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Women Lead Democratic Party Primary [November 11, 2019]

Scoring the October Presidential Debate [October 16, 2019]

Edmund Muskie, Joe Biden, and Political Illusions, a personal narrative [July 10, 2019]

Bernie Sanders at the Crossroads [June 25, 2019]

How Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Won [June 30, 2018]

Donald, Hillary, McCarthy (Democrats: We Love Workers) [June 23, 2018]

Bernie Sanders and Estes Kefauver [May 30, 2018]

Seattle Head Tax is Unfair [May 12, 2018]

Bernie Sanders Deludes Himself [April 6, 2018]

Census, Citizenship, and Constitution [March 28, 2018]

Democrats Working For Blue Wave in Washington State [March 25, 2018]

Pramila Jayapal Voted To Close the Government [January 28, 2018]

Tax Rich Blues, and Hear Them Whine [December 5, 2017]

Right Wing Poland Has Historic Roots [November 13, 2017]

Progress Across the Spectrum: a Winning Progressive Strategy [November 4, 2017]

Expand the Child Tax Credit to Zero Child Young Families [October 17, 2017]

Afghanistan Likely to Fall in 2018 [October 8, 2017]

Kurds have a Right to a Nation State [September 21, 2017]

Trotsky's Gas Warfare and Today's Left [September 4, 2017]

Destroying Democratic Party Monuments [August 19, 2017]

Founding Fathers, Fake News [July 30, 2017]

Saudi Arabia, Iran, and American Values [May 8, 2017]

Seattle City Council Race [April 24, 2017]

I Become a War Criminal [April 23, 2017]

Trump: An American Caligula [April 7, 2017]

Bush v. Trump and The Decline of the Republican Party [March 19, 2017]

Strategy for Moving America Left [March 4, 2017]

Rewrite: Yemeni Rebels Say [February 6, 2017]

An Antidote to Trump [January 31, 2017]

War on the Sick [December 26, 2016]

Will Trump Be a Coolidge Or a Hoover? [December 11, 2016]

How the Left May Have Destroyed Medicare [November 25, 2016]

World Will Warm to Trump [November 9, 2016]

Violence: As Above, So Below [July 18, 2016]

Democratic Party Draft Platform Analysis 2016 [July 4, 2016]

Bernie, Hillary, Donald and Adolf [May 14, 2016]

Thoughts on Capital for New Socialists [April 25, 2016]

How Republicans Could Beat Bernie Sanders [April 9, 2016]

FDR, Socialism & Sanders [March 26, 2016]

2016 Election the Most Complicated Ever [March 12, 2016]

Hitler? That would be Cruz, not Trump [March 6, 2016]

On Hating President Obama [February 27, 2016]

