No More Wars for Oil by David Swanson + 200,000 Rally For Climate Justice in DC + Avi Lewis

Image by Susan Melkisethian via Flickr

by David Swanson
Writer, Dandelion Salad
Let’s Try Democracy
April 30, 2017

What I Said at the Peace Hub of the Climate March:

Most countries on earth have the U.S. military in them.

Most countries on earth burn less fossil fuel than does the U.S. military.

And that’s without even calculating how much worse for the climate jet fuel is than other fossil fuels.

And it’s without even considering the fossil fuel consumption of the world’s leading weapons makers, or the pollution caused by the use of those weapons all over the world.

The U.S. is the top weapons dealer to the world, and has weapons on multiple sides of most wars.

The U.S. military created 69% of super fund environmental disaster sites and is the third leading polluter of U.S. waterways.

When the British first developed an obsession with the Middle East, passed along to the United States, the desire was to fuel the British Navy.

What came first? The wars or the oil? It was the wars.

Wars and the preparations for more wars consume a huge amount of oil.

But the wars are indeed fought for control of oil. So-called foreign intervention in civil wars is, according to comprehensive studies, 100 times more likely — not where there is suffering, not where there is cruelty, not where there is a threat to the world, but where the country at war has large reserves of oil or the intervener has a high demand for oil.

We need to learn to say:

No More Wars for Oil
and
No More Oil for Wars

You know who agrees with that? Pre-presidential campaign Donald Trump. On December 6, 2009, on page 8 of the New York Times a letter to President Obama printed as an advertisement and signed by Trump called climate change an immediate challenge. “Please don’t postpone the earth,” it said. “If we fail to act now, it is scientifically irrefutable that there will be catastrophic and irreversible consequences for humanity and our planet.”

In fact, Trump is now acting to speed up those consequences, an action prosecutable as a crime against humanity by the International Criminal Court — at least if Trump were African.

It’s also a crime impeachable by the United States Congress — at least if there’s some way to involve sex in it.

Holding this government accountable is up to us.

No More Wars For Oil
No More Oil for Wars

Say it with me.

---

David Swanson is an author, activist, journalist, and radio host. He is director of WorldBeyondWar.org and campaign coordinator for RootsAction.org. Swanson’s books include War Is A Lie. He blogs at DavidSwanson.org and WarIsACrime.org. He hosts Talk Nation Radio. He is a 2015 Nobel Peace Prize Nominee. War Is A Lie: Second Edition, published by Just World Books on April 5, 2016. I’ll come anywhere in the world to speak about it. Invite me!

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[DS added the video reports.]

200,000 Rally For Climate Justice in DC

TheRealNews on May 1, 2017

On Trumps hundredth day, marchers across the country demand an end to fossil fuel regime.

Avi Lewis: People’s Climate March

TheRealNews on Apr 29, 2017

In an exclusive interview at the People’s Climate March, Canadian activist and author Avi Lewis and Dimitri Lascaris discuss the Leap Manifesto’s demand for a just transition to a green economy and the movement in Canada, the US and beyond.

from the archives:

Trump’s Hundred Days of Rage and Rapacity by Ralph Nader + Nader Accepts Gandhi Peace Award: All Wars Are Preventable

Ralph Nader: Trump’s Attack on the EPA and Regulatory Agencies Will be a Disaster

The Top Way In Which Military Spending Kills Is Not With Any Weapon by David Swanson + 2 Video Reports

The Anti-Trump Protests: Don’t Ask: Where Were You For The Last 8 Years? by Bill Dores

Climate Change: The Potential Impacts of Collective Inaction by Graham Peebles