There are probably more innocent men and women in prison in the United States now than there were people in prison here total -- innocent and guilty -- 30 years ago, or than there are total people in prison (proportionately or as an absolute number) in most nations on earth.I ...
Open Mike
Blogger Profile: David Swanson
David Swanson is a longtime peace and justice activist and author of War Is a Lie and Daybreak: Undoing the Imperial Presidency and Forming a More Perfect Union.
David Swanson's Blogs
Erin Niemela's recent proposal that we amend the Constitution to ban war is provocative and persuasive. Count me in. But I have a related idea that I think should be tried first.While banning war is just what the world ordered, it has about it something of the whole Bush-Cheney ordeal ...
How the Pentagon Removes Entire Peoples
If we think at all about our government's military depopulating territory that it desires, we usually think of the long-ago replacement of native Americans with new settlements during the continental expansion of the United States westward. Here in Virginia some of us are vaguely aware that back during the Great Depression ...
There's no end to the pro-war movies we're subjected to: countless celebrations of bombs, guns, and torture. They come in the form of cartoons, science-fiction, historical fiction, dramas, and reenactments pre-censored by the CIA. Movies show us the excitement without the suffering. War in our theaters resembles almost anything else ...
Imagine if at some point during the 1990s or 1980s the President of the United States had given a speech. And this was his speech:My fellow Americans, I've been regularly shooting missiles into people's houses in several countries. I've wiped out families. I've killed thousands of people. Hundreds of them ...
Connecticut Advances Conversion from War to Peace Economy
The Connecticut legislature has sent to the governor to sign a bill that would create a commission to develop a plan for, among other things:"the diversification or conversion of defense-related industries with an emphasis on encouraging environmentally-sustainable and civilian product manufacturing. On or before December 1, 2014, the commission shall ...
CIA: An Idea Whose Time Has Gone
There's a contradiction built into every campaign promise about transparent government beyond the failure to keep the promises. Our government is, in significant portion, made up of secret operations, operations that include warmaking, kidnapping, torture, assassination, and infiltrating and overthrowing governments. A growing movement is ready to see that end.The ...
Why We Allow the Destruction of Our Planet
It's not enough to point out that our political system is completely corrupted by money, including money from coal and oil and nukes and gas. Of course it is. And if we had direct democracy, polls suggest we would be investing in green energy. But saying the right thing to ...
Most of the world's governments no longer use the death penalty. Among wealthy nations there is one exception remaining. The United States is among the top five killers in the world. Also in the top five: the recently "liberated" Iraq.But most of the United States' 50 states no longer use ...
Some Don't Pay Their War Taxes
This past Saturday morning felt like mid-winter in Asheville, North Carolina, but was actually some weeks past tax day, and dozens of people were gathered in front of a federal building to say something about what federal income taxes are used for -- something much more unusual than one would ...
The Revolution That's Not Being Televised
Hundreds gathered in Dallas to reject the Bush Lie Bury, and three went to jail. I flew from Dallas to Syracuse, where hundreds protested Obama's drone-murder program, and 32 went to jail and are still there (and will stay until trial unless bail can be raised) -- some of them ...
Dallas Morning News Claims Bush Never Lied
George W. Bush should be given an indictment, not a library. An online email action is letting the Department of Justice know the facts about the former president. And the People's Response to the George W. Bush Library and Policy Institute is filling the streets of Dallas with protesters this ...
Vile, Filthy, Bloody, Dirty Wars
Jeremy Scahill, author of Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army, has a new book that should be required reading for Congress members, journalists, war supporters, war opponents, Americans, non-Americans -- really, pretty much everybody. The new book is called Dirty Wars: The World Is a Battlefield.Of ...
Vieques 10 Years After the Bombing Stopped
By Helen Jaccard and David Swanson, http://warisacrime.org/viequesTen years ago May 1, the people of Vieques, Puerto Rico and their supporters from around the world defeated the most powerful military machine ever, through mass civil disobedience and without firing a single shot. On May 1, 2003 the bombing stopped and the ...
A Peace Movement That Moves Toward Peace
Why did the peace movement of the middle of the last decade not grow larger? Why did it shrink away? Why is it struggling now?As has been documented, a huge factor in the shrinking away was partisan delusion. You put a different political party's name on the wars and they ...
Why I'm Attending the Dedication of the Bush Lie Bury
On April 25th the George W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum and General Rehabilitation Project will be dedicated in Dallas, Texas. It takes up 23 acres at Southern Methodist University, 23 acres that neither humanity nor any other species may ever reclaim for anything decent or good.I'll be there, joining ...
Iraq War Among World's Worst Events
Ever More Shocked, Never Yet AwedBy David SwansonSwanson will be speaking on this topic in Washington, D.C., on Monday, March 18th. The following is a brief summary of a much longer, and fully documented, report available at http://warisacrime.org/iraq and being made available in an attractive 88-page PDF at http://www.coldtype.netAt 10 ...
