In playing basketball, I learned that if my team took a thrashing, and we did on more than one occasion, a post game breakdown of the game was fruitful if we began – not with the bad calls of the referees – but with our performance. What we did wrong, what assignments were missed, what was flawed in our game plan, and what adjustments in the lineup and game plan were in order if we hoped to win the next time that we took the court. Such a practice served us well. And I would argue would serve progressive and left political activists well too in moments of defeat of which we have had our share.

Russians protesting Putin’s invasion of Ukraine takes courage, a lot of courage. They deserve the support and solidarity of the peace, democratic, and progressive movements here.

Is it suprising that Putin’s dictatorial-fascistic regime invades an independent country in the name of fighting fascism? Not at all. That’s what fascist regimes do; they cynically and purposefully turn reality upside down or invent it altogether. What is suprising is when some left publications here – you expect it from publications on the right – accept and give credence to these lies.

Frederick Douglass said democracy demands “earnest struggle.” He was right then and is there any doubt that his observation is right now?

The latest issue of Foreign Affairs – The Age of Uncertainty – includes a number of interesting articles, including a sympathetic one on W.E.B. Dubois and his global outlook. The writer, Zachariah Mampilly persuasively argues that “the erasure of his views on foreign policy and the international order represents an enormous loss.”

Had leaders in the the U.S. and Western Europe heeded Dubois’ thinking, Mampilly writes, the world would look very different today. The present uncertainty and challenges facing humankind would be of a different order and far more manageable.