1029 QuickLinks

Tuesday, April 8, 2008
The Meekest Democratic Senator (No, Not Harry Reid)
Collaborator on telecom immunity, advocate of warrantless spying, cheerleader for invading Iraq? "That's just Jay being Jay," reports Alexander Zaitchik in a profile on AlterNet of Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-WVA).

Tuesday, April 8, 2008
Green Zone Now a Danger Zone
"The Green Zone was once considered an American oasis -- a protected bubble of comfort food, large, American-made sport-utility vehicles and enforced speed limits," reports the Washington Post. But since March 23, four Americans and 14 non-Americans have been killed inside by insurgent shelling.

Tuesday, April 1, 2008
The House That Karl Built
Scott Horton reports on Larisa Alexandrovna of Raw Story, who tracked down Karl Rove's resort home on the border of Florida and Alabama. After talking with locals, she wrote, "I have never seen anyone so unwelcome and unwanted in their own community."

Monday, March 24, 2008
Bet You Didn't Know This About McCain
"Two extraordinary moments in his political past that are at odds with the candidate of the present: His discussions in 2001 with Democrats about leaving the Republican Party, and his conversations in 2004 with Senator John Kerry about becoming Mr. Kerry's running mate on the Democratic presidential ticket." Elisabeth Bumiller reports in the New York Times.

Monday, March 24, 2008
Not Just 4,000 Dead, But 25 in Last Two Weeks
"American forces have just experienced the most violent two-week period in Iraq since September 2007," writes Brandon Friedman at Vet Voice. "Of the two significant numbers this week -- 4,000 killed during war and 25 in the last two weeks -- the latter figure is far more significant with regard to the current situation on the ground."

Monday, March 24, 2008
Sign of the Times: Best Buy, Home Depot Allow Haggling
"Shoppers are discovering an upside to the down economy. They are getting price breaks by reviving an age-old retail strategy: haggling," reports the New York Times. "A bargaining culture once confined largely to car showrooms and jewelry stores is taking root in major stores like Best Buy, Circuit City and Home Depot."

Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Spitzer's Successor Also Weighed Down by Infidelity Baggage
"The thunderous applause was still ringing in his ears when the state's new governor, David Paterson, told the New York Daily News that he and his wife had extramarital affairs."

Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Sheer Number of Suicide Bombers in Iraq Staggering
"Suicide bombers in Iraq have killed at least 13,000 men, women and children," writes Robert Fisk at Britain's Independent. "Our most conservative estimate gives a total figure of 13,132."

Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Spitzer May Be Guilty of Worse
(1 comments) The New York Megaphone received documents recently that indicate Eliot Spitzer's social connections -- WTC baron Larry Silverstein -- may be preventing him from investigating 9/11.

Wednesday, March 12, 2008
The Article That Helped Bring Down Admiral Fallon
"If, in the dying light of the Bush administration, we go to war with Iran, it'll all come down to one man. If we do not go to war with Iran, it'll come down to the same man," writes Thomas Barnett at Esquire. "He is that rarest of creatures in the Bush universe: a man of strategic brilliance."

Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Wired's Editor Thinks Free Is the Future of Business
"Once a marketing gimmick, free has emerged as a full-fledged economy. Offering free music proved successful for Radiohead, Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails, and a swarm of other bands on MySpace that grasped the audience-building merits of zero," writes Chris Anderson.

Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Spitzer's Fall Bad for Hillary
"The governor of her state -- who also happens to be one of her highest-profile backers -- is in trouble, big trouble," writes John Nichols at the Nation. "But Hillary Clinton doesn't want to go there."

Tuesday, March 11, 2008
It Wasn't Prostitution Ring That Led to Spitzer, But Vice-Versa
According to Brian Ross's page at ABC News, suspicious financial activity on the part of New York's governor "was initially reported by a bank to the IRS which. . . brought in the FBI's Public Corruption Squad. 'We had no interest at all in the prostitution ring until the thing with Spitzer led us to learn about it,' said one Justice Department official."

Friday, March 7, 2008
Obama Adviser and Pulitzer Prize Winner Calls Clinton a "Monster"
Samantha Power, author of the classic "Problem from Hell," tried to make it off the record. But she said, "She is a monster. . . . The amount of deceit she has put forward is really unattractive."

Monday, March 3, 2008
Bush Further Defunds Nuclear Storage Clean-up
"Buried in President Bush's proposed budget for next year is a story of broken promises," writes Washington's Gov. Chris Gregoire at the Washington Post. "The president wants to increase spending on every major category of our government's nuclear program except one: cleaning up our toxic nuclear legacy." Like the infamous Hanford.

Monday, March 3, 2008
Confronation with Iran Re-ignites
An exhibition by the US of nuclear documents that appeared (operative word) to have come from Iran's military laboratories open the road to more sanctions.

Thursday, February 28, 2008
The Financial Predators Had a Ball
In part V of a Global Research series, the incomparable William Engdahl explains how the multi-trillion dollar US-centered securitization debacle began to unravel.

Thursday, February 28, 2008
Nobe Laureate Ups Price Tag of Wars to $3 Trillion
White House response? "People like Joe Stiglitz lack the courage to consider the cost of doing nothing and the cost of failure. One can't even begin to put a price tag on the cost to this nation of the attacks of 9-11," said White House spokesman Tony Fratto. Sounds like the Edwards's are on the right path, doesn't it?

Thursday, February 28, 2008
McCain's Canal Zone Birth Prompts Queries About Whether That Rules Him Out
(1 comments) "The question has nagged at the parents of Americans born outside the continental United States for generations: Dare their children aspire to grow up and become president? In the case of Senator John McCain of Arizona, the issue is becoming more than a matter of parental daydreaming." Carl Hulse of the New York Times reports.

Thursday, February 28, 2008
Clinton Rebounds -- Picks up Half a Delegate!
"The anomaly happened because the Democrats Abroad will send 22 delegates to the Democratic National Convention, each with a half vote," reports the Associated Press. "The system is designed to enable the group to send more people to the convention, without inflating its voting power."

Thursday, February 28, 2008
Why Did McCain Aid Bud Paxson, His Implacable Foe?
"McCain never wavered from his opposition to the legislation Paxson pushed, which would have diverted those billions into his company's coffers and away from the U.S. Treasury," writes Scott Woolley at Forbes. "Whether McCain did any other, smaller favors for Paxson is a question that will draw new attention as the campaign heats up."

Tuesday, February 26, 2008
John and Elizabeth Edwards Launch Campaign to Link Recession to Iraq
(1 comments) They're "joining a coalition of 4 political action groups: the political arm of the SEIU, VoteVets, Moveon, and the Center for American Progress to launch a 20 million dollar initiative on bringing attention to the economic problems of the Iraq war and how it affects the American pocketbook," reports Open Left.

Tuesday, February 26, 2008
Another Passing Grade for Iran on Nuclear Activity
Once again, the US is dissatisfied with the IAEA and is fixating on a laptop of dubious origin with plans for a nuclear warhead on it in an attempt to institute another round of sanctions. Farideh Farhi at Informed Comment: Global Affairs explains.

Tuesday, February 26, 2008
Former Clinton Consort Gennifer Flowers Resurfaces
She seeks to auction off their recorded tapes. To stop Hillary? "I don't need to hurt Hillary. She is doing a fine job of that herself, along with her idiot husband."

Sunday, February 24, 2008
Indian Officials Dread Obama Presidency
Senators Biden, Kerry, and Hagel are in New Delhi trying to close the US-Indian nuclear energy deal -- one that's unlikely to be completed if the antiproliferation Obama is elected president.

Sunday, February 24, 2008
Is Pakistan Election a Win or Loss for Bush Administration?
"Given the administration's staunch backing for Musharraf," writes Jim Lobe at Asia Times Online, "particularly over the past year as he dismissed the supreme court, altered the constitution, and cracked down against the secular opposition -- Monday's vote seemed to be almost as much a rebuff to Washington as to Musharraf himself."

Sunday, February 24, 2008
Rare Interview with Baseball Legend
Sandy Koufax speaks! Though not for long. To the New York Times.

Sunday, February 24, 2008
First B-2 Stealth Bomber Crashes
After take-off from Guam. The crew ejected safely, but that's $1.2 billion (yes, billion -- for one plane) down the drain.

Sunday, February 24, 2008
Did He or Didn't He?
(1 comments) Newly conflicting claims about McCain meeting with communications giant and lobbyist. Either way, looks like he may be on the fast track to Giuliani land.

Friday, February 22, 2008
Quick Reaction Mutes Damage to McCain, Claims ABC
"In less than 24 hours the McCain campaign traveled the long distance from anger and anxiety to calm and confidence." Apparently ABC is taking the McCain campaign's word for it that the issue is resolved. Thanks once again for the objectivity, MSM!

Friday, February 22, 2008
Cluster Bomb Conference Ends on Upbeat Note
"More than 120 nations trying to negotiate a treaty banning most cluster bombs failed to reach agreement in talks that ended Friday in New Zealand," according to the AP. "But Human Rights Watch spokesman Steve Goose said the conference 'has been a rousing success.'"

Friday, February 22, 2008
University of Colorado Elects New President Who Doesn't Believe in Global Warming
(8 comments) Among other things, writes Sam Smith at Scholars & Rogues, he also co-founded a 527 group with Pete Coors for the purpose of bashing Democrats.

Wednesday, February 20, 2008
US Accused of Stalling Cluster Bomb Talks
Nobel Peace Prize winner Jody Williams accused the United States on Wednesday of trying to stall negotiations on an international agreement to ban cluster bombs - without even attending talks on the treaty.

Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Facebook Is Almost as Tough to Break Free of as the Mob
"Are you a member of Facebook.com?" asks Maria Aspan in the New York Times. "You may have a lifetime contract. Some users have discovered that it is nearly impossible to remove themselves entirely from Facebook, setting off a fresh round of concern over the popular social network's use of personal data."

Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Social Networking: The Next Generation
"Have you ever noticed how social networks don't do a very good job of representing how our personal networks actually function?" asks Dr. Slammy at Scholars & Rogues. "Sure, places like Facebook and MySpace and LinkedIn have their utility, but their flatness is a problem."

Tuesday, February 12, 2008
"Sorry, George, I Need More"
"George W. is going to give us back some money in May -- perhaps as much as $300 or $600 or $1200," writes Linda Seger at Huffington Post. "He thinks that this will make up for his failed economic policies. But isn't this similar to a giving a band-aid to a child who needs a $30,000 operation?"

Tuesday, February 12, 2008
"Our" Terrorist: Luis Posada Carriles
Why is terrorist Luis Posada Carriles enjoying the good life in Miami? Among other things, he's responsible for the 1976 downing of a Cuban passenger plane with 73 people on board, writes CODEPINK's Medea Benjamin.

Tuesday, February 12, 2008
The "Folly of Attacking Iran" Tour
Coming to a town near you. Meanwhile, watch the video of top Iran experts at Just Foreign Policy.

Friday, February 8, 2008
Bush Approval at New Low
Or his disapproval is at a new high -- 30% according to a new AP poll. But he can take heart that approval of Congress is even lower -- 22%. Bush, Reid, Pelosi: three peas in a pod.

Friday, February 8, 2008
Max Head-Romney, We Hardly Knew Ye
"Here lieth the campaign of Mitt Romney," writes Howard Fineman at Newsweek, "victim of the mistaken belief that the only way to succeed in national Republican politics was to turn yourself into something you are not."

Friday, February 8, 2008
Krugman: Today's Economy Cross Between Dot-Com Bust and S&L Crisis
"On one side," writes Paul Krugman at the New York Times, "the bursting of the housing bubble is playing the role that the bursting of the dot-com bubble played in 2001. On the other, the subprime crisis is creating a credit crunch reminiscent of the crunch after the savings-and-loan crisis of the late 1980s, which led to recession in 1990."

Friday, February 8, 2008
Shadow War: AT&T Versus Verizon for Control of American Communications
(1 comments) Why is AT&T willing to play Internet cop when Verizon is not? Martin Bosworth at Scholars & Rogues answers a question with a question: "Is AT&T getting preferential treatment or subsidization from the government if it offers itself up as a content policeman for Hollywood and Washington both?"

Sunday, February 3, 2008
Democrat Disaster Debunked
Chris Bowers at Open Left sees John McCain winning the Presidency over Hillary Clinton. Joshua Holland at AlterNet begs to differ.

Friday, February 1, 2008
I Am a Geek in a Jock Culture
"I'm an electrical engineer working in the aerospace industry," writes Brian Angliss at Scholars & Rogues. But "I can speak a few words of Klingon and Elvish, and I think it's totally cool that some people take the time to make their own chain mail."

Friday, February 1, 2008
"Der schwarze Kennedy"
Some Germans are calling Obama the black JFK. "America's extraordinary presidential campaign has captivated politicians and ordinary people around the globe," reports the Boston Globe.

Thursday, January 31, 2008
9/11 Commissioner Zelikow Interfered with Report
(1 comments) ABC reports that Philip Zelikow was holding private discussions with Karl Rove during the course of the 9/11 investigation. Not to mention giving colleague Condi Rice a free pass.

Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Nukes in Space (or at Least Lasers)
(6 comments) As it has in past years, the U.S. government plans to oppose a draft treaty, written by China and Russia, for the "Prevention of Placement of Weapons in Outer Space" when it is introduced Feb. 12 at the international Conference on Disarmament in Geneva. (Courtesy of Nukes of Hazard.)

Tuesday, January 29, 2008
Will Obama's Momentum Carry Over to Super Tuesday?
"Super Tuesday is a particular challenge for Obama, who trails Clinton in most national polls," reports the Los Angeles Times. "Three of the biggest states voting -- New York, New Jersey and Connecticut -- are in Clinton's backyard; a fourth, Arkansas, was her home before her husband was elected president."

Tuesday, January 29, 2008
Countrywide CEO Foregoes Plush Payoff Package -- But He's Still Smiling
"Lest you think Angelo Mozilo will be on the welfare rolls by next year, fear not -- he's still walking away with retirement funding and deferred compensation totaling $40 million or so," writes Martin Bosworth at Scholars & Rogues. "Oh, the horror! How will he show his face at the country club now?"

Tuesday, January 29, 2008
The Man Who Learned Too Little
"The sad thing about President George W. Bush's eighth and final State of the Union address is that he seems to have learned so little about the crises in which he's immersed his nation so deeply," writes Fred Kaplan at Slate.

Tuesday, January 29, 2008
Major New Player on the Progressive Web
The Washington Independent. (Still in beta, or testing, stage.) Welcome it to the Web with a page view.

Monday, January 28, 2008
Bad Tempers, Part II: McCain
"He is erratic. He is hotheaded. He loses his temper and he worries me," said Senator Thad Cochran (R-MS). "The thought of his being president sends a cold chill down my spine."

Monday, January 28, 2008
Bad Tempers, Part I: Bill Clinton
(1 comments) After Bill Clinton knocked down his former advisor, Dick Morris (now foe of liberals) in 1989, Hillary said, "He only does this to people he loves." How does she know? Did that include her?

Thursday, January 24, 2008
Is the Bush Stimulus Going to Help You?
"The rhetoric surrounding George W. Bush's economic stimulus package," writes Nomi Prins at AlterNet, "indicates a complete lack of comprehension of the difference between this 'national' economy and the 'people's' economy, and the extent of the gap between the two." So what else is new?

Thursday, January 24, 2008
Massive Munitions Blast in Mosul
At least 17 dead. "It reverberated through the city as no explosion ever had before," writes Juan Cole at Informed Comment. "The casualty toll is likely to rise, since there were still people trapped under rubble at the site of the massive explosion."

Thursday, January 24, 2008
Big Dog Is off the Leash and Ripping up the Yard
"Bill Clinton is all over the place -- campaign guru, surrogate candidate, one-man first response team," writes Gail Collins at the New York Times. "By next week, he'll be designing the bumper stickers."

