The RPI Challenge

It’s simple: If you know in advance that your actions will cause the death of thousands of civilians; attached to your criminal actions (actus reus) is a guilty mind (mens rea), which means malice aforethought, also known as intent, in Western jurisprudence and judicial philosophy. The razing of Gaza and the ongoing murder of thousands of civilians by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), with western imprimatur, is a war crime. Strafing civilian populations and pulverizing entire neighborhoods to...

Wounded Palestinians arrive to al-Shifa hospital, following Israeli airstrikes on Gaza City, central Gaza Strip, Monday, Oct. 16, 2023.  On Tuesday, October 31, 2023, the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu bombed a Palestinian refugee camp with 100,000 inhabitants, producing a hellscape of casualties, 50 dead, 150 injured, with buildings in collapse at the periphery of  massive bomb crater. The stated public intention was to kill a single Hamas commander.There are two...

When the Trump administration obtained an indictment of Edward Snowden for violation of the Espionage Act of 1917, many of us who believe that the Fourth Amendment means what it says were deeply critical of the government, and we remain so today. Snowden is the former CIA and National Security Agency operative -- he was a CIA agent and was later employed by a contractor for the NSA -- who blew the whistle on NSA and FBI mass undifferentiated warrantless spying on all persons in America. The...

We have arrived at the dystopian future depicted in the 2005 film V for Vendetta, which is no future at all. Set in the year 2020, V for Vendetta (written and produced by the Wachowskis) provides an eerie glimpse into a parallel universe in which a government-engineered virus wreaks havoc on the world. Capitalizing on the people’s fear, a totalitarian government comes to power that knows all, sees all, controls everything and promises safety and security above all. Concentration camps (jails,...

Do authoritarians deserve a chance to be treated with grace and forgiveness? The question is circulating regularly these days in the wake of the complete failure of covid pandemic response and the victory of the anti-mandate movement. The answer relies on a series of counter-questions based on logic and predictable outcomes. It's the kind of discussion that covid cultists don't want to have; they just want everyone to forget because they now have something to lose politically Scott Galloway,...

If you are opposed to continued US involvement in wars which are percolating globally and which threaten to ensnare our country, jeopardize our troops and ruin our economy, please read this article.  President Biden and Congress this week, in separate funding attempts, will likely pursue money to fund wars against Ukraine and Gaza, and to intensify further actions which could start wars against China and Iran. This is a defining moment for Mr. Biden, for Congress, for America and the world. ...

Louisiana Republican Mike Johnson has been chosen as the new Speaker of the House of Representatives, ending the three-week drama. Representative Johnson has a reputation as a fiscal and social conservative. He has at times opposed funding the Ukraine war, suggesting he may be open to non-interventionist arguments or at least unwilling to give the military-industrial complex a blank check. However, he also supports giving Israel "whatever it needs" to defeat Hamas.Speaker Johnson has suggested...

Several new testimonies by Israeli witnesses to the October 7 Hamas surprise attack on southern Israel adds to growing evidence that the Israeli military killed its own citizens as they fought to neutralize Palestinian gunmen. Tuval Escapa, a member of the security team for Kibbutz Be’eri, set up a hotline to coordinate between kibbutz residents and the Israeli army. He told the Israeli newspaper Haaretz that as desperation began to set in, “the commanders in the field made difficult decisions...

Below is my column in The Messenger on the renewed effort of Special Counsel Jack Smith to gag former President Donald Trump. At the same time, Judge Arthur Engoron has repeatedly fined Trump for his public statements about the New York fraud case. Engoron declared this week “Anybody can run for president. I am going to protect my staff.” There is widespread support for barring attacks on court staff and Trump did attack the Court’s clerk in a prior posting. However, most of his comments have...

“Peace Dove” by Jose TrujilloWhen will we ever learn? As a member of the US Congress for 16 years, I gave over 500 speeches warning about the consequences of US wars against Afghanistan, the Balkans, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Syria. I spoke for the imperative of peace in the Middle East, on behalf of Israelis and the Palestinians alike. I met with leaders of many countries who were grappling to keep their nations out of conflict and I came to understand the role some in the US government have played...

Tom Friedman uttered his dire warning in the New York Times on Thursday last: I believe that if Israel rushes headlong into Gaza now [unilaterally] to destroy Hamas — it will be making a grave mistake that will be devastating for Israeli interests and American interests”. It could trigger a global conflagration and explode the entire pro-American alliance structure that the US has built…I am talking about the Camp David peace treaty, the Oslo peace accords, the Abraham Accords and the possible...

Russia’s Dy Foreign Minister & Special Envoy Mikhail Bogdanov (C) held talks with Iran’s Dy Foreign Minister Ali Bagheri Kani and Hamas’ head of International Relations Mousa Marzouk, Moscow, Oct. 26, 2023 The US President Joe Biden is convinced that one of the reasons why Hamas launched the attack on Israel was because of the announcement during the G20 Summit in New Delhi on the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor . But he also admitted that this reading was based purely on his...

It now appears certain the United States is concentrating a huge naval force in the eastern Mediterranean, Red, and Arabian seas. Several NATO nations are also sending warships to join this growing fleet. Unknown numbers of US and NATO submarines are also certainly lurking in these regions. There is already substantial US air power presence in the Persian Gulf region. Israel is clearly working in concert with the US/NATO in whatever is brewing. And make no mistake, something big IS brewing. It...

Can the president fight any war he wishes? Can Congress fund any war it chooses? Are there constitutional and legal requirements that must first be met before war is waged? Can the United States legally attack an ally? These questions should be critical to a public debate over the US military involvement in Ukraine and the Middle East. Sadly, there has been no great debate. The media are mouthing what the CIA is telling them, and only a few websites and podcasts -- my own, “Judging Freedom” on...

We are approaching a reckoning.This is the point, as the poet W. B. Yeats warned, when things fall apart and anarchy is loosed upon the world.We have seen this convergence before in Hitler’s Germany, in Stalin’s Russia, in Mussolini’s Italy, and in Mao’s China: the rise of strongmen and demagogues, the ascendency of profit-driven politics over deep-seated principles, the warring nationalism that seeks to divide and conquer, the callous disregard for basic human rights and dignity, and the...

Joe Biden’s approach to international issues increasingly resembles George W. Bush’s disastrous foreign policy.  One key tendency in common is that both men view complex world affairs in dangerously simplistic terms as an existential struggle between good and evil.  In Bush’s case, the bitter fruit of that perspective became apparent with the seemingly endless armed crusades to impose western values in such alien settings as Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and Syria.  In Biden’s case, that attitude...