Tuesday, September 15, 2026

Ed Sheeran Chooses the Side of the Oppressor

Mike Figueredo (right) begins his latest Humanist Report segment with the following:

Singer Ed Sheeran decided to boot Macklemore from his tour after weeks of relentless pressure by the media, billionaire venue owners, and even fellow singer Pink. Why did they want Macklemore removed, you ask? Because he had the audacity to say “free Palestine” on stage. In this video we’ll talk about Macklemore's (correct) comments about Israel, the manufactured outrage, and why history will judge Ed Sheeran harshly for his cowardice.

Indeed, this whole situation reminds me of Desmond Tutu’s words: “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.”

Figueredo’s timely and insightful 18-minute video commentary can be viewed in its entirety below.





Related Off-site Links:
Hey, Ed Sheeran, Palestine Is Dying in White Silence Like Yours – John Pavlovitz (The Beautiful Mess, September 15, 2026).
Macklemore’s Tour Cancellation Shows Why Celebrities Don’t Criticize Israel – Caitlin Johnstone (Caitlin’s Newsletter, September 14, 2026).
Macklemore Responds After Removal From Ed Sheeran Tour: “The Victims Are the Palestinian People” – Ethan Millman (The Hollywood Reporter, September 14, 2026).
Robert Kraft, Associate of Jeffrey Epstein, Defends Banning Macklemore from Ed Sheeran Tour After ‘Free Palestine’ Comments: “We Do Not Provide a Platform for Hate Speech” – Jem Aswad (Variety, September 14, 2026).
Ed Sheeran Says Dropping Macklemore From Tour Was “Promoter’s Decision, Not Mine,” Explains Why He’s Not Speaking Out on Israel and Palestine – Jem Aswad and Zack Sharf (Variety, September 15, 2026).
Why White People’s Humanity Is “Just Humanity” But Yours Is “Politics” (The Sheeran Receipts)The Conscious Lee (September 14, 2026).
Rapper Macklemore Says NFL Owners Got Him Kicked Off Concert Tour for Criticizing Israel – Stephen Prager (Common Dreams, September 14, 2026).
“Free Palestine”: Macklemore’s Courage and the Myth of Pink’s “Loneliness” – Romana Rubeo (The Palestine Chronicle, September 14, 2026).
Pink Says Standing Up for Jews Has Been “Lonelier” Than She ExpectedThe Times of Israel (September 12, 2026).
Pink Addresses Backlash Over Comments About Macklemore’s Pro-Palestine Stance – Mitchell Peters (Billboard, September 12, 2026).
“Imagine Being Threatened by Peace”: Singer Pink Lambasted for Criticising Macklemore’s Pro-Palestine StanceThe New Arab (September 12, 2026).


See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
What Integrity Looks Like
Caitlin Johnstone on the Need to Cultivate Integrity – As Both an Individual and a Society
Genevieve Fraser: Quote of the Day – August 26, 2026
Jonny Rashid: Quote of the Day – August 10, 2026
“The Genocide in Gaza Is the Beginning. Welcome to the New World Order”
Omid Safi: Quote of the Day – March 7, 2026
Kym Staton: Quote of the Day – March 3, 2026
The Architecture of Settler Colonialism
“It Is Up to Us”
No Justice, No Peace
Macklemore and Ryan Lewis’ “Same Love”


Something to Think About . . .


I’ve previously noted that my straight friend and ally Iggy is dedicated to facilitating mind and body transformation – within his own life and the lives of others who are similarly interested in holistic personal growth and change. To this end, Iggy’s professional/vocational life focuses on providing a range of services, including mindset mentoring, naprapathic massage, and personal training in boxing, kickboxing, and Muay Thai strength building and conditioning.

Iggy also regularly posts videos, reflections, and memes via social media that convey his understanding of the need for – and ways of cultivating – lasting postive change in our lives. His recent posting of the above caught my attention.

I especially appreciate the question – What if it all works out? – and the invitation and challenge it offers: Let go. Allow all to fall into place.

Indeed, I like it so much that I thought I’d share it here at The Wild Reed. Thanks, Iggy!


See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
“Your Perception Is a Choice”
Australian Sojourn – April-May 2026: Gulmarrad, Maclean, and Brooms Head
A Fresh Take on Masculinity
Home to Myself
Opening to Love
Surrendering in Sacred Trust
Trusting the Sacred Flow of Life
Love’s the Only Dance
Active Waiting: A Radical Attitude Toward Life
Jesus and the Art of Letting Go

Image 1: Iggy.
Image 2: Michael J. Bayly (May 2026).

Monday, September 14, 2026

What Integrity Looks Like

I (mostly) agree with Qasim Rashid who said the following when sharing earlier today what I’m sharing this evening.

You absolutely should read Macklemore’s response to Robert Kraft forcing Ed Sheeran to cancel him. This is what integrity looks like. This is how you use your platform to stand up against Israel’s genocide in Palestine.

Here’s were I disagree with Rashid: Sheeran wasn’t forced to cancel Macklemore (pictured at right). He was pressured, and he caved.

Following (with added images and links) is Macklemore’s response to Robert Kraft, the billionaire and former Jeffrey Epstein associate who pressured Sheeran to dump Macklemore from his tour.

________________

I’m not sure how to start this. So I’m going to speak from the heart and share the truth. Ed Sheeran and his team have made the decision to remove me from The Loop tour.

But before I get into it, I want to say something that should be obvious. In this moment I think it matters. I am not a victim. Ed Sheeran is not a victim. Pink is not a victim. We have careers, money, opportunities, safety and audiences around the world. Whatever consequences any of us face for what we say, we get to go home to our families.

The victims are the Palestinian people. The men, women and children who have been killed, starved, displaced and forced to live through unimaginable violence. More than 20,000 children have been killed in Gaza alone. People are being killed today, and people will be killed tomorrow. I want to make sure that as I tell this story, we don’t lose sight of that.

