Recent ZNet

I’m not sure how many Inauguration Day protests in DC I’ve been to over the years. The one I distinctly remember is January 20th, 2001, George W. Bush’s first inauguration. There was a similar political dynamic then as the upcoming Trump one. A reactionary Republican was taking office, and progressives were very concerned about what Read more…

This is what a non-imperial, truly internationalist foreign policy would look like

You might be forgiven for imagining that laws are serious things. When you violate them, you can be locked in a cage for decades. That’s not true for big-time weapons dealers like the U.S. government. Two years after the creation of the Arms Trade Treaty, the news is that it’s failing in Yemen. I’m hard Read more…

The lesson for Democrats from the Republican coup in North Carolina is that public education is a cornerstone of our democracy, and closely related to the fight for voting rights, racial justice, and a more equal society

Today, you can not only deny history – the Armenian and Jewish Holocausts, Anne Frank’s diary, the gas chambers of Auschwitz – you can also tell fibs, big or small, about almost anything which annoys you

While the world has been transfixed on the epic tragedy in Syria, another tragedy — a hidden one — has been consuming the children of Yemen. Battered by the twin evils of war and hunger, every 10 minutes a child in Yemen dies from malnutrition, diarrhea, or respiratory-tract infections, UNICEF reports. And without immediate medical Read more…

The UN resolution — important as it is in itself — is not what Israel fears. What troubles Tel Aviv are the steps that would come after this resolution, particularly from the International Criminal Court

Campaigns are underway in more than a dozen additional jurisdictions to continue movement’s winning streak in 2017 and 2018

Electoral Integrity Project gave North Carolina an electoral integrity score of 58 out of 100 points

Even if the final decay of capitalism has arrived, that decay is likely to unfold over decades unless a global Left movement, uniting the variety of social and environmental movements and struggles across borders, can speed up the process

Each year Dispatches From the Edge gives awards to individuals, companies and governments that make reading the news a daily adventure. Here are the awards for 2016.   The Golden Lemon Award had a number of strong contenders in 2016, including: General Atomics for its MQ-9 Reaper armed drone, which has a faulty starter-generator that Read more…

Since Israel has already declared its refusal to comply with UNSCR 2334, the stage is now set for an ICJ and/or ICC option and decision that would further place Israel in criminal violation of international law

President Obama’s decision to allow passage of a UN Security Council resolution condemning Israeli settlements as illegal has done more to change the shape of the conflict than any other action in the last ten years

The emergence of new social and political movements may represent a beacon of hope to revive the region’s Left

In the wake of untold civilian casualties in Syria, thousands have pledged their support for what’s being called the Civil March for Aleppo. The initiative, which began in Berlin on Dec. 26, will see hundreds of marchers re-trace the 2,100-mile path between Syria and Germany that many refugees have been forced to walk. The group, Read more…

Refusing to accept Republican lawmakers’ brazen power grab, hundreds of North Carolinians flooded the halls of the General Assembly building in Raleigh Thursday evening to shame the officials as they passed a series of measures aimed at stripping power from Governor-elect Roy Cooper. Twenty people, including one journalist, were reportedly arrested for disrupting the special Read more…

The developing picture suggests the emergence of a New World Order, one that is rather different from the usual portrayals within the doctrinal system

Trump’s ignorance of the region will make him even more dependent on his advisers than most Presidents. And that’s not good news

The United States has had a longstanding love-hate relationship with the United Nations ever since 1952 when the world body began operations in New York city on an 18-acre piece of land which housed an abattoir where cattle was being trucked daily for slaughter. The late Republican Senator Jesse Helms, a fulltime chairman of the Read more…

The best way to protect those we love is to win over those who hate them

Could the Greens survive and even thrive as a strictly local party?

