While the Obama Administration drones on about seeking a diplomatic solution the Department of Defense has been tasked with designing weapons for a war with Iran. In the event of a bombing campaign in Iran redesigned “bunker buster” bombs will be the stars of the show.

George W. Bush presided over an international network of torture chambers and, with the help of a compliant Congress and press, launched a war of aggression that killed hundreds of thousands of men, women and children. However, instead of the bloody details of his time in office being recounted at a war crimes tribunal, the former president has been able to bank on his imperial privilege – and a network of rich corporate donors that he made richer while in office – to tell his version of history at a library in Texas being opened in his name.

I had a dream last night where I approached SF from Sausalito at night on the water. I was in a pick up truck with Xeni Jardin of Boing Boing and as we came over hill I was suddenly in a sea kayak at water level. The sun started hitting the city from the east with a dark sky behind it. The reflected lights off the buildings looked like fireworks. I remember in the dream trying to take a picture with my cell phone and knowing it wouldn’t do justice to the image. It was one of the most beautiful things I had ever seen in my life.

During this time of rebirth and renewal, these religious leaders remind us that we must strongly consider how our government conducts itself on behalf of our nation at home and abroad.

North Korea has decided to once again up the rhetorical ante by threatening an attack on Guam, Hawaii, and the U.S. mainland. This comes after a litany of other threats that seemed to have been mostly ignored by the international community as a new round of UN sanctions were passed in the wake of North Korea’s third nuclear weapons test.

Rep. Barbara Lee has introduced H.R. 198, a measure to repeal the Authorization for Use of Military Force. Opposed to repeal, the Obama administration is pleased to keep claiming that the 137-month-old resolution justifies everything from on-the-ground troops in combat to drone strikes and kill lists to flagrant abrogation of civil liberties.

The words in President Obama’s “State of the Union” speech were often lofty, spinning through the air with the greatest of ease and emitting dog whistles as they flew.

Let’s decode the President’s smooth oratory in the realms of climate change, war and civil liberties.

In Useful Enemies: When Waging Wars Is More Important Than Winning Them, David Keen looks at wars around the world and discovers many in which winning is not an object. Many of the examples are civil wars, many of them in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, some of them dragging on for decades. Wars become sources of power, wealth, and prestige. Exploiting civilians can take precedence for both sides over combatting each other. So can exploiting international “aid” that flows as long as wars are raging, not to mention the international permission to commit crimes that is bestowed upon those fighting the communists or, more recently, the terrorists.

The Department of Defense recently announced a formal change in policy allowing women to serve in combat positions. The announcement was somewhat symbolic given the changing nature of warfare and the role women already play in current military operations.

Escaped slaves fought on the British side, which promised to free them, during the American war for independence for white men. But nobody liked to talk about that much after the French won the war, although — come to think of it — nobody much likes to talk about the French winning the war, or for that matter about the big losers being, not the British but the Native Americans.

White folks weren’t eager to arm slaves, although an NRA-type genius just said on U.S. televisions this week that if slaves had only been armed they wouldn’t have been slaves. The militias famously protected by the Second Amendment included, perhaps primarily, white militias aimed at crushing slave rebellions. Escaped slaves fought for the Union in the Civil War, which may not have been an insignificant factor in Lincoln’s decision to announce their freedom.