Ed is my friend. I’ve known him for 13 years. We’ve shared late nights, studio sessions and stages. He has this infectious magic about him that I’ve grown to love. I consider him a brother. And because of that, we’ve had some difficult conversations this past week. The type of talks rooted in love and respect for one another that still end in a place of fundamental disagreement. Nothing I’m writing here is out of spite or because I want to tear down his character. But as I told Ed multiple times on the phone, our friendship can’t change my responsibility to tell the truth about what happened.

Last Monday, in the middle of all the media attention surrounding Pink and what I said at MetLife, Ed told me that Robert Kraft [right] called him. We were scheduled to play Gillette Stadium later this month, which is owned by the Kraft Group. Ed told me that Kraft said I would not be allowed to perform in his stadium. Ed also told me that Kraft had rallied some of the other stadium owners and collectively they gave him an ultimatum: if Macklemore stays on the tour, you will not be allowed to play in our venues.

Ed was in a fucked up position. He knew it. His typical apolitical stance was being challenged in a way it never had been before. He told me that the words “Free Palestine” and the image of the Palestinian flag were hurtful to a lot of people he spoke with. I told him that if those words were more offensive than tens of thousands of Palestinian children being killed by Israel, then there was a fundamental disconnect between where those people stood and where I stood. But he couldn’t get past his public facing, “I don’t take sides.”

And I get why people don’t. Taking a side can cost you. Money, brand deals, sponsorships, festivals, private shows, relationships and access. I’ve lost all of those things. But there is no neutral position between the oppressor and the oppressed. When one side has the bombs and bottomless financial and military support from America, refusing to take a side doesn’t leave you in the middle.

What I said at MetLife I have been saying on stages around the world for almost three years. So why is it an issue now? Because now I’m sharing a stage with one of the biggest artists in the world, in some of the biggest stadiums in America. At a certain level of exposure, “Free Palestine” becomes too much of a risk. If I kept doing the shows, saying Free Palestine, with Ed implicitly supporting it, the crowd getting loud and showing undeniable support for Palestinian liberation, what artist might speak out next? The stage becomes resistance. Maybe that’s why this time it became so important to silence me.

And one of the most effective ways to enforce that silence has been to weaponize the accusation of antisemitism. Antisemitism is real. And that is exactly why the word matters too much to be used as a shield against criticism of the Israeli state. When criticizing Israel, opposing Zionism or saying “Free Palestine” gets conflated with hatred of Jewish people, it doesn’t protect Jewish people. It protects Israel from accountability.

I hope this isn’t the end of my relationship with Ed. Thirteen years of friendship doesn’t disappear because of one painful disagreement. I hope we both continue listening, studying what is happening in Palestine and wrestling with what neutrality means in a moment like this. My door will always be open to continuing that conversation.

When my brother Omar was doing the subtitles for the video I posted from MetLife, I thanked him. He told me there’s a phrase in Arabic:

لا شكر على واج – “La shukra ala wajeb.” There is no thanks for a duty.

That stayed with me. Because that’s what this has become for me and millions of others around the world. A duty. Not something deserving of praise or gratitude. Not brave. Human.

Who is winning the internet, who is getting canceled, who gets to play the stadium and who doesn’t, all of it becomes so small when held against what we are actually witnessing in Gaza and the West Bank. An entire people being displaced, starved and killed while the world debates which words we are allowed to use to describe it, how those words make us feel, and whether our discomfort matters more than the people living through a genocide.

I didn’t need 10 shows from Ed. I needed 2. Two chances to stand in front of 90,000 people and say the words that somehow became too dangerous to say.

Free Palestine.

But if those words cost me the stage, while turning the conversation back to Palestine, then it was the most successful tour I’ve ever been on.

Macklemore
via social media
September 14, 2026



Following is David Doel’s 20-minute Rational National video commentary on Macklemore’s canceling by Robert Kraft and Ed Sheeran.





Related Off-site Links:
Macklemore’s Tour Cancellation Shows Why Celebrities Don’t Criticize Israel – Caitlin Johnstone (Caitlin’s Newsletter, September 14, 2026).
Macklemore Responds After Removal From Ed Sheeran Tour: “The Victims Are the Palestinian People” – Ethan Millman (The Hollywood Reporter, September 14, 2026).
Robert Kraft, Associate of Jeffrey Epstein, Defends Banning Macklemore from Ed Sheeran Tour After ‘Free Palestine’ Comments: “We Do Not Provide a Platform for Hate Speech” – Jem Aswad (Variety, September 14, 2026).
Why White People’s Humanity Is “Just Humanity” But Yours Is “Politics” (The Sheeran Receipts)The Conscious Lee (September 14, 2026).
Rapper Macklemore Says NFL Owners Got Him Kicked Off Concert Tour for Criticizing Israel – Stephen Prager (Common Dreams, September 14, 2026).
“Free Palestine”: Macklemore’s Courage and the Myth of Pink’s “Loneliness” – Romana Rubeo (The Palestine Chronicle, September 14, 2026).
Pink Says Standing Up for Jews Has Been “Lonelier” Than She ExpectedThe Times of Israel (September 12, 2026).
Pink Addresses Backlash Over Comments About Macklemore’s Pro-Palestine Stance – Mitchell Peters (Billboard, September 12, 2026).
“Imagine Being Threatened by Peace”: Singer Pink Lambasted for Criticising Macklemore’s Pro-Palestine StanceThe New Arab (September 12, 2026).

UPDATES: Ed Sheeran Says Dropping Macklemore From Tour Was “Promoter’s Decision, Not Mine,” Explains Why He’s Not Speaking Out on Israel and Palestine – Jem Aswad and Zack Sharf (Variety, September 15, 2026).
Hey, Ed Sheeran, Palestine Is Dying in White Silence Like Yours – John Pavlovitz (The Beautiful Mess, September 15, 2026).