Thursday, January 24, 2008
Kerry Speaks Out on "Swiftboating"
(1 comments) "I hate the term 'Swiftboating,'" writes Sen. John Kerry. "I hate how the name of the boats we honored when we were in uniform in Vietnam has become a verb for the twisted politics of Karl Rove." But today we need to fight the right wing's tactics not just to reclaim a word, but to reclaim our democracy.

Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Nato "Must Prepare to Launch Nuclear Attack"
(5 comments) Nato must prepare to launch pre-emptive nuclear attacks to ward off the use of weapons of mass destruction by its enemies, according to a group of former senior military officials, including John Shalikashvili, the former Nato commander in Europe and chairman of the US joint chiefs of staff. Talk about keeping all options on the table.

Friday, January 18, 2008
Ahmadinejad Fearless in Face of Israeli Ballistic Missile Test
"In an interview with al-Jazeera TV, the Iranian leader said Israel 'would not dare' attack Iran," The BBC reports. "He spoke as Israel announced it had test-fired a ballistic missile."

Thursday, January 17, 2008
White House Recycled Tapes Used to Record Emails
"E-mail messages sent and received by White House personnel during the first three years of the Bush administration were routinely recorded on tapes that were 'recycled,'" reports the Washington Post. Ah, Nixon's legacy.

Thursday, January 17, 2008
CentCom Commander Fallon Says Pakistan to Allow in More US Troops
"Navy Adm. William J. Fallon, commander of U.S. Central Command, said he believes increased violence inside Pakistan in recent months has led Pakistani leaders to conclude that they must focus more intensively on extremist al-Qaida hideouts near the border with Afghanistan," reports the Associated Press. Sneaking suspicion that the Pakistani people may not agree.

Thursday, January 17, 2008
Gates and Petraeus Have Different Ideas About Number of US Troops in Iraq
"While General Petraeus is in no hurry for more than five brigades to leave, Secretary Gates weighs a bigger drawdown," reports the Christian Science Monitor.

Thursday, January 17, 2008
Sequel to Schultz, Perry, Kissinger and Nunn's Anti-Nukes Article
Last year the WSJ published a widely read article by this quartet. In a follow-up they re-asses the state of nuclear disarmament and outline what needs to be done next. Though fossils, they're still influential.

Wednesday, January 16, 2008
US Shamed by Tiny Barbados
(3 comments) "Hats off to Barbados, which both signed and ratified the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) on Monday," writes Jeff Lindemyer at Nukes of Hazard. The U.S. is one of only 10 countries, such as Pakistan, Iran and Israel, to stand in the way of its full implementation.

Monday, January 14, 2008
Investors Flocking to Gold
Gold leapt past 900 dollars for the first time last week. Investors have taken refuge in gold amid economic jitters, particularly concerns that the United States is slipping into recession.

Monday, January 14, 2008
The Incredible Shrinking President
(1 comments) "The diminished George Bush, increasingly irrelevant at home and abroad, is fading into insignificance," writes the incomparable Chris Hedges at TruthDig. "A year from now one half expects to see him stand up at the next presidents inauguration and screech 'I'm melting! I'm melting!' as he sinks into a puddle of slime."

Friday, January 11, 2008
The Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty Is Still Our Best Hope
(1 comments) "The NPT is now at a dangerous tipping point, say experts such as Graham Allison, who warn that unless rapid progress is made on non-proliferation issues, there is a real risk of nuclear weapons being used for the first time since the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki," writes Declan Butler at Nature News. "The issues will come to a head at an intergovernmental meeting in 2010 in Vienna, Austria, of the NPT's 189 members."

Thursday, January 10, 2008
Arms Control Persons of the Year Named
Yes, constructive work in that area is actually being done. The Arms Control Association named Congressmen Peter Visclosky (D-Ind.) and David Hobson (R-Ohio) the winners. Due largely to their efforts, Congress rejected the Bush administration's proposal to fund research on a new, so-called "replacement" warhead. A Democrats and Republican working together -- what a concept!

Wednesday, January 9, 2008
Fewest Tears Yet for Bhutto
Ms. Bhutto, a Pakistani nuclear professor who knew her, reminds us that, "Her two tenures as prime minister were a nightmare of autocratic government and mis-governance. Billions disappeared from foreign aid. A Swiss court found her guilty of money laundering in 2003. Ms. Bhutto owned mansions and palaces across the world."

Wednesday, January 9, 2008
Pakistan Plays Bush Admin for a Fool
(1 comments) "The Pakistani military has diverted half of [US military aid] for use against India, apparently with no reaction from Bush," writes Peter Galbraith in the Boston Globe. "Pakistan's military has learned from experience that the United States does not monitor its assistance." Between that and Iraq, the IT guy for the White House must have forgot to hook it up with Excel and its spreadsheets.

Wednesday, January 9, 2008
We No Longer Have Any Excuse for Ignoring Plight of Iraqis
"McClatchy Newspapers set up a blog exclusively for contributions from its Iraqi staff," writes Michael Massing at the New York Review of Books. "'It's an opportunity for Iraqis to talk directly to an American audience,' says Leila Fadel, the current bureau chief." We can't screen their suffering out any longer. Follow the link for blog's url.

Wednesday, January 9, 2008
An American in Iran
"Traveling this Mexico-sized and intensely proud country, one is impressed by a similar weariness with politics, mixed with resentment at state efforts to stir the embers of revolutionary fervor," writes Max Rodenbeck. "The eye-rolling is not caused by some overpowering attraction to Western culture. Iranians cherish being different."

Tuesday, January 8, 2008
The Chuckabee Show Hits New Hampshire
"The power of Chuck Norris was on display last Sunday when a heckler interrupted Mike Huckabee," writes Alexander Zaitchik at AlterNet. "Don't make me send Chuck back there," deadpanned Huckabee.

Monday, January 7, 2008
Can You Win on Dull?
. . . asks Politico. "Both campaigns have now reduced their themes to single word," writes Roger Simon. "Obama has a sign that says: Hope. Clinton has a sign that says: Ready. But will Clinton get a chance to be ready? Having lost Iowa on Thursday and with the crucial New Hampshire primary just two days away, she chose not to rouse the crowd but bowl it over in a blizzard of policy details."

Monday, January 7, 2008
Krugman: The Economic Levee Has Been Breached
"It's no longer possible to hope that the effects of the housing slump will remain 'contained, as one of 2007's buzzwords had it," writes Paul Krugman at the New York Times. "The levees have been breached, and the repercussions of the housing crisis are spreading across the economy as a whole."

Monday, January 7, 2008
Kucinich Still the Workingman's Best Friend
(1 comments) "Kucinich advocates a full-employment economy, calling for a new version of the 1930s Works Progress Administration (WPA), which employed millions of Americans," Chris Hedges writes on Truthdig. "He wants to put people to work to rebuild the country's crumbling infrastructure, from its roads and bridges to its dams, levies, sewer systems, libraries and mass transit."

Monday, January 7, 2008
Eight Tribal Elders Shot Dead in Pakistan
"Eight tribal leaders attempting to broker a ceasefire in Pakistan's dangerous north-west province have been shot dead by suspected Islamic militants in eight separate killings," reports London's the Guardian. "The eight tribal leaders were scheduled to meet each other on Monday to discuss plans to achieve peace between between security forces and insurgents."

Friday, January 4, 2008
Hillary Abandoned by Iowa Women
(1 comments) "In what is bad news for Clinton, exit polling shows Obama beat the New York senator 35 percent to 30 percent among women caucus goers," reports Bill Schneider at CNN.

Friday, January 4, 2008
What Makes Obama Run?
(1 comments) For those suspicious of his motives, now is a good time to revisit what originally motivated Barack Obama to first run for public service. One from the archives.

Friday, January 4, 2008
Is This the Beginning of the End for Romney?
Romney, writes Susan Davis at the Wall Street Journal, "bet his strategy on victories in the early states of Iowa and New Hampshire. In five days, Romney will have to fend off Sen. John McCain. A victory in New Hampshire is now even more critical to Romney's bid, and if his loss here tonight is indicative of anything, it's that message beat money."

Friday, January 4, 2008
Why Did Kucinich Release His Voters to Obama?
(1 comments) Instead of Edwards? "It's hard to think of a single major issue -- including 'the war,' 'health care' and 'trade' -- for which Obama has a more progressive position than Edwards," writes Norman Solomon.

Friday, January 4, 2008
Russia Foiled 120 Cases of Smuggling Nukes Out
The question inevitably arises: How many got away? "A further 722 cases of illegal importing of highly radio-active material into Russia were detected -- possible evidence of a dangerous trade between ex-Soviet states," reports London's the Telegraph.

Thursday, January 3, 2008
John Edwards and His Bundlers of Joy
(2 comments) "John Edwards is the ONLY candidate who has never taken a dime from PACs or Washington lobbyists ever," writes Denny Wilkins at Scholars & Rogues. "He said he would expand public campaign financing and prohibit lobbyists from being campaign 'bundlers.'" Yet, he "has used 665 bundlers -- far more than any other presidential candidate -- en route to raising nearly $30 million" by the end of the third quarter.

Thursday, January 3, 2008
Gore Tried Populism in 2000
"He would fight these powers, and take on in particular 'big tobacco, big oil, the big polluters, the pharmaceutical companies, the HMOs.' John Edwards, 2008?" asks Marie Cocco at TruthDig. "No. Al Gore, 2000."

Thursday, January 3, 2008
Honoring a Departed Blogger: Harlem's Steve Gilliard
Who passed away this year. "By 2003," writes Matt Bai in the New York Times, "Gilliard had become one of the first official 'guest bloggers' on Daily Kos, then on its way to becoming the most influential of the new liberal political blogs, where he informed his indictments of the Iraq war with detailed references to the British occupation of Mesopotamia."

Wednesday, January 2, 2008
NY Times Shoots Itself in Foot by Hiring Kristol
Ian Williams at London's the Guardian writes: "Kristol, deservedly known as 'Quayle's Brain,' is a lightweight. . . whose magazine, the Weekly Standard, makes massive losses for Rupert Murdoch, its owner. These conservatives go on about market disciplines, but it is noteworthy how many of their thinktanks and publications depend on the kindness of eccentric billionaires."

Wednesday, January 2, 2008
Atomic Year in Review
The International Atomic Energy Agency prefaces its year in review: "Nuclear-related events and developments in 2007 reflected some rising stakes when it comes to global security, environmental, and economic issues." Talk about understatements.

Wednesday, January 2, 2008
Suddenly "Regime Change" Isn't Enough for Bush & Co.
(2 comments) "'Regime change with a view to ensuring continuity under military rule is no longer the main thrust of US foreign policy,' writes Michel Chossudovsky at Global Research. "The regime of Pervez Musharraf cannot prevail. Washington's foreign policy course is to actively promote the political fragmentation and balkanization of Pakistan as a nation."

Thursday, December 27, 2007
Benazir Bhutto's Courageous Legacy Marred by Wholesale Corruption
"I have buried a father killed at age 50 and two brothers killed in the prime of their lives," Bhutto wrote in a recent Op-Ed for The Washington Post. "I raised my children as a single mother when my husband was arrested and held for eight years without a conviction -- a hostage to my political career. I did not shrink from responsibility then, and I will not shrink from it now."

Thursday, December 27, 2007
Top 10 Myths About Iraq
Juan Cole demolishes the central myth -- that the surge is working. Read one of the world's leading authorities on Iraq at Informed Comment.

Wednesday, December 26, 2007
Republicans Can't Snake-Handle Evangelicals Any Longer
Sick of broken promises from presidents like Bush, evangelicals are looking to Mike Huckaee to lead them out of the wilderness and replace corporate interests with their own. Chris Hedges reports on the "Huckabites" for Truthdig.

Wednesday, December 26, 2007
The Dark Side of Ron Paul
(10 comments) Over at Scholars & Rogues, Sam Smith stirred up a hornet's nest when he brought to light some of Ron Paul's destructive positions -- including racism. (Scratch a libertarian and that's what you'll often find.)

Wednesday, December 26, 2007
Iran Dedicates Museum to Pursuit of Peace
(1 comments) "The people of Iran always hear about the glories of war, when we were invaded, but they rarely hear of the devastation of war," said its director, as reported by the Christian Science Monitor. Its volunteers "are hardly typical peaceniks. They are former soldiers who have been subjected to Iraqi chemical weapons attacks." Good to see an Iran peace initiative reported in the West.

Wednesday, December 26, 2007
A Crime Foretold: The Charsadda Bombing
"Yesterday's suicide attack that killed 56 people in Charsadda, a village northeast of Peshawar, Pakistan, was not aimed just at the former Interior Minister," writes Barnett Rubin of Informed Comment: Global Affairs. "It was part of a strategy by the Pakistani Taliban, supported by al-Qaida, to surround Peshawar with a ring of destabilization."

Monday, December 24, 2007
Wheee! Waterboarding a Pipeline to Hell
This brave soul actually tried waterboarding -- on himself. But (no pun intended) Scylla at the Straight Dope got in a little over his head. "I have never been more panicked in my whole life."

Monday, December 24, 2007
The True State of the Economy Is Reflected in the State of Our Teeth
(1 comments) "About 1 in 10 residents of Kentucky are missing all their teeth," reports the New York Times. Dr. Edwin Smith, who runs a free clinic, said that "at least once a month he sees a patient who has used Krazy Glue to reattach a broken tooth to the root or to an adjacent tooth." Is this 2007 or the Depression?

Monday, December 24, 2007
Moyers: What Did the Mitchell Report Teach Us?
(1 comments) "Ours is a society on steroids, and we're as blind as baseball's owners were a decade ago," writes Bill Moyers. "We cheer the winners in the game of wealth, the billionaires who benefit from a skewed financial system -- the losers, we kick down the stairs." And neglect to fight for a level playing field.

Monday, December 24, 2007
CIA's Rodriguez Determined Not to Be White House Fall Guy for Torture
(1 comments) According to the Times of London, "he may seek immunity from prosecution in exchange for testifying before the House intelligence committee." Asks Vincent Cannistraro, former head of counterterrorism at the CIA, "Why in the world would Jose Rodriguez -- one of the most cautious men I have ever met –- have gone ahead and destroyed the tapes?" Unless, of course, he was ordered to.

Friday, December 21, 2007
Iraq Was a Lose-Lose (and Lose Again) Proposition
Once for Iraq, once for the US, and once for al Qaeda. "Yet the bid to bring the Iraqi resistance groups under the banner of al-Qaida has not just failed. It has spectacularly backfired," writes Jason Burke at London's Guardian.

Friday, December 21, 2007
This Is So Cool: Lakota (Sioux) Secede!
(9 comments) Lakota Sioux Indian representatives declared sovereign nation status today in Washington D.C. following Monday's withdrawal from all previously signed treaties with the United States Government. "This is an historic day for our Lakota people," declared Russell Means, Itacan of Lakota. "United States colonial rule is at its end!"

Thursday, December 20, 2007
Blockbuster Three-Part Series Dissects Hillary Point by Policy Point
"On Iraq: Hillary says she wants the troops out. But does she really? On International Law: When it comes to human rights around the world, Hillary Clinton is little more than Bush Lite. On her military policy: There's every indication that it closely parallels that of the Bush administration." Courtesy of Foreign Policy in Focus.

Wednesday, December 19, 2007
Newspapers Cartoonists Have a Field Day with Steroid Scandal
These are not only hilarious, but a visit to Daryl Cagle's Professional Cartoonists' Index also highlights a cartoon's capacity to portray pathos.

Wednesday, December 19, 2007
Reid's Once-Chilly Relationship with Bush Now in Deep Freeze
Reports the New York Times: "Mr. Reid, Democrat of Nevada, calls the president 'this guy,' as in an interview last week, when he said, 'I am mystified, dumbfounded about how difficult it is to work with this guy.'"

