Peace and War

For today’s $5 Friday, I’ve given $5 to http://nomorevictims.org

By David Swanson

Even congress members who voted against the war supplemental in June 2009 are refusing to say they’ll vote against an escalation supplemental in the coming days. Some of them, in fact, such as Jerrold Nadler and Chellie Pingree have told me that they will vote No if it’s a stand-alone vote, but might very well vote yes if lots of other stuff is packed into the same bill.

Morally, this is like a cop telling you that murder will be allowed if you also do some good community read more

Candidate Obama said innumerable times that ending the war in Iraq would be the first thing he would do:

And he said many, many times that he would do so by beginning immediately to pull out one to two brigades per month and be done in 16 months, in other words: now:

When President Bush failed to pull out of Iraq, Senator Obama in 2007 said that Congress should overrule the president and read more

video.

Bombing…wanna feel my bombing?
Bombing…such a thrill my bombing
Bombing…wanna touch my bombing?
Bombing…it’s too much my bombing
Check it out my bombing, bombing.
Don’t you doubt my bombing, bombing.
talkin’ bout my bombing, bombing,
check it out my bombing

Every man wants to be a machobama man
to have the kind of bombing, always in demand
Missiles in the mornings, go drones go
blasting people with a joystick, muscles glow
You read more

33 billion for Afghan war

Swanson: Congress set to pass emergency funding for war  May 18, 2010

By David Swanson

Senator Tom Coburn, a Republican from Oklahoma, is committed to opposing a supplemental spending bill that includes $33.5 billion to escalate war in Afghanistan, unless the funds to pay for it are found.

On May 10th Senator Coburn wrote to his colleagues asking for their support for an amendment that would offset the new spending in this bill with cuts elsewhere. I spoke on Monday with Senator Coburn’s communications director John Hart who assured me that Coburn intends read more

JPG Image.
PDF Flyer.

By David Swanson

How can we stand to live in a country where this exchange is shown live on tv and nobody comments?

REPORTER: [I]n Marja there are reports — credible reports — of intimidation and even beheading of local people who work with your forces. Is that your intelligence? And if so, does it worry you?

GEN. MCCHRYSTAL: Yeah. It absolutely is things that we see. But it’s absolutely predictable.

I’m sorry. If it is predictable that people who work with you are going read more

By David Swanson

The peace movement, and the progressive blogosphere, can be very unpeaceful places, and it seems like I’ve spent the past day or two arguing with more people than I’ve communicated with pleasantly. This is not totally new, of course, but in this case I deserve a good share of the blame for it, so there may be an opportunity to learn a lesson.

The first thing I did was use a reckless headline. I titled an article “Obama Scraps Iraq Withdrawal.” Maybe I read more

http://www.theurbanjournal.org
Listen today!
Segment 1 David Swanson, author Daybreak
Segment 2 Pastor Susan Smith, author Crazy Faith
Segments 3 and 4 Joe Madison, XM

By David Swanson

So, we elected a president who promised a withdrawal from Iraq that he, or the generals who tell him what to do, is now further delaying. And, of course, the timetable he’s now delaying was already a far cry from what he had promised as a candidate.

What are we to think? That may be sad news, but what could we have done differently? Surely it would have been worse to elect a president who did not promise to withdraw, right?

But there’s a broader framework for this read more

Afghan Escalation Funding 
More War, Fewer Jobs, Poor Excuses 
By David Swanson, TomDispatch.com

Isn’t it time to call what Congress will soon vote on by its right name: war escalation funding?

Early in 2009, President Barack Obama escalated the war in Afghanistan with 21,000 “combat” troops, 13,000 “support” troops, and at least 5,000 read more

By David Swanson

Three of us constituents of Congressman Tom Perriello (D., Va.) talked with him for about 45 minutes on Tuesday, asking him to commit to voting against $33 billion to escalate war in Afghanistan. The congressman was polite, intelligent, and knowledgeable. He didn’t rant about evil Muslims or Mexicans or anything his predecessor might have done. He even agreed with us on many of the downsides to dumping another $33 billion into escalating a war opposed by a majority of read more