The new pope, Leo XIV, is off to an encouraging start as he calls for peace (from CNN):
Pontiff calls for ‘authentic, just and lasting peace’ Pope Leo XIV delivered his first Sunday blessing from the balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica on Sunday and used the address to pray for peace. “In today’s dramatic scenario of a third world war being fought piecemeal, as Pope Francis said, I too turn to the world’s leaders with an ever timely appeal: never again war!”
Pope Leo XIV at the central Loggia of St. Peter’s Basilica (Photo: Isabella Bonotto/Anadolu via Getty Images)
Sadly for the pope, U.S. leaders believe that peace is achieved through military strength and total dominance, unleashing “warriors” across the world. It doesn’t matter who the president is or which political party is putatively in charge. The Imperial State insists on colossal spending on wars and preparations for the same.
With respect to Gaza and the ongoing death and destruction there, Leo XIV had this to say:
“I am deeply pained by what is happening. Let the fighting cease immediately, let humanitarian aid be provided to the exhausted civilian population, and may all hostages be released.”
Sensible words. But it will take far more than words to stop Israel from its destruction of Gaza and its evisceration and evacuation of the Palestinians there.
Leo XIV also called for a just and lasting peace in Ukraine while highlighting the suffering of the Ukrainian people.
The word “peace” has almost disappeared from American discourse. Leo is helping to reinvigorate it. U.S. leaders are doing their best to sabotage it with war budgets that approach and exceed a trillion dollars yearly (this coming from a Christian nation, at least according to its leaders).
Leo is pointing the way. It’s time all those self-confessed Christians in America start following the Prince of Peace rather than the god of war.
It’s rather amazing how the New York Times covers ethnic cleansing and genocide in Gaza. Today’s NYT features an article (in my email newsfeed) that talks about the “war” on Hamas and identifies the key issue as the hostages and their return. From this article, you’d never know Gaza has been reduced to rubble in a bombing campaign equivalent to seven Hiroshima atomic bombs. You’d never know that more than 60,000 Palestinians have been killed, but that the likely number of killed is probably twice or three times that. You’d never know the Israeli government’s plan is to kill or push out all the Palestinians in Gaza, a “final solution” to the Gaza problem. You’d never know the main victims of Israel’s “war” have been innocent women and children in Gaza.
And while the NYT does mention starvation and the spread of diseases, it provides no estimate for the number of Palestinians killed as a result of Israel’s blockade.
Also, the NYT mentions that Israeli’s latest invasion may endanger the hostages. Nothing is said about endangering the lives of Palestinians in Gaza. Basically, all those who live in Gaza are treated as Hamas, as terrorists, who must either be killed or removed.
This is your “paper of record,” America, with all the news that’s fit to print.
Here’s what appeared in my news feed from the NYT. Judge for yourself:
WAR RETURNS TO GAZA
After an Israeli airstrike in Gaza on Saturday. Amir Cohen/Reuters
Over the weekend, Israel decided to call in military reservists and escalate the war in the Gaza Strip again.
The news reflects a sharp turn of events. Earlier this year, Israel and Hamas agreed to a cease-fire. That deal held for months, during which Israel halted operations in Gaza and Hamas handed over some Israeli hostages. But the cease-fire ended in March. Now, it seems the war is truly returning.
Why escalate now?
Israel has pressured Hamas to return all of the remaining hostages, especially the 24 who officials believe are still alive. Officials also say that Hamas must disarm as part of any future deal. But Hamas has refused. Before it makes further concessions, it wants the war over and Israel out of Gaza.
Israel hopes escalation will get Hamas to capitulate and return all of the hostages — while giving its troops a chance to destroy the group’s remaining infrastructure.
What is Israel’s plan?
The generals are calling up tens of thousands of reservists to expand operations in Gaza. They plan to occupy the region, forcibly relocate Palestinians in affected areas and oversee aid distribution.
Israel has blocked all aid, including food and medicine, from entering the territory for more than two months. (Some aid workers are accused of participating in the Oct. 7 attacks, The Times explained, and a lawsuit claims that Hamas skimmed $1 billion in U.N. aid. But the blockade has led to starvation and the spread of diseases, as The Times documented.) With direct control, Israel says, it will allow distribution to resume.
Will the plan work?
Israeli leaders say that military pressure secured the release of hostages before. They hope to replicate that success. Critics argue that Israel has by now exhausted its ability to pressure Hamas with force. They worry more fighting will put the surviving hostages at risk. — German Lopez
Are we living through a nightmarish simulacrum of reality, a Hollywood without happy endings? If so, let’s call it “Trumpwood.”
