Tikkun (https://www.tikkun.org/category/other_voices/page/24/)
Editor’s Note: America’s most famous right wing Republican rabbi is a very decent human being in his personal life even as he publicly supports cut backs in services and financial assistance to the poor and supports the repressive policies of the Israeli government toward Palestinians. And below in his article about proselytizing he makes some points worthy of discussion.
But, Mr. Putin, You Just Don’t Understand
By David Swanson
http://davidswanson.org/node/5238
Once in a while one of the videos somebody emails me a link to turns out to be well worth watching. Such is this one. In it a former U.S. ambassador to the Soviet Union tries to explain to Vladimir Putin why new U.S. missile bases near the border of Russia should not be understood as threatening. He explains that the motivation in Washington, D.C., is not to threaten Russia but to create jobs. Putin responds that, in that case, the United States could have created jobs in peaceful industries rather than in war.
“Pow, Pow, Yous Are Dead!”
Children, Toy Guns, and the Real Thing
By Frida Berrigan
[From our ally TomDispatch.com]
It was a beautiful evening and the kids — Madeline, two; Seamus, almost four; and Rosena, nine — were running across a well-tended town green. Seamus pointed his rainbow flag with the feather handle at his sisters and “pow-powed” them, calling out, “Yous are dead now, guys. I shot yous.”
Madeline and Rosena laughed and just kept on running, with Seamus at their heels. I hid my face in my hands. It wasn’t just that he was playing guns, but that he was using a Pride flag as his gun at a vigil to mourn those killed at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida.
Editor’s Note: Now don’t go jumping to the conclusion that I agree with Jeff St. Clair’s perspective just because I’ve posted it here. As I repeatedly say, we want a variety of perspectives on the elections on our website, and welcome yours if it’s original, lively, says something most of our readers will not have likely heard in the mainstream media, and is smart. That is not the same thing as true or accurate Asi turns out, he has written columns in which he denounces me personally as an apologist for Zionism (I wish he’d send those charges to the American Jewish leaders who repeatedly attack me for being an anti-Israel self-hating Jew!) So you have to judge for yourself if his perceptions match yours on what was happening at the convention. But we thought there were some points here worth considering, though that doesn’t mean we agree with them.
THE WASHINGTON POST VIA GETTY IMAGES
Senator Bernie Sanders had two good reasons for endorsing Hillary: 1. His firm belief that the country would be considerably worse off were Donald Trump to win the presidency; 2. If his movement to push the Democratic Party in a progressive direction would had been perceived as having failed to support Hillary Clinton, it would have been blamed if Hillary were to lose in November. If that happened, it would have given progressives the kind of bad reputation consumer advocate Ralph Nader got when he failed to tell his supporters in the 2000 presidential election to not vote for him but vote for Democratic presidential candidate Al Gore in those few states where the polls indicated that the outcome might well depend on Gore getting the Nader voters. The burden of that would have crippled his movement for many years to come.
Editor’s Note: Tikkun magazine doesn’t endorse any candidate or political party–we are barred from doing so as a non-profit. But we can print articles from our readers and other sources that provide their analyses and their views on the candidates and parties. Michael Moore’s analysis of the election is worthy of serious attention. As we say repeatedly, out choice of articles to print, put on our website and in our Tikkun Daily Blog do not necessarily reflect our own views–which are expressed only in our editorials in the print magazine–but rather reflect our desire to encourage public debate about important ideas (so, yes, we would welcome publication of very different views from those expressed by Moore or anyone else who seems to be backing or critiquing political candidates or political parties–see for example in our Tikkun Daily Blog an article about the Libertarian candidate, and we’ll be doing an interview with Jill Stein and we’ve requested interviews with Trump and Clinton and Sanders). In our Fall 2016 issue of Tikkun magazine we present our analysis of the reasons why many Americans are attracted to rightwing extremist movements and why they are likely to play an important role in American politics no matter who wins the 2016 presidential election.
The Big Rift
by Uri Avnery (chair of the Israeli peace movement Gush Shalom)
THE State of Israel was still young, when two famous comedians produced a short act:
Two Arabs stand on the seashore and curse a boat carrying new Jewish immigrants. Next, two of the new immigrants stand on the seashore and curse a boat carrying new immigrants from Poland. Next, two immigrants from Poland stand on the seashore and curse a boat carrying new immigrants from Germany. Next, two immigrants from Germany stand on the seashore and curse a boat carrying new immigrants from North Africa. And so on…
Perhaps this is the story of all immigration countries, like the US, Australia, Canada et al.
