MODEST CUTS PROPOSED

Last night I turned on CBS TV news to see what they were saying about the Obama-Medvedev summit on reducing nuclear weapons. The first ten-minutes of the show was about the coming funeral and memorial service for Michael Jackson and the legions of people who tried to get tickets to the memorial that will be held inside a basketball arena.

Finally the story came and went about the nuclear negotiations. Not much to it.

The current START-1 treaty between the US and Russia expires on December 5. Obama and Medvedev agreed in principal to cut deployed nuclear warheads from current levels to somewhere around 1,500-1,675 each. Still more than enough to bounce the rubble after a nuclear exchange.

According to an analysis piece posted by the Reuters news agency, the cuts announced on Monday only take the US and Russia 25 operationally deployed warheads below a range of 1,700-2,200, which both sides had previously committed to reach by 2012.

So modest is indeed the watch word here to describe this new deal.

Both sides are still working out what exactly constitutes a nuclear weapon and the whole "missile defense" ghost still remains in the room. The two leaders were also unable to resolve the contentious issue over reductions in missile launchers and bombers.

The Washington Post reported that "The Russian military is worried that the launchers and bombers could be used to quickly rebuild the US nuclear arsenal and would pose a threat to Russian forces even if armed with non-nuclear warheads [the prompt global strike system that the Pentagon has been talking about lately]."

I listened to the whole news conference yesterday that Obama and Medvedev held to outline their agreements. In the end this deal does not show the world that the US and Russia have made a serious commitment to get rid of their nuclear weapons thus setting an example for others to follow. If they think that states like Iran, India, Pakistan, Israel, or North Korea are going to be moved to shut down their nuclear programs, while the US and Russia maintain 1,500 or more nuclear warheads then they are indeed wrong.

There doesn't appear to be an understanding on either side that "Global Zero" does not mean a couple thousand nukes.

Sadly the military industrial complex in both countries still can't bear to give up their nuclear security blanket. They will though likely continue to press others to do what they are so far unwilling to do - and that is to honor the UN's Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) which calls on all nuclear powers to disarm now.

AFGHANISTAN-PAKISTAN WAR KILLER DRONES FLOWN IN NEW MEXICO

Bob Anderson from Albuquerque, NM sent me this story this morning. So the Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV's) are not only being flown from Nevada but New Mexico as well.

There is talk of trying to establish a UAV test range here in Brunswick, Maine when the Naval air station closes down next year.

This drone killing machine is the Pentagon's answer to escalating war costs and difficulty with recruiting.

Britain's newspaper, The Independent, has an article today that begins:

The use of unmanned drones as weapons of war in conflicts around the world has been called into question by one of Britain's most senior judges. Lord Bingham, until last year the senior law lord, said that some weapons were so "cruel as to be beyond the pale of human tolerance".

MORE FROM THOSE JAILED BY ISRAEL

Latest report from Cynthia McKinney and others who were put in jail by Israel for trying to bring humitarian aid into the demolished Gaza strip.

TURNING THE SHIP

Here we are preparing to start yesterday's parade in Bath.

It was a joy and we all were still talking about the experience last night.

It's pretty empowering when you consider the impact you can have in front of 10,000 people if you just put in some effort to be creative and coordinate your message.

The reports from people behind the puppet, who were holding signs, is that people in the crowd were saying, "Yeah, we want to build wind turbines in Bath."

Six years of talking about conversion is beginning to turn the ship.

STORMS AND POLITICAL STORMS CREATE FIREWORKS

* We were in our town's July 4 parade today walking behind the local PeaceWorks group banner. The parade drew a huge crowd (about 10,000) from all over as people love to come to Bath for the festivities that follow the parade each year. Our signs heavily featured the conversion of the military industrial complex to peaceful and sustainable technology development issue. Build wind turbines and rail in Bath instead of destroyers.....things like that. We had a huge puppet that took three of us to carry which was a smash hit. I held up one of the long arms and kept waving it to the crowd. People would say, "Wow." I've got to find a photo of it for the blog. Afterwards many of us went out to the home of a local peace group member, who lives along an estuary that feeds into the ocean, for a picnic. It's a beautiful spot.

* Last night we had a strong thunder and lightening storm for the second night in a row. Since moving to Maine over six years ago I can only recall a handful of such storms. They were routine when we lived in Florida. In June we had more rain in Maine than ever before recorded. Climate change has sent our Mother Earth into convulsions.

* The political world this morning is all a-buzz with Sarah Palin's announcement that she is leaving her job as governor of Alaska. She will now likely run for president so we can all get used to daily news stories about her travels around the US to begin drumming up support for her campaign. We are going to have to live with this for the next three years so hang onto your hats.