Tuesday, December 18, 2007
Government Watchdog's Top 10 Ethics Scandals
CREW's list includes those you'd expect, like "Millions of missing White House e-mails still unaccounted for." And those you wouldn't, like "Rep. Murtha's abuse of the earmarking process remains unchecked."

Tuesday, December 18, 2007
High-Ranking Defector Key to Iran NIE
And, yes, Bush knew about it. "The intelligence on the Iranian nuclear program obtained as a result of the U.S. debriefing of [the defector] would have been made available to Bush as soon as it was evaluated as important by the intelligence officials," writes Gareth Porter at AntiWar.

Sunday, December 16, 2007
Bill Clinton Takes Off the Gloves
(2 comments) In defense of his wife. "When is the last time we elected a president based on one year of service before he's running?" he said to Charlie Rose. "In theory, we could find someone who is a gifted television commentator and let them run. They'd have only one year less experience in national politics..."

Sunday, December 16, 2007
Late-Night Drama Needed to Coerce Climate Deal Out of US
"It overran by a day and the American delegation found itself being roundly booed, but a compromise deal on saving the planet has been hammered out at the climate change conference in Bali," reports London's Guardian.

Sunday, December 16, 2007
As if Hawkish Wing of Party Were the Only Democrats Who Cared About Security
"She is probably more assertive and willing to use force than her husband," says Richard Holbrooke, the former envoy for Bill Clinton. "Hillary Clinton is a classic national-security Democrat." At The Atlantic, Matthew Yglesias digs out this assessment of Democratic hawks from an old article.

Sunday, December 16, 2007
Israeli Minister Jumps on Bush's WWIII Band Wagon
"Something went wrong in the American blueprint for analyzing the severity of the Iranian nuclear threat," said Avi Dichter. "He seemed to imply that a world that let its guard down regarding Iran would be more vulnerable to attack by the Islamic regime," writes Laurie Copans at Huffington Post.

Friday, December 14, 2007
Is Senator Mitchell the Reincarnation of Joe McCarthy?
From squeezing the little guys -- trainers, strength coaches, clubhouse attendants -- to name names, to portraying Roger Clemens as public enemy number one, Mitchell's investigation has "witch hunt" written all over it. Howard Bryant at ESPN exposes Mitchell like Edward R. Murrow did McCarthy.

Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Maureen Dowd: Dumbest Guy Gives Dumbest Speech
(3 comments) The Defense Department's third in command under Rumsfeld: Douglas Feith, of course. "Jay Garner, America's first viceroy in Iraq, deemed him 'incredibly dangerous' and said his 'electrons aren't connected.'"

Tuesday, December 11, 2007
Torture Does Not Become. . .
a woman (at the risk of sounding sexist). "That House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has been a disappointing leader for House Democrats, few serious observers of the congressional condition will deny," writes John Nichols at the Nation. "But, now, she appears to be something more troubling: a serious hindrance to the fight against the use of crudest and most objectionable torture techniques."

Tuesday, December 11, 2007
A Housing Bailout Might Be a Boon, But Bush's Is a Bust
"For those who don't know, last week President Bush and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson unveiled a 'mortgage rescue plan' (NOT a bailout, they desperately stressed) that would enable qualifying homeowners to qualify for a five-year freeze of their mortgage at the current rate," writes Martin Bosworth at Scholars & Rogues. "But the general consensus is that it s**ks."

Tuesday, December 11, 2007
Iraq to US: Can't You Take a Hint? Go Home
"Permanent forces or bases in Iraq for any foreign forces is a red line that cannot be accepted by any nationalist Iraqi," the government's national security advisor said in an interview broadcast late Monday.

Tuesday, December 11, 2007
Is the Mahdi Army Morphing into Another Hezbollah?
"Sadr's top aides say the anti-American cleric is anything but idle. Instead, he is orchestrating a revival among his army of loyalists entrenched in Baghdad and Shiite enclaves to the south," reports the Christian Science Monitor. "Many analysts say what may reemerge is an Iraqi version of Lebanon's Hizbullah."

Monday, December 10, 2007
Has Indy Filmmaker Located bin Laden?
According to MSNBC: "Rumors are flying that filmmaker Morgan Spurlock of 'Super Size Me' fame may have done what the United States government has failed to do for the last six years -- find Osama bin Laden."

Monday, December 10, 2007
Systems Disruption: Rocket Attack on Key Iraqi Oil Refinery
"An oil refinery that produces much of the energy needed to power Baghdad is on fire after it came under rocket attack," reports Al Jazeera.

Monday, December 10, 2007
The CIA's Gift to Conspiracy Theorists
(21 comments) "I have to wonder what space-time continuum the CIA exists in," writes Bob Baer (of "Syriana" fame) in Time, "if they weren't able to grasp what a field day the 9/11 conspiracy theorists are going to have with [the destruction of detainee abuse tapes] especially at a time when trust for the government is plumbing new depths."

Sunday, December 9, 2007
Anatomy of a Scapegoating
"And the Goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities. . . " Scott Horton of Harper's explains how and why the administration decided to bring us the head of Jose Rodriguez for the destruction of records of detainee abuse.

Sunday, December 9, 2007
Honoring the Man Who Saved the World
(1 comments) In his Cold War Report in the eXile, Alexander Zaitchik writes about his visit with Stanislav Petrov. It's the 24th anniversary of the night he elected not to alert his superiors when a US missile launch showed up on his radar screen. He had the presence of mind to sense a false alarm -- and keep Russia from launching its nukes at the US.

Sunday, December 9, 2007
The Congressman Who Went from Freedom Fries to Limiting the President's War Powers
Rep. Walter Jones (R-NC) co-sponsored legislation renaming French fries in the House cafeteria "freedom fries." He's since introduced the Constitutional War Powers Resolution that would make it difficult for a president to go to war.

Thursday, December 6, 2007
China Poised to Stand up to US over Iran
Now that Iran is US-certified not to be developing nukes, it can be expected to run into a Chinese brick wall. Indeed, Beijing has emerged as the key player in getting the George W Bush administration to enter into a constructive engagement with Tehran. M.K. Bhadrakumar reports for Asia Times Online.

Thursday, December 6, 2007
The CIA "War" on Bush: The New Neocon Ploy
(1 comments) "Extreme Right meet the Extreme Left," writes Marc Cooper at HuffPo. "Now you both can agree. Whatever happens, it must be the fault of the CIA. Sleeper cell members, Al-Qaeda operatives, terrorists, foreign agents you can all rest easy. We've finally found the enemy and it ain't you. Nope. It's our own subversive intelligence services."

Thursday, December 6, 2007
Has Reality TV Finally Gone Too Far?
"The latest reality show being marketed to the major networks by the entertainment industry will certainly add more fuel to the heated immigration debate," reports Edmund Rocha at Scholars & Rogues. "Reuters recently reported that a Los Angeles company, Morusa Media, is marketing a new reality game show called 'Who Wants to Marry a US Citizen.'" And you thought politicians exploited the immigration issue.

Thursday, December 6, 2007
Iraqi Refugees in Syria Face Bleak Winter
McClatchy Newspapers reports: "Hundreds of thousands of Iraqi refugees in Syria face a bleak winter, with rising fuel costs that could leave many without enough money for food, the director of the World Food Program said Monday. About a third of Iraqi respondents in a recent United Nations study said they skipped one meal a day to feed their children." God forbid the US should, like, come to their aid.

Thursday, December 6, 2007
How You Gonna Keep Them Down on the Farm?
(1 comments) "Numerous Iraqi military and law-enforcement officials brought to the U.S. as part of special intelligence and training programs have run away and are seeking asylum in this country or disappeared altogether," reports the Washington Times.

Tuesday, December 4, 2007
Forget Rudy's Trysts, Focus on His Dealings with Qatar
(1 comments) "With Qatar's troubling record as both an American ally and a longtime haven for al-Qaida terrorists," writes Joe Conason in Salon, "including 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, or 'KSM,' the little Gulf sheikdom is a curious client indeed for Giuliani Security and Safety, a division of Giuliani Partners."

Tuesday, December 4, 2007
They Were Expendable
(1 comments) "U.S. soldiers mistakenly shot four Iraqi civilians, killing one, during operations against al Qaeda militants, the U.S. military said on Tuesday," reports Reuters. That's on top of the five killed in two similar shootings last week.

Tuesday, December 4, 2007
Jerusalem Weighs in on Iran NIE
Prime Minister Olmert is still pushing for stronger sanctions against Iran. But "Government sources in Jerusalem told Haaretz Monday night that the Bush administration appears to have lost its sense of urgency regarding Iran's nuclear program, making a military strike in 2008 increasingly unlikely."

Monday, December 3, 2007
When a Deterrent Becomes a Threat
(1 comments) "A recent study prepared for the Department of Defense observed that 'The world sees us as shifting from nuclear weapons for deterrence and as a weapon of last resort to nuclear weapons for war fighting and first use," write three arms control specialists. "This perception gives emerging world powers another reason to feel threatened by the United States and may embolden aspiring powers to seek their own nuclear weapons."

Monday, December 3, 2007
Hide the Women and Children -- Wolfie May Be Coming Back
"Don't ever say the Bush administration doesn't take care of its own," writes Michael Isikoff in Newsweek. "Nearly three years after Paul Wolfowitz resigned as deputy Defense secretary and six months after his stormy departure as president of the World Bank, Condoleezza Rice has offered Wolfowitz, a prime architect of the Iraq War," a position in the State Department.

Monday, December 3, 2007
Iraqi Insurgents Regrouping, Says Sunni Resistance Leader
A key insurgent leader told Jonathan Steele of London's the Guardian that, "Iraq's main Sunni-led resistance groups have scaled back their attacks on US forces in Baghdad and parts of Anbar province in a deliberate strategy aimed at regrouping, retraining, and waiting out George Bush's 'surge.'"

Monday, December 3, 2007
Five Myths About the Bomb (and Us)
"A world that's skeptical about the last superpower's intentions only gets more so when U.S. officials push unconvincing lines about the world's deadliest weapons," writes Jeffrey Lewis in the Washington Post. Follow link to find out some "myths about the U.S. nuclear posture of which the administration seems particularly fond."

Friday, November 30, 2007
Giuliani Really Steps in It This Time
"Rudolph W. Giuliani last night called a Web site's account of his spending a 'political hit job' as his campaign struggled to explain why hundreds of thousands of dollars in travel expenses for his mayoral security detail were billed to obscure city offices instead of the Police Department," reports the New York Times.

Friday, November 30, 2007
Interview with Scott Ritter on Why a War, When a War?
(1 comments) Excerpt from Detroit's MetroTimes: "Q. Why do you think that attack hasn't occurred? A: Let's remember that this is an elective war, not a war of necessity. It will be conducted on a timescale that's beneficial to those who who are planning the conflict."

Thursday, November 29, 2007
GOP Debate: Take My Tired and Poor -- Please
"Rarely has a debate left me so troubled about the future of the nation," writes Walter Shapiro at Salon. "What sent me into a free fall of depression was CNN's instinct for the fatuous in choosing the debate questions. It is a disgrace that in a two-hour debate (it felt longer) there was not a single question about the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, the powder keg in Pakistan or Iran."

Thursday, November 29, 2007
What We Unleash by Attacking Iran
"The deadliest weapon that the [Republican Guard] can employ against US forces in Iraq will be the 'live bomb,'" writes Hussain Moussavi for the Jamestown Foundaton. "Undoubtedly, the younger generation would be more willing to commit acts of suicide terrorism as a way to reenact the heroic days of the Iran-Iraq War."

Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Though Troubling, Putin's Nuclear Saber-Rattling Not a Direct Threat
Russian President Putin recently stated that, "One of the most important [military modernization] tasks remains raising the combat readiness of the strategic nuclear forces," reports Max Postman at Nukes of Hazard. While, "his choice of rhetoric may serve to undermine policy options in the future. . . his nuclear saber-rattling should not be confused with policy-making."

Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Suzy Homemaker: Counterterrorist
(3 comments) Not exactly -- Shannen Rossmiller, Wired reports, is a lawyer in Middle America who monitors jihadi websites from home, engages participants in online discussions, and has aided in the capture of several terrorists. A fascinating read.

Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Death to the Anti-Global-Warming Propaganda Machine
Brian Angliss begins by dissecting DemandDebate, an anti-global warming propaganda machine, and then takes apart, strand by strand, the entire disinformation network surrounding rich arch-conservative noisemonger Steven Milloy. This three-part series sheds tremendous light on the anatomy of a dog and pony show, and the lessons learned are neatly generalizable to many other propaganda machines polluting our public sphere.

Monday, November 26, 2007
Pentagon: Petraeus Doesn't Speak for All of Us
(1 comments) The Los Angeles Times reports: "Top military leaders at the Pentagon want to avoid a repeat of the last public assessment of the Iraq war -- with its relentless focus on the opinion of a single commander -- when the Bush administration makes its next crucial decision about the size of the U.S. force."

Wednesday, November 21, 2007
"Will McClellan Be John Dean to Bush's Richard Nixon?"
(2 comments) John Nichols of the Nation writes: "Scott McClellan's admission that he unintentionally made false statements . . . along with his revelation that Vice President Cheney and President Bush were among those who provided him with the misinformation, sets the former White House press secretary as John Dean to George Bush's Richard Nixon."

Wednesday, November 21, 2007
Pollster Zogby: The Democratic Race Is Just Beginning
"Clinton led Obama 38 percent to 27 percent in the new poll, a 10-point fall from her 46 percent to 25 percent lead last month," reports Reuters of a poll it took with Zogby, who said, "This race is just beginning, let alone all over."

Monday, November 19, 2007
U.S. Hopes to Use Pakistani Tribes Against Al Qaeda
Say what? According to the New York Times, "A new and classified American military proposal outlines an intensified effort to enlist tribal leaders in the frontier areas of Pakistan in the fight against Al Qaeda and the Taliban, as part of a broader effort to bolster Pakistani forces against an expanding militancy."

Monday, November 19, 2007
"Here Come the Thought Police"
(1 comments) "With overwhelming bipartisan support, Rep. Jane Harman's 'Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act' passed the House 404-6 late last month and now rests in Sen. Joe Lieberman's Homeland Security Committee. Swift Senate passage appears certain," reports the Baltimore Sun. "Not since the 'Patriot Act' of 2001 has any bill so threatened our constitutionally guaranteed rights."

Monday, November 19, 2007
U.S. and Russian Publics Strongly Support Nuclear Disamament
"Both Russians and Americans believe nuclear weapons are of very limited military utility," reports Jeff Lindemyer at Nukes of Hazard on a new study. "A majority of both Americans and Russians say that nuclear weapons should be used only in response to a nuclear attack and a large majority of Americans say that the United States should have a policy of never using nuclear weapons first."

Friday, November 16, 2007
This Was Not Your Mother's Presidential Debate
"The Democratic debate in Vegas: Fire-retardant pantsuits! Hecklers! Mysterious booing! GOP-style mudslinging! And a bizarre photo op." Salon's coverage is as lively as the debate.

Friday, November 16, 2007
Billions for Guns, Vetos for Butter
"It's time that we subject the Iraq war to the same cost-benefit analysis that we are called upon to impose on other government endeavors," writes E.J. Dionne at the Washington Post. "We are supposed to repeal or revise domestic programs that don't work. Shouldn't a troubled war policy be treated the same way?"

Friday, November 16, 2007
Democrats as Guilty of Treason as Bush & Co.
(1 comments) "The mainstream Democrats -- represented, say, by Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, John Edwards, Joe Biden, and Christopher Dodd -- have not levied war against the United States," writes Richard Behan at AlterNet. "Their treason lies instead in giving aid and comfort" to enemies of the state -- the Bush administration.

