Tag Archives: trump

Mapp to Nowhere

Posted on by under Neutrality and Complicity, Notes on the Anti-War Movement, Palestine, War with Iran

I get home, look at my mail, and find a solicitation to vote for Adrian O. Mapp, Democratic candidate for Congress in the 12th Congressional District. Mapp is “proudly endorsed” by Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, a person I respect. What does Mapp stand for? He tells us:

  1. Housing: he’ll expand affordable housing and protect working families from rising housing costs. 
  2. Healthcare: he’ll protect access to affordable, quality healthcare for families, seniors, and those most in need.
  3. Education: he’ll open doors to opportunity through education, job training, and relief from crushing debt.
  4. Immigration: he’ll support fair, humane, immigration reform rooted in dignity, security, and common sense.
  5. Taxes: he’ll fight for tax fairness and relief for New Jersey homeowners and middle-class families.

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The Time to Bail Out Is Now

Posted on by under activism, cancel culture, Fatwas, Neutrality and Complicity, Notes on the Anti-War Movement, War with Iran

If you’re in the United States Armed Forces, the time to seek Conscientious Objector status to the “Iran War” is now. Don’t delay. Don’t overthink. Don’t give in to excuses. Don’t engage in wishful thinking. Don’t succumb to pressure. Get out now. If ever you’ve sought to show valor on the battlefield, here is your chance. You’re on the battlefield. It’s called life. You have only one weapon at your disposal. It’s called integrity. Use either one to preserve the other, and flee this war as fast as you fucking can. Continue reading →

No Kings and the Anti-War Movement

Posted on by under activism, migrant defense, Neutrality and Complicity, Notes on the Anti-War Movement, Palestine, Trump 2, War with Iran

We’re about a month into the Iran War at this point. The war is, as predicted, a disaster getting worse by the day. As I’ve argued here before, we desperately need a large-scale anti-war movement, but the movement is, alas, in a low-energy state right now. Not that it’s entirely dead: there are direct actions taking place, some very brave ones, along with some ordinary demonstrations. And there’s no shortage of astute commentary out there as well.

But the movement has a problem in need of solution, and while No Kings seems at first to provide the solution, that appearance quickly evaporates on contact with it. The anti-war movement has a clear goal, ending the war, but lacks the means or numbers to accomplish it. No Kings has the numbers, but seems uninterested in ending the war (or any war), and uninterested even in broaching the topic. So it’s worth discussing the relationship, or anti-relationship, between these things. Continue reading →

Iran and the Perpetuity of Empire

Posted on by under Neutrality and Complicity, Notes on the Anti-War Movement, War with Iran

The Intercept reports that Trump is menacing Iran with a massive armada capable of prolonged war. The Times of Israel is talking about a “countdown” to war. The Washington Post reports that satellite imagery shows a rapid increase of US military planes near Iran. Responsible Statecraft’s lead story concerns the inadequacy of airpower to achieve Trump’s stated goals in Iran: ground troops would be required. The Guardian’s top five stories concern the imminence of a US attack on Iran, same with Reuters. The Financial Times has a top story on the imminent Iran war as a crisis of Trump’s own making. Continue reading →

Character, Complicity, and the Epstein Files

Posted on by under cancel culture, character based voting, Neutrality and Complicity

Monsters rule your world
Are you too scared to understand?
–Motorhead, “The Brotherhood of Man”

The first thing I have to say about the Epstein Files is that at this point, nobody can tell me that character-based voting is a politically-irrelevant fringe idea, and that my banging on about it for the last decade has been a waste of breath. A person’s sheer presence in the Epstein Files is not by itself evidence of guilt, but when the files do furnish evidence of guilt, it’s obvious that the guilt in question is politically relevant whether or not it’s policy relevant. Imagine that we resurrected a version of Jeffrey Epstein whose policy views aligned with yours, and who was running for office. Would you vote for him? Would Jason Brennan?

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Localize the Intifada

Posted on by under activism, migrant defense

The Use of Lethal Force in Self-Defense Against Federal Law Enforcement

I’m gratified to see that there’s been some explicit discussion in the last few weeks of a neglected topic that I mentioned in my post on Renee Good: do residents of the United States (citizens or otherwise) have a moral or legal right (however narrow, contextual, or limited) to use lethal force against federal law enforcement officers when those officers initiate force that endangers the life or limb of an innocent party? The answer is yes on both counts.  Just to be explicit: residents unquestionably have a right to kill federal law enforcement officers under certain conditions. The relevant question is not whether there is such a right, but the exact conditions under which it can legitimately be exercised.

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The Immigrant Trust Tour: Clifton

Posted on by under Uncategorized

I spoke tonight at Clifton City Council in Passaic County, north Jersey. Thanks to Jeff Hoey for the invitation to speak, and to both Jeff and the folks at the Palestinian-American Community Center of Clifton for the camaraderie. There was a rather different atmosphere in Clifton than, say, Princeton, West Windsor, or Cranbury–a circus atmosphere, at times. “Viewpoint diversity,” I think the savants call it.

A couple of members of the public expressed the widely-held view that while their ancestors came here legally, they have no sympathy for those who’ve come illegally. “Illegals,” on this view, deserve whatever anyone, including ICE, dishes out to them, including indefinite detention, deportation, impoverishment, expropriation, family dissolution, and premature death. Continue reading →

How You Gonna Win if You Ain’t Right Within?

Posted on by under migrant defense, Palestine

Just an FYI to the “No Kings” Democrats: you don’t get to blather to us about “No Kings” while calling for the disarmament of a population under military occupation. The people running these demonstrations seem too historically illiterate to remember that the American Revolution was a war, and that it got rid of the King by killing his troops. Continue reading →

The Fascist Regime

Posted on by under Uncategorized

Back in March, I wrote a post here called “I Think They Call This Fascism,” meant to be a preliminary inquiry into how to define “fascism” and apply it to present circumstances. I laid out seven methodological issues that arise in defining “fascism,” the second of which was how the concept of “fascism” applies to totalitarianism and authoritarianism. At the time, I was conceptualizing totalitarianism as revolutionary and all-encompassing, and conceptualizing authoritarianism as traditional and more limited in scope. Though I still think that totalitarianism vs authoritarianism is an essential issue, it now occurs to me that the preceding conceptualization, somewhat uncritically adopted from Jeane Kirkpatrick’s account, is misleading or wrong.

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“Not the Time for Cowardice”

Posted on by under activism, migrant defense

Statement of Sadaf Jaffer in support of a municipal resolution supporting the Immigrant Trust Act, Montgomery (NJ) Town Council, Sept. 4. 

Good evening,

As a former mayor and state legislator, I urge you to pass a resolution supporting the Immigrant Trust Act and to do everything in your power to ensure that our state assemblymembers Roy Freiman and Mitchelle Drulis cosponsor it as well. Continue reading →