“Lost Americans”: A national ballad of history and tragedy
We came across the ocean fighting through the stormy waves We carved out our dominion And planted it with graves We built a mighty nation on the backs and blood of slaves And sang our praise unto the Lord for the blessings that He gave In a covered wagon rolling cross the endless plain the […]
Lords of Misrule: UK Elites and the Rise of Global Feudalism
I darkly suspect that the UK is entering a long winter of discontent and widespread upheaval, which will likely end with the replacement of the hapless opportunist Boris Johnson by someone even worse: the hardcore, inhumane, hard-right true believer Michael Gove, with the equally inhumane, sinister crank Dom Cummings still running the show. (Cummings, remember, […]
Power not Piety: Trump Foes Falling for False Narrative on SCOTUS Pick
I see the GOP is successfully manipulating the narrative once again, drawing in even Trump opponents their web of falsehood that paints the Supreme Court pick as a “religious” issue instead of what it is: the installation of a rightwing hack who, having already helped kill one election, will spend decades entrenching the power of rapacious […]
The Surrendered Land: US Institutions Won’t Fight for Democracy
I follow the novelist A.R. Moxon on Twitter, where his political takes routinely bring genuine insight, wit and moral rigor to the increasing beserkery of our times. But he recently posted an observation, or prediction, that I found I couldn’t agree with, much as I would have liked to. It prompted some thoughts in response that […]
Keepers of the Condor: US Role in Evil Network Shown in Soft Light
Operation Condor: the illegal state network that terrorised South America (Guardian) Even an otherwise excellent, thorough, damning article on the ghastly horrors of Operation Condor has to paint US involvement in its Nazi-level atrocities in the very best light. The reason the US funded, armed, trained and protected the torture-lords of murderous rightwing dictatorships was, we’re […]
The Malevolent Malarkey of Biden’s Big “Law and Order” Push
Biden to Air Nationwide Law-and-Order Ad Condemning Rioters and Looters (NYT) This is so monumentally, stunningly, agonizingly stupid. Biden is adopting Trump’s false narrative about the protests, adopting Trump’s language and fighting on Trump’s turf, the very issue Trump WANTS to be the focus of the campaign, instead of his own manifold crimes and failures. […]
Show Them the Money: The Respectable Media Enablers of Trump’s Monstrous Lies
Activist Ady Barkan tells top Republican to apologise over doctored video (Guardian) There is simply no way for any of us to comprehend or adequately prepare for the amount of utterly depraved falsehood that is coming our way in the next two months. It is going to surpass anything that any of us has ever […]
Kenosha Goddam: The Rot at the Top Goes All the Way Down
This is the boy who drove to a town he didn’t live in, joining many other armed extremists from outside, with the specific intent of confronting American citizens protesting the shooting of an unarmed man seven times in the back, leaving him paralyzed. This boy and his fellow armed extremists — who were “violating curfew” […]
Touch of Evil: The Democrats Embrace War Criminals While Ignoring Millions Seeking True Hope and Change
Colin Powell to Appear at Democratic Convention (NYT) I’m sorry, but this is absolutely unconscionable. Colin Powell was a chief architect and abettor of a monstrous war crime that murdered tens of thousands of innocent human beings for no reason. The evidence is overwhelming that he knowingly, deliberately lied in his famous UN testimony about Iraq’s […]
Longing for a Land I’ve Never Seen Before
“The time’s gone awry; don’t you understand? Everything that you knew has turned into sand. Everything that you thought is no longer true. The man in the mirror is no longer you.” This is a song I wrote this year with my late father, Edsel Floyd (1930-2011). When he died, I got his old leather-bound […]