Once again, an unplanned and impromptu remark from President Biden has generated controversy, although this represents his third (incorrect) reference to a commitment to defend Taiwan.  Each time, Biden’s national security team has tried to walk back the president’s remarks, but the fact of the matter is that the United States is pursuing a policy of confrontation and containment with China.  There has been no attempt to pursue a diplomatic solution to our differences with China or to give Chinese leader Xi Jinping reason to believe that Sino-American relations could be improved through pursuit of a serious diplomatic dialogue.   More

Culture wars have real casualties, just look at the 19 kids and teacher slaughtered this past week on the altar of our gun culture. But for politicians, culture wars conveniently distract people from the economy. So in that sense, culture wars are humbug. They’re the junk reactionaries and fascists vomit forth to conceal from their addled base the fact that in recent decades rightists have enabled corporations to steal trillions of dollars from ordinary working people. But guess what? So-called liberal Dems do it too. And the Dems also skitter away from any discussion of how culture wars involve real money. More

The bitter and demagogic ex-president is his white nationalist party’s front-runner for the next presidential election. His endorsement is craved by many candidates seeking office under the banner of a racist and sexist party that borders on being his personal fiefdom. This fascist, vengefully white nationalist “Amerikaner” party is hard at work passing measures and enacting policies to suppress and dilute votes for the other major capitalist party and indeed to cancel election outcomes that don’t go its way. More