The New York Times is still getting the Bernie movement wrong

America's paper of record said a Bernie Sanders-inspired grassroots group was "failing"—just one day before its candidates rocked the Democratic establishment.

Before major news organizations pronounce someone dead, they ought to check the person’s pulse. Continue reading

A current thriving business sector: Trumpology

The opaqueness of the Soviet Union’s government led leading intelligence services around the world, including the Central Intelligence Agency, to invest millions of dollars into a discipline known as “Kremlinology.” Experts were hired to “read between the lines” of Soviet press statements, newspapers, and magazines and listen closely to Radio Moscow to gain some insight into the inner workings of the Kremlin, particularly after deaths or purges within the Soviet leadership. Photographs of the celebration of the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution were closely examined to see what Politburo members were not present during the traditional military parade through Red Square. Continue reading

Trump’s deplorable SCOTUS nomination

Nominating another right-wing extremist to the nation’s High Court surprised no one. Continue reading

The Trump-Kushner delusion on Palestine

Here’s a shocker: Donald Trump and his Palestine-Israel fixers think they can buy a peaceful and permanent settlement of the 70-year conflict by getting Arab governments to pressure the Palestinians into forgetting the “politicians’ talking points”—you know, superficial things like independence from the routine abuses and indignities of colonial oppression (that’s right; the same trifles Americans celebrated on July 4)—and focusing instead on what really matters: roads, jobs, and money. Continue reading

Reality remake

Among the more egregious movements now active on the American scene are those that seek to undermine the expression of reality within the public sphere. A good example of this is the long-running effort of some Protestant fundamentalists who seek to challenge the notion of evolution in public school textbooks and classrooms. This particular effort not only pits the unprovable religious beliefs of a relatively small number of ideologues against one of the best-demonstrated scientific theories of the modern age, but also seeks to shut down the public’s “right to know” the difference between opinion and fact. Continue reading

America bombs, Europe gets the refugees. That’s evil

The US government (with France and a few other US allies) bombs Libya, Syria, etc.; and the US regime refuses to accept any of the resulting refugees—the burdens from which are now breaking the EU, and the EU is sinking in economic competition against America’s international corporations. America’s corporations remain blithely unscathed by not only the refugees that are breaking up the EU, but also by the EU’s economic sanctions against Russia, Iran, and other allies of governments that the US regime is trying to overthrow in its constant invasions and coups. Continue reading

ICE and HHS not first to separate families

Although the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the Department of Health and Human Services are justly being hammered for separating immigrant families at the U.S. southern border, the policy of splitting apart families was previously enacted by Donald Trump’s Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). However, in the case of FEMA, the families separated were U.S. citizens. Continue reading

Abolishing ICE isn’t radical—it’s rational

ICE is supposed to keep Americans safe. Instead, it's terrorizing refugees, families, and small children.

As someone who was born and raised in the border state of New Mexico, I’m very familiar with political speak about immigrants and the border, especially when it comes to talking about safety. Continue reading

Refugee crises need long-term solutions

It seems to me that some opportunistic Western politicians are exploiting the refugee crises to feather their own nests by appealing to voters fearful of being culturally swamped and threatened economically. They tap in to people’s nationalistic instincts engendering contempt for the other, rendering ‘compassion’ to the status of a dirty word. Continue reading

Other nations trust America at their peril

Duplicity and betrayal define US relations with other nations and its own ordinary people—ill-served, abused and exploited in deference to its privileged class. Continue reading

A wall won’t fix immigration

The wailing in our country about the “invasion of immigrants” has been long and loud. As one complainant put it, “Few of their children in the country learn English . . . The signs in our streets have inscriptions in both languages . . . Unless the stream of the importation could be turned they will soon so outnumber us that all the advantages we have will not be able to preserve our language, and even our government will become precarious.” Continue reading

Correctly defining modern Zionism

Part Two: Buying the stairway to heaven?

Before modern Zionism took a hold on America, there once was a religious mandate to willfully provide for the less fortunate. Because of the scriptures, if not an ultimate fear of God, many of society’s super-wealthy of that bygone era did substantially contribute to serving the societies around them. This was shown in the construction of libraries, museums, universities, hospitals, endowments, social services and church social programs paid for by oligarchs such as Carnegie, Roosevelt, Blair, Morgan, Getty, Mellon and Tufts. Some of these men, knowing the capitalist crimes they had perpetrated on the path to their riches, were certainly buying their own “Stairway to Heaven.” Try as they might, none could deny in their minds the unavoidable final decision that would befall them all come “Judgment Day.” Continue reading

A public bank for Los Angeles?

