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How Police Culture Has Reshaped America

Cristina Beltrán New York Times
America’s wars on drugs, crime, terrorism and more — along with our endless involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan — have created a weapons-saturated politics of policing, border control and mass incarceration. This reshaping is not one-dimensional...

The Nuclear “War” in Ukraine May Not Be the One We Expect

Joshua Frank TomDispatch
From time to time, Vladimir Putin or one of his cronies has hinted that the Russians, pressed to the wall, might use a “tactical” nuclear weapon in Ukraine. And Russian military leaders have reportedly been discussing just such a possibility.

There’s No Business Like the U.S. Global Arms Business

William D. Hartung TomDispatch
When U.S. firms dominate a $70 billion a year global market, you’d expect to hear about it. Not so with the global arms trade. There are occasional pieces that, for example, note the impact of U.S. weapons transfers to Saudi Arabia, or the disastrous dispensation of weaponry to U.S. allies in Syria. But the sheer size of the U.S. arms trade, the politics that drive it, the companies that profit from it, and its devastating global impacts are rarely discussed.

Navy's New Laser Weapon: Hype or Reality?

Subrata Ghoshroy Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
The path to laser weapons is littered with dead lasers. The December 2014 tests on the US Navy's laser weapon were underwhelming. They reminded me of an old cartoon in which someone shot an arrow at the side of a barn, then painted a bulls-eye around the spot where the arrow landed. To add to the questionability of the December tests, they look like they were conjured up in a hurry—perhaps to impress those in charge of the purse strings.

Tidbits - September 25, 2014 - Lots of 'em

Portside
Reader Comments - People's Climate March, Greening of the Labor Movement, What Next; ISIS, Syria, Iraq, Muslim Fundamentalism; Ongoing War in Middle East; Elizabeth Warren and Israel; Theodore Roosevelt; Emmett Till, Michael Brown - Ongoing Struggle for Racial Justice; Guns and the Southern Freedom Struggle; Texas School Text Books; Military Weaponry in Schools - WTF?; Socialism, Worker Cooperatives; Today in History; Abraham Lincoln Brigade celebrations
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