Let's Try Democracy

A map of the U.S. states that might serve as safe havens for abortion rights . . .

. . . probably surprises nobody, and bears a strong resemblance to a map of the U.S. states that have banned the death penalty:

This may reflect opposing ideas of what it means to be pro-life or pro-death. But the same maps bear striking resemblances to countless other maps, such as the states that are seeking to abolish the Electoral College:

or the states that have made voter registration automatic:

or the states read more

By David Swanson, World BEYOND War, May 6, 2022

When we doubt that swift and dramatic change is possible, what we really mean is that we haven’t seen much swift and dramatic change for the better lately. There’s actually no disputing that massive and almost instant change is perfectly possible. For example, in a matter of days, the unified voices of virtually every television network, newspaper, news website, and entertainment outlet in the United States took millions of people without a thought read more

By David Swanson

I set out to meet people where they are. But where are they?

I found some of them at the nearby organic vegan fairtrade coffeeshop. I asked them what they thought of Ukraine. We exchanged ideas and outraged lamentations for a few cappuccini, and came up with a short statement that we thought we could all agree with and that was more peaceful than they would have proposed on their own. I offer it here as a model for peace groups to consider:

“The maximum possible quantity and read more

The madness of militarism is a collective madness. Nobody catches it from a single exposure. The repetition that makes anything else unthinkable makes the insane acceptable — and not just acceptable but righteous.

The Poor People’s Campaign sent around an email on Saturday with language that could have been churned out by anyone anywhere on the U.S. political spectrum, from the most extreme rightwing warmongers to the warmongers of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. It was signed read more

Here’s a link to a serious take on why allowing free speech on Twitter is to be feared. I think it should be taken seriously. I’ll quote from that link at length below and intersperse some responses:

“Here are some kinds of content Twitter’s rules now prohibit that could return under Musk:

“Election misinformation

“Twitter’s current rules say, “You may not use Twitter’s services for the purpose of manipulating or interfering in elections or other civic processes. This includes read more

By World BEYOND War, April 29, 2022

From April 21st to 28th, crowds and small groups of people in locations around the world have brought petitions, banners, and protests to the offices of the world’s largest weapons dealer, Lockheed Martin. Details, including photos and videos, of the Global Mobilization to #StopLockheedMartin are still being collected and posted at https://act.worldbeyondwar.org/stoplockheedmartin

The read more

There’s a lot of funny stuff in politics, but the most ludicrous has got to be these holdovers from the 1980s running around warning that we could all die in a nuclear war. The idiots have not realized that nobody cares, that they look like morons, and that they’ll only have seconds in which to point out that they were right. What sort of awards do they expect to be given in the space of a half a minute?

Everybody’s going to be about to die in a matter of seconds. Maybe some people read more