You may know that Donald Trump, who’s appeared in movies and had his own popular TV show, The Apprentice (where his signature line was, “You’re fired!”), has his very own star on Hollywood’s walk of fame (and shame). It’s rather amazing to recall that Trump was once seen as an entertaining billionaire buffoon, a friend to the Clintons, among other liberal A-listers. The relatable billionaire, so to speak, whose vulgar tastes ran to golden toilets. As they say, who cares if it’s true—go with the legend!
He’s a star! A star!
Trumpwood, I’d argue, is a twisted and bizarre version of Hollywood, where the Oval Office is just a set to him, where the world is just a stage where he manifests all his hatred and trauma and egotism. The rest of us are just bit players (or scenery, easily changeable and discardable) in his psychodrama.
It’s all show business to The Donald, all centered on himself, where he is (at least in his own mind) the ultimate A-lister. He is the “very stable genius,” the most powerful man in the world with the biggest nuclear button, the man who craves attention but who also demands obedience. Adoration is what fuels him. Without adoring masses, without his trumped-up towers to himself, he would wither away.
Trump is the ultimate taker, feeding off the adoration as well as the hatred of the rest of us. I wish we could ignore him, but he is the president, after all, so we can’t just wish him into the cornfield.
Perhaps in 2028, assuming we last that long, Americans might care to elect a public servant rather than a self-centered scene-stealing “star” as president. A man can dream.
P.S. Check out Tom Engelhardt’s latest at TomDispatch, which helped to inspire these thoughts of mine.
The so-called SignalGate scandal centered on the bombing of Yemen is highly revelatory. First, some resources. CNN has a useful annotated account of the chats exchanged at the highest levels of the Trump administration. At their respective Substacks, Lenny Broytman and Caitlin Johnstone have telling dissections of these chats as well. At Jacobin, Branko Marcetic has an important article that reminds us of the illegality of the attacks. As the article’s subheading puts it: The press [mainstream media] is mostly framing the Yemen group chat scandal as a story of incompetence. There’s little attention being paid to the deadliness, illegality, and ineffectiveness of the strikes themselves.
To me, among the most telling “chats” came from Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth. It highlights the “exceptional” nature of America:
*****
Pete Hegseth to Vice President JD Vance: I fully share your loathing of European free-loading. It’s PATHETIC.
But Mike [Waltz, the National Security Adviser] is correct, we are the only ones on the planet (on our side of the ledger) who can do this. Nobody else even close. Question is timing…
*****
This is precisely the problem for America since the Vietnam War, if not before then. We’ve created a monster military, a “global strike” force, that is capable of destroying any target anywhere around the globe. “Nobody else even close,” SecDef Hegseth correctly says. And because we can do it, because we are exceptional in military force, our leaders believe we should do it, even if it’s only to send a “message” to the world how tough we are, how committed we are to killing others.
Other countries—like those “free-loading” European ones—are PATHETIC because they don’t have America’s military might. Only we can smite evildoers around the globe, only we can do so while also arming Israel to the teeth and covering its flanks while it continues its annihilation of Gaza, and this is something we are immensely proud of.
My fellow Americans, this is not something to be proud of. Consider if America’s military in the 1960s had lacked the ability to deploy over half a million troops to Vietnam while also facing down the Warsaw Pact in Europe. Consider if America’s military had lacked the ability to invade Iraq in 2003 while also waging war in Afghanistan and garrisoning the globe with roughly 800 military bases. Consider how much blood would not have been spilled, and treasure wasted, if the U.S. military was smaller, focused on defense, and led by people who didn’t put muscle and flame emojis in their chats to celebrate U.S. military prowess at killing people in Yemen.
That U.S. military forces are the only ones who can kill globally with such comparative ease, that “nobody else even close,” is exactly what is wrong with our government. We place far too much faith and pride in military prowess, so much so that the Pentagon becomes the Pentagod, something we worship, something we make immense sacrifices to, as in budgets that approach $1 trillion yearly.
Not for nothing did President Dwight D. Eisenhower say in 1953 that this is no way of life at all—that we are crucifying ourselves on a cross of iron. Tell me again, who are the pathetic ones?
We must end our intoxication with military power before it ends us.
Yesterday, I awoke to grim news that Israel is bombing Gaza yet again, killing a few hundred people, even as the U.S. targets Yemen with “precision” bombs and strikes, apparently to intimidate Iran as well—and perhaps to provoke a war, as Israeli jets escort U.S. B-52 bombers in “exercises.”
War is in the news, incessantly, with Congress sidelined and feckless as usual.
