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What Obama's Presidency Has to Tell Us

Leon Wofsy Leon's OpEd
Controversial posting, by a long-time peace and social justice activist - Obama is the best occupant of the office since the end of World War II. We're unlikely to elect anyone of his quality in 2016. Like all presidents post-World War II, he has presided over the world's most (super) powerful empire. 'American exceptionalism' and flouting superior military and economic might, the empire systematically generates negative consequences for peace at home and worldwide.

books

Wising Up to the Wise Men of American Foreign Policy

Jeet Heer New Republic
Propping up dictators, rigging elections and aligning with some of the world's more unsavory characters is an accurate description of U.S. foreign policy past and present. It's also a fair characterization of the narrow gamut of thinking for both the wise oracles who urge containment and the hawks promoting armed confrontation. The book focuses on these elite policy makers who have become not just complacent with, but complicit in, U.S. hegemonic crimes worldwide.

Fear and Learning in Kabul

Kathy Kelly teleSUR
Physicians for Social Responsibility recently calculated that since 2001 in Iraq and Afghanistan, U.S. wars have killed at least 1.3 million and quite possibly more than 2 million civilians. Their report chides U.S. political elites for attributing on-going violence in Afghanistan and Iraq to various types of internecine conflicts as if the resurgence and brutality of such conflicts is unrelated to the destabilization caused by decades of military intervention.

Tidbits - May 21, 2015 - Victories in Philadelphia, Los Angeles; Third Party Builders; The Nakba; David Letterman Show and whiteness; Educators Make a Difference; more....

Portside
Reader Comments- Progressive Wins: Philadelphia / Los Angeles; Third Party Builders Meet; What U.S. Really Owes Black America; Thirty Years After MOVE Bombing; The Nakba: The Intentional, Deliberate Dispossession of Palestinians; Remembering Guy Carawan; David Letterman Show and whiteness; Educators and School Staff Make a Difference; Mike Brown Would Have Been 19; Announcements- Greece Solidarity 4 All U.S. Tour; Left Forum 2015 Today in History-Post-War Strike Wave

After Lobbying by Obama, Senate Agrees to Vote on Trade Bill After All; Why Elizabeth Warren is Fighting the TPP

Jonathan Weisman; Bud Meyers
The Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) - what's at stake? Why the secrecy, why the rush, why cut-off debate and input? The reason is - Money, big money, says the New York Times. Major American business interests, from Nike to Boeing and Hollywood to Silicon Valley, want the deal badly. Labor and environmental groups see it as a threat to American workers at the expense of profits.

Tidbits - May 14, 2015 - TPP; Stop-and-Frisk; White Americans and Police Accountability; Vietnam ,Debating the War; Remembering Jackson State Murders; more...

Portside
Reader Comments - Obama and the TPP; Stop-and-Frisk; White Americans and Police Accountability; Vietnam and Anti-War History and the Ongoing Debate; Remembering Jackson State Murders; Greece, Organizing New York; Those Who Work in Customer Call Centers; Announcements - Immigration, Work and Wages - Washington - May 21; Film Showing and Discussion - Blood Fruit - New York - May 22

Whither Cuba?

Cliff DuRand Truthout
Obama's strategy is to change Cuba, not through regime change, but by promoting capitalism within the country through support of a petty bourgeoisie. The fundamental objective of US policy has always been to bring Cuba back into the capitalist orbit. Today in Cuba a socialist state is actively promoting cooperatives, thereby devolving economic power to people at the grassroots level. There is a rejuvenation of civil society underway - a socialist civil society.

Joseph Stiglitz on the Trans Pacific Partnership: "This Is A Big Deal"

Alexandros Orphanides In These Times
The TPP is a massive trade agreement between the United States, Canada, Chile, Australia, Brunei Darussalam, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam. Critics of the agreement say it amounts to the promulgation of corporate globalization and neoliberalization and have likened it to "NAFTA on steroids."

Tidbits - March 12, 2015 - Ferguson, Selma, Voting Suppression, Racism, Venezuela, Netanyahu, Israel, Iran, Palestine and more...

Portside
Reader Comments - Ferguson and Racism; Venezuela - New Coup, Made in USA; Selma, Voting Rights and Today; International Women's Day, Wonder Woman; Netanyahu, Israel, GOP and Iran; Wisconsin Attack on Unions; Ukraine; Death Penalty, 'Justice', Incarceration; Leonard Nimoy; Books on Upton Sinclair, Michael Harrington; Announcement - Triangle Shirtwaist Fire commemoration; Today in History
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