On April 30th, Father Daniel Berrigan, an anti-war activist, Jesuit priest, author, and poet, passed away at the age of 94. Since the Vietnam War, Father Berrigan spoke bravely against American imperialism. But his opposition to US military interventions abroad went beyond speech. Father Berrigan bravely and repeatedly engaged in direct action to resist America’s…

In a move that should surprise no one, Reuters reports that the Obama administration announced that they’re going to deploy 200 more troops to Iraq. This doesn’t include the additional advisors, Apache helicopters and other gadgets that the US government has authorized to send to Iraq, nor the additional troops to Syria. At a recent…

You may be familiar with the role of proprietary automobile diagnostic software in enforcing a repair cartel of the Big Auto manufacturers, dealership mechanics, and auto repair chains and big garages that can afford to license the software. By using closed software that makes it impossible for an independent party to access it, or open…

Last week, Governor Gary R. Herbert signed a resolution which declared porn a public health crisis in the state of Utah. This latest authoritarian move by anti-porn moralists has been defended by Utah state Senator Todd Weiler who said, “This isn’t just a religious moral issue. Some people want to make this about sex education; no boy…

In a recent op-ed (Karma tastes delicious in America’s new, humane economy, Washington Post, April 15, 2016), Kathleen Parker lauds what she sees as “a revolution…in the ever-more-dignified animal kingdom.” For Parker, evidence of the revolution is clear: From SeaWorld’s ban on orca breeding, to Armani’s discontinuation of fur-use in products, to Walmart’s promise of…

Mike Lindell, president of My Pillow Inc., seems like a nice guy, and I like his product. But he says something in his commercial that bothers me: “Every part of my product is made in the USA.” What could be wrong with that? Lots of things. First, is it true? Lindell may really believe what…

In the cover story of this month’s Harper’s Magazine, author Dan Baum recounts a conversation he had with former Nixon domestic affairs adviser and convicted Watergate co-conspirator John Ehrlichman. Baum states that in 1994, Ehrlichman told him that the Nixon Administration started the War on Drugs as an attack on black Americans and anti-war protesters….

The repeated denunciations of the “coup media,” which supposedly favors the impeachment (a “coup,” in the government’s supporters language), is interesting because it shows how short everyone’s memories are (“Novos discursos, o mesmo golpismo“, Carta Capital, April 4; “Deputado Paulo Pimenta publica roteiro de golpe jurídico-midiático em 13 passos“, Jornal do Brasil, March 25). Nobody…

(CW: Discussions of transphobia and sexual abuse) The Washington Post recently reported on a South Carolina bill introduced by Senator Lee Bright who claims, “I don’t believe transgender people are pedophiles,” but, “I think grown adult men would use this as protection to violate women in the restroom.” Like many others, Bright fails to understand that…

Barack Obama recently said that his biggest blunder was “failing to plan for the day after” his intervention in Libya. While he defended the intervention itself, the president cannot deny that his reckless war has had disastrous consequences, including a growing ISIS presence in Libya. Hillary Clinton eagerly pressured the president to overthrow Moammar Gaddafi….

The release of the Panama Papers last weekend — a paper trail of eleven million leaked documents from the Mossack Fonseca global law firm — shows how major global banks move assets of billionaire capitalists and major political figures offshore to protect them from taxation. The revelation has stirred up a political hornets’ nest all…

The New York Times recently reported that on March 13th, Jeffery Pendleton was found dead in his jail cell. Pendleton was a homeless man who lived in New Hampshire and had been arrested on March 8th for outstanding fines and possession of small amounts of marijuana. His set bail of $100 was prohibitively costly for…

During his interview with the New York Daily News, Bernie Sanders was asked to specify the fraud committed by Wall Street banks. He replied: “What kind of fraudulent activity? Fraudulent activity that brought this country into the worst economic decline in its history by selling packages of fraudulent, fraudulent, worthless subprime mortgages. How’s that for…

In a speech March 28 at an award ceremony for the Toner Prize For Excellence in Investigative Reporting, the biggest enemy of investigative journalism since Nixon complained of the lack of… investigative journalism. That’s right. President Obama criticized the dominant journalistic culture for its stenographic approach of simply quoting the official statements of public figures…

The first nationally recognized Earth Day was celebrated in the United States on April 22, 1970. Now, 46 years old, the annual event is a world-wide phenomenon celebrated in more than 192 countries. It is a day numerous cultures come together to voice their support for environmental protection. I like a lot about Earth Day….

In an interview with Cenk Uygur March 23, Bernie Sanders noted, “The media is an arm of the ruling class of this country,” going on to point out its concentrated corporate ownership (for example, Disney’s ownership of ABC, Comcast’s of NBC, etc). This corporate media have a vested interest in not covering real news in…

Holman Prison in Alabama is home to death row and many there have little to lose should something go wrong. Given the degrading conditions of prisons and their lack of security for prisoners, it should come as no surprise that riots took place on March 11th and 14th. The first riot happened when a prison…

The continuing destruction of the steel industry in the UK has been a major news topic. And as usual, we see the typical narrative of either statist leftists who parrot nationalisation and subsidies as solutions, or the supposed market supporters, who take Ricardian economic arguments of specialisation and butcher them. What neither of these arguments…

After the terrorist violence in Brussels many people, including Barack Obama, said we should not change our way of life and live in fear because that is what terrorists want. Maybe, but is that all they want? It seems that something important is left out of the story. In the classical model of terrorism, instilling fear…

Whenever you read the words “our free market system,” it should raise a red flag. See, for example an article titled “Nobel Prize Economists Say Free Market Competition Rewards Deception and Manipulation,” by George Akerlof and Robert Shiller (Evonomics, Jan. 6). Now, if “free market” means anything, it means an economy where all market exchange…