See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
Caitlin Johnstone on the Need to Cultivate Integrity – As Both an Individual and a Society
Genevieve Fraser: Quote of the Day – August 26, 2026
Jonny Rashid: Quote of the Day – August 10, 2026
“The Genocide in Gaza Is the Beginning. Welcome to the New World Order”
Omid Safi: Quote of the Day – March 7, 2026
Kym Staton: Quote of the Day – March 3, 2026
The Architecture of Settler Colonialism
“It Is Up to Us”
No Justice, No Peace
Macklemore and Ryan Lewis’ “Same Love”


Caitlin Johnstone on the Need to Cultivate Integrity – As Both an Individual and a Society

In her latest piece on her substack, Caitlin Johnsone responds to “pop star” Pink’s denouncement of fellow singer Macklemore’s call (right) for an end to Israel’s genocide of Palentinians in Gaza by calling on both individuals and society to “cultivate integrity.”

________________

Western liberal democracies are like a narcissistic wife beater who postures as a sensitive he/him feminist on social media. Like a pop star who makes a show of fighting the power and defending the marginalized while supporting Israel.

Our society isn’t what it pretends to be.

Our entire civilization sustains itself through an endless river of blood, sweat and tears from the global south while making movies about fighting for justice and saving the world.

Our pundits wag their fingers at the “tyrannical regimes” in empire-targeted nations while our own rulers murder, starve and terrorize disobedient populations in order to dominate the planet.

In school they teach us that we are lucky to live in a free society where the people command the government with their votes and we have the right to express ourselves in whatever way we choose, when in reality wealthy oligarchs control the entire electoral process and our expression is aggressively manipulated through a complex system of censorship and propaganda.

We have no integrity.

To have integrity as an individual is to be the same sort of person you are at home as when you’re in public. To treat everyone with the same amount of kindness and respect regardless of whether they’re your boss, your child, your subordinate, or your friend. When all your thoughts align fully with all your words, and all your words fully align with all your actions, whether nobody’s watching or everyone’s watching. When the values you claim to hold are the same as the values people see you embodying in the life you actually live.

To cultivate integrity as an individual is to bring all of these factors into alignment, and eliminate all conflicts and contradictions between them in the way you live your life. To cultivate integrity as a society is no different.

And as denizens of the western empire we’ve got a long, hard journey ahead of us if we are to eliminate all the conflicts and contradictions between the type of society we claim to be and the type of society we actually have. In practice we’re about as incongruent with our theoretical values as any civilization could possibly be. We are an empire of frauds.

The fight for a healthy world is largely a fight to move us from fraudulence to integrity. To create a society in which our most noble aspirations and most deeply cherished values are reflected in the way our civilization is actually organized. That is the cause toward which we all strive, when all is said and done.

Gaining integrity as an individual means getting uncompromisingly real with yourself about what you’re actually like as a person. Gaining integrity as a society means opening as many western eyes as possible to the reality that everything we’ve been told about our civilization and about our world is a complete sham. Only then can we begin striking at the true roots of our problems and move into health and harmony.

Caitlin Johnstone
Western Civilization Is a Phoney Pop Star
Caitlin’s Newsletter
September 12, 2026


NEXT:
What Integrity Looks Like


Related Off-site Links:
Macklemore’s Tour Cancellation Shows Why Celebrities Don’t Criticize Israel – Caitlin Johnstone (Caitlin’s Newsletter, September 14, 2026).
Rapper Macklemore Says NFL Owners Got Him Kicked Off Concert Tour for Criticizing Israel – Stephen Prager (Common Dreams, September 14, 2026).
Robert Kraft, Associate of Jeffrey Epstein, Addresses Decision to Block Macklemore from Playing Gillette Stadium – Alex Young (Consequence, September 14, 2026).
“Free Palestine”: Macklemore’s Courage and the Myth of Pink’s “Loneliness” – Romana Rubeo (The Palestine Chronicle, September 14, 2026).
Pink Says Standing Up for Jews Has Been “Lonelier” Than She ExpectedThe Times of Israel (September 12, 2026).
Pink Addresses Backlash Over Comments About Macklemore’s Pro-Palestine Stance – Mitchell Peters (Billboard, September 12, 2026).
“Imagine Being Threatened by Peace”: Singer Pink Lambasted for Criticising Macklemore’s Pro-Palestine StanceThe New Arab (September 12, 2026).


For more of Caitlin Johnstone at The Wild Reed, see:
Caitlin Johnstone on the “No Kings” Protests
Quote of the Day – July 23, 2025
The Only Difference
Quote of the Day – January 22, 2025
“Status Quo Politicians Are Infinitely ‘Weirder’ Than Marianne Williamson”

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
Genevieve Fraser: Quote of the Day – August 26, 2026
Jonny Rashid: Quote of the Day – August 10, 2026
“The Genocide in Gaza Is the Beginning. Welcome to the New World Order”
Omid Safi: Quote of the Day – March 7, 2026
Kym Staton: Quote of the Day – March 3, 2026
The Architecture of Settler Colonialism
“It Is Up to Us”
No Justice, No Peace


Saturday, September 12, 2026

Alan Cohen: “Terrorism Will End When We Refuse to Be Terrified”

In continuing with the Wild Reed series commemorating the 50th anniversary of the publication of A Course in Miracles, I share this evening an excerpt from Alan Cohen’s 2015 book, A Course in Miracles Made Easy: Mastering the Journey from Fear to Love.

In this excerpt Cohen discusses the “end of terrorism,” a timely focus given that yesterday was the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the U.S.

____________

Humility is a virtue. Humiliation is not. Humbling yourself means allowing God to bring greater life to the world through you rather than letting yourself be a pawn in the ego’s* quest for blood. God champions your wellness and is doing everything He can to promote it. All else is a tragic misunderstanding of the will of God.