Maryland: Of, By, and For Lockheed Martin
What's the world's biggest war profiteer to do if it already owns the federal government but is having trouble kicking around the local government of Montgomery County, Maryland, where it's headquartered? Why, hire the state of Maryland to step in, of course. Lockheed Martin lives by killing, although nobody ever gives ...
In honor of the 10th Anniversary of Operation Iraqi Liberation, and in hopes of helping us keep in mind that every war is based on similar lies, even if sometimes the lies are told more competently, I'm making available here the introduction to my book War Is A Lie. If ...
Lawrence Wilkerson and David Swanson Debate Colin Powell's Lies at the United Nations
When I wrote about MSNBC's documentary on Iraq war lies this week, I linked to an earlier blog post of mine that drew heavily on a House Judiciary Committee report on the same topic, as well as to Lawrence Wilkerson's recent debate with Norman Solomon on Democracy Now!When Brad Friedman ...
A mountain of bad, in fact deadly, ideas that Congress will eagerly support, and a handful of good proposals that no one will work for and Congress will strive to bury: the SOTU is SNAFU, ICYMI. Obama's hiring Romney campaign staff, pushing for a massive corporate trade deal with Europe as ...
Drones and Our National Religion
The national religion of the United States of America is nationalism. Its god is the flag. Its prayer is the pledge of allegiance.The flag’s powers include those of life and death, powers formerly possessed by traditional religions. Its myths are built around the sacrifice of lives to protect against the ...
First U.S. City Passes Anti-Drone Resolution
Shortly after 11 p.m. on Monday, February 4th, the City Council of Charlottesville, Va., passed what is believed to be the first anti-drone resolution in the country. According to my notes, and verifiable soon on the City Council's website, the resolution reads:WHEREAS, the rapid implementation of drone technology throughout the ...
No city is an island, Entire of itself. Each is a piece of the continent, A part of the main.I write from Charlottesville, Va., but am hopeful that this message applies to your city, town, or county as well.In the absence of state or federal laws, localities around the United ...
In the absence of state or federal laws, localities around the United States are proceeding to put unmanned aerial vehicles in our skies as they see fit. The federal government has authorized the flight of 30,000 drones, and the use of drones up to 400 feet by police departments, at ...
Click here to suggest an article
Open Mike
-
June 20th, 2013
There are probably more innocent men and women in prison in the United States now than there were people in prison here total -- innocent ...
-
June 13th, 2013
Erin Niemela's recent proposal that we amend the Constitution to ban war is provocative and persuasive. Count me in. But I have a related idea ...
-
June 6th, 2013
How the Pentagon Removes Entire Peoples
If we think at all about our government's military depopulating territory that it desires, we usually think of the long-ago replacement of native Americans with ...
-
May 30th, 2013
There's no end to the pro-war movies we're subjected to: countless celebrations of bombs, guns, and torture. They come in the form of cartoons, science-fiction, ...
-
May 26th, 2013
Imagine if at some point during the 1990s or 1980s the President of the United States had given a speech. And this was his speech:My ...
-
May 22nd, 2013
Connecticut Advances Conversion from War to Peace Economy
The Connecticut legislature has sent to the governor to sign a bill that would create a commission to develop a plan for, among other things:"the ...
-
May 20th, 2013
CIA: An Idea Whose Time Has Gone
There's a contradiction built into every campaign promise about transparent government beyond the failure to keep the promises. Our government is, in significant portion, made ...
-
February 9th, 2011
Nonviolent Activism Is Middle Eastern
Muslims can look back to the classic nonviolent struggle against British empire waged by the Pashtuns from 1930-1934 in what is now Pakistan and Afghanistan. ...
-
May 19th, 2011
'Support Killing People or Lose Your Job'
"Ban the bombers are afraid of a fight "Peace hurts business and that ain't right "How do I know? I read it in the Daily ...
-
June 24th, 2011
Fifty years ago, freedom riders traveled by bus into the U.S. South. Now American freedom riders are joining their allies from around the world on ...
-
September 2nd, 2011
No, not 29 million job offers. I'm no better at applying for jobs than you are, and my town offers nothing but dead-end McJobs or ...
-
July 1st, 2011
How We Really Get Rid of Clarence Thomas
Am I the only one who noticed that ex-Nixon lawyer John Dean's article "John Dean Knows How to Get Rid of Clarence Thomas" concludes thus: ...
-
May 2nd, 2011
The plane I was on landed in Washington, D.C., Sunday night, and the pilot came on the intercom to tell everyone to celebrate: our government ...
-
May 13th, 2013
Why We Allow the Destruction of Our Planet
It's not enough to point out that our political system is completely corrupted by money, including money from coal and oil and nukes and gas. ...
