The recent China International Import Expo (CIIE) in Shanghai attracted little attention in the Western press but it is one more reminder that China is an economic and trading powerhouse that has surpassed the US. That is right, the word is “surpassed.” The CIIE also serves to remind us that China’s economic power now stands... Read More

Through the summer the world has watched as protests shook Hong Kong. As early as April they began as peaceful demonstrations which peaked in early June, with hundreds of thousands, in protest of an extradition bill. That bill would have allowed Hong Kong, a Special Administrative Region of China, to return criminals to Taiwan, mainland... Read More

The Doomsday Machine, the title of Daniel Ellsberg’s superb book is not simply an imaginary contraption from a movie masterpiece. A Doomsday Machine uncannily like the one described in Dr. Strangelove exists right now. In fact, there are two such machines, one in US hands and one in Russia’s. The US seeks to hide its... Read More

In the short space of five days, June 8-12, President Trump took three steps that upended the old post WWII global order and moved us a few steps toward a more peaceful world. Two of those steps are undeniable; the third is perhaps not so obvious. The Singapore Summit. The Singapore Summit comes first, because... Read More

Ever more antiwar voices are clamoring for a Stop Hillary Clinton movement in the Democratic primaries – and with very good reason. There are many alarming, indeed frightening, indictments of her tenures as one-half president in the 90s and then as Senator and Secretary of State. Her estranged relationship with truth, her callousness toward human... Read More

Does it not seem strange that, with the Cold War long over, the Paramount Enemies of the United States remain Russia and China? That is not a bad question to ponder during Vladimir Putin’s visit with Xi Jinping in Beijing. And there is no doubt that Russia and China hold this pariah status in the... Read More

Just weeks before Tax Day, April 15, Governor Deval Patrick, Obama’s “close friend,” signed into law a bond bill that dispenses $177 million in Massachusetts State Taxes to the Pentagon for construction and “upgrades” of U.S. military bases in the state. That’s right, not federal taxes but state taxes. On April 15, last year, the... Read More

China has stated its goals quite unambiguously. “A moderately prosperous society by 2020” is the first goal and “a strong socialist nation by 2049” as the second. But this may be simplified: China’s leadership wants its people to have a standard of living equal to that of the developed nations of the West. And that,... Read More