Participants in the Lausanne Conference announce the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action Regarding the Islamic Republic of Iran’s Nuclear Program (from left): Hailong Wu of China, Laurent Fabius of France, Frank-Walter Steinmeier of Germany, Federica Mogherini of the European Union, Javad Zarif of Iran, an unidentified Russian official, Philip Hammond of the United Kingdom, and John Kerry of the United States in the Rolex Forum auditorium of the EPFL Learning Centre, Écublens-Lausanne, Switzerland on 2 April 2015. The Lausanne framework has the potential to change the direction the Middle East away from conflict and towards peaceful coexistence.

The potential of Lausanne can be compared to that of the 1963 Limited Test Ban Treaty, which allowed the world to turn away from the brink of thermonuclear confrontation as seen during the Cuban missile crisis of October 1962, and to enjoy the benefits of war avoidance between the thermonuclear superpowers USSR and USA. What is shaping up now is the biggest foreign policy debate in US politics since `the rejection of the League of Nations after World War I. Do not let the GOP Congress of scoundrels and adventurers scuttle Lausanne, and place this country on the path to a general Middle East war and possible world war in the service of their sordid ambitions.

On October 7, 1963 President Kennedy signed the Limited Nuclear Test Ban Treaty in the White House Treaty Room. Looking on were (left to right) William Hopkins, Sen. Mike Mansfield, John J. McCloy, Adrian S. Fisher, Sen. John Pastore, W. Averell Harriman, Sen. George Smathers, Sen. J.W. Fulbright, Sec. of State Dean Rusk, Sen. George Aiken, President Kennedy, Sen. Hubert H. Humphrey, Sen. Everett Dirksen, William C. Foster, Sen. Howard W. Cannon, Sen. Leverett Saltonstall, Sen. Thomas H. Kuchel, Vice President Johnson.

Last Thursday seven British Party leaders met in a televised debate. Those present included Cameron for the Tories, Miliband for New Labor, Clegg for the Liberal Democrats, Farage for the xenophobic UK Independence Party, and Natalie Bennett for the Greens, plus Scottish and Welsh regional parties. Natalie Bennett of the Greens (photo) claimed that hers is the main anti-austerity party. But while the Greens may oppose certain forms of fiscal and wage austerity, they demand a ferocious energy austerity which is every bit as destructive, especially when combined with de-industrialization and the rejection of vital infrastructure investments.

So far as is known, the only candidate standing for the May 7 elections in any of the UK’s 650 election districts who rejects both fiscal/wage and budget austerity is Stuart J. Hooper of South Basildon and East Thurrock, Essex. Hooper wants a trading tax or financial transfer tax on the transactions of the City of London banks to replenish the Treasury. He also proposes the nationalization of the Bank of England to provide several trillion pounds sterling of national credit to fully fund the National Health Service build attractive, modern housing units, and rebuild Britain’s depleted infrastructure.

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