The world has become obessed with terrorism. Governments spend trillions of dollars on wars against terrorists, our beloved sons and daughters come home in caskets, and millions of innocent people are forced to undress in airports in order to ride on an airplane. Has it ever occurred to you that this is not how humanity was intended to live? Yet we can learn from even this most insane of scenarios: “All things are lessons God would have me learn” (Workbook, Lesson 193).

The answer to terrorism, personal and global, is found in the very place it lives: the fearful heart. Terrorism will end when we refuse to be terrified. The most insidious criminal is the inner terrorist, the part of your mind that bullies you or accepts bullying by others. An agitator in your psyche attempts to keep you small by encasing you in a circle of fear. You believe you are a tiny human body, alone, defenseless, and subject to the evil of the world. You believe people can hurt you without your permission, and you are powerless to create the life you yearn for. You believe you must go to a job you hate and tolerate obnoxious bosses, mean-spirited co-workers, and whiny customers. You accept that you must put up with demeaning relationships, struggle to survive, prove yourself to dead relatives, and hack your way through the jungle of life. Such inner terrorism is far more destructive to life on the planet than those who blow up cars and buildings. Psychic self-destruction turns bright, competent children with genius potential into hollow-eyed drones trudging through mind-numbing schools and then life-sucking jobs. The inner terrorist twists humanity into a writhing mass of fear, looking everywhere for love and finding it nowhere. So the world becomes a mockery of the heaven it was intended to be.

To all of this, A Course in Miracles says, “Peace to such foolishness!” (Workbook, Lesson 190:4:1). It assures us that as children of a loving, caring God, we deserve better. It emphatically tells us that crucifixion of self or others is not the will of God. "Perhaps you have misunderstood His plan, for He would never offer pain to you" (Workbook, Lesson 135.18:2). The will of God is entirely, utterly, eternally, only love. A Course in Miracles assures us that this is our will as well, therefore it must be done on Earth as it is in heaven.

Alan Cohen
Excerpted from A Course in Miracles Made Easy:
Mastering the Journey from Fear to Love

Hay House, Inc., 2015
pp. 102-104


* In The Gift of Change, Marianne Williamson writes the following about the ego as understood in A Course in Miracles.

The word ego here means what it meant to the ancient Greeks: a small and separated self. When we identify with the ego it’s like looking at a hangnail and thinking, “That’s who I am.” The ego is an imposter self, masquerading as who we really are yet in reality the embodiment of our self-hatred. It is the power of our own minds turned against us, pretending to be our champion yet in reality undermning all our hopes and dreams. The ego is a delusional splinter that has cut itself off from our larger spiritual reality. It sets up a parallel mental kingdom in which it sees itself as different and special, always justified in keeping the rest of the world at bay. Seeing ourselves as separate, we subconsciously attract and interpret circumstances that seem to bear out that belief. That delusional kingdom is hell on earth.

When we remember who we are, when we stand firm in the light of our own true being as children of God, then the ego begins, however gradually, to recede. Darkness cannot stand when we truly embrace the light [i.e., right/divine understanding] – when we consciously foster it and devote ourselves to it. That is why recognizing who we are – that we are love, that we are as God created us – is the most important thing we can do in any instant. Love is our spiritual reality, untarnished by anything that has happened in the material world. . . . [O]nly when we reject the ego’s account of who we are, can we begin to discover who we really are.

And who we really are, is holy.

Our holiness is both the opposite of and the antidote to the ego. It is a state of being in which we have reconnected with our Source, remembering that in fact we never left. We were created by God in a state of holiness, we were born onto the earth in a state of holiness, and we will return to this state upon our death. All of us, however, in between our infancy and death, fell asleep to our true nature and experience the hell of our self-imposed separation from God. Remembering our connection to our Source awakens us and frees us from the nightmares we create. In any Holy Instant, the ego is made null and void. (Pp. 17-19)


See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
Why A Course in Miracles Is Not “New Age”
A Course in Miracles: A Gift of Peace
Mysticism and Miracles
Gifts of Abundance
I Am One With the Beloved
Being One With the Beloved, the Source of All Things
Your Peace Is With Me, Beloved One
Dwelling in Peace
The Peace of God
You Are My Goal, Beloved One
Be In My Mind, Beloved One
Stepping Out of Time and Resting Your Mind
Resting in the Presence of the Beloved
In the Stillness and Silence of This Present Moment
The Beauty and Challenge of Being Present in the Moment
Today I Will Be Still
I Need Do Nothing . . . I Am Open to the Living Light
Aligning With the Living Light
An Expression of Humility
Choosing to Awaken

Images: Michael J. Bayly.


Friday, September 11, 2026

25 Years of the “Exact Wrong Response to 9/11”

In marking the 25th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the U.S., Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J.S. Davies have penned a powerful piece that explains why “25 years of war was the exact wrong response to 9/11.”

First published this past Wednesday, September 9 at Common Dreams, I share this important article today at The Wild Reed in its entirety.

________________

The lesson of 9/11 should be that war is not the answer to any of the problems facing the United States. After inflicting violence and chaos on country after country for twenty-five years in a “global war on terror” that has evolved into a Zionist genocide and a revived Cold War against Russia and China, the widespread public opposition to Trump’s war on Iran suggests that most Americans have finally learned that lesson.

Unfortunately, powerful sections of our corrupt business and political elites have not.

Most Americans old enough to remember September 11, 2001, can still recall the horrifying images played endlessly on our TV screens as the scale of the mass murder became clear.

But we also remember something else: the sinking feeling that the hopes and dreams of billions of people, in the U.S. and around the world, would be pushed to the back-burner for the foreseeable future, as our leaders and corporate media all too predictably embraced a new agenda of revenge, fear-mongering, jingoism and military violence.