Chinks in Bernie Sanders Progressive Armor [February 5, 2016]
A Chicken in Every Pot, Hillary v. Bernie [January 21, 2016]
Jobs, White Men, and Angry Politicians [January 6, 2016]
Hillary's Vast Family Wealth [December 24, 2015]
Bernie Sanders Voted Republican on H.R. 1424 [September 27, 2015]
Carly Fiorina's Babes on Bayonets Campaign [September 20, 2015]
Biden Bid, Pocket Boroughs & Primary Antics [August 3, 2015]
What is there in Syria? [June 30, 2015]
Uncle Raymond Clinton, Or Is Hillary Still Mobbed Up? [March 25, 2015]
U.S. Now Allied with Al Qaeda: Praise God! [March 27, 2015]
Venezuela, Democracy and U.S. Arrogance [March 10, 2015]
Gone Girl Politics [November 10, 2014]
House of Cards, 2014 Deal [November 1, 2014]
Woodrow Wilson, Eugene Debs, and Bashar Assad [September 22, 2014]
Obama's Idiotic Foreign Policy [September 10, 2014]
Demonizing Assad Backfires [August 30, 2014]
States, Nations, Israel and Palestine [August 11, 2014]
Obama Pouring $500 million in Fuel on Syrian Fire is a Declaration of War [July 27, 2014]
How George Bush Recreated the Taliban [June 24, 2014]
The Double Coup of Fifty-Two [June 7, 2014]
Will Anyone Run for Peace in 2016? [May 30, 2014]
Global Justice, or Just American Imperialism? [May 19, 2014]
Republicans for Deficits [April 11, 2014]
Free Speech Gone Wild: McCutcheon v. FEC [April 3, 2014]
Why America Can't Afford Another Cold War [March 8, 2014]
Obama Against Elections And Human Rights [March 7, 2014]
Crimea, Ukraine, and Self-determination [March 3, 2014]
Peace Through Poverty [February 24, 2014]
Leon Trotsky and Kshama Sawant [December 29, 2013]
Learning from Ho Chi Minh [December 15, 2013]
Other People's Imperialism: Roosevelt, Hitler and Ho Chi Minh [December 2, 2013]
The Real Debt Ceiling [October 9, 2013]
Defund Republicare [September 19, 2013]
Syria, War Crimes, and Marijuana Reform [August 30, 2013]
Raise Medicare Contributions [April 3, 2013]
Is Zionism A Crime Against Humanity? [March 3, 2013]
The State of Barack Obama [February 13, 2013]
Settlements as War Crimes [January 31, 2013]
Chiang, Diem, Karzai and Mohamoud [January 18, 2013]
French in Action in Mali [January 12, 2013]
Eisenhower, Business, and War [December 26, 2012]
Time to Amend the Second Amendment [December 19, 2012]
The Poisonwood Congo [November 22, 2012]
President Obama's Dark Africa [November 11, 2012]
Four Troop Surges: Philippines, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan [November 4, 2012]
Exceptional Exceptionalism [October 28, 2012]
Egypt and America, 1882 and 2012 [October 3, 2012]
Obama Grabs Yemen [September 17, 2012]
Tax the American Empire [July 14, 2012]
Impeach Antonin Scalia [June 28, 2012]
Vladimir Putin and the Atheist Holocaust [January 28, 2012]
Gang Rape of Somalia [November 19, 2011]
Occupy Political Offices [November 14, 2011]
Ready for a Caining? Herman Cain's Twisted Politics [October 6, 2011]
Aircraft Carriers, China, and the U.S. Economy [August 10, 2011]
Republican, Democratic, and Tea Party [August 3, 2011]
Republicans, Loaves and Fishes [July 31, 2011]
Somalia Fact Famine in U.S. [July 20, 2011]
When the GOP Was Still Grand: the Republican Platform of 1884 [July 18, 2011]
Crazy Republicans with Guns and Aspirations [July 3, 2011]
U.S. Close to War with Pakistan [April 23, 2011]
Good Friday, Socialism, and Acts 4 [April 22, 2011]
Coffin Ships, Deregulation, and Al Gore [April 1, 2011]
No Nukes, No War, No Service [March 15, 2011]
Dictators, Cruelty, and Longevity [March 10, 2011]
Carrying Firewood [March 3, 2011]
Presidents Day, In War Crimes Court [February 20, 2011]
Obama, Karzai, Truman and Chiang [January 17, 2010]

2014 is the New 2011 for Afghanistan [November 20, 2010]
Corporate Personhood, Islam, and the Philippines Occupation [September 29, 2010]
Obama Raids Peace Activist Homes [September 25, 2010]
Should the 17th Amendment be Repealed? [June 8, 2010]
Pirates, Blockades, Embargoes and Privateers [June 3, 2010]
Picking up the War Tab [May 24, 2010]
Kandahar, Okinawa, and Imperial Implosions [May 23, 2010]
Could Socialism Kill Capitalism? [May 6, 2010]
Immigration and the Economy [February 26, 2010]
Okinawa, Japan, and China [January 24, 2010]
Franklin Roosevelt's Iron Fist [January 14, 2010]
Lessons From the British Empire [January 13, 2010]
And the War Goes On [August 16, 2009]
Korea, Barack Obama, and Theodore Roosevelt [May 27, 2009]
Theodore Roosevelt, Hawaii and Japan [May 25, 2009]
The Holy Roman Empire, Hitler, and Benedict XVI [May 14, 2009]
Afghanistan: the Last Crusade? [May 9, 2009]
China, Satellites, and Puppets [April 4, 2009]
Obama's Asian War Extension Course [March 30, 2009]
The Dutch East Indies, Racism, and World War II [March 12, 2009]
Theodore Roosevelt, Obama and Afghanistan [February 24, 2009]
President Obama Does Afghanistan [February 10, 2009]
Same As the Old Boss? President Obama Bombs Pakistan [January 24, 2009]
Barack Obama and Somalia: Prelude [January 13, 2009]
Is America A Democracy? [January 8, 2009]
Barack Obama and Woodrow Wilson [December 8, 2008]
Robert Rubin: The Truth is Out [November 24, 2008]
Pius XI and the Rise of General Franco
Democrats Join Oil Drilling Team [September 17, 2008 at Mike Thompson Watch]
Barack Obama's Dividend Play [September 7, 2008]
Barack Obama, Sarah Palin and Economic Justice [September 1, 2008]
U.S. Government of Somalia Collapsing [August 3, 2008]
Senators McCain and Obama Already Failing [June 7, 2008]
Vietnam, Iraq, and the U.S. Senate [March 16, 2008]
Quagmires: Bush's Iraq v. Kennedy's Vietnam [March 10, 2008]
Somalians Attacked by U.S. Navy [March 4, 2008]
Vietnam: Harry Truman's War? [March 2, 2008]
Presidential Power and Primary Horse Races [January 11, 2008]
Somerset and the Rule of Law [December 27, 2007]
Somalia Spinning [December 4, 2007]
Somalia and Nation State Failures [October 12, 2007]
Bush Backfires in Somalia [September 27, 2007]
Bush and Beyond [August 29, 2007]
And the War Goes On #2 [August 13, 2007]
Barack H. Obama's True Colors [August 4, 2007]
Harry Potter and Natural Liberation [August 1, 2007]
Abolish the U.S. Senate [at California Democracy blog July 22, 2007]
If It Isn't A Crusade, What Is It? [June 20, 2007]
Democracy, Ethiopia and Palestine [June 18, 2007]
And the War Goes On [May 25, 2007]
Dem Pols Just Can't Stop the War
[May 18, 2007]
Hawaii, Iraq, War and Peace
[May 14, 2007]
Corruption in the U.S.A. [May 9, 2007]
We Know You Want a Revolution [May 1, 2007]
Lyndon Johnson, Vietnam and Iraq [April 15, 2007]
China: How Scared Should We Be? [April 2, 2007]
Peace Has A Price Democrats Won't Pay [March 19, 2007]
US War Crimes in Somalia [January 9, 2007]
Population Incentives [January 6, 2007]
Saddam Hussein and Abraham Lincoln [December 30, 2006]
To the Democrats Belong the Spoils [December 29, 2006]
Catholicism and Fascism [December 12, 2006]
Bobby Kennedy [December 11, 2006]
Somalia [December 8, 2006]
World War I: Why We Fought [December 5, 2006]
Woodrow Wilson and the Lusitania [December 4, 2006]

