Over the last decade, Maryland's political establishment repeatedly expanded corporate gambling in our state, promising the tax proceeds would swell funding for public education. In fact, the reverse happened, and the new tax revenue was used to offset steep cuts to K-12 education from the general fund budget. A similar proposal was floated recently regarding taxing the fossil fuel industry, which could create a perverse incentive to maintain or even expand an industry wreaking havoc on our climate at a time when we must place a definitive sunset date on using dangerous energy sources altogether. While market-based proposals like a carbon tax or cap-and-trade might be an intermediate step in Maryland's green transition, these policies have been shown to be insufficient to the scale of the crisis we face; now is not a time for professional environmental incrementalism. Continue reading

By Mark Dunlea This year marks the 18th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks that killed more than 3,000. 9/11 was used as the justification for U S invasions in the Middle East and the war on terrorism. It was used to curtail civil liberties and suppress political dissent at home, and to further bankrupt our public treasury in order to pay for an ever expanding military industrial complex. Our government lied about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq[1] to invade a country which had no role in 9/11. Continue reading

The Green New Deal (GND) first entered U.S. political discourse during Howie Hawkins’ 2010 Green Party campaign for New York Governor. Jill Stein, the Green Party’s candidate for president, later invoked the idea in her 2012 and 2016 campaigns. Implementation of a Green New Deal is now being vigorously discussed at all levels of power. On the international stage, where the deal was first put forward by the United Nations Environment Program in 2009; in Congress, where New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and others have pushed for its inclusion in a new domestic agenda; and especially at the state and city level, where programs like DC’s recent clean energy legislation already invoke its precepts. Continue reading

As someone who has worked with both addicts and mentally ill folks in professional settings for many years, I have also had several opportunities to interact with and at times, confront Neo-Nazi and White Supremacist skinheads, when I ran a punk rock venue. Most addicts and mentally ill folks were not violent, though some hurt themselves. In one instance, I was involved in dealing with a young man who was a school shooter at a local high school.  Continue reading

By Ajamu Baraka – The "squad" condemns Trump for his white nationalism, not understanding that as a white supremacist settler-colonial state, white nationalism is"American" nationalism. "Biden as a neoliberal white supremacist imperialist was always clear where he stood." Continue reading

Trump’s 2020 budget proposal reflects another significant increase in military spending along with corresponding cuts in spending by Federal agencies tasked with the responsibility for providing critical services and income support policies for working class and poor people. Trump’s call for budget cuts by Federal agencies is mirrored by the statutorily imposed austerity policies in most states and many municipalities. Those cuts represent the continuing imposition of neoliberal policies in the U.S. even though the “A” word for austerity is almost never used to describe those policies. Continue reading

On this Juneteenth, we must confront the impacts of racism dating back to the founding of the United States with the slave trade of Black people brought from Africa, Jim Crow segregation, and policies that continue to this day that cause wealth inequality, disinvestment in Black communities, police violence, mass incarceration, and white nationalist violence. A pre-eminent African historian, Basil Davidson, credits the initiation of the African slave trade to Columbus. The first license granted to send enslaved Africans to the Caribbean was issued in 1501, during Columbus’s rule in the Indies. Davidson labels Columbus the “father of the slave trade.” African slavery is as old as the European colonization of North America. Continue reading

More than two years after the groundswell demanding recounts in the 2016 election, the fight for election integrity and voting justice is still going strong. To keep you up to date on our work, made possible by the generous support of recount contributors, here are some exciting developments in the continuing struggle on the front lines. Continue reading

This question has deep relevance. In my first BLOG after returning from the Alliance for Global Justice "End Venezuela Sanctions" delegation, my goal was to provide the most fundamental information possible about what we can do as a government and as citizens of the United States. Most people in Venezuela and the U.S. can agree on these three basics: no war, end sanctions (which are a form of deadly warfare), and respect the sovereignty of other nations. The U.S. is not the boss of the world, and recent "help" from the U.S. has not helped the people of the world. Continue reading

WASHINGTON D.C., June 10, 2019 – In the case United States v. Honkala, defendant Cheri Honkala, international anti-poverty and housing activist, was found guilty of unlawful entry of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). The Poor People's Economic Human Rights Campaign (PPEHRC), of which Honkala is the founder, condemns this attack on free speech and the right to petition our government, and the silencing of dissent. Continue reading