These were the words that did it, that knocked the composure out of me. I was standing at what felt like the heart of Chicago on a January afternoon, corner of Wabash and Wacker, next to the river and beneath the tower known as Trump. The crowd had swelled by this time to nearly a thousand.

I kept looking up at the letters. They were two stories high: TRUMP. Smugly in command of God knows what — the whole world? As their presence became ever more unbearable, the speaker’s words suddenly pulled me back into the present moment. They put the matter as simply as possible. They were what brought us all down here, clustered together in the bitter wind: THE PEOPLE DO NOT WANT WAR.

There was no “unless” attached to this statement. The raw simplicity tore me open. I burst into tears as the wind cut through me.

This was Jan. 4. It was one of 70 protests across the country the day after Trump ordered a drone strike that “took out” (as the media love to put it) Iranian Major Gen. Qassim Soleimani as he was leaving the Baghdad airport in a two-car convoy. Some dozen people were killed in total. It was, as the world grasped in stunned disbelief, an act of war.

"We have grasped the mystery of the atom and rejected the Sermon on the Mount. Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants. We know more about war than we do about peace - more about killing than we do about living."-- General Omar Bradley

“The moment we all feared is likely upon us. An unstable President is way over his head, panicking, with all his experienced advisers having quit, and only the sycophantic amateurs remaining. Assassinating foreign leaders; announcing plans to bomb civilians. A nightmare.” –Chris Murphy, US Senator (D-Connecticut)

Wednesday, January 8, 2010, 11:30 AM – 1:00 PM
Please join us for lunch and conversation about using art to shine a light on the current refugee crisis around the world. Artist Rosy Avoscan, Laurie Van Balen of Columbus Crossing Borders, and DSOP Justice Promoter Barbara Kane, OP will discuss their current efforts and ways to help. You can also view Rosy's current art exhibit "Am I Us or Them" during the program. Lunch and program are free, but please register. Link in tickets (on the Facebook event page). Location: Martin de Porres Center, 2330 Airport Dr., Columbus 43219.  Facebook.

There's nothing like an illegal and utterly reckless U.S. act of war to illuminate the political character of presidential candidates. In the days since the assassination of Iran’s top military official, two of the highest-polling Democratic contenders have displayed the kind of moral cowardice that got the United States into -- and kept it in -- horrific wars from Vietnam to Afghanistan and Iraq.

Eager to hedge their bets, Joe Biden and Pete Buttigieg have offered merely tactical critiques of President Trump’s decision to kill Qassim Suleimani. In sharp contrast to Elizabeth Warren and especially Bernie Sanders, the gist of the responses from Biden and Buttigieg amounted to criticizing the absence of a game plan for an atrocious game that should never be played in the first place.

Many journalists have noted that only in recent days has foreign policy become prominent in the race for the 2020 nomination. But what remains to be addressed is the confluence of how Biden and Buttigieg approach the roles of the U.S. government in class war at home and military war abroad -- both for the benefit of corporate elites.

Tuesday, January 7, 2020, 6:30 – 8:30 PM