Tech economy is drawing new inhabitants and businesses but is contributing to dislocation, leaving families, teachers and even principals with housing woes

European political leaders are making the same mistake in reacting to the massacre at the Christmas fair in Berlin, in which 12 died, as they did during previous terrorist attacks in Paris and Brussels. There is an over-concentration on the failings of the security services in not identifying and neutralising the Tunisian petty criminal, Anis Amri, Read more…

we must creatively exploit the differences between the Establishment Parties and factions within the ruling elite in a manner that builds mass based/popular support for a politics of social transformation

Protecting the homeless is a core part of defending social security, medicare, medicaid, public schools, child labor laws, parks and indigenous lands

Bill Fletcher and Bob Wing have written an important post election analytical essay with many excellent recommendations on the path forward. “Fighting Back Against the White Revolt” is a must read for all people of good will concerned about the future of humanity. Throughout the election period, both authors provided clear and clarion voices on Read more…

When Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff was impeached in May and removed from office in August, many called it a coup. The president was not charged with anything that could legitimately be called a crime, and the leaders of the impeachment appeared, in taped conversations, to be getting rid of her in order to cut off a corruption investigation Read more…

The efforts to flout voter-approved laws are part of ongoing conservative and corporate-backed strategies to keep wages low

There is nothing in the constitution that grants American voters the right to choose their president

Declaration of Intent and Call to Action The Spirit, Power and Significance of an Historic Gathering They came by the hundreds, more than two thousand in all, from the greater Newark/New York region, Black America and the Pan African World, drawn by the urgent impulse to connect, network, bond, share and unite in the wake Read more…

Throughout history, serious people have fought back

What the Trump phenomenon tells us is that globalization writers of all stripes underestimate the degree to which the U. S. bourgeoisie is concerned about the deteriorated state of affairs in the nation

Understanding the phenomenon of Donald Trump demands that we look beyond the individual himself and, instead, into the way US society has evolved over the last few decades

The world’s richest nations continue to reap a disproportionate amount of the globe’s profits

Today marks the 146th day since Donald Trump last held a news conference. As the Electoral College backs Trump, we speak to former Labor Secretary Robert Reich, now a professor at the University of California, Berkeley. “Democracy depends on a free and independent press, which is why all tyrants try to squelch it,” Reich recently Read more…

“This would be a horrible humanitarian tragedy”

‘Presidents, Republicans and Democrats, have understood that our goal must be to reduce the number of nuclear weapons, not expand them.’

People have already died from Modi’s sudden assault on 80% of India’s economy

Buzzfeed recently had a crack at drawing attention to Venezuela’s food scarcity problem. Unfortunately most of its claims were wildly off the mark. The video by Buzzfeed’s Pero Like channel starts with their hugely popular formula consisting of a bunch of people sitting down to try something – normally a strange food, or something fun. However, Read more…

U.S. abstains from Security Council vote, allowing resolution to pass

The United Nations Security Council on Friday passed a resolution with 14 member states in favor and 1 abstaining (the US), condemning Israeli government support for Israeli squatters

Our best weapon is our own solidarity

Every country has mixed feelings about its future, but some are more self-confident than others. At the present moment, there are very few countries in which self-doubt does not seem greater than self-confidence. This seems to me true of the United States, both western and eastern Europe, Australia, the Middle East, and most of Africa Read more…

With no hope of being able to return to their homes in the near future, and with no place or family to go to, people seem resigned to their fate. “We are sick with pain,” one man told us

Is it even possible for working people of all kinds to vote their economic interests given the corporate orientation of both parties?

The emphasis is on political decentralisation (democratic confederalism), a women’s revolution and the importance of ecology

Lead testing results across the country found almost 3,000 areas with poisoning rates far higher than in the tainted Michigan city. Yet many of these lead hotspots are receiving little attention or funding

Refinery Town: Big Oil, Big Money, and the Remaking of anAmerican City. By Steve Early. Foreword by Bernie Sanders. Boston: Beacon Press, 2016   The word had not yet been coined, but the early 1970s to early 1980s saw a remarkable wave of “municipalism,” that is the invasion of city government by radicals and their Read more…

Is home lost forever, then, Lost for evermore? Every creek I crossed ahead Was cooler than before. The things that I set out to do I know not what they are; Dear people of my little town, I’ve strayed, I’ve strayed too far. At rise of dawn I see no sun, At dusk no voice Read more…

Participatory economics has long been proposed as an alternative to capitalism and centralized planning. It remains, nonetheless, a misunderstood concept and continues to find opposition among both capitalists and anticapitalists. So, what exactly is “participatory economics” and how does it fit with the socialist vision of a classless society? In this interview, Michael Albert, founder Read more…