City council puts it to the voters

California legislators exploring the public bank option may be breaking not just from Wall Street but from the Federal Reserve. Continue reading

Coming soon to your neighborhood: 5G wireless

Just as any new technology claims to offer the most advanced development; that their definition of progress will cure society’s ills or make life easier by eliminating the drudgery of antiquated appliances, the Wifi Alliance was organized as a worldwide wireless network to connect ‘everyone and everything, everywhere” as it promised “improvements to nearly every aspect of daily life.” Continue reading

No joke: Getting serious about Syria

Remember back to that very sad day when you finally found out that there wasn’t any Santa Claus? That everything your parents had ever told you about Santa Claus was a lie? And not only that, but then you also found out that millions of other kids in America, just like you, had been systematically lied to as well? And that the culture of an entire nation has colluded to make YOU believe in cute little elves and Mrs. Santa and chimneys and cookies after midnight and some happy workshop at the North Pole. . . . Continue reading

Postcard from the End of America: Lancaster County, PA

I’ve hung out with poet Hai-Dang Phan in quite a few places. Since our first meeting in Certaldo, Italy, in 2003, we’ve downed a few pints together in New York, Washington, Milwaukee, Iowa, Illinois, Philadelphia, Hanoi, Saigon and Vung Tau. This week, Hai-Dang flew down from Boston, and with his rented car, we spent two days visiting a handful of Pennsylvania and New Jersey towns. Continue reading

Correctly defining modern Zionism

Part One

There is much that the civilized world does not understand about modern Zionism. Today, the definitions of being Jewish, Israeli or Zionist are, to most people, analogous. They are not. Continue reading

Netanyahu regime cuts off funds to Palestinians

When it comes to fundamental Palestinians rights, Netanyahu operates like a tinpot despot. Continue reading

‘Deal of the century’ is not new and the PA leadership is not a victim

Donald Trump’s ‘deal of the century’ will fail. Palestinians will not exchange their 70-year long struggle for freedom for Jared Kushner’s cash; nor will Israel accept even if there is a demilitarized Palestinian state in the West Bank. Continue reading

Washington moves against Rafael Correa

As president of Ecuador, Rafael Correa was a Godsend for the Ecuadorian people, for Latin American independence and for WikiLeaks’ Julian Assange. By serving justice and truth instead of Washington, Correa earned Washington’s hatred and determination to destroy him. Continue reading

The Constitution is not neutral: Courts of Justice should not act like Courts of Order

For those still deluded enough to believe they’re living the American dream—where the government represents the people, where the people are equal in the eyes of the law, where the courts are arbiters of justice, where the police are keepers of the peace, and where the law is applied equally as a means of protecting the rights of the people—it’s time to wake up. Continue reading

Kushner gives Israel’s military-intelligence sub-state a blank check

Donald Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner has provided a windfall business for Israel’s sub-state, consisting of retired and active members of the Israel Defense Force, Mossad, Shin Bet, Unit 8200, AMAN, Unit 81, Unit 9900, Mamram, the Israel National Cyber Directorate, and other Israeli intelligence entities, a virtual blank check to pursue intelligence arrangements that were normally the purview of American defense firms. Continue reading

‘Why can’t the US just simply invade?’ Officials say Trump pushed U.S. military overthrow in Venezuela

Surrounded by his top military aides in a White House meeting less than a year ago, the Associated Press on Wednesday reports that President Donald Trump wanted to know why the U.S. military couldn’t “just simply invade” the country of Venezuela. Continue reading

Freedom Rider: Ocasio-Cortez and the Left

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is a living Rorschach test for leftists. Her primary win over incumbent Joseph Crowley in a New York City congressional district is impressive on many levels. But the reaction to her victory demonstrates the sad state of affairs of left-wing politics in this country. Continue reading

57 unpatriotic ways the Corp/Dems have enthroned Trumputin

As we celebrated our nation’s birth, and organize to once again overthrow an illegitimate tyrant, we might pity Trump’s classic liberal enabler, Al Dershowitz. Continue reading

How to prevent future Trumps

Why did so many working class voters choose a selfish, thin-skinned, petulant, lying, narcissistic, boastful, megalomaniac for president? Continue reading

Today is Matrix Reinforcement Day

Today, July 4, 2018, is the 242 anniversary of the date chosen to stand as the date the 13 British colonies declared independence. According to historians, the actual date independence was declared was July 2, 1776, with the vote of the Second Continental Congress. Other historians have concluded that the Declaration of Independence was not actually signed until August 2. Continue reading

The assassination of journalists represents a post-facto slide into fascism

The first funerals for the five journalists slain by a deranged anti-press activist with a penchant for threatening journalists and supporting alt-right heroes like Donald Trump and former Anne Arundel county board member and racist League of the South advocate Michael Peroutka had yet to be held when Trump warned his opponents to “just take it easy because some of the languages, some of the words you . . . even some of the radical ideas, I really think they’re very bad for the country.” Continue reading

America is one-dollar-one-vote, not really one-person-one vote

The only comprehensive and scientific study which has ever been done of whether the U.S. is a democracy or a dictatorship, was published in 2014. It studied the period 1981 through 2002, and it found that, “In the United States, our findings indicate, the majority does not rule—at least not in the causal sense of actually determining policy outcomes.” Continue reading

Israel plans annexation of West Bank land

US support and encouragement lets Israel get away with mass murder and much more. Its longstanding plans call for stealing and annexing all valued Judea and Samaria land. Continue reading

Resisting the ICEstapo!

I put the course on International Human Rights Law into the College of Law curriculum over three decades ago. One of the things I teach my law students and future lawyers is that the Undocumented have human rights because they are human beings. Continue reading

Is the leash now off the ‘Other CIA’?

The Central Intelligence Agency’s headquarters in Langley, Virginia, is merely the tip of a US intelligence iceberg. Much of the CIA, whether or not it is with a “wink and a nod” from its director Gina Haspel, a veteran of the agency’s extraordinary rendition and torture program, exists in the murky world of “carve out” contracts and front companies. This “unofficial CIA” is where “plausible deniability” for US intelligence actions is of paramount importance. Continue reading