Editor’s Note: Tikkun Magazine does not endorse any candidate for public office or any political party. But we do encourage our readers to send us their thoughts about the various candidates if they have something new to say that has not already been said in one of the articles on our website or in Tikkun Daily blog. We’ve had nothing about The Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson, so when a reader sent us this information we wanted to put it up so you’d know about this candidate as well as the ones more fully covered in the lamestream media.–Rabbi Michael Lerner
On January 6, 2016, Johnson declared that he would seek the Libertarian nomination for the presidency.[5] On May 18, Johnson named former Massachusetts Governor William Weld as his running mate.[108]
On May 29, 2016, Johnson received the Libertarian nomination on the second ballot.[6]
Political positions[edit]
Main article: Political positions of Gary Johnson
Johnson’s views have been described as fiscally conservative and socially liberal[109] with a philosophy of limited government[110] and military non-interventionism.[111][112] He has identified as a classical liberal.[113] Johnson has said he favors simplifying and reducing taxes.[114] During his governorship, Johnson cut taxes fourteen times and never increased them.[115] Due to his stance on taxes, political pundit David Weigel described him as “the original Tea Party candidate.”[116] Johnson has advocated for the FairTax, a proposal which would abolish all federal income, corporate and capital gains taxes, and replace them with a 23% tax on consumption of all non-essential goods, while providing a regressive rebate to households according to income level. He has argued that this would assure transparency in the tax system and incentivize the private sector to create “tens of millions of jobs.”[117] In June 2016, Johnson said that he supported the Trans-Pacific Partnership.[118]
Johnson has said that he supports balancing the federal budget immediately.[119] He has stated he supports “slashing government spending”, includingMedicare, Medicaid, and Social Security,[114] which would involve cutting Medicare and Medicaid by 43 percent and turning them into block grant programs, with control of spending in the hands of the states to create, in his words, “fifty laboratories of innovation.”[119] He has advocated passing a law allowing forstate bankruptcy and expressly ruling out a federal bailout of any states.[110] Johnson has expressed opposition to the Federal Reserve System, which he has cited as massively devaluing the strength of the U.S. dollar, and would sign legislation to eliminate it. He has also supported an audit of the central bank, and urged Members of Congress in July 2012 to vote in favor of Ron Paul’s Federal Reserve Transparency Act.[120]
In his campaign for the Libertarian Party nomination, he stated he opposed foreign wars and pledged to cut the military budget by 43 percent in his first term as president.[112] He would cut the military’s overseas bases, uniformed and civilian personnel, research and development, intelligence, and nuclear weapons programs.[121][122] He has stated his opposition to US involvement in the War in Afghanistan and opposed the US involvement in the Libyan Civil War.[123] He has stated that he does not believe Iran is a military threat, would use his presidential power to prevent Israel from attacking Iran, and would not follow Israel, or any other ally, into a war that it had initiated.[124]
Johnson is a strong supporter of civil liberties and received the highest score of any candidate from the American Civil Liberties Union for supporting drug decriminalization while opposing censorship and regulation of the Internet, the Patriot Act, enhanced airport screenings, and the indefinite detention of prisoners.[125] He has spoken in favor of the separation of church and state, and has said that he does not “seek the counsel of God” when determining his political agenda.[126] Johnson endorsed same-sex marriage in 2011;[127] he has since called for a constitutional amendment protecting equal marriage rights,[127] and criticized Obama’s position on the issue as having “thrown this question back to the states.”[128] On the other hand, Johnson opposes Roe v. Wade, believing states should decide the matter.
Editor’s Note: This article below demonstrates that the BDS movement’s claims to be successful are very exaggerated. At the same time it shows a critical weakness of the BDS strategy–its ability to switch the discourse from what’s wrong with the Occupation to the rights and wrongs of the strategy of BDS. On that terrain, the Israeli rightwingers seem to be winning, whereas on the terrain of discussing the Occupation itself the Netanyahu government could more easily be shown to be ethically deformed and systematically violating the ethical principles of the Jewish people throughout most of our history and violating the explicit commands of our Torah. As such, BDS is a gift to the rightwingers. This is one of several reasons why Tikkun only supports boycotting products from the settlements but does not support a general bds against all aspects of the State of Israel.
Editor’s Note: The events described below are part of a consistent pattern by the Israeli government to make life unbearable for the Palestinian people living inside Israel. We receive these kinds of reports every week, and rarely put them up on our website, and are only putting this story on the website to remind our readers that this is happening over and over and over again as the Occupation continues. Those who wonder why random Palestinians living inside Israel sometimes resort to violence (actions we condemn) need only place themselves in the position of those who see or personally experience this kind of violence on behalf of an Israel that shames the Jewish people and desecrates our Torah by calling itself “the Jewish state.”–Rabbi Michael Lerner
Occupation forces demolish Palestinian homes in Jerusalem for two consecutive days
Occupation forces demolish Palestinian homes in Jerusalem for two consecutive days
Published July 21st, 2016 – 05:00 GMT
Bulldozers escorted by Israeli policeand Jerusalem municipality inspectors demolished on Wednesday several Palestinian structures located adjacent to the Atarot settlement industrial park north of Jerusalem, a day after structures were torn down in neighboring Beit Hanina, as well as in the occupied East Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan. One of the owners of the structures, Kamal Abu Sneina, told Ma’an that Israeli forces and municipality inspectors deployed into the area and started to tear down his structures while the owners were not present. “When we arrived, we were forced to stay away,” Abu Sneina said, adding that police officers detained him inside a police vehicle while the demolition was carried out.
