Elizabeth Sherman: John McCain, dead at 81, helped build a country that no longer reflects his values
Arizona Sen. John McCain – scion of Navy brass, flyboy turned Vietnam war hero and tireless defender of American global leadership – has died after a year of treatment for … Continue reading
Samira Abrar: The Human Cost of War for Afghan Children
Youth growing up in Afghanistan today have never known peace, and after almost two decades of U.S. development efforts, living conditions in the country may be worse than when the … Continue reading
Marc Jampole: Bellicose Nation
The U.S. spends 40% of the world’s total military budget, and this huge expenditure is controlled by an inconsistent and bellicose ignoramus. Trump favors disruption over working together, and he … Continue reading
Joan E. Bauer: Remembering V. S. Naipaul at the Dawn of a Dark Century
The November rain rat-tats, beads on the window. I scratch words, anxious birds on a yellow pad. In your cottage in Wiltshire, perhaps you are writing. Your anguished Asiatic … Continue reading
Riad Saleh Hussein: A Serene Evening
This evening is serene, This evening is not calm. I am a man or a pack of dynamite— Under my trench a red goose or a black unicorn. The woman … Continue reading
Robert Okaji: Aleppo
A father sings to his son, dead two days, and the platitudes persist. Widow of night. Lantern’s trick. What trace, you wonder, exists of humanity in these etched walls? Light … Continue reading
Video: A Portrait of Iraq
. From director Janssen Powers: If you Google image search “Iraq” looking for photos of anything other than soldiers and war then you’re in for some serious scrolling… Since the … Continue reading
Michael Simms: The Garden and the Drone
We come to the garden because it is beautiful. Arborvitae, hydrangea, anemone— Even the names are beautiful. . The men who call themselves our leaders Seem far away. We feel … Continue reading
John Samuel Tieman: Mary Borden’s The Forbidden Zone, a near-forgotten masterpiece
Recently, PBS aired a documentary marking the hundredth anniversary of the end of World War I. Almost in passing, a memoir by Mary Borden who founded a hospital and served as … Continue reading
Stacy Bannerman: Is Climate the Worst Casualty of War?
The money misspent on the Iraq War—a war for oil, let’s not forget— could have purchased the planetary conversion to renewable energy. Just sit with that a moment. . “The … Continue reading
David Ades: The Storm’s Dark Edge
There is nothing to be seen in the sky: white, an unpainted canvas, it keeps its secrets to itself. Notice, though, the wind’s fierceness, the waves already crashing … Continue reading
Medea Benjamin: Who Will Stop Trump from Tweeting Us into War with Iran?
Trump’s crippling sanctions will go into effect on November 4th. Donald Trump may be taking us to war on Iran and those who should be trying to stop him—from Congress … Continue reading
Majid Naficy: Nightmare at Dawn
I just let go of a nightmare And jumped out of my coffin. The moon peeks out from behind my neighbor’s rooftop. At this moment one should pick a pen. … Continue reading
Tom Engelhardt: Turning 74 in a Failing World
Three Failing Experiments? Mine, America’s, and Humanity’s. There was a period in my later life when I used to say that, from the age of 20 to my late sixties, I … Continue reading