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January 11, 2017: Trump to send 1000 more troops to Afghanistan

March 20, 2015: Obama May Keep 10,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan

Featured Essay:

And the War Goes On
May 25, 2007

By William P. Meyers

At what point does a nation, in particular the civilians of a nation, take on the collective responsibility for the evils ordered by their leaders?

The War in Iraq goes on. No doubt there will be suffering if U.S. troops leave. No doubt there was suffering before U.S. troops got there. But there is also no doubt that the starting of the war was a War Crime; that Democratic Party politicians, with extremely few exceptions, supported it along with Republican politicians. And there is no doubt that hundreds of thousands of people have died, both Iraqi military and civilians. The sum total of suffering rose because of American action, and it will subside when our troops leave.

The Democratic Party politicians want to wear their peace symbols and have their war too, and they have succeeded. They allowed the Republican minority to vote with substantial minority of Democratic congressmen to pass, 280 to 142, the funding needed to continue the war crimes without any significant restrictions or a timetable for withdrawing the troops. Complex maneuvers were required: the actual vote, on roll call 425, was to concur in a Senate amendment to H.R. 2206, which makes "emergency supplemental appropriations" for the 2007 fiscal year. The Senate passed H.R. 2206 as amended too, so now George W. Bush will sign it.

To stop the war in Iraq the Congress would have had to just pass no funding at all. That would not please their donors and the people whose votes are bought with your tax dollars.

The guy from my district, Representative Mike Thompson, is a good illustration of how this vote had to be engineered. Mike is popular, known for his work on the Wine Caucus, but of course against drunk driving. He states he is a Catholic, but in this northern California district he finds it best to be pro-Choice. To this day he derides the Peace Movement from the Vietnam War era; he fought in the war and will not admit he committed war crimes. But the vast majority of voters here want out of Iraq, and not in 2008. So Mike supports our troops, but voted against the appropriation because he was assured that it would not pass. He's tired of those peace protests outside his office. I hope he is having nightmares, I hope the ghosts of the Vietnamese are prioritizing haunting his dreams at night. Maybe that is why wine is so important to him.

But we are collectively responsible for allowing this to happen. I don't want to go too far with the idea of collective responsibility. The Democratic Party, headed by President-for-Life Franklin D. Roosevelt and his successor Harry Truman, decided collective responsibility made it okay to firebomb German and Japanese urban centers. Then they committed the most famous war crimes in history, the vaporization of the civilian populations of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

If the Islamic fundamentalist warriors hold the U.S. collectively responsible for supplying military aid to Israel, does that justify an attack on a basically civilian target like the World Trade Center?

I don't expect the American people to do much thinking. It would be nice, but historically it is not a trend. But to the limited extent that thought takes place that is not the mere echoing of stupid TV shows (and YouTube), I think we all should think about collective responsibility.

The communists of Vietnam may not be my cup of tea from an ideological standpoint, but I think they got it right as far as national responsibility. They had a responsibility to throw out the French. They had a responsibility to throw out the Americans. But they did not need to attack the French in France or Americans in actual United States territory.

Self-defense, or collective self-defense, should not be waived as a right and duty. But using it as an excuse for aggression is an old trick, used by petty criminals and Presidents of the United States alike.

Iraq is not about self-defense. Afghanistan is not about self-defense either.

2018 is the new 2014 (Which was the new 2001)