We found out later that only hours after the attacks – less than six hours after the first plane struck the World Trade Center and barely five hours after the Pentagon was hit – the planning for America’s military response to the 9/11 massacre was already under way.

At 2:40 pm, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld convened a meeting at the Pentagon. Notes taken by Undersecretary Stephen Cambone, later obtained by CBS News, recorded Rumsfeld demanding the “best info fast. Judge whether good enough hit S.H.” – meaning Saddam Hussein – “at the same time” as Osama bin Laden. Then came the chilling instruction: “Go massive. Sweep it all up. Things related and not.”

Twenty-five years later, we can look back and see how the U.S. government used September 11 to unleash a crusade of violence, war crimes and chaos across the world. Experts like Nuremberg prosecutor Ben Ferencz and military historian Michael Howard warned from the beginning that declaring a “war on terror” made no sense and would make matters worse.

They were right, of course. But when the State Department’s annual Patterns of Global Terrorism report for 2004 showed an unprecedented increase in global terrorism following the U.S. invasion of Iraq, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice simply cancelled and discontinued the report, replacing it with a new one with different criteria to prevent comparison with previous years.

But, as Rumsfeld made clear to his subordinates from the outset, the 9/11 crisis provided an open-ended pretext for endless wars against enemies who had nothing to do with the attacks, and for the re-militarization of the United States after the small reduction in its military spending after the end of the Cold War.

Total U.S. military spending for the past 25 years has exceeded $21 trillion (in 2024 dollars), surpassing the combined spending of the other 18 largest military powers in the world. During that time, China has built a whole new civilization and infrastructure, and leap-frogged the U.S. economy to become the world leader in clean energy, high-speed rail and technological sectors in which the US was once preeminent.

Both Democrats and Republicans are responsible for these counter-productive choices, and the appalling human costs of these wars on the countries the United States has attacked, bombed or invaded make this an especially atrocious way to squander our nation’s wealth.

The history of the United States during this period calls to mind an old Greek myth. Croesus, the famously wealthy king of Lydia, asked the Oracle at Delphi what would happen if he invaded Persia. The Oracle told him, “If you cross the Halys river, a great empire will fall.” Encouraged, Croesus launched the invasion. But he lost the war, and the empire that fell was his own.

In pursuing their global imperial ambitions, our leaders and ruling classes have discounted and betrayed the real sources of America’s prosperity and security: the well-being of the American people and peaceful relations with our neighbors around the world.

They have led us into war, poverty and extreme inequality, and hollowed out a system of government that was slowly becoming more democratic. At home, decades of political struggle by labor, civil rights and other social movements produced enormous advances, including Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, major investments in public infrastructure and education, and a highly progressive tax system – with the top income tax rate at 91% until 1963 – that helped finance those public goods and narrow the gap between rich and poor.

Contrary to the “End of History” theory embraced by many policymakers after the Cold War, and Margaret Thatcher’s famous insistence that “there is no alternative” to the extreme neoliberal capitalism that she and Ronald Reagan ushered in, societies always have political and economic alternatives. It is only a transparently self-serving choice by America’s corrupt ruling classes that saddles us with a system that keeps all decision-making power in their own hands in order to build their own wealth to the detriment of the country we all share.

We can see one alternative today in New York City, where Mayor Zohran Mamdani is pursuing a different set of priorities: expanding free childcare, making major investments in affordable housing, improving public transportation, and freezing rents for tenants in rent-stabilized apartments. Electoral politics can be part of the solution, but only if it reflects what ordinary people really want, instead of limited choices between oligarchic “lesser evils.”

Americans are demanding a renewal of social progress, with universal healthcare, quality public education, and all the things we need but can’t afford as long as this bloated, destructive war machine remains our government’s top priority. As Martin Luther King lamented in 1967, “I knew that America would never invest the necessary funds or energies in rehabilitation of its poor so long as adventures like Vietnam continued to draw men and skills and money like some demonic, destructive suction tube.”

Twenty-five years is a long time to keep moving in the wrong direction, especially when that direction involves endless war and the destruction of other countries. We are a long way from where most Americans would like our country to be. But we have a pretty good idea of what is wrong and what we need to do:

Stop throwing money at a broken, destructive war machine. Stop threatening and blockading our neighbors. Close overseas bases and bring our troops home. Tax the wealthy. Start rebuilding our country, and replace war and militarism with cooperation and problem solving. Take public ownership and responsibility for things we all need and use, like education, healthcare, housing, infrastructure, and utilities. Abolish ICE, and other militarized institutions that waste our national resources and do not serve the public good. Insist that the military be scaled back to its legitimate role of defending the United States against a possible, but very unlikely, foreign military attack.

If we have truly learned the lesson of the past twenty-five years, then we must translate it into policies that reflect that. The real test is not whether we can finally see what went wrong after 9/11. It is whether we are able to change course.

Medea Benjamin & Nicolas J.S. Davies
25 Years of War Was the Exact
Wrong Response to 9/11

