BRAD WOLF – In 1958, legendary peace activist Philip Berrigan asked a youth retreat group the following question: “What’s it going to be with you? Are you going to go through life playing both ends against the middle, playing cozy, not committing yourself, sitting on the fence?” That question is as potent, and as dangerous, today as it was then. For us, and for the victims in the breach.
Category: May 2025
How to Fight Trump Without Caving to Corporatists
RICHARD (RJ) ESKOW and NORMAN SOLOMON – The DNC should provide leadership at times like these. But there’s still no leadership, several months into a second Trump regime that’s much worse than the first. There’s energy to oppose, but it’s uncoordinated. James Hightower charts the way: the agitator gets the dirt out in the washing mac; and there’s nothing in the middle of the road except yellow lines and dead armadillos.
Trump is Trying to Reverse the New Deal
RICHARD D wOLFF – The class politics of Trump carry forward the actions of his predecessors across the last century. The details, not the goals, vary with the circumstances. It is worth remembering that in all empires, when their rise inevitably turns into decline, those who accumulated the greatest wealth and power use these resources to retain their position. They thereby offload the costs of decline onto the middle and lower classes. The latter suffer more and face the consequences first. Trump’s first budget proposals starkly exhibit this offloading. For most empires, such offloading proves socially divisive and ends very badly.
Greenpeace remains determined to fight the corporate silencing of dissent
NICK ENGELFRIED – As Greenpeace prepares to appeal a devastating verdict in a lawsuit brought by a pipeline company, the environmental group is not only defending itself — but the very right to protest.
Close the Digital Gap Before It Becomes a Ballot Gap
DAKOTA HALL – Why the right’s “always-on” media machine wins, and how we catch up before 2026.
Stop Avelo Movement is Taking Off
COALITION TO STOP AVELO – TWO HUNDRED Anti-Avelo grassroots organizations in nearly ALL of the Avelo destination cities have joined our Coalition. Together, we will force Avelo to stop operating illegal, inhumane and unconstitutional deportation flights for ICE. Please help the Coalition continue to grow. We want to connect with activists everywhere, but especially in Detroit, Dallas, Chicago, Wilmington, DE, Mesa, AZ, and Palm Springs.
Please forward this newsletter to your network of allies – both in your own city and across the country.
How the Pacific Northwest’s Dream of Green Energy Fell Apart
TONY SCHICK and MONICA SAMAYOA – Oregon and Washington passed aggressive goals to decarbonize their power supply but left it to the Bonneville Power Administration to build the transmission lines needed for wind and solar. The agency hasn’t delivered.
The Extinction Order: Trump’s Executive Order 14270 Doesn’t Deregulate; It Dismantles
JOHN MARKS – On April 9, 2025, U.S. President Donald Trump signed Executive Order 14270, blandly titled “Zero-Based Regulatory Budgeting to Unleash American Energy.” Behind that bureaucratic name is a sweeping directive: Dismantle a century of environmental protections.
Do we Americans have the maturity to deal with the important issues of our time?
BOB TOPPER – The nation is hungry for leadership by decent and honorable men and women, who will respect their oath to the Constitution and dedicate themselves to the common good. An autocracy cannot be the solution, for all of the problems in American society, our liberal democracy is far more successful than any autocracy or theocracy. We must repair the one we have by putting competent people in government not showmen and pretty faces.
Defending Democracy Is My Retirement Plan
DAVID J. SMITH – It’s time for us to do our part. We need to get out and defend democracy, not only for us but for others unable or fearful to act including immigrants (documented and undocumented), government workers, young people, and many others feeling vulnerable right now. Those of us retired are best positioned to act. We must make fighting for democracy our generation’s retirement plan.It’s time for us to do our part. We need to get out and defend democracy, not only for us but for others unable or fearful to act including immigrants (documented and undocumented), government workers, young people, and many others feeling vulnerable right now. Those of us retired are best positioned to act. We must make fighting for democracy our generation’s retirement plan.
Support, Challenges Grow for Unions
JOHN P. RUEHL – The United Steel Workers must navigate factionalism while championing labor rights amid rising anti-union pressures and global trade fragmentation.
The Limitations of Military Might
LAWRENCE WITTNER – Rather than continuing to pour the wealth of nations into the failing system of national military power, how about bolstering other global instruments for attaining international security and peace?
1300 May Day Protests Are Just Part of Resistance to Trump’s Agenda
RIVERA SUN – May Day is the International Labor Day and people across the world took action.
The Vietnam and Gaza Wars Shattered Young Illusions About U.S. Leaders
NORMAN SOLOMON – Many young eyes recognized the war policy positions of Hubert Humphrey and Kamala Harris as immoral. Their decisions to stay on a war train clashed with youthful idealism. And while hardboiled political strategists opted to discount such idealism as beside the electoral point, the consequences have been truly tragic – and largely foreseeable.