Friday, November 16, 2007
US Dismisses Nuclear Report on Iran
(2 comments) "The much-anticipated report on Iran by the head of International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) that was released this week confirms 'substantial progress'," writes Kaveh Afrasiabi at Asia Times Online, "yet, the US government has reacted swiftly by belittling Iran's cooperation and maintaining its aggressive push for a new round of United Nations sanctions on Iran." In other words, business as usual.

Wednesday, November 14, 2007
Rich Venezuelan Students Calling for Ouster of Chavez
"Violent street demonstrations by privileged middle and upper middle class university students have led to major street battles in and around the center of Caracas," writes James Petras at Dissident Voice. "More seriously, the former Minister of Defense, General Raul Isaias Baduel, who resigned in July, has made explicit calls for a military coup."

Wednesday, November 14, 2007
Cheney's Controlled Bloodletting
Hunting, not Iraq, where it's uncontrolled. Martha Rosenberg of AlterNet reports: "Last month in a caravan of 15 sport utility vehicles and an ambulance -- no jokes, please -- Cheney made his way to Clove Valley Rod & Gun Club, about 70 miles north of New York City, near Poughkeepsie, for a day of controlled bloodletting."

Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Bob Herbert: Stop Deifying Ronald Reagan Already
To a true progressive nothing grates more than the saintly regard the late President Reagan was held in by not only Republicans, but America at large. As Bob Herbert writes in the New York Times, "Throughout his career, Reagan was wrong, insensitive and mean-spirited on civil rights and other issues important to black people."

Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Real Heroes Refuse to "Shut up and Sing"
Sam Smith at Scholars and Rogues takes the opportunity of the Dixie Chicks' new CD to pen an ode to their courage, which is on view in the documentary "Shut Up and Sing." "It's been a long time," Smith writes, "since an artist or a band was asked to endure so much."

Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Senator Feinstein's Pro-Mukasey Vote Blowing up in Her Face
"A coalition of progressive Democrats upset with Feinstein's controversial votes will ask the California Democratic Party to censure her at its executive board meeting this weekend," reports Max Follmer at HuffPost. To make matters worse, she also supports granting immunity to spying telecom companies.

Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Many Children of Middle-Class Black Families Plunging into Poverty
The Washington Post reports: "Nearly half of African Americans born to middle-income parents in the late 1960s plunged into poverty or near-poverty as adults, according to a new study -- a perplexing finding that analysts say highlights the fragile nature of middle-class life for many African Americans."

Friday, November 9, 2007
Thanks, Chuck and Diane, for an AG Not Quite as Bad as AG
"The Senate voted Thursday night to confirm the nomination of Michael B. Mukasey as attorney general, despite often emotional opposition from Democrats who said his refusal to disavow a controversial interrogation method made him an unsuitable leader for the U.S," reports the Los Angeles Times. He's incrementally less objectionable than Alberto Gonzalez.

Friday, November 9, 2007
3,000
You've seen, or heard of, the movie "300," in which the Persians get their heads handed to them by the Spartans. Now see "3,000," in which Persia is attacked by Israel and-or the US because its pugnacious leader can't keep himself from boasting about his 3,000 centrifuges.

Friday, November 9, 2007
Nuclear Apartheid
America's standard for saying which countries can have nuclear weapons is simple: Countries we like can have them. Countries we dislike can't. That sums up this remarkable oped at AlterNet by Tad Daley of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War.

Thursday, November 8, 2007
Is Israel Edging Closer to Attacking Iran?
"A claim by President Ahmadinejad that Iran has 3,000 working uranium-enriching centrifuges sent a tremor across the world yesterday amid fears that Israel would respond by bombing the country's nuclear facilities," reports London's Times. "I wouldn't be surprised if we do something if the international community leaves us alone," said an Israeli defense expert.

Tuesday, November 6, 2007
Harry Shearer's Beach Boy Torture Spoof up for TV Guide Award
"'Waterboardin', USA,' created by Shearer as a Beach Boys-style spoof that 'almost makes torture look like fun,' has been nominated in the 'Funniest Web Video' category of the 2007 Online Video Awards, hosted by TV Guide,'" reports Mike Sheehan at Raw Story.

Tuesday, November 6, 2007
Another Bush Backfire on Terror
"President Bush's coddling of Pakistani leader Pervez Musharraf suddenly risks being exposed as another case of White House anti-terror policies going spectacularly bad," writes Dan Froomkin at the Washington Post. "The country that Bush considers a bulwark against terror may gain infamy as a crucible for terror instead."

Tuesday, November 6, 2007
Olbermann's Harshest Indictment of Bush Administration Yet
(1 comments) "In light of the recent revelations related to Daniel Levin, former acting assistant attorney general for the Bush administration in 2004, Keith Olbermann cuts to the chase in a lengthy Special Comment and clearly accuses George W. Bush of criminal acts that warrant trial and imprisonment," reports Thought Theatre. Olbermann charges that Bush & Co.'s overriding concern at this point is just to stay out of jail.

Tuesday, November 6, 2007
Five Members of Afghan Parliament among Those Killed in Taliban Bomb Attack
Dead estimated between 30 and 70. "The attack is among the deadliest in Afghanistan since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion," reports MSNBC. "Taliban bombers have killed regional governors in the past, but never have militants killed so many high-ranking officials in one attack."

Monday, November 5, 2007
Empathizing with the Arab World
Englishman John Glubb studied the Arabs in the first half of the 20th century. The blog Small Wars Journal has highlighted some of his observations. What at first seems like stereotyping is leavened by his admiration for them. E.g., "Amongst Bedouins freedom [tends to] degenerate into anrchy -- but they were freer perhaps than any other race in the world." Full of gem after gem like this.

Monday, November 5, 2007
Whatever Happened to That Good Old "American Glow"?
"God, I miss that American glow," writes Colin McEnroe at the Hartford Courant. "I can feel it right now, as surely as I can remember the sun gleaming across a snow fort I built with my friends." He goes on to lament our descent into torture.

Friday, November 2, 2007
US Driving Turkey into Iran's Arms
"The retired general who served as President Bush's special envoy to deal with the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK)," reports McClatchy newspapers, said that the US is "driving, strategically, the Turks and the Iranians together."

Friday, November 2, 2007
Draft Al Gore TV Commercials to Run
The Associated Press reports: "A national group seeking to draft Nobel Peace Prize winner Al Gore as a Democratic presidential candidate will begin airing a television ad on CNN and in New Hampshire promoting a petition drive to encourage the former vice president to run."

Friday, November 2, 2007
Requiem for the Last American Soldier to Die in Iraq
"At some point in the future, soldiers will pack up their rucks," writes Brian Turner in the New York Times. "C-130s will rise wheels-up off the tarmac. . . At some point. . . the war in Iraq will end. And I've been thinking about this a lot lately. . . the last American soldier to die in Iraq."

Friday, November 2, 2007
Arab States Reach Out to Iran
Reuters reports: "U.S.-allied Gulf Arab states are willing to set up a body to provide enriched uranium to Iran to defuse Tehran's stand-off with the West over its nuclear plan, Saudi Arabia's foreign minister told a magazine on Thursday." Of course, that means they all plan to go nuclear now.

Friday, November 2, 2007
Middle East Racing to Nuclear Power
"This week Egypt became the 13th Middle Eastern country in the past year to say it wants nuclear power, intensifying an atomic race," reports the Christian Science Monitor. They're spurred on both by Iran's plans for nuclear power and their own dwindling oil supplies.

Thursday, November 1, 2007
Rumsfeld's Memos Reveal Surprising Sensitivity to Critical Columnists and Editorials
Robin Wright of the Washington Post reports on Donald Rumsfeld's memos, "often referred to as 'snowflakes,' [they] shed light on Rumsfeld's brusque management style and on his efforts to address key challenges during his tenure as Pentagon chief. . . a sampling of his trademark missives obtained yesterday reveals a defense secretary disdainful of media criticism and driven to reshape public opinion."

Thursday, November 1, 2007
Trigger Finger Still Hairy
(1 comments) "The Bush administration has come under fire for stating before a United Nations conference that the U.S. nuclear arsenal is not on 'hair-trigger alert,'" reports Colum Lynch at the Washington Post. In fact, much of the arsenal is capable of launch in minutes.

Thursday, November 1, 2007
Russia Pours Billions in Oil Profits into Nanotech Race
"After sleeping through the high tech revolutions of the late 20th century, the Russian government is dumping billions into nanotechnology," reports Alexander Zaitchik at Wired. "The Kremlin. . . announced the creation of Rosnanotekh, a state nanotechnology corporation slated for $5 billion in initial funding," which propels it past China and even with the US.

Thursday, November 1, 2007
Torture -- from the Horse's Mouth
"Most people cannot stand to watch a high intensity kinetic interrogation," writes Malcom Nance, a 20-year veteran of the US intelligence community's Combating Terrorism program, at critical group blog, Small Wars Journal. "One has to overcome basic human decency to endure watching or causing the effects."

Tuesday, October 30, 2007
Bicycle Bomber Kills 28 in Baghdad
The Washington Post reports: "An 11-year-old boy, Alaa Kassim Mohammed, was walking to school when he was hit. As he moaned in pain from his hospital bed, his father asked doctors if they were going to amputate his foot. 'This suicide bomber wanted to attack those policemen because he thinks they are apostates, but what did my son do wrong to deserve this?' said his father, Kassim Mohammed, a security guard."

Tuesday, October 30, 2007
Similarities to Clinton Land Obama in a Tough Spot
"In the nine months since launching his insurgent campaign for president, Senator Barack Obama of Illinois has seized on a slew of issues in trying to set himself apart from Senator Hillary Clinton of New York," reports the Boston Globe. "But with Clinton's dominance unabated, there is little evidence Obama has made headway on any of them."

Tuesday, October 30, 2007
Blackwater Provides Administration with Another Believe-It-or-Not Moment
"The State Department promised Blackwater USA bodyguards immunity from prosecution in its investigation of last month's deadly shooting of 17 Iraqi civilians," reports the Associated Press. "'Once you give immunity, you can't take it away,' said a senior law enforcement official familiar with the investigation."

Tuesday, October 30, 2007
Laura Bush Has the Audacity to Defend Her Husband's SCHIP Veto
"It's really easy to blame people for so-called voting against children," the first lady said in an interview on Fox News Sunday, reports the Hill. "She went on to say that the bill would cover children who are not poor and added that the program is often used to cover adults." Hmm, never met a doctor who couldn't tell a child from an adult.

Tuesday, October 30, 2007
The Horror Is Getting to Matt Taibbi
Mike Sheehan interviews him at Scholars and Rogues. Taibbi on 2008: "If the race comes down to Hillary and Giuliani, the Green Party could nominate Big Bird and win 28% of the vote. And a third party is definitely needed, since the Democrats have become captives of the money wing of their party."

Tuesday, October 30, 2007
New Embassy in Iraq a White Elephant
"The new American Embassy in Baghdad will be the largest, least welcoming, and most lavish embassy in the world: a $600 million massively fortified compound with 619 blast-resistant apartments and a food court fit for a shopping mall," writes William Langewiesche at Vanity Fair. "Unfortunately, like other similarly constructed U.S. Embassies, it may already be obsolete."

Monday, October 29, 2007
Iran Shifting Its Trade from West to East
"China is expected to overtake Germany as Iran's biggest trading partner this year," reports the Washington Post. Also, "with the benefit of record high oil prices, Iran is likely to be able to withstand the new U.S. sanctions." As usual these days, everyone seems to come out smelling like a rose except the U.S.

Monday, October 29, 2007
Times Calls Bush Our for Trash-Talking Iran
From a New York Times editorial today: "America's allies and increasingly the American public are playing a ghoulish guessing game: Will President Bush manage to leave office without starting a war with Iran? Mr. Bush is eagerly feeding those anxieties."

Monday, October 29, 2007
Yet Another Washington Scandal Brewing
"Larry Flynt, editor and publisher of Hustler magazine, just told FOX Business Network's Neil Cavuto that he's 'hoping to expose a bombshell' that will stand 'Washington and the country on its head.' Within the next week or two, he says his magazine will expose a sex scandal of huge proportions involving a prominent United States Senator." Republican, presumably.

Friday, October 26, 2007
How Do We Back Out of Our Nuclear Cul-de-Sac?
(1 comments) "The Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty is still the best route out of our current nuclear crises," reports London's The Independent, "yet the NPT is being used as toilet paper by the world's leaders. The Bush administration, for example, has ignored both parts of the bargain: it has buffed up its own arsenal instead of reducing it, and it has recognized and rewarded other countries for proliferation."

Friday, October 26, 2007
Republican Kyl Urges Senate Not to Ratify Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty
"The necessity –- and indeed, urgency –- of a fully funded, supported, and implemented CTBT has only increased since the Senate failed to endorse its ratification eight years ago," writes Jeff Lindemyer at Nukes of Hazard. "In fact, given recent technical advances that allow for the increased ability to verifiably detect nuclear testing, CTBT opponents have even less legs to stand on than they did at that time."

Friday, October 26, 2007
"Attack Iran and You Attack Russia"
(2 comments) "A high-level diplomatic source in Tehran tells Asia Times Online," reports Pepe Escobar, "that essentially Putin and the Supreme Leader [Khameini] have agreed on a plan to nullify the George W Bush administration's relentless drive towards launching a preemptive attack, perhaps a tactical nuclear strike, against Iran. An American attack on Iran will be viewed by Moscow as an attack on Russia."

Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Why We All Need to Root Against the Rockies
(1 comments) Because, with their evangelical litmus tests, the organization aligns itself with the worst of Colorado -- the fanatical fundamentalists of the Colorado Springs mega-churches. Sam Smith at Scholars & Rogues explains.

Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Turjks Can't Restrain Themselves from Launching Raids inside Iraq
"Turkey has targeted Kurdish separatists with a series of cross-border attacks despite reports that Iraq had succumbed to pressure to close down terrorist training camps," reports London's The Telegraph. As many as 34 Kurds were reported killed.

Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Fires Bring Back Specter of Katrina for Bush
"Hurricane Katrina has many legacies for the Bush White House, none pleasant. One is the guarantee that as soon as disaster strikes in the United States, President Bush's every move is closely scrutinized," reports ABC News. "This became clear yet again on Tuesday, as the enormity of the wildfires sweeping across Southern California became apparent."

Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Mark Morford: American Kids Dumber Than Dirt
(11 comments) How bad is the state of kids' minds today? "It is not bad at all," a teacher tells Morford. "It's absolutely horrifying." Morford elaborates: "If you think the hordes of easily terrified, mindless fundamentalist evangelical Christian lemmings have been bad for the soul of this country, just wait" until these kids grow up.

Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Urgency About Iran All in Bush & Co.'s Head
"I cannot judge their intentions, but supposing that Iran does intend to acquire a nuclear bomb, it would need between another three and eight years to succeed," Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), told France's Le Monde newspaper. If we let our leaders attack Iran, we can't say one of the most respected voices on the planet didn't warn us.

Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Ecuador's President: Turnabout Is Fair Play
(2 comments) Rafael Correa has refused to renew Washington's lease on on air base in his country, set to expire in 2009, reports Reuters. Unless, he said, "they let us put a base in Miami -- an Ecuadorean base." Tou-friggin'-che!

Tuesday, October 23, 2007
You're Not Helping Matters, Iran
(2 comments) Amnesty International today expressed alarm at the new wave of executions in Iran and said that it has already recorded almost 250 executions since the beginning of 2007, although the true total of those put to death could be significantly higher.

Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Neocons Elevate Ahmadinejad to Pantheon of Hitler, Stalin and Mao
"Iran has an economy the size of Finland's," writes Fareed Zakaria in Newsweek. "Israel and every Arab country (except Syria and Iraq) are quietly or actively allied against Iran. And yet we are to believe that Tehran is about to overturn the international system and replace it with an Islamo-fascist order? What planet are we on?"

