If there is one good thing to be said about 2006, the consensus on Swans would have to be, "it's almost over." Or as Milo Clark puts it, "huff and puff and blow 2006 into history..."
In our year-end issue, we present a variety of perspectives, ranging from a "New Way Forward" for Swans in 2007 by Jan Baughman, to comprehensive overviews in the respective styles of Gilles d'Aymery, Ed Herman, Milo Clark, and Phil Greenspan. The anti-immigration movement and the power of political expression were topics at heart for Eli Beckerman and Michael DeLang. Bob Wrubel analyzed the failure of the anti-war movement, while Martin Murie celebrated three noteworthy successes of the year. Gerard Donnelly Smith looked at the unfinished business that should be attended to in 2007, should the midterm election mandate be taken seriously rather than falling into the political dustbin of broken promises described by Charles Marowitz. American expat Troy Headrick provided his perspective on the year and the U.S. from his home in Turkey; and another expat, Peter Byrne, sent a wonderful Swans-centric holiday gift of his creative humor and wit. George Beres told a World War II story in which British and German soldiers put down their weapons and shared Christmas on the battlefield, and Guido Monte painted another of his colorful poems.
Finally, we close with your letters and our wishes for a peaceful holiday season. We'll be back on January 1st with our traditional, irreverent, and downright impertinent predictions for 2007.
As always, please form your OWN opinion, and let your friends (and foes) know about Swans.
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Jan Baughman: 2006 And Counting
It's like Review 2005, or 2004, or 2003, or 2002, or whichever version -- I could go back to the year in which I opened my eyes to the stalemate that so many of us have been pinned down by from time immemorial. We keep dissenting war, complaining about social policies, lamenting the decline, yet still hoping for the best. More...
Gilles d'Aymery: Was 2006 A Worthy Year? - Holiday Reading
Chaos and loss of control seem to be the common denominator of this ending year, with its corollary, the attempt to regain control, at least domestically, through the midterm elections that saw the Democrats taking over Congress and the Iraq Study Group (ISG) that attempted to conflate the disgruntling voices within the establishment and to confine the limits of dissent. More...
Edward S. Herman: Reflections On 2006
The year 2006 has been another bad one, despite the fact that the world's most important set of "willing executioners" (the US public) has finally aroused itself enough to slap down the frat-boy would-be emperor in the November elections. More...
Martin Murie: Three Victories In 2006
Another disaster year, but there are always those little-noticed flares of resistance, here, in these States of America. Alison and I want to put three of these on the year's gloom board. Look! Flickering lights that never quite go out. More...
Eli Beckerman: The Year That Wasn't
Fear, bloodshed, tears, despair, destruction, corruption, and conquest. These are words that are beginning to describe every year since 2001. More...
Michael DeLang: A People's Resolution
Towards the end of each year it has become my habit to look back on the year and try to determine the one thing that may have produced the most profound impact on my understanding of the world in which I live. More...
Gerard Donnelly Smith: Unfinished Business (2006)
Among the piles of papers strewn about my desk, things wait for completion: poems to finish, essays to write, letters to compose, house renovations to finish. Yet these things seem insignificant when compared to our nation's unfinished business: ending war, balancing budgets, prosecuting elected traitors, stopping racist profiling, rebuilding flood damaged neighborhoods, enacting universal health care, reforming school funding. More...
Robert Wrubel: The Anti-War Movement Failure
2006 is the year in which we can finally say goodbye to the anti-war movement. By allowing the focus of the debate to be shifted entirely onto the November elections, we allowed victory to be defined as a Democratic Congress. More...
Charles Marowitz: 2006: Promises, Honored Or Broken
One might assume that the highpoint of a generally catastrophic year in American politics was the dramatic sweep by the Democrats in the midterm elections. More...
Troy Headrick: Coming Full Circle
I'm grateful to have been asked by Gilles d'Aymery to write an essay on 2006 -- "from my perspective," he specified. First of all, this matter of "perspective" is tricky. I anticipate that much of what I'll have to say in this piece will be about American politics and culture, but my knowledge of those is limited to information I can gather second-hand, filtered through the Internet. More...
Milo Clark: A Year Of Implosion
Lee and I live a nearly idyllic life in rural Hawaii. Doesn't stop me from worrying about the rest of things, though. More...
Philip Greenspan: The Year The Obvious Was Acknowledged
2006 is the year when it became obvious that the United States was a declining world power and the momentum of that decline was accelerating! It's hard to tell when the turning point occurred. More...
Peter Byrne: Merry Xstress 2006
Let g-d and Swans have a dialogue. More...
George Beres: Killing And Christmas Year In Year Out
For those who accept the Biblical tale, Christmas comes to put to rest life's deepest contradictions. More...
Guido Monte: 2006: Pulvis et umbra sumus
A special 2006 colorful representation of creativity that was published in slightly different form two weeks ago. Different colors. Same themes and memes. More...
Two takes on Harold Pinter, from Charles Marowitz and Peter Byrne; kudos for Gerard Donnelly Smith's "Lucifer's Lament"; thoughts for Alouette Arouet from Sancho Panza; and an exchange between Senator Barbara "Change the Course" Boxer and Jan Baughman. More...
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