On December 1, President Barack Obama officially announced a massive escalation of the U.S. war on Afghanistan, tripling the number of American military personnel there since Obama took office. This move marks a decision by Washington to continue the colonial occupation of Afghanistan indefinitely, and with it the bloody slaughter of the Afghan people. Obama’s claim that he would “begin the transfer” of U.S. forces by mid-2011 was just sucker bait for gullible liberals. “Afghanistan Is Now Obama’s War,” proclaimed the media from New York to London to Mumbai. But Afghanistan has been the Democrats’ war since the moment it was launched, in September 2001, and together with the war on Iraq, it is a bipartisan imperialist war. No one in Washington thinks the Afghan puppet army will be able to handle the Taliban. The actual U.S. strategy is not to defeat the Taliban but to weaken it enough so that elements of the Islamists can be brought into a political deal. It is striking that in the United States, a majority of the population is turning against the war even though there hasn’t been a major national antiwar march in more than two years – ever since the start of the last presidential election campaign. At protests following Obama’s announcement of more troops to Afghanistan, organizers carefully avoided any signs mentioning the president by name. Our Internationalist contingent, in contrast, carried signs including, “Hey Obama, How Many Kids Did You Kill Today? Defeat Imperialist Slaughter in Afghanistan, Iraq.”

Soren Kierkegaard spoke of faith as a "leap across seventy-thousand fathoms of water." He sought to introduce Christianity into comfortable Danish Christendom. The language of proclamation runs crossways to the language of time (Bonhoeffer). The me-society, the majority society, has lost its way and needs the immigration society and help from Canada & Russia

There is indeed something interesting about the relationship between the winner of the Noble Prize for Peace accepting the award by speaking about “a just war” and using our military presence i.e. our military “occupation” in Afghanistan as an example of that “just war.”

"The earth does not belong to people; people belong to the earth" (chief Seattle). Nature is not a free good, external or sink but our living mother and the basis for future human life. Alternative economics and community centers could lead us out of the dystopia of imperial wars.

BETWEEN THE LINES Syndicated Radio Newsmagazine

censorship at KPFA

Worldwide 136 cities of millions at the coasts are directly endangered by the rising sea level.. The president cannot win a two-front war against the conservatives.. Over 100 German regions have resolved to be completely renewable by 2025.

BETWEEN THE LINES Syndicated Radio Newsmagazine

There is real possibility for a significant leap in the reform process in the Philippines after the 2010 elections. If, as seems likely at this time, Noynoy Aquino wins the presidency, a number of converging developments could produce the conditions necessary for change. The first is Noynoy himself, who has successfully embodied the political legacy of his mother Cory, and his father Ninoy. This, in turn, has introduced a new dimension of enthusiastic voluntarism to the election campaign. Finally, the people running Noynoy’s campaign constitute the leading core of an enlarged reform constituency.

A tribute to our troops at Christmas and a memorial of the Christmas Truce of 1914. A project for Mr. Cutler's grade 6 class. 'Christmas in the Trenches' is sung by John McCutcheon.