Counterpunch going in the crapper once again and more

After removing it from my main blogroll, I hadn't even visited it before my July vacation until the end of September.

Ye gads. It's got issues.

Beyond giving the late Ward Churchill a pass on being a pretendian, here's some of the recent "fun."

Wait, wait, here's the start of the fun. Per Counterpunch's search bar, the word "pretendian" isn't even in the entirety of Counterpunch online. Gads.

The DSA Roseys are like anarchists! Wingnuts will take a bong hit off that.  And why do Jeff St. Clair and Joshua Frank have someone who has written for places like the WaPost and Guardian writing for them? This other person gets it more right, without identifying what he's discovered, perhaps because he doesn't know. When I saw him talk about how "caucuses have a level of power within DSA that is absurdly disproportionate to the number of people they represent," I said, he's talking about the Green Party. Caucus-based tribalism is not anarchism.

Speaking of, via surrogates, St. Clair continues hating on the Green Party with running this interesting, or "interesting," takedown obit of David Cobb, via a presumable flunky contributor. (That may be the same person I ran into via Silverstein's "Washington Babylon" revamp. It is and oh no.) You know what? Mine's much better, in part because it doesn't turn into a laughable paean to the DSA Roseys, whom the author claims are more effective than Greens. Beyond that lie, there's others. First, Nader had never officially registered as a Green in 2000, part of the reason for his 2004 party demise. Basically, per this paper, he tried to play footsie, like Jesse the Body Ventura in 2020 and Cornell West in 2024, wanting the nomination on a platter but refusing to engage before that. And(rew)ie Stewart's also a conspiracy theorist on Malcolm X's death.

(Stewart originally ran the piece on that person's [sic] Substack and St. Clair picked it up. Speaking of? Again, fuck you; and I'm sorry that I went out of my way to challenge High Country News for stopping running you as well as Felice Pace and others. And, per my editing of that person's first name? A "transgender woman" would be a woman wearing men's jeans and Carhatts. You're a transgender man, clearly male, Clyde. Or, perhaps better yet, to use that old-time word? You're a transvestite.)

"Pergressuve" John Ferrer gives off the vibes of a Cold War 2.0 Russiaphobe in this piece with the inaccuracy early on of claiming Ukraine has gained territory in 2026. It has, but Russia has gotten more, in areas that were Ukraine-held before this year. Even fucking Ukrainian Pravda admits this. Feffer is a George Soros neolib. Why's he writing for Counterpunch?

Looking outside Counterpunch's pages, Frank has a new book: "Bad Energy." I quote from the editorial blurb on Goodreads: 

In Bad Energy, award-winning journalist Joshua Frank argues that the green energy transition is driven not by an effort to save the planet but by profit incentives. We must stop burning fossil fuels if we have any hope of saving the planet, but the significant, haphazard expansion of green energy in recent years—from large solar projects to wind energy to mining for renewables—has destroyed communities and ecosystems. And worse, renewables simply cannot match our ever-expanding demand for energy, driven in no small part by the rapid proliferation of data centers in the world’s wealthiest nations.

I'm not saying he's all wrong, but that's an oversell at a minimum. 

The first claim? No, something more accurate would be:

The green energy transition, launched as an effort to save the planet, has been taken over by a profit-first focus.

There you go.

Second, you can't have small solar or wind projects. Even without data centers being pushed, pushed, pushed, we need more renewable electricity as is. Conservation might be nice, but, and not wanting to sound like Darth Cheney, by itself, it's not a major part of the answer. 

Third, no, not all such projects have "destroyed ecosystems," and many have actually boosted rural communities. Get out west of the 97th meridian, but before you get to full desert, wind or solar farms have allowed family cattle ranches to stop overgrazing, and thus cut a few cow farts and belches out of the system while at least partially protecting the natural vegetation that still remains. 

Counterpunch has an extract from the book. The last one-third is still partially general environmentalism, but it also steers into NIMBYism. 

Third, Joshua, in January 2025, when you went from Montana to Los Angeles, how did you get there? Flight? Big old Montana gas-guzzling pickup? Midsized car? Hybrid? (Disclosure: I have a 2011 CVPI ex-cop car. It was cheap, but yes, uses more gas than smaller cars. But, because it was cheap, I'll run it until it gets near the point of needing more major repairs.)

The biggest issue, though, is one that I called out eons ago. No consistent editorial direction. It plays out in detail in a variety of issues. Russia-Ukraine is perhaps the biggest current example; besides that Russiagate-sounding piece, you may have others giving more support to Russia withstanding NATO. You may even have someone halfway like Max Blumenthal.

Speaking of Max, from Counterpunch's past of a few years ago, more than today, takes on China in general and Xinjiang in particular are all over the fucking board. And, that's not just in the past. Note this April 2026 piece, of a type with which I would agree. That said? One of the two authors called out, Vijay Prasad, writes for Counterpunch! Although he's not written there about Xinjiang in 2026, he did as recently as two years ago. Maybe St. Clair or Frank finally put an editorial thumb on a scale?

Yes, one can argue you'd like people to think for themselves. You'd also like a magazine of politics and opinion to take an actual stand, though. Wouldn't you?