Portland activists are blocking the eviction a family from its home of 65 years.

It is surely no coincidence that the family is black. But all the other residents have already been pushed out.

Azerbaijan tortured, even beheaded Armenian prisoners, including civilians. Armenia has done some of this, too.

US citizens: call on Biden to appoint a climate-oriented cabinet.

The new district attorney of Los Angeles County will no longer seek the death penalty, no longer try children as adults, no longer ask the court to make a sentence longer.

In addition, the new DA will not ask for cash bail, except for violent or serious felonies. To this, the thug union had a completely bullshit response.

The response presents us with a fantasy world in which (1) everyone who gets bail was charged with shooting a gun and (2) making people facing such charges pay bail is going to make them less dangerous.

It is bullshit because those are serious, violent felonies, so the DA's no-bail policy does not apply to them at all.

The bully has started reorienting the US military away from the self-defeating "war on terror" and towards a possible war with China and/or Russia.

Ending the "war on terror" is a good thing, because terrorism is a tactic, not an enemy, and war is not an effective way to put an end to it. But what about the military's new orientation?

I think the US can easily avoid war with Russia, because Putin doesn't aim to rule the world. He has started local wars in battling over regional influence, and he stirs the pot further away, but he is willing to keep peace when the US is. The US foolishly and provocatively tried to extend NATO into the former Soviet Union right up to the borders of Russia; it should have been content to have a buffer zone. Buffer zones between powers make for peace between the powers. I think it is not too late for the US and Russia to use that approach.

It is true that Putin has corrupted and destroyed democracy in Russia and runs a corrupt and repressive regime, but war is not the way to deal with that.

It should be possible once again to agree with Russia on limiting nuclear weapons; Russia was amenable before. But it may be necessary now to include China in that system.

The confrontation with China is a more difficult problem. China is rapidly expanding its military and is set on capturing Taiwan, but unlike Hong Kong, Taiwan can't be captured except by war. I doubt China would stop after that — successful conquest tends to inspire more conquest.

We must not allow that, but what should we do to stop it? We want to avoid having to fight that war, but one aspect of avoiding a war is, as always, preparing to win it if it starts.

But that's not the only way to avoid a war, and increasing the size of the armed forces is not the principal way to make a nation strong. Nor is shooting the only form of war.

China has moved from preparations for economic warfare to overt economic aggression. The US needs to stop China from agrandizing itself this way.

That will be difficult, because China has been strengthening itself as an economic power for decades, even as the US has perverted its economy to weaken itself.

Poor, hungry, sick working people in debt for their education do not make a country strong — or great, for that matter. Private equity predators and outsourcing do not make productive industry. They are designed to make the rich richer.

It is paradoxical that in China, the state owns big business, whereas in the US, big business owns the state — amusing because they sound equivalent. They do have some things in common. Both lead to making people suffer and denying them political power, for example. But there is also a difference.

In China, the state reasserts control when necessary so that Chinese businesses make the country stronger. By contrast, the US submits when businesses impose policies that weaken the country. US capitalists strip-mine the ground they and we stand on. China does not allow its capitalists to do that.