Given the intense media coverage over Charlottesville, a recent small headline largely escaped notice, but it could have a major impact on how Americans come to terms with the excesses that developed from the “global war on terror.” For the first time, several individuals closely associated with the CIA torture program were about to become answerable in a court of law for “legally aiding and abetting and/or factually aiding and abetting torture,” forcing the government to intervene and come to a settlement of the case.

1. Let’s start with the obvious. Charlottesville, Virginia, and Charlotte, North Carolina, are actually two completely different places in the world. The flood of concern and good wishes for those of us here in Charlottesville is wonderful and much appreciated. That people can watch TV news about Charlottesville, remember that I live in Charlottesville, and send me their kind greetings addressed to the people of Charlotte is an indication of how common the confusion is. It’s not badly taken; I have nothing against Charlotte. It’s just a different place, seventeen times the size. Charlottesville is a small town with the University of Virginia, a pedestrian downtown street, and very few monuments. The three located right downtown are for Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, and the Confederacy. Neither Lee nor Jackson had anything to do with Charlottesville, and their statues were put up in whites-only parks in the 1920s.

Several years back, I led a team of authors drafting articles of impeachment against then-President George W. Bush for then-Congressman Dennis Kucinich.

Is silence on racism still racism? Does it matter?

hite supremacy survives on violence, but the President of the United States can’t, or won’t, bring himself to condemn either. Most Americans, it seems, don’t have that difficulty, judging by the outpouring of disgust with the President and the hail of statues coming down around the country.

That’s the encouraging early public response to President Trump’s reactionary news conference in Trump Tower in New York on August 15. The news conference was supposed to be about the nation’s highways and other physical infrastructure. Even though the actual remedy was limited to an executive order that’s supposed to reduce regulatory delays, Trump summarized his accomplishment by saying: “We are literally like a third-world country. Our infrastructure will again be the best. And we will restore the pride in our communities, our nation. And all over the United States will be proud again.”

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