Archive | Commentary

Washington – Fifteen people were arrested on March 1 in front of the White House after winding their way for two hours through the streets of the nation’s capital, demanding the U.S. stop torturing detainees in military prisons. Members of Witness Against Torture began their protest at the steps of the U.S. Supreme Court, continuing […]

The spin-doctors at the right-wing Cato Institute are spinning out of control.  In a syndicated editorial (Houston Chronicle, 27 February 2006), these stalwart advocates of the privatization of almost everything in heaven and earth suggest that selling (or giving — they’re not clear on this point) the Grand Canyon National Park to the Walt Disney […]

Hopes were high.  There was near euphoria among left-wing Germans a half year ago: two main wings of the progressive movement, one quite strong in the eastern states, the other small but growing stronger in the much larger, more populous western states, joined together for an election campaign last year, had unprecedented success (over 8 […]

Jyllands-Posten stood Clausewitz on his head.  Its now infamous cartoons of Mohammed are not so much speech as acts.  Acts of provocation and belligerence.  They are the latest round of politics as war by other means. Make no mistake.  Jyllands-Posten is not in the business of promoting the freedom of speech.  Nor are the European […]

Dear Ms. Shirin Ebadi: The appeal you and Mohammad Sahimi addressed to “Western democracies” in the International Herald Tribune on January 19 disappointed this former admirer of yours.  Your invitation to the current and previous imperial powers to intervene for human rights in Iran fails precisely on grounds of the noble principles you invoked to […]

  At last, you can now have your own Deluxe 2006 Edition of Iraqopoly! Click on the image for a larger view. “Iraqopoly: The Deluxe 2006 Stay the Course Edition” Rules: There Are No Rules — Only Ideology Get to Baghdad, and then Spin for an Exit Strategy. Bush Makes Axis of Evil Speech — […]

Click on the image for a larger view. Doug Minkler is a San Francisco Bay Area artist specializing in fundraising, outreach, and educational posters. Minkler has collaborated with ILWU, Rainforest Action Network, SF Mime Troupe, ACLU, the National Lawyers Guild, CISPES, United Auto Workers, Africa Information Network, ADAPT, Cop Watch, Street Sheet, and Veterans for […]

“Third-rate men, of course, exist in all countries, but it is only here that they are in full control of the state, and with it of all the national standards.” — H. L. Mencken Hard on the heels of the Cheney hunt for Republican lawyers, we now have the Great DP-World Port Controversy. Democrats like […]

Few things are more frustrating than the doxa to which a hybrid and multifarious object such as “Islam” is all too readily reduced by formulaic provocation and paranoiac reaction.  The current “cartoon war” between “militant” Muslims and “militant” liberals in the “West” is a case in point.  Once again, people are led to view themselves […]

William Morris said, in an article that appeared in The Commonweal on 21 June 1889, “[I]t cannot be too often repeated that the true incentive to useful and happy labour is and must be pleasure in the work itself.”  Morris’s remark pertained to a debate at the end of the nineteenth century on the nature […]

Click on the image to watch a preview of “Soldiers & Students” One of the largest youth antiwar organizations — the Campus Antiwar Network — is calling for a week of actions against military recruitment on March 13-19, 2006.  Pepperspray Productions of Seattle recently released a DVD titled “Soldiers & Students” that features counter-recruitment actions […]

Washington – 2/22/06.  Today is Day Eight of our 34-day fast for peace at the U.S. Capitol, the Washington component of the Winter of Our Discontent campaign organized by Voices for Creative Nonviolence (www.vcnv.org). The four of us in D.C., Maureen Foltz, Jeff Leys, Ed Kinane, and I are doing a liquids-only fast.  Maureen and […]

I’ve just about had it.  I cannot watch one more episode of the Daily Show which makes racist jokes about Arabs and Muslims.  I am sick and tired of people who see themselves as part of the left writing articles that put a liberal gloss over what is, in essence, a right-wing “clash of civilizations” […]

Michael Steinberg, “The Architecture of Dreamworld 1: Like a Sex Machine” (31 October 2005); “The Architecture of Dreamworld 2: The Disarming Reflex” (17 November 2005); “The Architecture of Dreamworld 3: Going Postal” (28 December 2005) There’s probably no way to make critical generalizations about popular culture without sounding like a curmudgeon.  As I look over […]

Nestled on the bank of the Illinois River, the small community of Meredosia, Illinois sits sixty-five miles west of the state capitol.  In 1955, National Starch and Chemical built a plant there and has been a key employer for this community of about a thousand people.  A producer of adhesives, National Starch was generally considered […]

Many eyes are on the U.S. real estate market.  “During the past five years, home prices have risen at an annual rate of 9.2 percent,” according to the 2006 Economic Report of the President released on February 13. Was this growth normal?  We need the historical context of home price increases to answer this question. […]

  The death of twelve persons on January 2 in Kalinga Nagar of Jajpur district in Orissa, when the police fired on adivasis (adi = original, vasi = inhabitants) protesting against state-directed displacement and demanding adequate compensation, once again demonstrates the impact of escalating “development” aggression on India’s aboriginal communities. According to the official version, […]

El 22 de enero del año 2002, Evo fue expulsado del Paraíso.  O sea: el diputado Morales fue echado del Parlamento. El 22 de enero del año 2006, en ese mismo lugar de pomposo aspecto, Evo Morales fue consagrado presidente de Bolivia. O sea: Bolivia empieza a enterarse de que es un país de mayoría […]

On Wednesday, February 15, 2006, a group of war resisters began a 34 day liquids-only fast in Washington, DC.  The fast is sponsored by the Voices for Creative Nonviolence (VCNV) — a nonviolent action group made up of regular citizens who are fed up with the direction of the US government, especially as regards its […]

The United Transportation Union, which represents railroad conductors and some engineers, reports that negotiations with the railroad corporations had broken down over the issue of crew reduction.  The carriers are demanding the implementation of one-person train crews for many routes on the US freight rail system.  The current standard train crew is two, an engineer […]