Common Dreams
September 9, 2026



Related Off-site Links:
The U.S. Had a Choice After 9/11. It Chose Wrong – Elie Mystal (The Nation, September 11, 2026).
25 Years Since the September 11 Terrorist Attacks – Patrick Martin (World Socialist Web Site, September 11, 2026).
“Horror to Last a Lifetime”: Juan González on Covering 9/11 Attacks in New York City 25 Years Ago TodayDemocracy Now! (September 11, 2026).
On 25th Anniversary of 9/11 Attacks, Condemnation of Global “War on Terror” That Has Killed Millions – Jake Johnson (Common Dreams, September 11, 2026).
9/11 Began 25 Years of Non-stop War and Abuses of Power – Pam Bailey (Current Affairs, September 11, 2026).
On 9/11, We Said, “Never Forget.” Then, We All Forgot – John Pavlovitz (This Beautiful Mess, September 11, 2026).
Empire as a Way of Life: 25 Years Since 9/11 – Tariq Ali (Tariq Ali, September 11. 2026).
“Reign of Terror: How the 9/11 Era Destabilized America and Produced Trump”: An Interview with Spencer AckermanDemocracy Now! (September 10, 2026).
The Burning Towers Foreshadowed a Burning World – Viet Thanh Nguyen (Zeteo, September 10, 2026).
Osama Bin Laden Won – Nick Turse (The Intercept, September 11, 2026).
America After 9/11: 25 Years of Fear, War, Surveillance and Permanent Emergency – John and Nisha Whitehead (The Rutherford Institute, September 8, 2026).
25 Years After 9/11, How Do We Build a Movement to Stop Endless Wars? – Mark Engler (Waging Nonviolence, September 9, 2026).
4.7 Million Dead, $8 Trillion: Counting the Devastating Human and Economic Costs of the Post‑9/11 WarsDemocracy Now! (September 10, 2026).
After 9/11, the “War on Terror” Was a War of Terror – Norman Solomon (Common Dreams, September 9, 2026).
“Let’s Just Round Them Up”: The Rise of Islamophobia in the Post-9/11 Domestic War on TerrorDemocracy Now! (September 9, 2026).
Muslim Children Should Not Carry the Burden of the 9/11 Attacks – Maryam Hasan (Common Dreams, September 10, 2026).
Son of 9/11 Victim Says “Please Stop” Exploiting Tragedy to Spread Anti-Muslim Bigotry – Brett Wilkins (Common Dreams, September 11, 2026).
25 Years Later: Afghan New Yorker Masuda Sultan Remembers 9/11 and 19 Relatives Killed in U.S. BombingDemocracy Now! (September 10, 2026).
25 Years After 9/11: Cover-Up of Air Quality Risk Proved to Be “Death Sentence” for ThousandsDemocracy Now! (September 8, 2026).
Top Democrats Called Out for Silence Over Racist Push for Mayor Zohran Mamdani to Skip 9/11 Memorial – Julia Conley (Common Dreams, September 9, 2026).
Mamdani Says NYC Can Honor 9/11 Victims by Building a City Where “We Run Toward One Another” – Julia Conley (Common Dreams, September 11, 2026).
Remembering Gay Hero Mark Bingham Who Saved Hundreds of Lives on 9/11 on Flight 93 – Lily Wakefield (Pink News, September 11, 2026).
Defining Images From the 9/11 Attacks – Reuters (September 10, 2026).
The 9/11 Decade: Timeline of Voices of Dissent on Democracy Now!Democracy Now! (September 11, 2012).
Hijacking Catastrophe: 9/11, Fear, and the Selling of American Empire – A film by Jeremy Earp and Sut Jhally (2004).


See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
Remembering . . .
Remembering September 11 and Its Aftermath
A Letter to “Dear Abby” re. Responding to 9/11
Rebecca Solnit on How 9/11 Should Be Remembered
Karen Armstrong on the 9/11 Attacks: A “Flagrant and Wicked Abuse of Religion”
Kittredge Cherry on Mychal Judge, the “Gay Saint of 9/11”
Before (and After) the Poison
Let’s Also Honor the “Expendables”
Praying for George W. Bush
The Tenth Anniversary of the U.S. Invasion of Iraq


Image 1: Michael J. Bayly (Faces of Resistance: Images and Stories of Progressive Activism at the Turn of the Millennium (1997-2006)Gallery 9: Responding to 9/11 and the “War of Terror,” Part 2).

Image 2: Photographer unknown.

Image 3: Michael J. Bayly (Faces of Resistance: Images and Stories of Progressive Activism at the Turn of the Millennium (1997-2006)Gallery 9: Responding to 9/11 and the “War of Terror,” Part 3).

Following is the commentary at Faces of Resistance that accompanies this image.

Minneapolis resident Jack Rossbach was in New York City on September 11, 2001, representing Veterans for Peace at the United Nations’ Conference for Non-governmental Organizations. Exactly one year later, while participating in the weekly vigil outside of the Edina-based international weapons selling corporation, Alliant Techsystems, he recounted his experiences of that fateful day.

“I was on a bus going toward the U.N. for an early morning session when a woman with an incredibly strong New York accent starting asking what the people outside were looking and pointing at,” remembers Jack. “And then she started yelling about the hole in one of the World Trade Center towers and we soon all realized that a plane had crashed into it – into the North Tower of the World Trade Center.

“I’d taken training in responding to catastrophic events so I got off the bus, caught another one and headed back toward the World Trade Center. That’s when I saw the second plane fly behind the South Tower and then hit it from behind.

“[On the streets] everybody was talking to everybody else. I mean, communication was just wide open. I remember there was a young man by a truck and he was just shaking, just shaking – telling us how he saw these planes intentionally crash into the towers. I knew then it had been an intentional act by people who believe that killing is a way to solve problems.

“I couldn’t see the South Tower because the smoke from the North Tower was too thick to see it, although when the South Tower collapsed I saw the dust storm . . . The second tower came down about twenty minutes later.”

About his presence at the Alliant Techsystems vigil on the first anniversary of 9/11, Jack said: “I’m totally devoted to non-violent resolution to conflict and to somehow or other convincing [those who are part of] the war machine that they're going in the wrong direction. There is another way – a very successful other way.”


Thursday, September 10, 2026

Quote of the Day

I don’t hate America. I hate what America has been taught to tolerate.

I hate that we call basic things “radical.” Healthcare? Radical. Paid leave? Radical. Clean air? Radical. Kids not getting shot in math class? Somehow political.

Meanwhile, the loudest “patriots” are usually the same people telling struggling Americans to shut up, stop complaining, and be grateful. Grateful for what? A flag doesn’t pay rent. A bald eagle doesn’t cover insulin. Fireworks don’t fix bridges. And chanting “U.S.A.” doesn’t make a broken system less broken.

