June 2011

If it won’t play here it will here.

The Pentagon Washington Post has yet to mention Section 1034 of the Defense Authorization Act of 2012, but you can expect it — if it passes the Senate — to show up in many a future editorial, as it will give presidents the “legal” (although unconstitutional) power to launch and continue wars, something the Washington Post adores.  A Post editorial on Monday demanded that no withdrawal of troops be made from Afghanistan.  Never mind these promises:

“After read more

From Between the Lines

 RealAudio  MP3

Interview with David Swanson, co-founder of AfterDowningStreet.org, conducted by Scott Harris

When President Obama announced his decision to deploy 30,000 additional U.S. troops to Afghanistan in December 2009, he also pledged to begin a withdrawal of those troops beginning in July 2011. The promise to wind down the war in Afghanistan was politically necessary, with a growing number of U.S. citizens no longer supportive of a war that will be entering read more

LONDON — Before long public pressure might just lead Britain to drop out of participation in US wars, a move that would seriously damage future pretenses of acting as an international coalition.

I’ve spent the past few days here in London talking with leaders of the Stop the War Coalition, sitting in on a weekly planning meeting, and attending a day-long conference on building opposition to the Afghanistan and Libya wars. This movement is strong, smart, well-organized, and eager to read more

Remarks from a plenary at the Stop the War Coalition’s June 11, 2011, conference in London on “Afghanistan and the War on Terror: 10 Years On.”

I want to thank the Stop the War Coalition and Lindsey German in particular for having invited me here, and for having invited me to a similar conference five years ago. Maybe in 2016 we can meet under better circumstances. I’m especially glad to have come back to Europe because George W. Bush can no longer do so. He recently read more