This week marks the 75th anniversary of the US nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Reflecting on the wholesale slaughter that resulted in these nuclear attacks is important. However, it is essential that every American and indeed every world citizen know where we are at today regarding nuclear weapons.
To say that we are pushing ever closer to nuclear catastrophe is a vast understatement. We are inching ever closer to nuclear apocalypse and the catalyst for this insanity is US militarism. We need to come to terms with several realities. One is that the Trump administration has with intent and precision gutted and destroyed virtually every arms treaty that helped hold the world together these past decades. The shredding of these binding nuclear treaties has opened the door to nuclear proliferation that will put the entire planet on hair-trigger alert.
A demonic companion piece to the obliteration of long-standing and hard-fought treaties is the Trump administration’s desire to renew nuclear weapons testing-which last occurred in 1992. There is absolutely no advantage, politically, militarily-or morally,-to even consider the renewal of nuclear testing. But Donald Trump and our embedded nuclear priesthood are poised to take this horrific step backwards.
Finally, there is our approved “nuclear modernization plan,” which has ushered in the W-76 “low yield” nuclear warheads which are already deployed on our Trident submarines. Our war planners are telling us and the world that the W-76 is a weapon that can be readily used in a conventional conflict — a sentiment that has reasoned people worldwide recoiling in horror. Tragically, the W-76 deployment is only a small piece of the US nuclear modernization plan. We are talking weapons development and deployment that will cost a staggering $1.5 trillion plus — with no end in sight.
Imagine just for a minute what humanity and mankind could achieve if we pooled our national and global resources to those issues and matters that really mattered. If we reallocated the money and resources spent on extinguishing all life on Earth, we could address and stop global hunger-catastrophic climate change-the destruction of the global habitat-and the ending of the sixth great extinction, of which our voracious military spending is the primary causal factor. Another world is possible — it is something we can achieve. We owe it to our children, to ourselves and the unborn generations to come to eradicate and eliminate all nuclear weapons. Our future depends on it.
JIM SAWYER, Edmonds, Wash.
Margot Ford McMillen’s musings make me hope that COVID-19 is the existential threat to humanity that makes us put aside our differences and rally together for mutual survival in the manner of ’50s “B” sci-fi films. Nothing like an alien invasion to rouse the public to forge common alliances and, thereafter, create a society based on harmony with nature and each other; in a word: socialism.
For too long we’ve created a society akin to the “Ferengi” (an odious alien species from the Star Trek franchise motivated solely by greed and profit) pillaging the planet for personal plunderage and power to the detriment of all life on Earth.
Intentionally continuing on this destructive path is beyond irresponsible, it’s criminal. It would mean our species is without any redeeming qualities and deserves to be annihilated allowing the planet to breathe a sigh of relief.
ROBERT McALLISTER, Lantana, Fla.
COVID-19 does not discriminate between religious and secular gatherings. It spreads easily at both gatherings, thereby health of entire communities is put at risk. It is like equal opportunity for all religions. This happens when it is Christian, Jewish, Muslim or any other religious gathering. It has been recorded that all of them have gotten the virus. You remember when President wanted all Christians to go to church on Easter Sunday and it did not happen! A lucky break — for all.
G.M. CHANDU, Fresh Meadows, N.Y.
It looks as though we might actually see at least some of Resident Trump’s tax returns after all. Of course, he’ll flail about trying to stop it, and may even succeed till after the election, but it’ll happen sooner or later. And I think we’ll find something interesting.
Now, we know DJT isn’t worried about revealing shady deals; I doubt that he even knows the difference between shady and legit (and if he does, I’m sure he doesn’t care). Nor does he care about payments to bimbos; that horse left the barn already, and anyway, bimbos (not excepting Sean Spicer) are all he hires to be his front for the press.