America has incredible people. That’s the tragedy. The people are better than the system they’ve been forced to defend.



See also the following Wild Reed posts:
Welcome to the U.S.A. . . . Officially
“Organized Sustained Systemic Resistance and Self-Defense Are Our Only Options”
Maha D. Blackfeather’s Message to the American People: “We’re Finally Seeing the Truth”
And So Here We Are
Chris Hedges on the End of the American Empire
Inauguration Day Thoughts (2025)
Progressive Perspectives on Where Democrats Went Wrong in 2024
Election Day U.S.A. (2020)
Marx and Class Struggle – Then and Now

Image: Artist unknown.


Wednesday, September 09, 2026

Stay Supple, Like a Reed


The hard and rigid
will be broken.
The soft and supple
will prevail.

Tao Te Ching
(Chapter 76)

A tree that will not bend snaps in the first real storm. Reeds that bend all the way to the ground stand up again the moment the wind passes.

This chapter of the Tao Te Ching uses the body itself as evidence. A living person is soft, flexible, yielding to touch. A corpse is stiff, rigid, resistant to movement. Life, in this observation, is not defined by strength in the way most people define it. It’s defined by pliability. Rigidity is what death looks like, physically and metaphorically both, whether it’s showing up in a body or in a mind that has hardened into fixed positions it refuses to update.

This cuts hard against the instinct to treat strength as firmness, standing your ground, refusing to bend under any circumstance. That kind of strength works right up until it meets a force larger than itself, and then it doesn’t bend, it breaks, because it never developed the capacity to absorb pressure without shattering. Softness isn’t the absence of strength. It’s a different kind of strength, one that survives precisely because it never needed to prove it couldn’t be moved.

This applies as much to identity and belief as it does to trees and bodies. A person who cannot update their views when reality contradicts them isn’t strong. They’re brittle, waiting for the specific pressure that will finally break what refused to bend even slightly. A person who stays supple, willing to adjust, willing to be wrong, willing to move without losing themselves in the moving, is the one still standing long after the rigid position has cracked.

Nothing that refuses to bend survives long enough to see what comes next. Only what stays supple gets to keep growing.

Pyramid Consciousness
via social media
August 29, 2026


See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
The Oak and the Reed
Flexibility and Flow
Trusting the Flow
Trust and Surrender
Awakening the Wild Soul
The Fatherly Heart
Vulnerability Is Power
Love as Exploring Vulnerability
Love as "Quest and Daring and Growth"
Our Bodies Are Part of the Cosmos
Move Us, Loving God

Image 1: Michael J. Bayly (September 2023).
Image 2: Michael J. Bayly (June 2009).


Tuesday, September 08, 2026

Finding Our Center-Deep


Draw into thy Centre-deep . . . thy Heavens within.
. . . Take present care of the Heavens of your Mind.
Dive into your own Celestiality, and see with what
manner of spirits you are endued: for in them
the Powers do entirely lie for Transformation.


How do we find our center-deep? We have hid from it all our days, though it beams upon us like a lighthouse and continually shows us the path to the center. This path of light can be discovered in times of quietness and solitude, when we withdraw from the bustle of life and contemplate who and where we are in the great web of existence, when we still our minds from the spindle of anxiety and redefine our being as a partaker in the vast macrocosm.

In the stillness of our body, mind, and soul, we discover the special spirits who are our guides and helpers on the spiritual path. These spirits are not fantasies or psychological archetypes; they are real, living beings.

Finding out which spiritual helpers we are gifted with is the primary task for those who would seek out their center-deep. All of us have our own spiritual friends – those beings who do not have a human or earthly existence but who nevertheless exist and accompany us. We do not choose them; they and we are drawn to each other according to the gifts we share. They cooperate with us in the work of transformation; for, by our encounters with the spirits of our center-deep, we grow and change as we are accompanied and taught.

Sitting in silence, become aware of your own center-deep. What kind of landscape does it have? Who is there with you? What has drawn you both there?

– Caitlin Matthews
Excerpted from The Celtic Spirit:
Daily Meditations for the Turning Year

HarperSanFrancisco, 1999


See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
Time to Go Inwards
Within You
In the Stillness and Silence of This Present Moment
The Beauty and Challenge of Being Present in the Moment
No Other Time, No Other Place
Today I Will Be Still
Allow Everything to Rest Right Now
A Sacred Pause
Aligning With the Living Light
Mystical Participation
A Season of Listening
Eckhart Tolle on Silence and Stillness
A Prayer of Anchoring
Cultivating Stillness
Inner Peace
The Source Is Within You
The Most Sacred and Simple Mystery of All
The Centered Life as An Advent Life
“Call Upon Those You Love”
Mistwalking
Holy Encounters Where Two Worlds Meet
Forever Oneness
“Window, Mind, Thought, Air and Love”
To Dream, to Feel, to Listen

Image: Saaxiib Qurux Badan (“Beautiful Friend”), Minneapolis, MN – Michael J. Bayly (7/26/23).


Monday, September 07, 2026

Quote of the Day

I believe in God.

I will never understand how some believers think it helps their cause to push theocracy – whether it's American Christian nationalism, Iranian Islamic theocracy, or Jewish ethno-state.

If your idea of God is so weak it needs man-made enforcement, then I hate to break it to you but you don’t worship the All Powerful Creator; you work for an all fragile cult.

Faith that requires force is a farce. Let there be no compulsion in faith. Let us ensure separation of religion and state.

Qasim Rashid
via social media
September 7, 2026


See also the following Wild Reed posts:
Douglas Richer: “God is Love and There Is That of God Within Everyone”
The Mystic Jesus: “A Name for the Unalterable Love That All of Us Share”
Guidelines for the Advent of a Universal Mysticism: An Introduction | Part 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8
In Search of a “Global Ethic”
One Wisdom
In the Garden of Spirituality: Richard Rohr – Part 1 | 2
Sufism: Way of Love, Tradition of Enlightenment, and Antidote to Fanaticism

Image: Artist unknown.