The constant drumbeat of war—the never-ending concussion of bombs in the Middle East—put me to mind of Orwell’s 1984. Nothing favors authoritarian states more than a constant state of war. If you truly want to weaken the Trump administration, reject their “warrior” and “war fighting” rhetoric and their selling of “peace through strength,” by which they mean peace through bombing and killing. Some “peace,” right? They may as well go full Orwell and declare that “war is peace” while making the Pentagon the “Ministry of Peace.”
Speaking of Orwell, and needing a break from death and mayhem, I remembered this piece that I wrote in 2018. Citizens, you had best police not only your words and actions, but the faces you make as well, especially when our Dear Leader is talking.
Written in September 2018
Facecrime!
W.J. Astore
We’re truly living in Orwellian times. A 17-year-old high school student, now known as #plaidshirtguy due to his choice of wardrobe, was removed from a Trump rally in Montana because of the faces he was making as Trump spoke. You can read all about here, and watch an interview with him at CNN.
Not surprisingly, people who stand behind Trump are selected ahead of time and told to clap and cheer. This young man did that, but he also chose to look quizzical, skeptical, and bemused at times. This is not allowed! A Trump staffer eventually intervened to remove him from the audience due to his “face crime.” To make matters worse, he was then held by the Secret Service for ten minutes, after which he was asked to leave the event.
Leave the event? For making skeptical and quizzical facial expressions?
You may recall from George Orwell’s “1984” that “Facecrime” existed. Anyone making skeptical or otherwise unacceptable faces when the Party announced bogus victories, production figures, and so forth opened himself or herself up to serious punishment.
Thanks to plaid shirt guy, we now know that facecrime has come to America. Just remember, fellow citizens, always to smile and cheer in the presence of Our Dear Leader. Unless you want to be detained and sent away — perhaps next time to the cornfield.
*From my copy of “1984”: “In any case, to wear an improper expression on your face (to look incredulous when a victory was announced, for example) was itself a punishable offense. There was even a word for it in Newspeak: facecrime, it was called.” (From the end of Chapter 5.)
Forget about peace or reductions to military spending
According to an NBC News poll, America is rooting for Ukraine but Trump prefers Russia. Seriously. That’s the gist of the headline.
The intent of this poll wasn’t to analyze how Americans think about the Russia-Ukraine War or Trump or military strength. It was to control how they think by giving them only the most constrained choices.
Let’s take a close look at the results and the NBC headline. According to NBC News:
When asked where they believe Trump’s sympathies are, 49% choose Russia, 40% say they think Trump favors neither side, and 8% choose Ukraine. Another 3% say they are not sure.
So, a majority of Americans, 51%, believe Trump is either carefully neutral on the war, a Ukraine supporter, or they don’t know. A minority (49%) believes he sympathizes with Russia. But the headline says Americans believe “Trump prefers Russia.”
The photo that accompanies the NBC article shows Trump lecturing Zelensky.
Interestingly, I see no question about whether the Russia-Ukraine War should end after three long and bloody years so that lives are saved, or whether the U.S. should stop sending billions in weaponry to Ukraine with virtually no oversight as to where the weapons end up.
Further on, Americans are asked whether we should focus more on domestic affairs or whether we haven’t been strong enough globally. A majority of Americans believe we should focus on domestic affairs. But note how there’s no choice given for opposing war and preferring peace. Americans aren’t asked if they think the government is relying too much on military force. You have only two options: focus more at home, or strengthen the U.S. position abroad.
Interestingly, it’s Democrats who are most concerned with strengthening America’s position abroad, with nearly six out of ten taking this position, whereas six out of ten Republicans want to focus on domestic affairs. That is a remarkable result, as Democrats have supplanted Republicans as the party of military interventionism and “strength.”
Again, NBC didn’t bother to ask directly whether Americans would prefer peace and substantial reductions to military spending. You are not supposed to have those preferences, so you’re not asked about them.
The bottom line of this poll and article is simple: Real Americans support Ukraine. Only 2% of Americans support Russia. Trump is overly sympathetic to Russia.
Apparently, real Americans can’t support peace nor are they allowed to consider significant reductions to spending on wars and weapons. To do so would be un-American, or so NBC News seems to suggest.
America’s Revival Will Begin When It Finally Embraces Peace
Arguably the biggest problem in America today is that the government remains on a wartime footing. The possibility of America being a normal country in normal times, at peace, is simply never mentioned. In current politics and in the mainstream media, there is no vision of America being at peace with the world. Ever.
