This rendition may not look quite kosher according to the prevailing definition of patriotism. Then again, when was the last time you read, or have you ever read, Swans' motto? Take a second, it's right on the front page. The power of questioning -- not simply believing -- has no friends... So, here we go!
"Hmmm, I've written a lot lately," says Stephen Gowans. A lot, indeed! What about four essays dissecting various aspects of our latest excursion into madness? If that's not enough, then read the thought forms created by Milo Clark. Take a moment to get acquainted with the nuts and bolts of propaganda, from 1917 on, and read again Jan Baughman's essay. Look at what could be done in terms of a real energy policy alternative. Familiarize or refamiliarize yourself with Randolph Bourne. Finally, enjoy Lulay's poem and the letters to the editor.
There is plenty to read and think about before, as always, forming your own opinion; and, please, do not forget to let your friends (and foes) know about Swans. It's your voice that makes ours grow.
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Stephen Gowans: Our Masters of Propaganda
One of the surest ways of knowing you're being blanketed by propaganda is to be told that whatever makes Washington look bad is propaganda....That's been happening a lot lately. More...
Stephen Gowans is a writer, a political activist and a Swans' columnist.
Gilles d'Aymery: Propaganda: Then and Now
In January 1916, President Woodrow Wilson stated, "So far as I can remember, this is a government of the people, and this people is not going to choose war." More...
Gilles d'Aymery is Swans' publisher and co-editor.
Jan Baughman: Mind Control in the New Kind of War
While published two weeks ago, this commentary is worth reading in light of the above two essays. More...
Jan Baughman is a Biotech scientist and Swans' co-editor.
Stephen Gowans: Our Religious Monsters
"Western theologians as keen as the Taliban to pervert religions of peace"
A cartoon depicting God giving a thumbs up to American bombers.
More...
Stephen Gowans: Our Terrorists
Despite repeated assurances that it isn't targeting civilians in its bombing campaign against Afghanistan, the Pentagon has admitted that it has deliberately attacked Afghan civilians. More...
Stephen Gowans is a writer, a political activist and a Swans' columnist.
Stephen Gowans: Getting the Pipeline Map and Politics Right
"Our first objective is to prevent the reemergence of a new rival," said the leaked Pentagon policy-planning document, excerpted in The New York Times, in 1992. More...
Stephen Gowans is a writer, a political activist and a Swans' columnist.
Philip Greenspan: Unlikely Suspect
I have been sitting back observing the situation presently at hand here, I believe that I am to address it as a state of war if I am to be politically correct. More...
Philip Greenspan is a retired attorney and a World War II veteran.
Gilles d'Aymery: A Real Energy Challenge
In a conversation with president Jiang Zemin of China in early 1996 former president Clinton said, "the greatest threat to our [US] security that you present is that all of your people will want to get rich in exactly the same way we got rich. More...
Gilles d'Aymery is Swans' publisher and co-editor.
Milo Clark: Stormy Skies
The 18th and 19th centuries were about ideologies. The 20th about economics. Now, in the 21st century, we are about religions, again. More...
Milo Clark: Staring at the Stars
Freedom of speech is real. We are free, within reasonable bounds, to say or to write pretty much what we please. Others are quite free to ignore what we say or write. They do. More...
Milo Clark is a Swans' founding member, advisor and columnist.
Randolph Bourne: The War and the Intellectuals
To those of us who still retain an irreconcilable animus against war, it has been a bitter experience to see the unanimity with which the American intellectuals have thrown their support to the use of war-technique in the crisis in which America found herself. More...
Randolph Bourne: War Is the Health of the State
To most Americans of the classes which consider themselves significant the war [World War I] brought a sense of the sanctity of the State which, if they had had time to think about it, would have seemed a sudden and surprising alteration in their habits of thought. More...
Randolph Bourne [1886-1918], was a social critic, an essayist and a journalist with an extraordinary intellect.
Sandy Lulay: Dance of Flowers at Cherokee
A mouse colony survives the stone,
The dirt, the bones:
Nibbling away at the shapes of yesterday.
More...
Sandy Lulay is Swans' in-house poet.
Occasionally we publish e-mails we've received with the author's response.