Monday, October 22, 2007
The Secret History of the Impending War with Iran
Former high-level administration official Flynt Leverett tells Esquire the story of how Bush & Co. rejected Iran's sincere, comprehensive peace offerings in 2003. Thus proving the road to hell is paved with bad intentions.

Thursday, October 18, 2007
How bin Laden Beat George Bush
Al Qaeda expert Peter Bergen (who once interviewed bin Laden) mercilessly skewers the Bush administration for the ongoing disaster that is the war on terror in this rare New Republic article that doesn't make you roll your eyes.

Thursday, October 18, 2007
Iran and Russia Draw Closer Together
The Caspian Summit was a success, writes Kaveh Afrasiabi at Asia Times Online: "It is as much shared interests as common worries and concerns, eg, the US's unbounded interventionist policies, that have now brought Iran and Russia closer together and to the verge of a new strategic relationship."

Thursday, October 18, 2007
'Politics Have Interfered With Our Work'
From Germany's Der Spiegel: "Chief UN War Crimes Prosecutor for the former Yugoslavia Carla Del Ponte spoke about allegations surrounding her legal performance, and the obstacles to bringing war criminals to justice."

Thursday, October 18, 2007
Has Iraq Turned British Soldiers into Monsters?
Hospital workers allegedly reported signs of torture and murder on the bodies of Iraqi insurgents killed after a gun battle with British troops three year ago.

Friday, October 12, 2007
Reuters: Will Nobel Win Mean Gore Will Run for President?
The award of the Nobel Peace Prize to Democrat Al Gore on Friday increases pressure on him to launch a late bid for the U.S. presidency, but advisers say he is showing no signs of interest in the 2008 race.

Thursday, October 11, 2007
Failing Prevention, Can We Recover from a Nuclear Attack?
(3 comments) In April, a group of leading federal government civilian and military officials, scientists, policy experts, and journalists convened in Washington to ponder two different questions: What will the United States actually do on the day after prevention fails? What preparations are necessary?

Thursday, October 11, 2007
Iran, the Inflatable Bogeyman
"Benjamin Netanyahu would like Americans and Israelis to believe that it's 1938 all over again," writes Dr. Trita Parsi at Rootless Cosmopolitan. "Iran, he tells us, is Nazi Germany; President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is Hitler. And, of course, that means that anyone who advocates diplomacy and engagement with Tehran is simply reprising the tragic appeasement politics of Neville Chamberlain."

Thursday, October 11, 2007
New Guard Hiring the Old Guard
"Paul Wolfowitz was a VIP at the Sept. 5 premier of 'Alive Day Memories: Home from Iraq' and was still smiling after the screening, which featured insurgent footage of IED attacks, severed limbs, shredded brains, and left hardly a dry eye in the place," reports libertarian American Conservative magazine. Meanwhile presidential hopefuls promise a change in foreign policy but hire Neocon advisers.

Thursday, October 11, 2007
Are "Rational Business Decisions" the Best Newspapers Can Do Today?
Bet you didn't know this about newspapers, but, as Dr. Denny writes at Scholars & Rogues, "Some of that heralded doomsday circulation decline is intentional." It's all part of their strategy of attracting quality, not a quantity of, subscribers. Where does that leave journalism?

Tuesday, October 9, 2007
Noam Chomsky: US a Nuclear Outlaw
We're granting India "'terms of nuclear trade more favorable than those for states that have assumed all the obligations and responsibilities' of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, which India has not. In most of the world, few can fail to see the cynicism. Washington rewards allies and clients that ignore the NPT rules entirely, while threatening war against Iran, which is not known to have violated the NPT."

Tuesday, October 9, 2007
Iran Runs TV Mini-Series on the Holocaust
(1 comments) You mean in denial of the Holocaust? To the contrary -- it relives Iran's role in rescuing Jews during World War II.

Tuesday, October 9, 2007
Why Are Weapons Systems So Expensive?
(3 comments) Most sophisticated weapons systems, writes Edward Luttwak at The American Interest, are "almost entirely made by hand, with a profligate use of costly skilled labor."

Monday, October 8, 2007
Suicide Bombing Has Become SOP for Taliban
"British forces used to describe the Gereshk valley as the 'black heart of Taliban country,'" reports Britain's The Independent. "After months of ferocious fighting, much of this area of Helmand province in southern Afghanistan has been reclaimed, and reconstruction and development work is at last under way." But the violence has not abated. Instead, it has taken on the lethal form of suicide bombings

Monday, October 8, 2007
Russia's Inter-Generational Catastrophe
"'This is an intergenerational catastrophe,' says Vladimir Chouprov, a nuclear specialist with Greenpeace Russia, which helped organize a demonstration commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Mayak blast last week in Chleyabinsk. 'We are seeing the second and third generations living amid radioactive contamination, both accidental and systemic.'" Alexander Zaitchik reports for Moscow's The eXile.

Monday, October 8, 2007
Storm Worm Is Out to Enslave Your Computer
(1 comments) "The Internet criminal/hacker marketplace has produced a major innovation called the 'Storm Worm' and it is rewriting the rules of engagement in computer security," writes futurist John Robb at Global Guerillas. "It is nearly immune to defense, suppression, or eradication -- demonstrated in that it has already infected up to 50 million computers and slaved them into a massive botnet."

Thursday, October 4, 2007
Is There Anything "Socially Redeeming" About the Subversive Sarah Silverman?
(5 comments) "Cringe-worthy comedy is nothing new," writes Kera Bolonik at The Nation. But, "Is she or isn't she funny? Is she genuinely mean, or is she making a commentary about American ignorance?"

Thursday, October 4, 2007
Does an Iraq Tax Belong on Progressives' Agenda?
Massachusetts Democratic congress member James McGovern (among others) thinks it does. While in Iraq he came across a sign in a US military facility in Ramadi, Iraq. "The sign read, 'America is not at war. The Marine Corps is at war; America is at the mall.' The sign reflects a perception among many US soldiers and their families that the American people are not sharing in their sacrifice."

Thursday, October 4, 2007
"Insane on Asylum"
(1 comments) The Los Angeles Times came up with an editorial title to die for. And it is deadly serious. "The administration can't or won't admit most Iraqi refugees," it writes. "Is it incompetence or indifference?"

Thursday, October 4, 2007
Blame Blackwater on the Baby Boomers
"We didn't want to serve in the military madness that was Vietnam," writes Jim Booth at Scholars & Rogues, "and we've made it abundantly clear that a draft of our well coddled little Millenials would be political suicide." What else could a "war mongering chicken hawk like George 'Mission Accomplished' Bush" do but hire outside contractors?

Wednesday, October 3, 2007
"A.Q. Khan's Nuclear Wal-Mart: Out of Business or Under New Management?"
Are nuclear materials and technology still being smuggled around the world even though Mr. Nuclear Black Market, Pakistan's A.Q. Khan, has been put out of commission? According to this House Committee on Foreign Affairs report, "At least some of Khan's associates appeared to have escaped law enforcement attention and could, after a period of lying low, resume their black market business."

Wednesday, October 3, 2007
General Petraeus: "Sycophant Savior"
All great generals, from Washington to Grant to Eisenhower, understood politics, writes Andrew Bacevich in American Conservative. But General Petraeus "is a political general of the worst kind -- one who indulges in the politics of accommodation that is Washington's bread and butter."

Wednesday, October 3, 2007
Press Gave Clarence Thomas a Free Pass
"Numerous stories that raised questions about Thomas' credibility were known to the press during the hearings -- many of which never saw the light of day until after his confirmation," writes Laura Sydell at FAIR. Like the other women who accused him of sexual misconduct.

Wednesday, October 3, 2007
"Witness for the Persecution"
"I believe in affirmative action, but I have to acknowledge there are arguments against it," writes Eugene Robinson in the Washington Post. "One of the more cogent is the presence of Justice Clarence Thomas on the U.S. Supreme Court." Robinson, one of the nation's foremost -- and funniest -- columnists, is, of course, also black.

Wednesday, October 3, 2007
John McCain -- Wandering Down Dominionist Alley Again
"John McCain is at it again. This time out he. . . comes dangerously close to suggesting that only a Christian would be fit to be president." But, asks Sam Smith at Scholars & Rogues, "Is religion causing us to field a weaker national leadership team?"

Tuesday, October 2, 2007
Is It Too Early for a Post-Mortem on the Democratic Congress?
(1 comments) "The Democrats' antiwar campaign has failed," writes Gary Kamiya at Salon. "President Bush's ruinous Iraq adventure will continue indefinitely, despite the fact that a majority of the American people oppose it. Too divided and afraid of being called 'weak on national security' to stop funding it, the Democrats have been reduced to hoping that voters punish the GOP in 2008."

Tuesday, October 2, 2007
Anita Hill (remember her?) Answers Back Clarence Thomas
"Justice Thomas has every right to present himself as he wishes in his new memoir, 'My Grandfather's Son,'" writes Anita Hill. "He may even be entitled to feel abused by the confirmation process that led to his appointment to the Supreme Court. But I will not stand by silently and and allow him, in his anger, to reinvent me."

Tuesday, October 2, 2007
Senate Approves $150 Billion More for the War
(8 comments) "Thwarted in efforts to bring troops home from Iraq, Senate Democrats helped pass a defense policy bill authorizing another $150 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan," reports ABC News. "Monday's 92-3 vote comes as the House planned to approve separate legislation Tuesday that requires President Bush to give Congress a plan for eventual troop withdrawals." And you thought money didn't grow on trees.

Friday, September 28, 2007
John Carlos of Black-Gloved 1968 Olympic Fame Marches for Jena 6
"I can't believe we still have to be marching," track and field legend John Carlos said in an interview with Dave Zirin. "We need our young people. . . figuring out ways to do the unexpected. In 1968, that's what we did. You have to do what's contrary to the norm to give them something to think about."

Thursday, September 27, 2007
Keeping Loose Nukes in the Corral
(1 comments) Security from possessing nuclear weapons might be an illusion. But some peace of mind can be obtained from knowing that they're not going to get into the hands of terrorists. Read Nuclear Threat Initiave's "Securing the Bomb 2007," just released, to find out what's being done and what needs to be done.

Thursday, September 27, 2007
To Hear Bush & Co. Tell It, Iran's a Superpower
The administration insists on believing Iran is arming and influencing elements in Iraq. But, as Gareth Porter writes in his latest column, a national intelligence estimate holds that the "major driver of violence" is not Iran, but the "self-sustaining character of Iraq's internal sectarian dynamics."

Thursday, September 27, 2007
The Hundred-Mile Diet
"It's a pitiful thing to contemplate," writes Chris Ketcham in The Nation. "By my estimation, close to 85 percent, perhaps even 95 percent, of the food that feeds my hometown of Moab, Utah, population 5,000, gets trucked or flown in over the red-rock desert, often from continental distances. Cut off that supply line. . . and the city would starve to death in a week."

Thursday, September 27, 2007
Is an MP3 Price War About to Begin?
"Amazon.com has started selling unrestricted MP3s," writes Brian Angliss on Scholars & Rogues, "and they're fielding an army of songs over 2 million strong. Amazon's prices for the unrestricted versions are equal to or less than the same usage-restricted song from iTunes." Yet another "tactical defeat," Angliss writes, for the "music empire."

Wednesday, September 26, 2007
How an Attack on Iran Could Snowball into World War III
(10 comments) Philip Giraldi lays out the nightmarish scenario on AntiWar. Must read.

Tuesday, September 25, 2007
Seymour Hersh Optimistic About Internet Reporting
(1 comments) "There is an enormous change taking place in this country in journalism," Seymour Hersh told the Jewish Journal in a new interview. "And it is online. We are eventually -- and I hate to tell this to the New York Times or the Washington Post -- we are going to have online newspapers, and they are going to be spectacular."

Tuesday, September 25, 2007
First New US Nuclear Reactors Since the 70's Might Be Built
From the New York Times: "An independent power producer expects to ask the Nuclear Regulatory Commission on Tuesday for permission to build two nuclear reactors at a site 90 miles southwest of Houston, the first time since the mid-1970's that a company has sought approval to build a nuclear power plant in the United States."

Tuesday, September 25, 2007
Imaginary Conversation Between Alan Greenspan and O.J. Simpson
On their new books by humorist Andy Borowitz. Excerpt -- Greenspan: I'm sure you get tired of people asking you this, but here goes: Where do you get your ideas? Simpson: (laughing) Boy, do I ever get tired of that question! Sometimes I think I'm going to kill the next person who asks me that."

Tuesday, September 25, 2007
Wal-Mart to Sell Talking Jesus Dolls
"Jesus, who looks remarkably like the Brawny Paper Towel Man," writes Steven Asma at In These Times, "has a kung-fu grip and utters soothing but authoritarian Bible quotes, like, 'I tell you the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again.'"

Monday, September 24, 2007
Auschwitz Down-time: Nazis at Their Leisure
These recently recovered photographs on display at the Holocaut Memorial Museum are a testament to the Nazis' ability to compartmentalize the horrors they perpetrated.

Thursday, September 20, 2007
Buddhist Monks March in Myanmar
"Almost 1,000 Buddhist monks, protected by onlookers, marched through Myanmar's biggest city for a third straight day Thursday and pledged to keep alive the most sustained protests against the military government in at least a decade," reports Britain's Guardian.

Thursday, September 20, 2007
With Bush & Co., Be Careful What You Wish For
"Be careful what you wish for," as the New Republic reports in a subscription article excerpted by Nukes of Hazard. "That is the lesson of the Bush administration's newly unveiled deal to provide India with nuclear fuel and technology. Because, when the Bushies negotiate, they're extremely dangerous."

Monday, September 17, 2007
Iraq Death Toll Rivals Rwanda Genocide, Cambodian Killing Fields
A new study estimates that 1.2 million Iraqis have met violent deaths since Bush and Cheney chose to invade. Joshua Holland reports on AlterNet.

Friday, September 14, 2007
New Jersey's Governor Corzine Bucks Administration on Health Care
"Democratic Gov. Jon Corzine informed President Bush this week that New Jersey will not obey federal rules that would make it harder to enroll middle-income kids for a popular government-subsidized health insurance program," reports the New York Times.

Friday, September 14, 2007
Dominican Republican Shames US
"In a scarcely covered but important development," writes Jeff Lindemyer at Nukes of Hazard, "the Dominican Republic last week joined an ever-growing list of countries to ban all nuclear explosions by ratifying the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT)." Among the 10 who haven't: the US.

Thursday, September 13, 2007
Admiral Fallon Characterized Petraeus as a "Little Chickens**t"
"In sharp contrast to the lionization of General David Petraeus by members of the US Congress during his testimony this week," writes top commentator Gareth Porter, "Petraeus's superior, Admiral William Fallon, chief of the Central Command (Centcom), derided Petraeus as a sycophant during their first meeting in Baghdad in March." (This article is funny as heck.)

Thursday, September 13, 2007
Ban Ki-moon and ElBaradei on Collision Course
"The stage is now set for two diametrically opposed developments, one at the IAEA, which has hailed Iran's cooperation as a 'significant step in the right direction', and the other at the UN, where secretary general Ban Ki-moon has reiterated the Security Council's demand for a complete suspension of Iran's uranium-enrichment and reprocessing activities." -- Kaveh Afrasaiabi on Asia Times Online

Thursday, September 13, 2007
Al Qaeda in Russia?
"What better day than September 11th for Russian Duma deputies to announce that the recent chaos in [the republic of] Ingushetia is linked to none other than Al Qaeda," reports Moscow's the eXile. "This past summer, Ingushetia suffered over 40 terror attacks, and they seem to be rising in intensity and deadliness." And you thought Al Qaeda only struck the West in the US and UK.