Editor’s note: Tikkun magazine does not endorse or oppose any candidate or political party. But we do encourage our readers to send us articles representing their perspectives. We again request that those of our readers who support or oppose any of the major candidates for President of the U.S. in the Democratic, Republican, Libertarian or Green parties to submit articles reflecting their perspectives. –Rabbi Michael Lerner
Could Hillary Be Any Worse? Sure, Add Tim Kaine to the Ticket
By David Swanson
http://davidswanson.org/node/5225
Tim Kaine has been consistently ranked as one of the least progressive Democrats in the U.S. Senate.
An Illegal Military Strategy Disguised as Technological Advance
By Rebecca Gordon
(originally published at TomDispatch.com)
Think of it as the Trojan Drone, the ultimate techno-weapon of American warfare in these years, a single remotely operated plane sent to take out a single key figure. It’s a shiny video game for grown ups — a Mortal Kombat or Call of Duty where the animated enemies bleed real blood. Just like the giant wooden horse the Greeks convinced the Trojans to bring inside their gates, however, the drone carries something deadly in its belly: a new and illegal military strategy disguised as an impressive piece of technology. The technical advances embodied in drone technology distract us from a more fundamental change in military strategy. However it is achieved — whether through conventional air strikes, cruise missiles fired from ships, or by drone — the United States has now embraced extrajudicial executions on foreign soil.
Is Violence Justified to Resist Racial Oppression? Editor’s Note: While I disagree with the author’s argument for use of violence to resist oppression, I do think that his points have validity and that those of us who believe in the sanctity of human life must confront the complex realities facing oppressed peoples in the US and around the world and come up with effective strategies so that people do NOT resort to violence. I believe we have done that with our interfaith and secular-humaist-and-atheist-welcoming NSP– Network of Spiritual Progressives (particularly thorugh the strategies inherent in the Spriitual Covenant with America www.tikkun.org/covenant, the Global and Domestic Marshall Plan www.tikkun.org/gmp and the ESRA–Environmental and Social Responsibility Amendment to the U.S. Constitution www.tikkun.org/esra, we are in a weak position to effectively counter those who resort to violence until a lot more people who agree with our approach actually join our NSP and begin to develop active chapters that push for these programs, liberal foundations start to fund us, and people with some disposable income begin to financially and politically back our activities, including our Empathy Tribe notion described in the editorials of our Summer 2016 and Fall 2016 issues of Tikkun Magazine. I should also point out that violence by the oppressed frequently leads to more violence, either the overwhelming violence of the oppressors who have control of the armies, or, in the few instances where the oppressed actually succeed in violently overthrowing their oppressors, they all to often have then created societies in which they use violence to perpetuate the new regime they have created, thereby oppressing others. –Rabbi Michael Lerner
Former Judge William Boardman of Windsor County, Vermont – is well known in the progressive community for putting politicians of both major political “parties” on the spot…
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President Obama observes a ceremony to honor NATO soldiers at the NATO summit in Warsaw on Friday.
STOP THE VIOLENCE! We mourn all the victims of violence, including the large volume of violence against people that goes unreported and underreported, including poor people and people of color, but also we mourn for the very few police officers who have been hurt or killed by those outraged at the way police have been harassing or murdering members of their community, their people, their race, etc. EVERY HUMAN LIFE IS PRECIOUS. None of the violence is ok. Not black on black violence, not white on black violence or black on white violence, not police violence, not acts of violent retribution.
From the Islamic Cultural Center of Northern California (ICCNC)
July 4, 2016
It is with great sadness and profound grief that we have to once again express our deep sympathy to the recent victims of the savage crimes of ISIS in Orlando, Turkey, Bangladesh, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia. Those who carry out these barbaric and vicious acts pay no heed to the religion or nationality of their innocent victims but are driven by sheer hate, animosity, and bigotry to promote their own political agenda. You must know that the overwhelming majority of their victims are Muslims and not people of other faiths or unbelievers. Thus, even though these terrorists claim that they are acting in accordance with the teachings of Islam, which is furthest from the truth and reality, the fact of the matter is that they have instrumentalized Islam for their ulterior motives and are exploiting the religious lexicon found in the Islamic tradition to recruit native Muslims and converts who are disillusioned, disenfranchised, lacking an identity, and mentally unstable. ICCNC would like to channel the sympathy and energy generated from this great tragedy and the enormous suffering and pain toward healing and constructive understanding of some of the potential causes that have given rise to radicalism and extremism among a fringe group of Muslims, with the hope of finding solutions to uproot this scourge.