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During the first decade of the 21st century, a battle between the Religious Right and the New Atheists emerged. Both were gaining strength from charismatic leaders, able to articulate their beliefs and accumulate followers. Energized by George W. Bush’s faith-based presidency, the Religious Right, the most politically active of organized religions, attempted to direct local and national legislation to its social conservative agenda. With most voters crowded towards the center of the political spectrum, the Religious Right maintained control of a solid bloc of “swing” votes …

Emilio Pettoruti (Argentina), Arlequín (‘Harlequin’), 1928.
Before he won Argentina’s presidential election on 19 November, Javier Milei circulated a video of himself in front of a series of white boards. Pasted on one board were the names of various state institutions, such as the ministries of health, education, women and gender diversities, public works, and culture, all recognised as typical elements of any modern state project. Walking along the board, Milei ripped off the names of these and other ministries while crying afuera! (‘out!’) and declaring that if elected president, he …

The recent horrific events in Dublin left many in shock as a stabbing incident developed into an anti-immigration rally, which in turn developed into a riot as a tram, busses and Garda cars were set on fire.

In the early afternoon a man stabbed three children and a care assistant (who were taken to hospital). He was stopped by a 43-year-old Deliveroo driver who intervened and hit him with his helmet.

Then, “after the stabbing incident, rumours spread that the alleged perpetrator was an illegal North African immigrant ‘fresh off the boat’, along with false rumours that the …

The government wants us to believe that we have nothing to fear from its mass spying programs as long as we’ve done nothing wrong.

Don’t believe it.

It doesn’t matter whether you obey every law. The government’s definition of a “bad” guy is extraordinarily broad, and it results in the warrantless surveillance of innocent, law-abiding Americans on a staggering scale.

For instance, it was recently revealed that the White House, relying on a set of privacy loopholes, has been sidestepping the Fourth Amendment by paying AT&T to allow federal, state, and local law enforcement to access—without a warrant—the phone records of Americans who …

Tagreed Darghouth (Lebanon), from the series The Tree Within, a Palestinian Olive Tree, 2018.
Every day since 7 October has felt like an International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, with hundreds of thousands gathering in Istanbul, a million in Jakarta, and then yet another million across Africa and Latin America to demand an end to the brutal attack being carried out by Israel (with the collusion of the United States). It is impossible to keep up with the scale and frequency …

Aggressive pre-dawn police raids on homes and charging individuals with hate crimes for posting social justice messages is legal overreach at best and “thought crimes” reflecting creeping fascism at worst.

Truth is Heather Reisman, not those putting up posters, is the one who should have been charged with breaking Canadian law.

Between 4:30 and 6 am Wednesday Toronto police raided the residences of seven individuals alleged to have been involved in putting posters and fake blood on an Indigo bookstore on November 10. According to a summary of the police operation posted by World Beyond War, eight or …

There was no better example of Australia’s politicised public service than its Home Affairs Secretary, Mike Pezzullo.  In most other countries, he would have been the ideal conspirator in a coup, a tittletattler in the ranks and bound to brief against those he did not like.  Give him a dagger, and he was bound to use it.

His rise to power paralleled that of the emergence of that super amalgam of a ministry that arose during the Turnbull government.  Falling for the fatal error that centralising power assures the consolidation of efficiency, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull was swayed by arguments that …

It’s 35 years since formation of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) “to advance scientific knowledge about climate change caused by human activities.” Subsequently, COP21 at Paris ‘15 warned the world not to exceed 1.5°C, and worst case, not to exceed 2.0°C above pre-industrial or risk lasting damage to crucial life supporting ecosystems, ultimately leading to some level of an extinction event.

Following three decades of IPCC failures to convince nation/states to make a dent in greenhouse gas emissions, which increase more and more each year, a high-ranking group of rebellious climate scientists claim the IPCC’s upper temperature limits of …

It resembles a chronology of desperation, shifting narratives, and schoolboy howlers. From the outset, the mass lethality of Israeli strikes against Gaza and the collective punishment of its populace needed some justification, however tenuous. If it could be shown, convincingly, that Hamas and its allies had militarised such civilian infrastructure as hospitals, they would become fair game for vengeful air strikes and military assault. Thus, could Israel’s soldiers demonstrate, not merely the animal savagery of Hamas, one indifferent to humanity and suffering, but the virtue of Israel’s own military objectives. The forces of pallid light would again prevail against swarthy …

“It should never have happened,” an elderly Holocaust survivor of a Nazi death camp told the New York Times. He was referring to the colossal failure on October 7, of Israel’s touted high-tech military and intelligence operations that opened the door to Hamas’ attack on Israeli soldiers and civilians. In many parliamentary countries, the government ministers who are responsible for this kind of failure would have immediately been forced to resign. Not so with Prime Minister Netanyahu’s ministers.

Instead, Netanyahu’s coalition of extremists, who know that the Israeli people are enraged about their government’s failure to defend the border, has unleashed a …

Negev Nuclear Research Center photographed by a U.S.
reconnaissance satellite in 1968 Declassified Public Domain
It’s one thing to burrow beneath the ground, digging to construct a tunnel for refuge, a passage of goods, or to store weapons during a time of war. It’s quite another to use one hand, as a small child, to try and dig your way out of the rubble that has collapsed upon you.

Professor Mustafa Abu Sway, a professor based in Jerusalem, spoke sadly of the reality in Gaza where, he said, “one child …

Woman hugging tree video
*****
Painting by Sliman Mansour

I hugged the olive tree. It was precious to me, so I hugged it. I felt like I was hugging my child. I’d raised the tree like my child. They attacked around 500 trees filled with olives. Each tree could have filled two sacks of olives. They destroyed my olive tree, but I grew them back. I tended them and they came back even better than before. Settlers will never be able to take …

(Full article …)

How to be a blockhead.

The divisive America of today longs for the time when the country united in one mission and selected a leader it could trust to accomplish the mission. The year is 1940 and the New York Times estimates that incumbent president, Franklin D. Roosevelt Jr. (FDR), a non-declared and drafted candidate for the Democratic Party (D) nomination, will have 691.5 delegates before the convention, well ahead of his two rivals, Vice-President John Garner’s 69.5 delegates and Postmaster General James Farley’s 38.5.delegates. At the convention, FDR wins the nomination on the first ballot by near acclamation.

Before the Republican (GOP) convention, …

I am a Black man in prison, and I want to talk about trauma. I want us all to be able to talk about trauma.

I’m here because when I was a teenager and young man, I made many bad life choices involving drugs and violence. Living with the consequences of my actions is not always easy, but I keep moving forward toward redemption. As I have struggled to understand those choices, I also have realized I must go further back in my life, long before I committed a crime, if I want to heal myself.

When I was a child, I …