Wednesday, September 12, 2007
The Power of Myth
(3 comments) "Six years after the 9/11 terror attacks on the U.S., it seems the media still have some educational work to do," reports Editor & Publisher. "A new CBS/New York Times poll reveals that even today, 1 in 3 Americans believe that 'Saddam Hussein was personally involved in the September 11th, 2001, terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.'"

Wednesday, September 12, 2007
What's with Us, Anyway?
(2 comments) "Reports indicate that massive firepower is ready to be launched against the Iranian regime, the Iranian state and its society as a whole," writes K. Darbandi on Asia Times Online. "And the US public is hardly blinking."

Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Drowning the Porn Industry in Regulations
Proposed Justice Department regulations require the porn industry to keep records of its employees as extensive as if they worked in national security. "This will do next to nothing," writes Martin Bosworth at Scholars & Rogues, "to address the real issue of child pornography, as sex offenders and child predators are often already a trusted member of an individual's social circle."

Tuesday, September 11, 2007
NY Times: Crocker's Speech a Crock
"The assessment that Ryan C. Crocker, the American ambassador to Iraq, gave to Congress on Monday left unmentioned or glossed over some of the most troubling developments of the past nine months. His portrait of Iraq did not include many of the signs of deepening divisions between Sunni Arabs and Shiites and within each sect, which have raised fears among many Iraqis that their country will fracture further."

Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Where's My Trickle-Down, Dude?
(2 comments) "Well," writes Paul Krugman of the New York Times, "Friday's dismal jobs report showed that the Bush boom, such as it was, has run its course. And working Americans have a right to ask, 'Where's my trickle?' As far as I can tell, America has never before experienced a disconnect between overall economic performance and the fortunes of workers as complete as that of the last four years."

Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Rocket from Gaza Injures Dozens of Israeli Soldiers
"The rocket hit an equipment store at the Zikkim training base," reports the BBC, "sending shrapnel flying through surrounding tents where soldiers were sleeping. Four of the wounded soldiers were in a serious condition, the military said. It is the largest number of injuries sustained in a single rocket attack against Israel from Gaza."

Friday, September 7, 2007
Young American Jews Becoming Apathetic About Israel
"For our parent's generation, the question that mattered was, how do we regard Israel? For Generation Y (born after 1976) the question is indeed, why should we regard Israel?" said Roger Bennett, a vice president of The Andrea and Charles Bronfman Philanthropies, which sponsored the study.

Friday, September 7, 2007
Ironically, White House Actually Undermines Executive Power
In his new book, Jack Goldsmith, Bush's former legal counsel, argues that "administration insiders most determined to increase executive power actually undermined it," writes Rosa Brooks in the Los Angeles Times. "Future presidents from either party will face a suspicious Congress and skeptical courts, and will find it more difficult to advance their agendas."

Friday, September 7, 2007
John Edwards Gives Major Speech on Terrorism Today
Excerpt: "There is now only one key question we must ask ourselves: are we any closer to getting rid of terrorism than we were six years ago? And the terrible answer is no, we're further away. Today, terrorism is worse in Iraq, and it's worse around the world. So what does all this mean? It means the results are in on George Bush's so-called 'global war on terror' and it's not just a failure, it's a double-edged failure."

Thursday, September 6, 2007
ElBaradei: We Are Moving Rapidly Towards an Abyss
In an interview with Der Spiegel, the International Atomic Energy Agency Chief calls for Iran to be more forthcoming, but cautions the US against an attack. "Something like that would trigger a terrible conflagration in the region, and it would certainly strengthen the positions of those in Tehran who favor the development of a nuclear bomb."

Thursday, September 6, 2007
Islamist Terrorists Planned Massive Attacks in Germany
(1 comments) The three suspected terrorists seized Tuesday were planning huge bomb attacks on targets in Germany. The bombs they were planning to make would have had more explosive power than those used in the Madrid and London terror attacks.

Tuesday, September 4, 2007
US Arms Pouring into Middle-East
Meanwhile the Pentagon, reports Le Monde diplomatique, "has lost track of 110,000 AK-47 rifles and 80,000 pistols (plus 115,000 helmets and 135,000 items of body armour) supplied to the Iraqi government in 2004 and 2005."

Tuesday, September 4, 2007
The View from Tehran's Street: Please, No Bombs
"Like the rest of his friends," reports Reza Aslan on Slate, "Kamran has grown so disenchanted with Iran's political system and so suspicious of American intentions in the wake of the Iraq war that he has simply given up. He doesn't vote in Iranian elections anymore. He barely reads the newspapers."

Tuesday, September 4, 2007
Congress Returns to More Heat Than It Left
Congress recesses to beat the heat, but upon its return, finds it's hotter than ever. "Many Democratic senators and representatives spent the long, hot August recess listening to voters and party activists back home who are enraged that the party did not find a way to rein in a deeply unpopular war after taking control on Capitol Hill last fall," reports The Boston Globe.

Tuesday, September 4, 2007
Hillary in Chains
Prayer chains, that is. Is she a fundamentalist at heart? "In fact, Clinton's God talk is more complicated -- and more deeply rooted -- than either fans or foes would have it," report Kathryn Joyce and Jeff Sharlet in Mother Jones, "a revelation not just of her determination to out-Jesus the GOP, but of the powerful religious strand in her own politics."

Friday, August 31, 2007
Artist Spurned by Bush Library Finds Unique Way to Take Revenge
(2 comments) "British artist Jonathan Yeo had every reason to be offended," reports Germany's Der Spiegel. "The Bush Library in Texas had yet again rescinded a commission it had given him to paint a portrait of Bush. In the end, though, the artist created one using a collage of pornographic images."

Friday, August 31, 2007
How Do We Raise a New Generation of Journalists?
(1 comments) "We have reached the point where 'who is a journalist?' is a lot more problematic a question than it was a few short years ago,'" writes former journalism professor Sam Smith in the first installment of a Scholars & Rogues Special Report.

Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Gonzalez Should Have Been Wiretapping His Own Party
"The real shame for Alberto Gonzales," writes sports columnist recently turned political columnist Mike Lupica, "is that he leaves his job of attorney general without ever putting his passion for surveillance to its best and most logical use, which means against his own party."

Tuesday, August 28, 2007
"Sinking ship leaves rat"
Michael Tomasky, American editor of Britain's Guardian, came up with one of the all-time headlines to describe Gonzalez leaving Bush's service. The rest of the column is filled with just as much irony.

Tuesday, August 28, 2007
How Does Laura Bush Live with George -- or Herself?
(1 comments) Susan Douglas of In These Times thinks Laura may be the worst First Lady in recent memory. "First, she has had no consistent program or agenda that has changed anything for the better. Second, she provides PR cover for her husband so she can pretend they're doing one thing, like helping school children, while he can do another, like screwing them and their teachers through disasters like 'No Child Left Behind'."

Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Attack on Iran Might Prove Popular with Americans
(1 comments) Initially, anyway. Raw Story reports on Pat Buchanan's appearance on the Scarborough Show. He "believes that an attack on Iran would be well received by Americans and that the Democratic Party would not offer any meaningful opposition. 'My guess would be that Barack Obama and Miss Hillary and the others would be in a state of paralysis.'"

Monday, August 27, 2007
Outsourcing Intelligence Betrays American People
Intelligence activities, writes James Carroll in the Boston Globe, "like security functions in Iraq, are increasingly carried out for the sake of large paychecks. The Post reported that 'outsourced' intelligence operatives cost, on average, twice what comparable government employees are paid."

Friday, August 24, 2007
Inviting Unwanted Attention to His Desperation
"Desperate presidents resort to desperate rhetoric," writes Jim Hoagland in the Washington Post, but "citing the U.S. failure in Vietnam to justify staying on in Iraq. . . is producing unintended consequences of a most damaging kind to a sitting president."

Friday, August 24, 2007
Bush Must Have Forgot Rove's Parting Words: Don't Mention Vietnam
"There can have been few speeches more laughable than George Bush's latest," writes Ian Williams in Britain's Guardian. "Referring to books he has surely never read, laden with specious historical parallels guaranteed to turn round and bite him in the bum, it is one long 'speechwriter wanted at the White House' ad."

Friday, August 24, 2007
When Giants Walked the Earth...the End of the Age of Rock Stars
"Whatever happened to real rock stars?" asks Jim Booth as Scholars & Rogues. "What we wanted was the spectacle. It was 1976 and we wanted the Big Bang. But. . . rock became, despite my sincere efforts (and those of dear friends who push good new music at me constantly) less than everybody's everything."

Friday, August 24, 2007
Krugman: GOP Trapped in Its History of Cynicism
"For decades it has exploited racial animosity to win over white voters," writes Paul Krugman of the New York Times on immigration, "and now, when Republican politicians need to reach out to an increasingly diverse country, the base won't let them."

Tuesday, August 21, 2007
Good News (Sort of) for Once: All Escape Smoking Chinese Airliner
"A crew member of the Boeing 737-800, operated by Taiwan-based China Airlines, could be seen on video jumping from a cockpit window seconds after the explosion," reports the Washington Post. "Despite what passengers described as 10 minutes of panic and terror inside the plane before they found the emergency slides, none of the 165 people aboard was killed or seriously injured" in the incident in Japan.

Tuesday, August 21, 2007
Average Incomes Fall for Most Americans from 2000 to 2005
"Americans earned a smaller average income in 2005 than in 2000, the fifth consecutive year that they had to make ends meet with less money than at the peak of the last economic expansion, new government data shows," reports David Cay Johnston in the New York Times.

Monday, August 20, 2007
Republicans' Preferred Opponent? Could Be Clinton
"Day after day last week, outgoing White House political strategist Karl Rove delivered slashing attacks on Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton," writes Peter Wallsten in The Los Angeles Times. Why? He may be "trying to stampede Democrats into nominating her, having concluded that Obama, Edwards or someone else would pose a stiffer challenge to the Republican nominee."

Monday, August 20, 2007
Not Only Bush & Co., But the Military Has Betrayed Our Trust
(2 comments) "Largely unrecognized by the American public, unacknowledged by those in power, and denied by professionals in uniform, the United States suffers today from an enduring crisis in civil-military relations," writes Gregory Foster in In These Times. He compares it to a lymphoma or termite infestation -- its symptoms hidden and unnoticed -- that destroy the body or structure from within.

Monday, August 20, 2007
It's Getting Drafty
"The administration promises to enlarge the Army and Marines, as do the leading Democratic presidential candidates," writes William Pfaff in The Baltimore Sun. "Fine. But what if the pool of volunteers is drying up?" At least it would spur the young to rise up against the Iraq War in greater numbers.

Monday, August 20, 2007
Absence of Rove Frees Cheney to Pursue Iran Agenda
(1 comments) "It was Karl Rove who had been consistently serving as the anti-Cheney with regard to expanding the Middle East quagmire into Iran," writes Karen Kwiatkowski at Lew Rockwell. "It seems Rove understood that nearly five years of killing people, destroying infrastructure in Iraq wasn't working -- and probably shouldn't be complicated by attacking the neighbors." Whoever thought we'd be sorry to see Rove go?

Thursday, August 16, 2007
Defense Spending -- the Democrats' Gorilla in the Room
"The United States is currently spending more on the military than at the height of the Reagan military build-up or during the Vietnam or Korean wars," writes Frida Berrigan on Foreign Policy in Focus. "Given these figures -- there is plenty of fodder for Democratic candidates wishing to take on the Bush administration's love affair with the Pentagon." So why the silence?

Thursday, August 16, 2007
Kucinich's Voice in the Wilderness Sounds the Alarm
John Nichols of The Nation writes that "the unprecedented attempt to label Iran's 125,000-strong Republican Guard as a 'specially designated global terrorist' group -- is, as [Congressman Kucinich] says 'nothing more than an attempt to deceive Americans into yet another war -- this time with Iran.'" Yet, his is a "lonely voice" among the Democrats.

Thursday, August 16, 2007
Stealth Candidate: Watch Out for Huckaby
In "The Christian Right's New Man" in American Prospect, Sarah Posner describes how no one is happier with the results of the Iowa Straw Poll than charismatic evangelical Christians, who recently declared Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee "one of our own."

Thursday, August 16, 2007
Pailla Found Guilty
U.S. citizen Jose Padilla was found guilty of "supporting terrorism." "The Bush administration," reports Reuters, "accused him after his 2002 arrest of plotting to set off a radioactive bomb. Bush ordered him imprisoned by the military as an 'enemy combatant.' But Padilla was indicted in a civilian court in November 2005 on charges that do not mention any bomb plot."

Wednesday, August 15, 2007
Clinton Playing Fast and Loose with Nukes
"Loose nuclear talk makes us vulnerable, not strong, and calls into question the judgment of those who seek to be commander in chief," writes Jim Walsh of the Council for a Liveable World on the Clinton-Obama clash over nuclear weapons. "Clinton is playing politics with an issue that could have profound ramifications for the future of nuclear proliferation."

Wednesday, August 15, 2007
Draft Elizabeth Edwards for President
"The problem for me with the other candidates [aside from her husband, John, that is] is I don't know what it is that drives them. What is it they really believe in that makes them get up in the morning and want to do this?" From a penetrating interview with her in The Progressive.

Wednesday, August 15, 2007
"If he's so smart, how come you lost Congress?"
CBS reporter Bill Plante ignited the blogosphere when he dared ask President Bush the obvious about Karl Rove. He was simultaneously given the "balls of the day" award and called a "rude little liberal."

Wednesday, August 15, 2007
That Sucking Sound You Hear Is the Constitution Going Down a Rat Hole
. . . in room 641A at 611 Folsom Street, San Francisco. That's the hub from which all our data is being "mined" under the Terrorist Surveillance Program.

Tuesday, August 14, 2007
The Mussolini in Giuliani
No offense to Italians intended. But, in 1994, he was caught making some fascist remarks, summed up by Pensito Review: "Life was better back in authoritarianism's golden age because citizens bowed to the government and kept to their place." Follow the link to see his actual remarks.

Tuesday, August 14, 2007
What Do We Have in Common with States Like Colombia, North Korea, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Israel, and Pakistan?
Like them, it's failed to ratify the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty. Yet, on August 1, reports Nukes of Hazard, tiny Palau ratified it, shaming us big-time.

Tuesday, August 14, 2007
Romney and Giuliani, like Bush, Feel Your Pain -- Not
Recent self-serving comments by Giuliani and Romney resemble those of George Bush, whose self-centeredness, Paul Krugman observes, "shines through whenever he makes off-the-cuff, unscripted remarks."

Tuesday, August 14, 2007
80,000 Glocks in Their Pockets
(1 comments) "80,000," writes Jim Booth on Scholars and Rogues. "That's how many Glock 19s and other pistols the GAO figures have gone missing among the 190,000 weapons that are 'lost' in the Iraq War zone. The weapons that are supposed to be used to bring law, order, and stability to Iraq are instead being used to destabilize the entire region."

Monday, August 13, 2007
Hideous Giuliani Video
(3 comments) In this deeply offensive and infuriating clip Rudy tries to make jokes about his harsh welfare policies as mayor of New York City.

Monday, August 13, 2007
Black Web Surfing: What Is It?
Not deadly or stealthy like Black Ops or the horror movie The Ring. It's an energy-saving technique as intriguing as it is innovative.

Monday, August 13, 2007
Instead of a Gold Watch, Rove Gets a Subpoena
"Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy said Thursday he will subpoena White House political adviser Karl Rove to testify about the firings of federal prosecutors," reports CNN.

Wednesday, August 8, 2007
We've Let Ourselves Become Hostage to China's "Nuclear Option"
(1 comments) The Chinese government has begun a concerted campaign of economic threats against the United States, hinting that it may liquidate its vast holding of US treasuries if Washington imposes trade sanctions to force a yuan revaluation, reports Britain's Telegraph.

