There are not many issues that are a greater waste of time and money in our era of AI and political polarization locally and globally than efforts to reverse the nuclear arms race. Addressing root causes to prevent most local, national and global threats must be paramount. But prevention appears to be an un-American principle. For at least 5 decades the Peace movement investments in disarmament have mostly failed to reverse the Nuclear Arms Race. Great nuclear weapon reductions were once made, yet nuclear armed nations (US, Russia, Israel, China, India, Pakistan, N. Korea) have starting wars with other nations lacking them. This is an incentive for any non-nuclear nation to get more. Worse yet, some of the nations that already gave some up have now regretted it.
U.S. Mayors have many other seriously disruptive domestic issues needing focused attention; jobs, housing, inflation, food & energy costs, health care, education, crime, murder rates, drug addiction, violent extremist groups, cyber security...and debt. In addition, our national 'independent' government has failed to stop other globally disruptive interdependent forces like pandemics, extreme weather events, violent religious extremists, wars, genocides, refugee flows, and the evolution of multiple forms of other WMD that are now cheaper, easier to make and move, anonymous, and more deadly than a nuclear weapon.
This days United for Peace & Justice www.actionnetwork.org (June 24, 2026) action alert... asks people to “Organize Locally for Peace and Justice”. As if that's going to make any difference. It will in the fundraising spirit of their campaign from donors ignoring the obvious in favor of their reactionary mental bubble.
U.S. Conference of Mayors Urges the United States to Lead a Global Effort to Halt and Reverse the Nuclear Arms Race
In a time of growing tensions among nuclear-armed states, at the close of its 94th Annual Meeting the final business plenary of the United States Conference of Mayors (USCM) unanimously adopted a bold new resolution, “Urging the United States to Lead a Global Effort to Halt and Reverse the Nuclear Arms Race.” The USCM is the official nonpartisan association of more than 1,500 American cities with populations over 30,000. Resolutions adopted at its annual meetings become USCM official policy. The 2026 USCM Mayors for Peace resolution was sponsored by Mayor Lacey Beaty, of Beaverton, OR, and cosponsored by Mayors Larry Agran, of Irvine, CA, Martha Guerrero, of West Sacramento, CA, Adena Ishii, of Berkeley, CA, Elizabeth Kautz, of Burnsville, MN, Chris Koos, of Normal, IL, and Barbara Lee, of Oakland, CA...
Why are people ignoring the causes of those "tensions among nuclear-armed states"? The vast majority of organizations in the progressive peace movement have been ignoring the inherent UN flaw within the Security Council. It prioritizes the protection of national severity of the most powerful nations plus wealthy entities above the protection of basic human rights and the environment.
The life, death, and environmental costly consequences are clear in last year's statistics - with 65 active conflicts now using increasingly cheap and more powerful weapons. The last 26 years had more conflicts than any time since World War II. Plus, nations (some with nukes, some without) squaring off against other nations - doubled in the last few years. More than in any year since 1946. Russia -Ukraine, Israel – Iran, US - Iran, Israel - Palestine, India - Pakistan, Thailand - Cambodia, Afghanistan-Pakistan, Syria - Yemen, and US/Great Britain - the Hootie’s in the Red Sea.
These were the deadliest conflicts on Earth since the 1994 Rwanda genocide, where in just 100 days about 800,000 people were slaughtered - mostly with clubs or machetes. Now anything can be weaponized (social media, courts, cars, drones...), making disarmament delusional and a waste of nonrenewable time and donated cash demanding it. Virtually ignoring all the other real threats people, nature, and nations face daily.
Without global justice there will be no peace. And that isn't coming any time soon. The 'Peace through strength" movement (now most popular among the most powerful governments) is even more delusional than the progressive peace movement. Israel's genocide in Gaze, war crimes in Lebanon, and crimes against humanity in the West Bank have sealed the fate of Jewish people (both Zionists and non-Zionists) almost anywhere globally. Political borders are simply indefensible. Jews now have a target on their back ... with no end in sight given some Zionist Jews strongly believe the bible is a real-estate manual - and thus, willing to kill and even die in mass numbers -defending this delusional religious concept.
This political, national, and religions delusion, plus every other motivation for war, genocide, or collective mass murder or punishment is fundamentally our species mental health crisis. These mental constructs (religion, nationalism, capitalism...communism) are not in our social species DNA. They were concepts our minds created about 10,000 years ago when they aided in bonding our tribes and growing growth. Unfortunately, our thumbs enabled the evolution of weapons as tools, then aided by extremely intelligent human minds. And now we have multiple forms of WMD that will NEVER go away...
Not until we realized AI's exponential growth into AGI, might decide humans are the problem. And its own survival is at stake. We are gambling with the chances AI, AGI, or humans will achieve wisdom in time.
Don't bet on it. But AI/AGI might decide we are worth keeping around for entertainment.
If these progressive Peace do-gooders were serious about reducing conflicts they would unite with other progressive movements (Environment, economic/social Justice) and advocate for businesses funding the SDG ASAP. By investing in human health, economic, and environment sustainably at local community levels - those businesses, billionaires, and trillionaires might have a chance of making capitalism and profit making sustainable.
If progressive movements continue to refuse to unite...to stop this insanity - it would be wise to start preparing for the consequences. If you've read yesterday's blog post, you'll likely notice the coming chaos is inevitable.
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