There is always an enemy, usually plural. Russia. China. Iran. North Korea. The inchoate threat of terror and terrorists. Islamist extremism. All these and more are cited by the “experts” in the “national security state” as requiring a military response. If some kind of peace deal is orchestrated for the Russia-Ukraine War, America and its war machine will immediately pivot to Asia. Or the Middle East. Or perhaps Africa. Or all three.
I’m amazed when friends tell me they’re concerned about U.S. isolationism. Usually this concern is couched in America’s alleged withdrawal from (or even betrayal of) Europe in light of the Russia-Ukraine War. Their message to me is simple: America must keep sending weapons and intel to Ukraine until Russia and Putin are defeated, “as long as it takes.” The “it” is left undefined, but apparently “it” refers to an unqualified Ukrainian victory over Russia, followed by Ukraine’s eventual admission into NATO. Whether that “it” is even possible—whether that “it” could well lead to a nuclear exchange—doesn’t seem to matter because “We’re at war.”
I don’t know how anyone can think America will return to isolationism when the U.S. has 800 military bases globally and a vision of global reach, global power, and total dominance everywhere. And when America spends more on its military than the next ten countries combined (and most of those are U.S. allies). Dominating the globe isn’t exactly consistent with isolationism.
The problem with all the war rhetoric, the war narrative, the war framing, the warrior and lethality talk, is what it enables and facilitates, which is atrocity. Waste. Destruction. War is no way of life at all. As Ike said, the persistence of war is humanity crucifying itself on a cross of iron.
War is immensely corrosive to democracy. It is the enemy of freedom. Just listen to James Madison:
James Madison
Of all the enemies of true liberty, war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debt and taxes; and armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few. In war, too, the discretionary power of the Executive is extended; its influence in dealing out offices, honors and emoluments is multiplied; and all the means of seducing the minds, are added to those of subduing the force, of the people. The same malignant aspect in republicanism may be traced in the inequality of fortunes, and the opportunities of fraud, growing out of a state of war, and in the degeneracy of manner and of morals, engendered in both. No nation can preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare …
*****
If you’re concerned about authoritarianism, if you’re concerned about maintaining and strengthening freedom, if you’re concerned about combatting corruption and waste, if you’re concerned about America’s huge deficits, stopping war should be your number one concern.
War is a terrible thing, and a state of war enables all kinds of butchery. Just ask the indigenous peoples of America, or the peoples of Palestine today. Even genocide can be disguised as a wartime exigency, a wartime necessity. How many times throughout history has the declaration, “We’re at war!” been used to justify the most heinous crimes against humanity? Even the Nazis hid behind wartime exigency to justify the mass euthanasia of the old, the mentally ill, and other forms of “life unworthy of life” as part of the T4 program (which anticipated the Holocaust).
The true revival of America will begin when this country declares itself to be at peace with the world. Until then, precipitous decline will continue for as long as our government remains at (and continues to celebrate) war.
I recently ordered a few items from Amazon. Random stuff like a shower caddy, an iPhone case, and lamp sockets. It won’t surprise you to learn they were all “Made in China.”
I ordered some clothes from a fancy online retailer. The clothes said “Designed in California” but they were, of course, Made in China.
What is America making? What are we sending overseas? Bombs and bulldozers for the devastation and dismantlement of Gaza and other Palestinian Territories. Consider this article from Ken Klippenstein (excerpt follows), which details roughly $10 billion in “foreign aid” to Israel.
Here’s what Klippenstein had to say:
*****
While the entire news media is focused on Trump’s suspension of arms for Ukraine, the administration is arming Israel to the teeth. The nature of the bombs being sold indicates Israel’s military is preparing to continue its bombing campaigns in Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, and Yemen; as well as preparing for possible war with Iran.
Included in the sales are tens of thousands of controversial 2,000 lb. bombs so heavily criticized during the Gaza war for their destructive capacity, and thousands of “Hellfire” missiles that are used for targeted killings.
When I visited the Defense Security Cooperation Agency website’s section for major arms sales to see a breakdown of the weapons, I was immediately struck by the fact that five of the last six sales were to Israel.
Screenshot of DSCA’’s “Major Arms Sales” landing page
The U.S. bombs and missiles being sent to Israel, almost all made by Boeing, are included in:
2,166 GBU-39/B 250-pound Small Diameter Bombs (SDB) Increment 1.
2,800 MK 82 General Purpose, 500-pound bomb bomb bodies.
13,000 KMU-556 JDAM Guidance Kits to attach to MK-84 (2,000-pound) bomb bodies.
3,475 KMU-557 JDAM Guidance Kits to attach to BLU-109 (2,000-pound) bomb bodies.
1,004 KMU JDAM Guidance Kits to attach to 500-pound GBU-38v1 bomb bodies.
