The TPNW is extraordinary because — in the words of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons which helped shepherd the treaty through the UN negotiating process and won a Nobel Prize for it — it’s “the first globally applicable treaty that categorically prohibits the most destructive, inhumane instruments of war ever created.”
Browsing: Opinions
Look Your Best – We’re Coed
The authors of the Constitution had lived under the government of England where the King was not only commander in chief of the Armies of the Empire, but could declare war as well. History, a favorite subject of the authors of the Constitution, was studied to see where England and other nations went off the rails and degenerated from legitimate government into tyranny and they found a single error repeated over and over again. What was it?
The Founding Fathers envisioned a democracy upheld by virtuous citizens, yet their fears of its fragility have come true. The “political red line” serves as a metaphor for leaders who overstep moral, legal, and ethical boundaries, often leading to their downfall.
In April 1966, Senator J.W. Fulbright, Chair of the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee, gave a remarkable and highly-publicized speech at Johns Hopkins University, condemning the U.S. role in the Vietnam War. Warning of “the arrogance of power,” Fulbright argued that “we are not living up to our capacity and promise as a civilized power for the world.” It turned out to be a momentous speech, enraging President Lyndon Johnson and providing a rallying point for U.S. critics of the conflict.
The term “common sense” is often evoked by President Trump, though his “common” sense can seem grotesquely solitary and unique, as for example when he cruelly shut down the USAID program, increasing disease, malnutrition and death for people in faraway places with desperate needs.
Imagine that during World War II, at the height of Nazi Germany’s blitz of Britain, President Roosevelt invited PM Winston Churchill to Washington and humiliated him with derisive comments about Britain’s looming defeat and failure to thank the President for US support. Unthinkable, of course, but that’s exactly what happened when Ukraine’s President Volodymir Zelensky visited Washington and had to endure Donald Trump’s appalling interrogation.
It also saves communities. It makes air and water cleaner and safer. It saves households money on their electricity bills. And it makes way for growth in renewable energy, which is better for the environment, makes power grids more resilient and reliable, and creates more jobs than coal ever will – or ever should – again.
The words are from George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four (where else?), explaining the root causes of a dystopian world. The book may be a work of fiction, but his words are deeply embedded in reality – we need enemies, the worse the better! This certainty may well be humanity’s most profound existential threat. I fear it could be “the meteor” that hits Planet Earth, ultimately spelling extinction for the dominant species.
It Doesn’t Matter Who is in What Chair as Long as God is on the throne.