Wednesday, August 8, 2007
Nuclear Energy Reconsidered
Before you recoil in horror, read Brian Angliss's post on Daedalnexus. He not only describes the benefits of breeder reactors, he offers his ideas for updating and amending the you'll-miss-me-when-I'm-gone Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.

Thursday, August 2, 2007
Times's Michael Gordon Spear-Carrier for Administration's "Iranians Killing Americans" Narrative
Michael Gordon of The New York Times is carrying on the tradition of Judith Miller war-mongering by spreading the rumor that Iran is behind attacks on US troops in Iraq, writes Gareth Porter in The American Prospect. Such as the Karbala operation last January in which five Americans were killed.

Thursday, August 2, 2007
Gonzalez's Hold on Job Seems "Unshakeable"
. . . according to Time's Massimo Calabresi. Basically, Bush needs him as a firewall between him and special prosecutors.

Wednesday, August 1, 2007
Reframing the Public Lie About Wealth in America
Writing at Scholars & Rogues, Sam Smith presents an innovative new program for taking the wealth issue away from the Republicans. For example: "GOP policies favor the hoarding of wealth by an elect few. Those who oppose them [like Democrats] promote the creation of wealth by providing opportunity for the many." No American should be blocked by Republican policies from attaining financial security.

Wednesday, August 1, 2007
Here Lies a Man Impeached
In 1876, William Worth Belknap, secretary of war during the Grant administration, writes The Washington Post's Dana Milkbank, "became the first -- and, to this day, the only -- Cabinet officer to be impeached. Rep. Jay Inslee (D-Wash.) would like to change that. He has introduced a resolution to weigh impeachment proceedings against Alberto Gonzales."

Wednesday, August 1, 2007
In Iraq the Killing Season Is Year-Round
"This was the deadliest July for US troops since the Iraq War began," writes Juan Cole at Informed Comment. "July is like a blast furnace in Iraq, with temperatures approaching 120 degrees F. in the shade. Guerrillas typically lie low in this unfavorable environment, compared to other seasons, and so the casualty rates go down. Instead, this year the killing season has gone on as if it were spring."

Wednesday, August 1, 2007
What Does It Mean to Be Un-American?
(1 comments) . . . asks Joanne Mariner at FindLaw. "The American Freedom Campaign, launched yesterday," she writes, "is an online and offline effort to build grassroots support to strengthen American democracy, restore constitutional checks and balances, and remedy abuses of power. The central focus of the campaign is to reassert the notion that the United States is a nation of laws, and that even the President is not above the law."

Wednesday, August 1, 2007
"The single greatest negative legacy this administration could leave"
That's what Joe Biden called the administration's decision to let START (Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty) expire. As evidenced by his comment, "That decision hasn't gone over very well with the intelligence community or ranking members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee," writes Jeff Lindemyer at Nukes of Hazard.

Monday, July 30, 2007
Gonzalez's Lies Nothing New
"Controversy over Gonzales's candor about George W. Bush's conduct or policies has actually dogged him for more than a decade, since he worked for Bush in Texas," according to The Washington Post. "Whether Gonzales has deliberately told untruths or is merely hampered by his memory has been the subject of intense debate among members of Congress, legal scholars and others who have watched him over the years."

Friday, July 27, 2007
Horrors! Arlen Specter Fails to Observe Protocol on Air Force One
"Guests of President Bush aboard Air Force One generally know that he expects them to behave in a certain way: No showboating or mingling with the on-board press corps and, certainly, no criticizing the commander in chief or his team," writes Jim Rutenberg in The New York Times. "Senator Arlen Specter violated both points of decorum on Thursday."

Friday, July 27, 2007
The Threat of War with Iran Will Just Not Go Away
"As US and Iranian diplomats met in Baghdad," writes the incomparable Gareth Porter, "the domestic US political climate appeared decidedly more supportive of an aggressive US posture toward Iran than existed just a few months ago, reflecting the apparent triumph of the Bush administration's narrative on Iran's role in Iraq." You know, the narrative that goes: Never take your eye off Cheney for a minute!

Thursday, July 26, 2007
The Wellsprings of Our Torture Policy
In Vanity Fair, Katherine Eban explains how America's coercive interrogation methods were developed by two C.I.A. psychologists who had spent their careers training U.S. soldiers to endure Communist-style torture techniques.

Thursday, July 26, 2007
Colombian Paramilitaries Set New Benchmark in Horror
President Bush and Canada's Prime Minister Harper cozy up to Colombian President Alvaro Uribe. But, reports Dan Gardner in The Ottawa Citizen, he's implicated in torture and massacres by paramilitaries using their implement of choice -- the chainsaw.

Thursday, July 26, 2007
Secret Squirrels Spying on Iran?
(1 comments) Police in Iran are reported to have taken 14 squirrels into custody --because they are suspected of spying. The rodents were found near the Iranian border allegedly equipped with eavesdropping devices. Iranian paranoia or your tax dollars at work?

Thursday, July 26, 2007
Could Americans Support Another Hitler?
(1 comments) "Some might argue that Germans," writes Jacob Hornberger at Lew Rockwell, "should not have supported their government officials during the war because it was obvious that Hitler and his henchmen were evil. The problem with that argument, however, is that throughout the 1930s many Germans and many foreigners" saw Hitler as a strong leader like Roosevelt.

Tuesday, July 24, 2007
Fatwa Fun
Foreign Policy magazine lists the funniest fatwas (Islamic religious rulings, though technically nonbinding) -- from banning unclothed sex to outlawing Pokemon. Politically incorrect? "Lighten up," as Mitt Romney says.

Tuesday, July 24, 2007
Best Explanation Yet of 'Why They Hate Us'
They want to like us. "Pakistani rock musicians listen to Jimi Hendrix and Nirvana," writes Mohsin Hamid in The Washington Post. But "Americans need to educate themselves about what their country has done abroad. And they need to play a more active role in ensuring that what the United States does abroad is [in keeping] with the American public's own sense of American values."

Tuesday, July 24, 2007
The Ultimate Resource for Debunking Anti-Global-Warming Arguments
"The deniers serve a valuable scientific purpose," writes Brian Angliss on Scholars and Rogues. "When they find a real hole, or just think they have, addressing their claims are what has made the science of global heating as bullet-proof as it now is." Angliss has "gathered the top anti-global heating claims into a list and provided a reasonably thorough debunking for every one."

Tuesday, July 24, 2007
Breaking. . . Gonzalez Takes Shots from Both Sides of Aisle Before Senate Judiciary Committee
(2 comments) "Senate Judiciary Committee members accused Attorney General Alberto Gonzales of misleading them and hinted at perjury charges over his testimony about the Bush administration's surveillance of suspected terrorists," reports Bloomberg. "Your credibility has been breached to the point of being actionable," said Arlen Specter. Schumer and Feingold piled on too.

Saturday, July 21, 2007
Threaten Our Efforts in Iraq and Face Frozen Assets
"In a little-noticed executive order issued on Tuesday, President Bush directed the Treasury Department to block the U.S.-based financial assets of anyone deemed to have threatened 'the peace or stability of Iraq or the Government of Iraq'," reports Spencer Ackerman on TPMmuckracker. "'That could be anything,' says Ken Mayer, an expert in executive orders." And anyone -- like US citizens.

Saturday, July 21, 2007
Blair's Predecessor as Middle East Envoy Undermined by Bush & Co.
"Wolfensohn recalls," reports Israel's Haaretz, "powerful forces in the U.S. administration worked behind his back: They did not believe in the border terminals agreement. The official behind this development, he says, was Elliot Abrams, and every aspect of that agreement was abrogated."

Friday, July 20, 2007
Plame Civil Suit Thrown Out of Court, Juan Cole Says There Will Be Hell to Pay
(4 comments) "So Bush and Cheney have deeply damaged recruitment, morale and efforts among our counter-terrorism agencies at the same time that their greedy and duplicitous occupation of a major Arab Muslim country, Iraq, is generating a new terrorist threat against the American homeland," he writes at Informed Comment. "They are creating the perfect storm. So the judge threw out the lawsuit. But we will all be paying the damage."

Friday, July 20, 2007
Is Training Iraqi Forces Really a Good Idea?
(1 comments) "In effect," write General William Odom and Lawrence Korb in Financial Times, by training local Iraqi forces, "we are arming different sides in a civil war. It is no accident that as the number of trained Iraqi security forces has grown, so have attacks on coalition forces, Iraqi civilians and the Iraqi security forces themselves."

Friday, July 20, 2007
Bush's Worst Fears Have Already Come True
To Bush, failure in Iraq means ascendant radicalism among both Shia and Sunni Muslims, and it would embolden sponsors of terrorism such as Iran and Al Qaeda. "Excuse me again?" writes Eugene Robinson of The Washington Post. "This is what Bush believes would happen? Hasn't he noticed that these catastrophes have already befallen us?"

Friday, July 20, 2007
The $54 Million Pants Lawsuit Has Been Turned into a Right-Wing Cause
The plight of drycleaners the Chungs, sued for $54 million, "which is legitimate and undeserved by any standard," writes Martin Bosworth on Scholars and Rogues, is "now being converted into a right-wing talking point, and [a Chamber of Commerce] fundraiser is being underwritten" by right-wing elements. Frivolous lawsuits, greedy trial lawyers and all that.

Friday, July 20, 2007
Atlanta Sick About -- and of -- Vick
As one Atlanta fan said of others, in a Sports Illustrated article by Jack Wilkinson, ""These people don't want to see Vick. If they keep him, there's always going to be that stab, that open wound. I love Vick to death, but if he's guilty, I don't even want to see him. He's gotta go. He might need some help, too." Ya think?

Friday, July 20, 2007
Mike Gravel Schools Harry Reid in How to End a War
Gravel, who's been there and done that with Vietnam, says in an open letter to Harry Reid, "If you really want to shape war policy, you must call up a cloture vote every single day. Of course you wouldn't have the votes at first, but that's why you need to force the Senate to remain in session seven days a week to vote every day on cloture throughout the summer." Then Harry can write an essay: How I Spent My Summer Vacation.

Thursday, July 19, 2007
Iraq -- "The most important consequences are often the unintended ones"
Writes Timothy Garton Ash of London's The Guardian. Furthermore, "so far as the human eye can see, the likely consequences of Iraq range from the bad to the catastrophic. Looking back over a quarter-century of writing about international affairs, I can not recall a more comprehensive and avoidable man-made disaster."

Thursday, July 19, 2007
Cheney and Ahmadinejad: Long-Lost Twins
"Both men are hawks who defy the international community, scorn the U.N. and are unpopular at home because of incompetence and recklessness -- and each finds justification in the extremism of the other," writes Nicholas Kristof of The New York Times. They and their people "listen to each other, cite each others' statements and goad each other to new excesses."

Thursday, July 19, 2007
Blogger First to Spot New Chinese Nuclear Sub -- Using Google Maps!
(1 comments) The Navy Times reports: "An image of what could be one of China's new nuclear ballistic missile submarines is available on the Google Maps and Google Earth satellite-image site, a defense blogger is claiming." Follow the link in the second paragraph to the blog itself and the pics.

Thursday, July 19, 2007
The Guns of August
When Pat Buchanan isn't busy railing against Mexicans, his anti-intervention libertarianism can be valuable. "Why is Congress going on vacation?" he asks. "Why are a Democratic-controlled House and Senate not asking [hard questions about Iran]? Why is Congress letting Bush and Vice President Cheney decide whether we launch a third war in the Middle East? Is Congress in on it?"

Thursday, July 19, 2007
Al-Qaeda Sea Change: Zawahiri Calls for End to Sunni-Shiite Schism
(2 comments) It seems clear, writes Michael Scheuer (the CIA's "Anonymous") on Asia Times Online, that Zawahiri and bin Laden "want the broadest possible degree of Islamist unity to be in place before the next attack" -- on the US, that is.

Wednesday, July 18, 2007
Demonizing Iran Becomes Harder and Harder All the Time
(1 comments) Last week, a visit by the International Atomic Energy Agency to Iran "culminated in a 'serious and substantial' agreement heralding a new level of Iran-IAEA cooperation," writes Kaveh Afrasiabi in Asia Times Online. Meanwhile, the administration's verbal onslaught against Iran has achieved a level of desperation as it watches its justifications for attacking Iran evaporate.

Wednesday, July 18, 2007
Scheer: We Finally Got the President We Were Warned About
(1 comments) "George W. Bush is the imperial president that James Madison and other founders of this great republic warned us about. He lied the nation into precisely the "foreign entanglements" that George Washington feared would destroy our experiment in representative government, and he has championed a spurious notion of security over individual liberty, thus eschewing the alarms of Thomas Jefferson," writes Robert Scheer.

Wednesday, July 18, 2007
Ever Wonder Exactly What's So Bad About the World Bank?
Alexander Zaitchik explains in The eXile. For example, "Russia-watchers know the horrific stats about Russian men's grotesquely low life expectancy [now at 60], which, coincidentally, is the retirement age for Russian men." Recently, to cut pension expenditures, the World Bank "suggested that the retirement age for men be raised to 65." Get the picture?

Tuesday, July 17, 2007
Administration Setting Up Petraeus as Fall Guy?
(1 comments) Think Progress reports "some members of the military are worried that the general is being set up by the Bush administration as a scapegoat if conditions in Iraq fail to improve. 'The danger is that Petraeus will now be painted as failing to live up to expectations and become the fall guy for the administration,' one retired four-star officer said."

Tuesday, July 17, 2007
Military Community Has Found Its Ross Perot in Ron Paul
"Paul has often reiterated his views that US security has been worsened by its military presence in Iraq," reports Iraq Slogger. "One might think such criticism of the war and the Commander-in-Chief's leadership would make Paul a pariah to the military community, however, the latest figures indicate the antiwar Republican is receiving more donations from employees of the US military than any other Republican candidate."

Tuesday, July 17, 2007
Iraq Versus Vietnam
In futbol, that is. Iraq's national team advanced to the quarterfinals of the Asian Cup in Bangkok Monday. Iraq will face Vietnam in the next round. Whoever loses can console itself with the knowledge that, when matched against the US, it at least neutralized its offense.

Monday, July 16, 2007
Australian Telecom Worker Mows Down Cellphone Towers
"A man who believed that his health had been damaged by mobile phone signals led a convoy of police cars and onlookers across western suburbs of Sydney as he used a 15-tonne armoured personnel carrier (APC) to flatten seven phone towers," reports The Times of London. We love our cellphones, but none of us want the towers near us.

Monday, July 16, 2007
Don't Get Sick on Weekends or at Night
As Paul Krugman of The New York Times points out. Also, regarding the myths about the superiority of US health-care, he writes: "A recent article in Business Week put it bluntly: 'In reality, both data and anecdotes show that the American people are already waiting as long or longer than patients living with universal health-care systems.'"

Monday, July 16, 2007
"Mahdi Army, Not Al-Qaeda, is Enemy No. 1 in Western Baghdad"
Reports The Washington Post. "The militia has a structure familiar to U.S. soldiers: brigade and battalion commanders leading legions of foot soldiers. Its fighters are willing and able to attack Americans with armor-piercing bombs, mortars, machine guns and grenades. Meanwhile, the political wing of Sadr's movement plays an outsize role in the national government."

Monday, July 16, 2007
More and More Republicans Turning a Deaf Ear to Administration
"Last Tuesday, Senator Susan Collins of Maine took a telephone call from Condoleezza Rice, asking her to wait until September to call for any changes in the strategy," reports David Nather in Congressional Quarterly. "Collins listened politely [but still] introduced an amendment to the Defense authorization bill that would require the administration to start changing the strategy."

Sunday, July 15, 2007
Al Zawahiri Reportedly Stage-Managed Red Mosque Standoff
(1 comments) According to The Times of London, "Al Qaeda's leadership secretly directed the Islamic militants whose armed revolt at the Red Mosque in Islamabad ended last week with more than 100 deaths after it was stormed by the Pakistan army. . . . the troops who finally took control discovered letters from Osama Bin Laden's deputy."

