January 2008

The Speech McCain Should Give

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By David Swanson

I may be a United States Senator and a candidate for President and the Republican frontrunner. But I am, more importantly (assuming you’ll take my word for it) a man who has been tortured.

There are two key types of people in the world, and I am both of them. I have been tortured, and I have tortured. I have suffered man’s inhumanity to man, and I have turned on my fellow human beings. I am a victim and a criminal. I am a victim who has turned against the victims. I read more

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Veteran Jailed for Speaking

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By David Swanson, based on report from Malachy Kilbride

Mike Ferner was found guilty today in District of Columbia Superior Court. He has just been sentenced.

Ferner was originally sentenced to 5 days incarceration suspended and 6 months unsupervised probation including a $100 fine and $50 to the victims compensation fund.

He told the judge that he would not pay the fine and that his highest civic duty was to protest as the Germans should have done against Hitler. “Today we must speak out against read more

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To Nancy With All Due Respect

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By David Swanson

Dear Nancy. Cindy asked me to write you a letter and promised she would deliver it. So I picture the two of you in your home over tea as you peruse this and a four-foot stack of similar missives, and I hope mine catches your eye, and I hope there are no more of those annoying poor people out front, or that you’re able to have them arrested quickly and quietly.

I know that there is good in you, Nancy, and I know that you are extremely smart. I can tell by the skill with which read more

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Rethinking Labor Union Endorsements

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By David Swanson

Labor unions declined to send a message on their issues or to move other candidates to their positions by backing Kucinich, but it has now become clear that they could have backed Kucinich, and he could have failed just as badly, and labor would have accomplished no less (possibly more) than it accomplished by lining up behind Clinton, Edwards, and Dodd, all of whom have lost to Obama. And Clinton, Edwards, and Dodd could have saved the energy they spent courting labor, for all read more

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Impeachment on New Hampshire Table

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By David Swanson

On Sunday evening, two days before the New Hampshire Primaries, with a presidential candidate spouting vacuous dreamy rhetoric behind every snow bank, the good people of New Hampshire took the time to hold two forums on the question of how we can remove the current president and vice president BEFORE January 2009.

The first event was a discussion of impeachment in Keene, NH, organized by Progressive Democrats of America and featuring Steve Cobble, Tim Carpenter, Dan DeWalt, John read more

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Florida ACLU for Impeachment

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By David Swanson

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Florida has followed the lead of the ACLU of Central Florida, the ACLU of Monroe County Florida, and the ACLU of the Treasure Coast (Florida), all of which followed the lead of the ACLU of Southern California in backing impeachment and calling for the National ACLU to do the same.

The ACLU was a prominent supporter of Richard Nixon’s impeachment. In 2006 an ACLU panel argued read more

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Remembering the Separation of Powers

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By David Swanson

In a December 31, 2007, editorial, the New York Times faulted the current president and vice president of the United States for kidnapping innocent people, denying justice to prisoners, torturing, murdering, circumventing U.S. and international law, spying in violation of the Fourth Amendment, and basing their actions on “imperial fantasies.”

Um, thanks for finally noticing. What would you suggest we do about it?

“We can only hope,” concludes the New York read more

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