It’s true he’s concerned that we’ll discover he’s not as rich as he claims. But here’s what I think really gives him the jimjams (and so far, no one, not even Robert Reich, seems to have considered this): the tax returns, and eventually his financial statements, will show that he has no more money than if he’d taken his daddy’s $480 million, stuck it into a few decent-paying investments, and left it there, taking a million or so now and then for daily expenses. After all, even at only 2-3% return, that’s an easy 10-12 mil a year. Give it 40 years, and he might even have been an actual billionaire by now. All he’d have had to do was play golf and pretend to be a TV star. Oh, right — that’s what he is doing.
MARTIN GRAETZ, Acton, Mass.
The USA has recently entered a new era. Confederate flags and monuments are disappearing and certain names are being changed. These relics, allegedly intended to honor the Confederacy and its Civil War heroes, displayed at southern colleges and universities, political conventions, above state capitols, on vehicle bumpers, on towels, t-shirts, etc., everywhere, are now being removed because their use in recent years has been preempted by racists, states-righters, the KKK, segregationists and white supremacists — namely, by those and others who oppose those fighting for civil rights and equality.
These relics, say some, like our president, are simply manifestations of a First Amendment right to free speech. If so, then it is speech that has to be regulated, like the shouting of “fire” in a crowded theater. Such relics do send a message, but it is a message that should be learned in museums and history books, not out in public places, where it will serve as a constant “salt in the wound” that reminds citizens, young and old, of the Civil War, slavery, and the “lost cause” — that the South has never recovered from. The removal of these relics is a sign of recognition that they were being used for much more than to honor history and heroes. It is also a favorable sign that those fighting for their civil rights are growing in number and influence. The State of Mississippi recently removed the last Confederate flag flying over a southern capitol. This action deserves recognition and a sigh of relief by all Americans.
R. AMOS, Severn, Md.
Lunatic fringe fascist fool Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) is without a doubt the dumbest, most worthless member of Congress, and considering the laughably low intelligence level of the average lazy Republican racist officeholder these days, that’s really saying something! Rep. Gohmert is an imbecile and a sick scumbag, not to mention corrupt.
Lamebrain Louie Gohmert needs to resign from office immediately and begin preparing his legal defense against the multiple lawsuits headed his way for Gohmert maliciously forcing his staff members (by forbidding them from wearing masks or from working at home) and his colleagues (by Gohmert refusing to wear a mask while at work) to become infected with Gohmert’s COVID-19 disease, all because whiny little clueless conservative crybaby Gohmert the goofball has apparently been taking his medical advice from traitor Trump’s White House witch doctor named Dr. Demon Seed.
Resign, Louie Gohmert — you’re an idiot! And if dishonorable dimwit Louie the loser isn’t man enough to resign, just vote the Moscow-loving moron out of office on Nov. 3, right along with Gohmert’s god, Donald Trump, otherwise better known as Vladimir Putin’s puppet. Send sick psycho Louie Gohmert and his partner in crime demonic Donald Trump to Russia where those anti-American bigots belong.
JAKE PICKERING, Arcata, Calif.
The killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis brings to mind a conversation I had with a police officer at a birthday party. I, never in law enforcement, said that I believed that two kinds of people become police officers: those who have a strong sense of right and wrong and those who crave power. He agreed with me, saying “We call them the do-gooders and the bullies,” and later added, “It’s the bullies who rise up in the profession.”
RICHARD SIBLEY, Phoenix, Ariz.
Black lives, brown lives, red lives, white lives, blue lives, all life matters, regardless of gender, ethnicity, race, religion, social or economic status, including the environment, nature and all species of wild life. Until we learn this as a society, we will forever be in turmoil.
BOB STONE, Bristol, Conn.
Just when we think
we’re up to date,
the news is infused
with new debate.
Quicksand invades our history;
the ’50s no longer a mystery.
Kick out entertainers
and all the cohorts
so we can get back
to watching good sports.
FLORA ORMSBY SMITH, Marblehead, Mass.
From The Progressive Populist, September 1, 2020
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