OBAMA'S AFGHANISTAN OFFENSIVE

MESSAGE FROM JAILED CYNTHIA MCKINNEY

This phone call is from former Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney from inside prison in Israel after the humanitarian aid boat called the "Spirit of Humanity" was captured while in international waters by Israel. The 21 people on-board, including McKinney and Nobel Laureate Mairead Maguire, were trying to bring a shipment of humanitarian supplies to the besieged territory of Gaza.

Israel's siege of the Gaza Strip has continued unabated for over two years and badly needed reconstruction aid has been prevented from entering the Strip after the 22-day war on Gaza this past winter. Recently, President Obama called for humanitarian supplies to be permitted to enter the Gaza Strip and a number of members of Congress have traveled to the Strip and remarked on the dire circumstances facing the impoverished civilian population.

So far the White House and Congress has been silent about this Israeli abduction of the 21 peace and humanitarian activists. The mainstream media in the US is ignoring the story.

You can send a message to Obama and to your Congressional delegation about this situation by going this this web site.

Please send a message now.

NASA MOON BOMBING A TEST OF FIRST-STRIKE SPACE WEAPONS

NASA is preparing to bomb the moon. That's right, bomb the moon from space.

On June 18 NASA launched the Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) from Cape Canaveral in Florida on its journey to the moon.

When the space craft arrives near the moon it will fire a missile, at twice the speed of a bullet, from the spacecraft into the moon's surface. NASA maintains that the "test" will displace several miles of lunar material in order to find out if water is present on the moon's surface.

NASA will then have the $511 million mission's mother satellite circle the moon for at least a year creating a detailed map of the moon's surface. NASA says the new maps will be crucial for identifying possible landing sites for astronauts in future years as permanent bases are built on the moon for the eventual mining of helium-3. Scientists have long suggested that helium-3 could be used for fusion power back here on Earth and would make the profits of the oil industries pale in comparison.

NASA has publicly maintained in recent years that all of their space missions are now "dual use" - meaning that each mission they launch is both civilian and military at the same time. Thus one must consider that this LCROSS moon bombing mission is likely testing the capability of Pentagon technologies to launch missiles from space that could hit targets on Earth.

As the US and Russia enter negotiations to reduce the numbers of nuclear weapons in their stockpiles I can assure you that Russia will be thinking about this LCROSS test. They know that the US is developing "first-strike" capability from space and from Earth. Add "missile defense" into the equation, which would give the US the shield after the first-strike sword has been thrust, and one can see that these new technologies will only "complicate" hopes for the abolition of nuclear weapons.

TOUGH NEGOTIATIONS NEXT WEEK

President Obama will be meeting with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on July 6-8 in Moscow in hopes to "reset" relations between the two nations. One primary goal will be to explore negotiations for reduction of nuclear missiles.

Reuters reports, "Both leaders see further arms cuts as a key to maintaining global strategic stability. However, Moscow views U.S. plans to create an anti-missile system and deploy elements in Eastern Europe as a threat to its security... Medvedev has expressed hopes Obama will be less committed to the missile defence plan than Bush. Russian media have quoted U.S. officials as rejecting any linkage between the new arms deal and the missile defence."

The Chinese will be watching this summit closely as they too are deeply concerned about US "missile defense" systems being deployed near their borders in Japan, South Korea and on Naval ships just off their coast.

The new American military strategy of surrounding Russia (via NATO) and China will be put to a test in these new negotiations.

The US and Russia do recognize the need, and want to reduce, nuclear weapons because they are getting "out of control." Both leaders also realize they must take the lead if they hope to have others put down their nukes. Nukes are a huge waste of resources that both countries would rather be spending on other conventional military technologies - like space technology.

But at the same time Russia (and China) understand that if they reduce their nukes without the US backing off on "missile defense" deployments in their neighborhoods, then the US gains strategic first-strike advantage. They are very reluctant to give up their retaliatory nuclear capability under those circumstances.

The 1986 Reagan-Gorbachev nuclear negotiations broke down because of US insistence on Star Wars. The same thing happened when Clinton-Putin had similar negotiations and reached a similar impasse.

This will be a huge reality check for the global peace movement as we find out just how far Obama is willing to go when it comes to reaching his proposed "global zero."

News Flash: For an early sign of how these meetings will go check out this CBS News story that indicates the US is likely to tell Russia that it is not going to compromise on deployment of "missile defense" systems in Europe or on NATO expansion. See it here