The U.S. Military Budget as a Mushroom Cloud: Why It’s Time to Make Deep Cuts at the Pentagon
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The U.S. Military Budget as a Mushroom Cloud: Why It’s Time to Make Deep Cuts at the Pentagon

A retired Air Force lieutenant colonel considers a military in which the losses are all on the battlefield, and the gains are all in the Congress as well as in the military-industrial complex that continues to soar like a missile in a moment when so many other parts of this society are sinking fast.

Nuclear Weapons and World Order: a Dialogue
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Nuclear Weapons and World Order: a Dialogue

The world is more dangerous than at any time since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the battlelines between the nuclear weapons states and governmental and civil society anti-nuclearism has never been more definitively drawn. A dialogue between two renowned anti-nuclear activists.

Democracy Crumbling: How Did India End Up Among Top 3 ‘Backsliders’?
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Democracy Crumbling: How Did India End Up Among Top 3 ‘Backsliders’?

A recent report by International IDEA, an inter-governmental think tank, finds that “70% of the global population now live either in non-democratic regimes or in democratically backsliding countries”. The report cites Brazil, India and the United States as the biggest backsliders globally.

The Fierce Determination of Ordinary People to Build an Extraordinary World
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The Fierce Determination of Ordinary People to Build an Extraordinary World

United States President Joe Biden has suborned 111 countries to attend his Summit for Democracy on December 9–10, ending on Human Rights Day. In the name of democracy, the U.S. government is pushing its own agenda to consolidate power and further its national interests.

High Court Delivers ‘Victory’ for Rights of Nature Movement in Ecuador
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High Court Delivers ‘Victory’ for Rights of Nature Movement in Ecuador

On December 1, the Constitutional Court of Ecuador ruled that mining in a protected forest violates the rights of nature established by the nation’s constitution.

Nuns Against Nuclear Weapons: Plowshares Protesters have Fought for Disarmament for Over 40 Years, Going to Prison for Peace
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Nuns Against Nuclear Weapons: Plowshares Protesters have Fought for Disarmament for Over 40 Years, Going to Prison for Peace

Since 1980, there have been over 100 actions in support of nuclear disarmament by Plowshare nuns in the U.S., the U.K. and Europe. The name comes from the Bible: “They shall beat their swords into plowshares … nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.”

U.S. Shouldn’t Be Invited to Summit for Democracy, Let Alone Be its Host
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U.S. Shouldn’t Be Invited to Summit for Democracy, Let Alone Be its Host

While opting to snub Russia and China from the summit, the US has invited many countries which can hardly be classified as democratic: from apartheid Israel, to Brazil, whose leader Jair Bolsonaro this summer declared that “only God can oust me.”

Edward Bernays: Propaganda and the U.S.-Backed 1954 Guatemalan Coup
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Edward Bernays: Propaganda and the U.S.-Backed 1954 Guatemalan Coup

Whether selling cigarettes or deposing world leaders, Edward Bernays molded reality like clay. In his hands, words spun like so many hollow jars. However, the one constant, the one truth among his many distortions, is that Bernays had no use for the truth.