and in our supply chain." And if the U.S. steps up and takes the lead on climate mitigation, Immelt promises to "create 250,000 green jobs in the economy."
A Challenge to Corporate Feudalism?
"[T]he powers of financial capitalism had another far-reaching aim, nothing less than to create a world system of financial control in private hands able to dominate the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole. This system was to be controlled in a feudalist fashion by the central banks of the world acting in concert, by secret agreements arrived at in frequent private meetings and conferences." --Prof. Carroll Quigley, Tragedy and Hope, 1966
Mourn Granny D.; Then Organize for Clean Politics
Doris "Granny D" Haddock, whose 3,200-mile walk across the United States at the age of 90 drew thousands of activists into the movement for political reform, has died Tuesday evening at the age of 100.
The Dublin, New Hampshire, grandmother's death came ten years and ten days after she finished the remarkable two-year walk, which she undertook to promote the passage of campaign finance reform legislation (in particular the McCain-Feingold Campaign Finance Reform law).
Working Families Still Squeezed
There were grumblings from all corners of the AFL-CIO at its winter meeting in Orlando recently. "Disappointment", "disillusionment", "unengaged", these words and worse peppered press reports describing labor's view of President Obama and the Democrats.
Organized labor spent $200 million to help elect the president and support of its 15 million members is considered absolutely critical for Democrats to hold the line this November.
Official Dogma: Iraq War a Success
The New York Times' Tom Friedman, who did as much as any single individual to persuade large numbers of Democrats and "moderates" to support the invasion of Iraq, today writes:
Making Good Neighbors, Online and Off
When Michael Wood-Lewis and his wife, Valerie, moved from Washington, D.C., to the south end of Burlington, Vermont, in 1998, "we'd landed in what we thought was our dream neighborhood. It was walkable, near the lake, full of trees. But we were having trouble getting to know the neighbors.
NATO Goes Anti-Nuclear?
President Obama's call for a nuclear-weapons-free world in Prague last April unleashed a great outpouring of support from international allies and grassroots activists demanding a process to actually eliminate nuclear weapons. One recent and unexpected initiative has come from America's NATO allies.
Iraqis Against All Odds
The Iraq elections underline the tenacity of its people and their determination to take back their country.
Iraqis have succeeded in pulling away from the brink despite, not because, of US policies over the last seven years.
Crediting George Bush's policies for hard earned Iraqi accomplishments adds insult to injury.
It was not only the timing of declaring "Mission Accomplished" from a battle ship that was proved unfortunate, but the whole notion of 'US victory' in Iraq is utterly nonsensical considering the horrific human, societal and other costs.
Financial Transactions Tax: A Little Tax on the Big Casino
So here we are. It's as if the whole world is channeling the scene from the movie, Jerry Maguire, when Cuba Gooding Jr. jumps up and down shouting, "Show me the money!" Fund universal health care and climate policy, extend unemployment benefits, and rebuild crumbling infrastructure.