Duty to Warn

Until I remember that I, too, am a human being, I have been with increasing frequency drawn to the conclusion that human beings have evolved with such an obsession with other individual humans that they simply cannot attribute proper importance to far-reaching policies.

If you want to excite a crowd, you don't tell them that virtually every official in Washington is in complete and harmonious agreement on massive military spending, more nuclear weapons, occupying Afghanistan, bombing Iraqis, bombing Syrians, bombing the hell out of Yemenis, and drone murdering at will. That's about as interesting as subsidizing fossil fuels and rendering the earth uninhabitable. Who cares!

If you want some sign of life out of an audience, you tell them that a particular politician is an idiot or a clown or a racist or a sadist or a misunderstood saint. Now, that has value. That has meaning.

The solution to the presidency of Donald J. Trump is simple, if those of us who are decent, caring and responsible human beings will stand together and act as one. In opposition to every Trump legislative proposal passed into law by his Republican lapdogs in Congress, we will not offer lengthy and detailed complaints. Talk is not only cheap but it is often worthless, and it is always impotent when exchanged with someone not prepared to even listen to the thoughts of others. As reply to all probably illegal and certainly immoral executive orders signed by this septuagenarian toddler, we will never explain our opposition. Those who understand the deadly and worldwide threats presented by this man don’t need explanations, and for those who do not or will not understand, no explanation would suffice to change a single mind. All Americans who value not only their only lives but the very existence of America as a compassionate democracy and not a totalitarian state must respond with just one word, which we will repeat a thousand times if necessary. And we must be prepared to back up that single syllable utterance with the totality and unity of our actions.

When Rachel Maddow finished a 26-minute monologue that spanned two segments on her MSNBC program last Thursday night, her grave tones indicated that she thought she’d just delivered a whale of a story. But actually it was more like minnow -- and a specious one at that.

Convoluted and labored, Maddow’s narrative tried to make major hay out of a report from Moscow that a high-ranking Russian intelligence official had been dragged out of a meeting, arrested and charged with treason. Weirdly, Maddow kept presenting that barebones story as verification that Russia’s President Vladimir Putin had directly ordered the hacking and release of Democratic campaign emails in order to get Donald Trump elected president.

It was a free-associating performance worthy of Glenn Beck at a whiteboard. Maddow swirled together an array of facts, possible facts, dubious assertions and pure speculation to arrive at conclusions that were based on little more than her zeal to portray Trump as a tool of the Kremlin. Even when sober, Joe McCarthy never did it better.

With two pen strokes, and just days into his administration, President
Donald Trump has already signed two executive orders signaling his intent
to be the most immigrant-hostile president in more than a generation.

Now, some may think the true impact of Trump's policies will be felt in
far-off lands. And it's true: The lives of many who dreamed of coming to
this country have been deeply disrupted.

But if you are a mayor like me, you know that many of the hardest hit
communities will be in cities and towns all over this country. Places like
Santa Fe, with the highest proportion of new immigrants in its region and
a vibrant culture and thriving economy, are a living testament to the
rewards a community can reap if it opens its doors.

For 400 years, Santa Fe has seen the benefit of being a welcoming
community. Immigrants in our city are business owners, children attending
our schools, artists contributing to our culture and economy, veterans who
served our country in uniform, and hard-working people on whom local
businesses rely.

California can require Monsanto to label its popular weed killer Roundup as a carcinogen, although the corporation maintains that the product is harmless, according to a ruling by a judge in Fresno, California.

California would be the first state to order this level of labeling if this decision by the California Carcinogen Identification Committee is sustained by further court action. . Monsanto previously sued the nation's foremost agricultural producing state by filing court motions to the effect that California’s carcinogen committee acting under the powers given to it by Proposition 65, had illegally based their decision for mandatorily requiring the warnings on “erroneous” findings by an international health organization based in France.

What is Roundup and what is the problem with its chief ingredient, glyphosphate?

What are the grounds for impeachment?

1. Get active around policy not personality. And try to nudge newly active or re-activated people in that direction. To take one example of thousands, we should be cheering more loudly for the commutation of Chelsea Manning's sentence. And we should have raised a lot more hell than we did over the idea of locking her up to begin with -- and Obama's pronouncing her guilty before his subordinates tried her -- and over all the other whistleblowers still in cages or facing persecution. More support for not bombing Syria in 2013, and more condemnation for arming proxies instead. More -- hell, any -- support for Trump deescalating hostility with Russia, and more opposition to his proposals to "kill their families" and "steal their oil."

“The F-35 Lightning II Program (also known as the Joint Strike Fighter Program) is the Department of Defense’s focal point for defining affordable next generation strike aircraft weapon systems for the Navy, Air Force, Marines, and our allies. The F-35 will bring cutting-edge technologies to the battlespace of the future.”

Lurking behind this perky little PR blurb, from the F-35’s own website, is the void into which the soul of the human race has disappeared.

This is war consciousness: locked into place, awash in money. The deeply flawed F-35, the most expensive military weapons system in history, is ultimately projected to cost over $1 trillion, but no matter: “It will bring cutting-edge technologies to the battlespace of the future.”

As you ride the Amtrak along the Pacific coast between Los Angeles and San Diego, you pass the San Onofre nuclear power plant, home to three mammoth atomic reactors shut by citizen activism. 

Framed by gorgeous sandy beaches and some of the best surf in California, the dead nukes stand in silent tribute to the popular demand for renewable energy. They attest to one of history’s most powerful and persistent nonviolent movements.