loudlylovingreview

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Henry A. Giroux: From the Streets of LA to the National Stage, The Left Must Win the Cultural War

Trump’s war on dissent can only be defeated by a left that challenges the values sustaining authoritarianism. Thousands of protesters rally in Downtown Los Angeles, California, during an anti-Trump demonstration on June 14, 2025. BARBARA DAVIDSON / GETTY IMAGES On June 6, resistance ignited in the streets of Los Angeles to confront the Trump regime’s brutal campaign against immigrants, enforced…

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Alice Friman: The Nick Poems

1.“Perfection rested on them for a moment like calm on a lake” –Anne Carson There was no perfectionand no calmbut there was a lakeand he turned to herDo you know what you’re doing?and she said yesthough deep in her virginityshe knew nothingbut what she wantedand that—twenty years laterwhen again she answeredyes, she said, yesin a room somewherein New York Citywhere there was no lakeand no…

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Emilie Lygren: With and Without

Hunger ––I can’t hear the wordwithout my mind swinging to Gaza. Though “hunger” is too tame––its consonants, too close, too soft.“Famine”–– word of long vowels, an open mouth. Saying “starvation” requires a clench of the teeth.I stare out the window at a safe bowl of trees and grass,peas hanging from a vine, fresh water beadingalong the fence line. Carrots burrowed under soft dirt.It only feels…

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Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II, Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove: Americans Don't Want Trump's Illegal War on Iran

We will all pay the costs of this war, though we can’t yet know how high they will be. People protest the involvement of the U.S. in Israel’s war against Iran near the Wilshire Federal Building on June 22, 2025 in Los Angeles, California. The Trump administration has bombed Iran with the largest B-2 bomber strike in U.S. history without obtaining Congressional approval. (Photo by David…

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Kahlil Gibran: War

One night a feast was held in the palace, and there came a man andprostrated himself before the prince, and all the feasters lookedupon him; and they saw that one of his eyes was out and thatthe empty socket bled.  And the prince inquired of him, “What hasbefallen you?”  And the man replied, “O prince, I am by professiona thief, and this night, because there was no moon, I went to robthe…

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Watson Institute, Brown University: US military aid to Israel

The estimates on the graph below are conservative; while they include approved security assistance funding since October 7, 2023, supplemental funding for regional operations, and an estimated additional cost of operations, they do not include other economic costs. Related U.S. military operations in the broader region since October 7 are part of the fuller picture and not included in the graph.…

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Elena Novak: 50 years after the Vietnam War, the legacy of nonviolent resistance lives on

At the 50th anniversary celebration of the end of the Vietnam War in Ho Chi Minh City, U.S. antiwar activists drew lessons for stopping the war on Gaza.  During the commemoration of the Reunification of Vietnam, a display of white doves — a symbol of peace — were woven through the parade. (WNV/Alyzza May) ~~ “It was a big show.” That is how Robert Levering described the celebration in Ho Chi…

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Robert Cording: An Unasked for Inauguration Prayer, 2025

Lord of the light that revealshow we have failed and failed againthe one requirement asked of us—to love one another. Lord of our freedomand our freedom to abuse being free,our never-ceasing need for endless rightswithout ever recognizing,as your prophet Weil has pleaded, our inherent obligations to one another. Lord who lives with us in the bloody mess of history tattooed with the timelineof our…

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Sandy Solomon: Widow

An amputated leg, they say, tingles, an ear long deaf still jangles the brain:the body asserts the integrity of its parts,and this body, at odd hours, yearnsas if his hand had passed my shoulder,as if snores rose above the downturned book.Now the mockingbird at the mulberryand its mate on the fence pretend they’re crowsand their caws contend with the noise in my bonesas I stand at the window…

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Majid Naficy: A Song for Peace

Oh, war!How long do you knockAt the gates of my city?Let me become a shouting voiceTo silence the echoOf your heavy fists,A voice louderThan the roar of the fighting planesOver a city at war,A voice deeperThan the moaning of deathIn the shameless mouth of earth.I am not a man of epicsWho blows your lying leaders’ horn.For years my Rostam* has diedIn his well of loneliness.I am a man of lyrics,A…

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Patrice Taddonio: 10 Documentaries on the Science, Politics and Impact of Our Changing Climate

A still from FRONTLINE and NPR’s documentary ‘Hurricane Helene’s Deadly Warning,’ showing the storm’s destruction in North Carolina. ~~ In the FRONTLINE documentary Alaska’s Vanishing Native Villages, residents of a coastal Alaska Native community called Hooper Bay confront a dilemma. Their way of life relies in part on harvesting food directly from the sea. But as the documentary explores,…

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Richard Levine: Solstice

We approached the solstice from a Ferris wheel,crowned and paused between day and night. We held onto each other and each spoke-like hour, immersedin beach-tide sounds, briny scents and banking gulls. Fireflies came on to spangle the dark light, like nocturnalflowers blooming as quietly as secrets we carry – like the moon its hidden face, like the tides tuggingour dreams awake, like the sudden…

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Jessie Redmon Fauset: Nostalgia

Lonely log cabinOn the road to Notasulga, Sighing and sagging and quaking;Let me breathe to the heart of your wallsA secret—To keep it from breaking.Once in a Harlem cellar,A brown girl,Wiggling and struttingIn a stranger’s arms,Dreaming of youFor a God-given moment—Forgot to proffer her charms.~~~~From Black Opals 1, No. 2 (Christmas 1927). This poem is in the public domain. Jessie Redmon…

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Don Krieger: Juneteenth at Carter-Howell-Strong Park in Tallahassee

“… all men are created equal …” Declaration of Independence, July 4,1776.  Eighty-seven years later: “… all persons held as slaves … are and henceforward shall be free …” Emancipation Proclamation, January 1, 1863.  Two years later federal troops take control of Texas to ensure that all enslaved people are freed, June 19, 1865, Juneteenth Eighty-nine years later: “… in the field of public…

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Jessica Corbett: 'The Hunger Games of Gaza' | IDF Kills 70+ Palestinians Trying to Get Food Aid

“It was a massacre,” said one witness, adding that Israeli troops continued firing on people as they fled. Palestinians gathered at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, a southern city in the Gaza Strip, as the wounded and the bodies of those killed in an Israeli attack on humanitarian aid seekers were brought there. (Photo: Abed Rahim Khatib/picture alliance via Getty Images) ~ With the world’s…

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Chivas Sandage: The Endless War Begins Again 

early in the morning, families asleep in their beds. I do not mention the babies to my wifewhen she brings a mug of coffee to me in bed, askingwhat’s wrong. She started work so early, before reading the news. I tell her 150 people were takenbut then the number grows to 251. She tries to readthen tries not to. I make the mistake of saying they took three generations in one family.A mother, two…

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Teresa Coady: Rethinking Climate Action | A New Guideline for Planetary Health

A new framework for planetary health reveals that our Industrial Age mindset—not human needs—is the real driver of environmental collapse. Source: Meer The Global Environmental Outlook (GEO), compiled by the member states of the United Nations, reports on a range of planetary disasters, including coral reef bleaching, species loss, wildfires, extreme weather events, melting glaciers, and the…