PETER BERGEL: $700 billion is a number that rings a bell for most Americans these days. It was the first installment U.S. taxpayers were forced to pony up for Wall Street to “stimulate” the economy. But, according to analyst Don Monkrude, that sum is also, coincidentally, the amount by which the 400 richest Americans increased their net worth during the Bush years.
The Incredible Shrinking Health Care Reform
NORMAN SOLOMON: Like soap in a rainstorm, “health care reform” is wasting away.
They’ve Got the Whole World in Their Hands
KEN McCORMACK: If we are to have peace, it must begin with the children.
Seeing Obama as Norwegians See Him
GEORGE LAKEY: I just returned from a research trip to Norway where the people I interviewed often brought up the topic of our new President. The first was Kristin Clemet, the director of a conservative think tank. “This spring on a delegation to Washington I was struck again,” she said, “by how different the political spectrum is in Norway from your country. Here, Obama would be on the right wing.” I checked her view with others — academics, politicians, activists all over the Norwegian spectrum — and all but one agreed. In Norwegian terms, our President’s positions are very conservative.
Letters to the Editor
This month’s letters to the Editor: 1) Vote With Your Dollars Against Chevron ; 2) Mountaintop Removal Protest Prompts Bail Money Request; 3) ACES Bill Too Watered Down to Support; and 4) Voice of the People? Not.
Now We See You, Now We Don’t: The Human Cost of Drone Attacks
KATHY KELLY: In early June, 2009, I was in the Shah Mansoor displaced persons camp in Pakistan, listening to one resident detail the carnage which had spurred his and his family’s flight there a mere 15 days earlier. Their city, Mingora, had come under massive aerial bombardment. He recalled harried efforts to bury corpses found on the roadside even as he and his neighbors tried to organize their families to flee the area.