Friday, September 04, 2026

Kadeem Announces His Next Show


One of my favorite dancers, Kadeem Hosein (known as Kadeem En Pointe), has recently announced a second live / live-stream show. It’s a re-imaginging of Act II of Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker entitled “A World of Our Own” (For a review of Kadeem’s first show, “All the World’s a Stage,” click here.)


Following is Kadeem’s description of his December 19 show, along with his reasoning for encouraging folks to buy their ticket early.

__________________


I want to explain why booking early for my next show genuinely matters to me. My mission with everything I’m doing is to make ballet more accessible – financially, physically and emotionally.

I want to reach people who may never have seen a ballet before. People who have never felt represented or welcomed within ballet. People who love the art form but can’t easily get to a theatre because of where they live, accessibility, travel or cost.

That is a huge part of why I’m putting on this production in December. The Nutcracker is known around the world by even those who don't know ballet. This is an opportunity to really get the art form I love in front of so many people in a fresh (and hopefully exciting!) way.

For the in-person performance, I’ve deliberately priced 60% of the theatre at just £25 because I want a significant part of the auditorium to remain genuinely affordable.

The difficult reality is that, by doing that, even a completely sold-out theatre would only recoup around 35% of the planned production budget.

That means the livestream is an enormous part of making this possible.

The livestream this time isn’t an afterthought. It is central to what I’m trying to build. It means somebody thousands of miles away can experience the production at the same time as somebody sitting in the theatre, or even catch up for 14 days after if they can’t watch live but still want to be a part of this.

But because this is independently produced, many of the costs have to be committed to months before I know how many people will ultimately watch.

That’s why when you book matters almost as much as whether you book.

If you know you want to watch the performance, it would make an extraordinary difference to how much progress I could make towards funding the production if you booked right now.

It would give me the confidence to keep moving forward with not just this show but with what comes after it. More productions. More opportunities for artists. More accessible tickets. And perhaps, eventually, the opportunity to take this work to audiences in other cities and countries too.

So if you already know you’re going to watch, either on YouTube from anywhere in the world or with us at the theatre in London, I would be incredibly grateful if you booked early.

And I mean what I say about accessibility. If you genuinely want to watch the livestream but the ticket price is currently beyond what you can afford, please send me an email. I don’t want finances to be the reason somebody who wants to experience the production has to miss it.

Every booking helps me prove that there is an audience for a different way of making ballet – one that can be ambitious but still fairly priced and accessible at the same time.

I really hope we can keep building that together! ❤

Kadeem


Are you interested in supporting Kadeem beyond purchasing a ticket to his new show?

Well, you can join me in making a one time or recurring donation. Another way is by purchasing a copy of his most recent creative project. I’ll let Kadeem say more . . .

My new coffee table book The Pointe Of Passion is now available for you to have in your home. I hope that this book can serve as a reminder of perseverance and passion and can maybe insipire at least one person to find their passion – whatever that might be 🖤


Trust me, it’s a beautiful publication. My copy arrived in the mail just last week!


Here’s more about the book from Kadeem's website:

The Pointe of Passion is the first true photographic archive curated by Kadeem En Pointe, bringing together more than a decade of images captured in locations around the world. It is printed as a premium 98 page, 8 × 10 inch hardback coffee table book.

From the earliest photographs en pointe in public to the work being created today, this coffee table book traces an artistic journey through pointe shoes, tutus, public spaces and more. Alongside already shared images are never-before-seen photographs, offering an intimate look at the evolution of a project that has challenged perceptions of who ballet is for.

More than a collection of photographs, The Pointe of Passion is an exploration of becoming. It asks who ballet has traditionally made room for and what becomes possible when those boundaries begin to shift. It is a celebration of passion and the belief that beauty can be found and created in the most unexpected places.

Unlike many coffee table books, The Pointe of Passion has been published entirely independently. Every stage of its creation – from curating the archive to designing, printing and fulfilling each order – is funded and managed by Kadeem, allowing the project to remain true to the vision that has guided it from the very beginning. Every purchase directly supports the continued creation of independent ballet projects that seek to make the art form more accessible.

Signature and personalisation will be added to the first blank page on the inside, unless otherwise requested.


Click here to purchase The Pointe of Passion.






Related Off-site Links:
Kadeem’s Official Website
“Being a Ballet Dancer Is Years of Hard Work, But It’s All Worth It” Says Kadeem En Pointe – Stuart Norval (France 24, February 26, 2026).
Men en Pointe: Ballet Dancers Kick Against Gender Stereotypes – Matilda Martin (The Guardian, March 10, 2021).





For previous posts about Kadeem, see:
Kadeem
A Message in Dance That Challenges, Inspires and Liberates
Kadeem En Pointe: Finding Freedom in Dance
A Mesmerizing Performance


See also the following dance-related Wild Reed posts:
The Soul of a Dancer
The Trouble with the Male Dancer – Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3
Dancer Calvin Royal III: Stepping Into His Light
The Premise of All Forms of Dance
The Art of Dancing as the Supreme Symbol of the Spiritual Life
The Power of Dance
“Then I Shall Leap Into Love”
Love’s the Only Dance
We All Dance
Not Whether We Dance, But How
The Dance of Life
And As We Dance . . .
Our Dance
“I Came Alive With Hope”
Finding Balance in the Presence of the Beloved
Our Bodies Are Part of the Cosmos
Flexibility and Flow
Move Us, Loving God
A Prayer for Dancers
Trusting the Flow
Aristotle Papanikolaou on How Being Religious Is Like Being a Dancer


Image: Photo by @mandyleft