17,475 FMU-152A/B multi-function fuzes for bombs.
*****
Holy shit! Nearly thirty-six thousand 2000-pound bombs! That is 36 kilotons, roughly the equivalent of the two atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. And that’s not including the assorted 1000- and 500-pound bombs tossed into the mix.
This is an astonishing amount of ordnance for Israel to continue its ethnic cleansing campaign in Gaza and the West Bank.
President Trump, of course, has the full support of most Democrats in sending this stockpile of destruction to Israel. Call it bipartisan genocidal enablement.
America sure is an “exceptional” nation. No nation is better at bombing others—or supplying the bombs for others like Israel to do so—then flattening what remains with “Made in USA” bulldozers.
Honestly, I wish my country made shower caddies, iPhone cases, and lamp sockets instead of bombs and bulldozers. Don’t you?
I confess I didn’t watch President Trump’s address last night nor the response from the Democrats. I’ve heard enough of Trump bloviating and I’ve had my fill of Democrats and their “resistance.”
Checking my news feed this AM, I see that the Democratic response was given by a “moderate,” Senator Elissa Slotkin of Michigan. She’s an ex-CIA agent, so I guess that means we can trust her? And she served alongside troops in the disastrous Iraq War, so I guess she’s patriotic and smart?
Senator Slotkin tackled Trump not by citing progressive ideas and Democratic worthies like FDR and George McGovern but by applauding a Republican President, Ronald Reagan. President George W. Bush also got a positive mention.
Her main complaint was the “chaos” unleashed by Trump/Musk. She made a big deal about protecting the “homeland” along with immigration reform. She dropped a lot of buzzwords. She stressed that Trump apparently doesn’t think that America is theexceptional nation. And that he’s too cozy with Russia and Putin. The usual charges.
What was missing was vision, especially moral commitments to peace and justice. I heard nothing concrete about enlarging unions, boosting wages, affordable health care for all, serious student loan debt relief, or putting a stop to genocide in Gaza.
We’re still exceptional. Apple pie!
Slotkin’s speech was a perfect product of the corporate Democrats, or, more accurately, the uniparty and the national security state. She’s for “responsible” change. She’s for the middle class. Even apple pie got a mention!
Apparently, the Democratic plan to win back the presidency in 2028 is to reanimate the body of Ronald Reagan with apple pie as his running mate. How’s that for “resistance,” America?
Bonus Lesson: Slotkin said America’s “superpower” is that we’re a nation of “strivers” and “risk-takers” who are “never satisfied.” I guess other nations and peoples don’t have innovators with ambition, or maybe they’re too easily satisfied, unlike Americans?
The Disastrous Oval Office Meeting Between Trump and Zelensky
It’s never a good idea to bite the hand that feeds you. In effect, that’s what President Zelensky did yesterday in a contentious meeting with President Trump and Vice President Vance.
Bloodbath? Showdown? Blow-up? Or a rare example of backroom brawling in plain sight?
My email this morning featured many takes on the meeting from the media. Here are a few choice words: Showdown. Dispute. Debacle. Blow-up. Botched visit. Bloodbath. Feud.
It must have been strange for Zelensky. He’s used to coming to DC and getting his way. Of being feted and fawned over. Who does he think he is, Bibi Netanyahu? Bibi has AIPAC and Congress behind him, and lord knows who and what else. Zelensky, to borrow from Trump, doesn’t have those cards. His hand is weaker and he didn’t play it well.
Matt Taibbi has an article on the meeting with a full (if imperfect) transcript. Check it out here. Taibbi is generally critical of Zelensky; the historian Timothy Snyder is critical of the “inhospitable” and “indecent” Trump/Vance. Check out Snyder’s video here.
As I watched the video from the Oval Office, and heard Zelensky’s complaints, I almost thought he was going to break out his rendition of the Streisand/Diamond duet, “You don’t bring me flowers anymore,” except with new lyrics:
You don’t send me weapons anymore.
Joking aside, it’s rare when you see backroom brawling in the open. These meetings before the press are usually so staged, so vapid, and often so dishonest that it was refreshing to see something unscripted, spontaneous, and impassioned.
Here, I recall Winston Churchill’s quip that “There is only one thing worse than fighting with allies, and that is fighting without them.” Zelensky may find that he’s lost his most powerful ally; then again, perhaps he believed he’d already lost Trump/Vance, thus he seized his chance to be defiant and to go out strong.
I don’t know. It takes a clever man to play a weak hand well and a lucky one to win with it. And I don’t think Zelensky is either clever or lucky enough here.
Bracing Views 