Friday, July 13, 2007
AlterNet: "Forget Sen. Vitter's Penis -- Follow His Money"
(1 comments) While the media has given extensive coverage to GOP Sen. David Vitter's sexual indiscretions, the real scandal is his dealings with money and politics. Read Denny Wilkins's article in AlterNet.

Friday, July 13, 2007
Democrats Consider Giving Hedge-Fund Managers Yet Another Tax Break
(1 comments) "During the 2000 presidential campaign, Ralph Nader mocked politicians of both parties as Republicrats,' equally subservient to corporations and the wealthy," writes Paul Krugman. "But right now, as I watch Senate Democrats waffle over whether managers of private equity funds and hedge funds should be subject to the same taxes as ordinary working Americans -- I'm starting to feel that Mr. Nader wasn't all wrong."

Friday, July 13, 2007
Unlucky Friday the 13th for Harriet Myers
(1 comments) "A court battle over President Bush's broad but largely untested claims of executive privilege grew more likely yesterday when a House panel took the first step toward bringing contempt charges against former White House counsel Harriet E. Miers," according to The Washington Post.

Friday, July 13, 2007
The Evergreen Revolution
Peace magazine's editor Metta Spencer speaks with M.S. Swaminathan, the father of India's Green Revolution. Concerned it would become the "greed" revolution, he coined the term "Evergreen Revolution" -- productivity improvement without ecological harm.

Friday, July 13, 2007
US Moving Nukes Out of Germany and Closer to Middle-East
According to the Strategic Security Blog, "the withdrawal from Ramstein Air Base shifts the geographic focus of NATO's nuclear posture to the south." It makes it that much harder to "create a Mediterranean Nuclear Weapons Free Zone, and persuade countries like Iran not to develop nuclear weapons."

Wednesday, July 11, 2007
$4.8 Million Stripped Out of Cheney's Budget
. . . for not complying with security rules for classified information, reports TPMMuckraker. "It's unclear if the move will survive a full Appropriations Committee vote, but if Cheney wants his money back, all he needs to do is allow the National Archives' Information Security Oversight Office to perform a few unobtrusive inspections. Don't hold your breath, though."

Wednesday, July 11, 2007
Administration Spurned Special Olympics Because Kennedys Supported It
(2 comments) "Dr. Richard Carmona, a former U.S. surgeon general, told a congressional panel that top Bush administration officials repeatedly tried to weaken or suppress important public health reports because of political considerations," writes Gardiner Harris in The International Herald Tribune. In fact, "Administration officials even discouraged him from attending the Special Olympics" because of its ties to the Kennedys.

Wednesday, July 11, 2007
Red Mosque Siege Was a Zero-Sum Game
(1 comments) "Following the military storming of the Lal Masjid (Red Mosque) in Islamabad, considered a hotbed for support of the Taliban and al-Qaeda, US President George W Bush has praised Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf's role in checking extremism," writes Syed Saleem Shahzad on Asia Times Online. But "Whether they were security forces personnel or Lal Masjid militants, both were Muslims and both were martyrs."

Wednesday, July 11, 2007
American Actually Killed in Green Zone
"At least 20 mortar rounds and Katyusha rockets struck the fortified Green Zone on Tuesday afternoon, killing an American service member and two other people," reports The LA Times. The attack came the "same day gunmen kidnapped Iraqi Police Col. Mahmoud Muhyi Hussein, who directs security inside the Green Zone, as he was driving in the central Baghdad neighborhood of Jadriya." No safe havens left in Iraq.

Tuesday, July 10, 2007
Musharraf Nixes Negotiations, Goes Waco on Red Mosque
(2 comments) A draft agreement to end the standoff in Islamabad's Red Mosque was rejected by Pervez Musharraf, according to Bloomberg News. Instead government troops attacked, killing the militant's leader, though without the loss of life to innocents that characterized the Clinton-authorized attack on the Branch Davidians at Waco.

Tuesday, July 10, 2007
Administration Likely Behind Musharraf Attack on Red Mosque
"Apparently saying he was 'heavily under duress from his allies,' [read: Bush & Co.] Musharraf ordered in the military to end the seven-day standoff," writes Syed Saleem Shahzad on Asia Times Online. "Unconfirmed reports even say that Musharraf personally led the assault."

Monday, July 9, 2007
Should You Be Able to Drive Anywhere You Damn Well Please?
An alliance of local officials and timber, mining, and off-road-vehicle lobbyists -- along with their friends in the White House -- have dug up a Civil-War-era statute to stake road claims all over the West. Read "Off-Road Rules" by journalist Christopher Ketcham at Mother Jones.

Monday, July 9, 2007
All Quiet on the Home Front, But Nuclear Terrorism Could Change All That
(1 comments) "After nearly six years without a second attack on U.S. soil, some skeptics suggest that 9/11 was a 100-year flood," writes nuclear terror expert Graham Allison. "And yet the danger of a nuclear attack by terrorists is not only very real but disturbingly likely."

Monday, July 9, 2007
Even the CIA Has Been Privatized
"Over the past five years," writes R.J. Hillhouse in The Washington Post, "there has been a revolution in the intelligence community toward wide-scale outsourcing. Private firms such as Abraxas, Booz Allen Hamilton, Lockheed Martin and Raytheon recruit spies, create non-official cover identities and control the movements of CIA case officers." Does not compute, does not compute. . .

Sunday, July 8, 2007
New York Times Finally Comes Out Firmly on Side of Withdrawal from Iraq
(3 comments) The New York Times has had it. Today's lead editorial reads: "It is time for the United States to leave Iraq, without any more delay than the Pentagon needs to organize an orderly exit." It also provides a plan.

Sunday, July 8, 2007
Sinatra Grew to Hate "My Way"
(2 comments) "Few of the nitwits who insist that the song 'My Way' be played at their funerals are aware that this hymn to self-absorption originated with a flamboyant French pop singer who died in his bathtub while changing a light bulb," writes cultural critic Joe Queenan in his new column on Britain's The Guardian.

Sunday, July 8, 2007
Libby and Vanunu: What's Wrong with This Picture?
(7 comments) The legendary Daniel Ellsberg comments on the contrast between the cases of Lewis Libby, just released from prison, and Israel's nuclear whistleblower, Mordechai Vanunu, just returned to prison.

Sunday, July 8, 2007
Another 100 Dead in an Iraq Suicide Attack
(1 comments) "A suicide truck bomber blasted a Shiite town north of Baghdad on Saturday, killing more than 100 people," according to the AP, which calls it "a sign Sunni insurgents are pulling away from a U.S. offensive around the capital to attack where security is thinner."

Sunday, July 8, 2007
If Iran Were America (and We Were Iran)
What if Iran and the US had inhabited Bizarro World (where everything is opposite) for the past 50 years? Read this eye-opening article by Jeffrey Bryan at Lew Rockwell to glean some understanding of what Iran has gone through at the hands of the West.

Friday, July 6, 2007
Siege of Red Mosque Inflames Pakistan
(1 comments) "Pakistani officials have denied television reports that President General Pervez Musharraf's plane was shot at," writes Syed Saleem Shahzad on Asia Times Online. "But what they can't cover up is the turmoil that is spreading across the country in the wake of the government's decision to forcibly seek out Taliban and al-Qaeda assets in the radical Lal Masjid (Red Mosque)in Islamabad."

Tuesday, July 3, 2007
Are We Really Still a Superpower?
China, Russia and Europe are no longer impressed. "We're still dangerous, with all our bombs and missiles," writes Michael Ventura in The Austin Chronicle. "But we won't be fighting another ground war anytime soon, and everybody knows it. Financially and militarily, we're no superpower anymore -- though no presidential candidate can say that."

Tuesday, July 3, 2007
The Shadow of the Bomb Lengthens
"Mine is a generation that has always lived under the shadow of the bomb," writes outgoing British Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett. "But there is a danger in familiarity with something so terrible. If we allow our efforts on disarmament to slacken, the nuclear shadow that hangs over us all will lengthen and it will deepen. It may, one day, blot out the light for good."

Tuesday, July 3, 2007
It's Time for the US to Forswear First Use of Nukes
(1 comments) "To this day, the United States has never established a policy of 'No First Strike' or 'No First Use' for its nuclear arsenal," writes Jerome Grossman in The Topeka Capitol Journal. "China is the only nuclear weapons state that has a standing 'No First Use' declaratory policy. It is time for the US to take the nuclear option off the table by declaring a 'No First Use' policy."

Tuesday, July 3, 2007
Joe Wilson: Libby Commutation an Obstruction of Justice
"This from the president who refused to listen to the Pope's clemency appeals over the execution of first female prisoner in Texas since the Civil War," said former Ambassador Joseph Wilson in a phone conversation with TPMmuckraker. He was referring to the 1998 execution of Karla Faye Tucker while Bush was governor.

Tuesday, July 3, 2007
Military Trying to Pin Five American Deaths on Iran
"Iranian operatives helped plan a January raid in Karbala in which five American soldiers were killed, an American military spokesman in Iraq said today," writes Michael Gordon (The New York Times's most suspect reporter since Judy Miller was given the pink slip). It also claims that Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps has used operatives from Hezbollah to train and arm Shiite militants in Iraq.

Tuesday, July 3, 2007
"Laura Bush's Candy-Coated Bubble"
At the blog, One Utah, Stuart Merrill writes of Laura Bush's recent visit to a schoolroom in Mali: "For Mrs. Bush they covered the mud on the walkway, installed electrical outlets, a generator and fans, painted only the entrance of the building, leaving everything she didn't see in utter squalor. Once Mrs. Bush left they removed the fans, furniture, generator, even the electrical outlets from the walls."

Monday, July 2, 2007
Republicans Aging Fast
"The percentage of Republicans age 55 and older grew from 28 percent in 1997 to 41 percent now," writes Jon Ponder on The Pensito Review, "while the number of 18- to 37-year-olds dropped from 25 percent to 17 percent. A Republican analyst finds this to be alarming: 'These results point out just how old our base is shifting.'"

Monday, July 2, 2007
The Rich Get Richer and the Poor Get Deader
"Food production in developing countries will halve in the next 20 years unless wealthy nations lower their rate of consumption, the Stockholm Environment Institute warned at a weekend conference," reports the AP. The more greenhouse gases emitted by affluent nations, the more desert is created in sub-Saharan Africa.

Monday, July 2, 2007
How to Drive Afghans into the Clutches of the Taliban
"The assessment of Saturday's [NATO] pre-dawn air strike in the Gereshk district came from the mayor and police chief, who said that 62 Taliban militants had died during the attacks as well as 45 ordinary Afghans including women, children and the elderly," writes Andrew Buncombe in London's The Independent. President Hamid Karzai said it was "difficult for us to accept or understand" what had happened.

Monday, July 2, 2007
Executive Privilege Is a Constitutional Myth
(1 comments) "President Dwight Eisenhower was the first president to coin the phrase 'executive privilege,' but not the first to invoke its principle: namely, that a president has the right to withhold certain information from Congress, the courts or anyone else - even when faced with a subpoena," writes Eric Weiner on AlterNet. But it's mentioned nowhere in the Constitution.

Monday, July 2, 2007
American Dream Slashed Along with Home Values
"House prices will not collapse to nothing like the most ridiculous of the Internet stocks," writes economist Dean Baker on AlterNet, "but homes in the most-inflated markets could lose 30 to 50 percent (in real terms) from their bubble peaks."

Monday, July 2, 2007
If You Read Only One Article About Iran. . .
read "Iran Has a Message. Are We Listening?" in Sunday's Washington Post. "My conversations with hard-liners and reformers inside Tehran," he writes, suggested that "under the right circumstances, Iran may still be willing to stop short of building a bomb. 'Iran would like to have the technology, and that is enough for deterrence,' says Iran's former ambassador to London."

Friday, June 29, 2007
John Dean: Cheney's Genius Is Letting Bush Think He's President
"Those with whom I have spoken have serious doubt that Bush and the White House staff really knows what Cheney is doing, why he is doing it, or how he is doing it," writes John Dean on Find Law. "Cheney's genius is that he lets George W. Bush get out of bed every morning actually believing he is the President."

Friday, June 29, 2007
Juan Cole on the Stupidest Words Ever by a US President
(2 comments) Juan Cole quotes President Bush saying, on Thursday, "In Israel terrorists have taken innocent human life for years in suicide attacks. The difference is that Israel is a functioning democracy and it's not prevented from carrying out its responsibilities. And that's a good indicator of success that we're looking for in Iraq." Cole's comment: "These words may be the stupidest ones ever uttered by a US president."

Thursday, June 28, 2007
Far from al-Qaeda, Iraqis Killed by US Were Fighting Militants
The BBC reports on another tragic blunder by US forces on June 22: "The US military announced that its attack helicopters, armed with missiles, engaged and killed 17 al-Qaeda gunmen. But villagers say that those who died had nothing to do with al-Qaeda. They say they were local village guards trying to protect the township from exactly the kind of attack by insurgents the US military says it foiled."

Thursday, June 28, 2007
US to Offload Gitmo Inmates to Pakistan
With the Bush administration under pressure to close the US detention facility at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, plans have been made to relocate some of its "war on terror" captives to the countries of their origin. In Pakistan, construction has already begun on new special jails in three cities, paid for by the US. Inmates can expect a long wait for their day in court. Syed Saleem Shahzad reports at Asia Times Online.

Thursday, June 28, 2007
Warren Buffett: Let Me Pay More Taxes -- Please
According to The Washington Post, Warren Buffett, appearing at a fundraiser for Hillary Clinton, "slammed a system that allows the very rich to pay taxes at a lower rate than the middle class. Buffett cited himself, the third-richest person in the world, as an example. Last year, Buffett said, he was taxed at 17.7 percent on his taxable income of more than $46 million. His receptionist was taxed at about 30 percent."

Wednesday, June 27, 2007
"The Banality of Greed"
Writing on TruthDig about yet more Halliburton corruption, Robert Scheer says: "One shudders at the blissful arrogance of this modern Daddy Warbucks, who sees no conflict of interest over the blood-soaked profits garnered by the once-bankrupt division of the company that left him rich."

Wednesday, June 27, 2007
"Leaving No Tracks"
Don't forget to read the fourth article in Jo Becker and Barton Gellman's blockbuster Washington Post series: "Angler: The Cheney Vice-Presidency." It's journalism as well-positioned as any to make a difference.

Wednesday, June 27, 2007
"Neoconned Again?"
"The pundits who made the case that led to the Iraq catastrophe are continuing to urge a larger, greater war that would engulf the entire Middle East, though," writes Philip Giraldi on AntiWar, "many of them are now arguing that negotiations should precede nuking, if only to prove that diplomacy does not work."

Wednesday, June 27, 2007
It's Not Iran, But Soviet-Era Weapons, That Are Arming the Taliban
"While United States officials accuse Iran of arming a resurgent Taliban, officials [in Afghanistan] say the weapons are actually part of vast caches left behind by the Soviet military that fought a nine-year war in Afghanistan before withdrawing in 1988," writes Tahir Qadiry on Asia Times Online.

Tuesday, June 26, 2007
Prominent Conservatives Label Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty a Threat to Western Civilization
(1 comments) "Two prominent conservatives placed ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) -- an important treaty signed by 177 countries that would ban the testing of nuclear weapons absolutely -- on a list of top 18 threats to western civilization, along with nuclear terrorism and weapons proliferation in rogue states," writes Kyle Atwell on Nukes of Hazard. In other words, we can have them, but you can't.

Monday, June 25, 2007
Nader Contemplating Another Run
(2 comments) London's The Guardian reports Ralph Nader as saying: "The two parties are still converging. I really think there needs to be more competition from outside. Democrats have become, over the years, very good at electing very bad Republicans." Note to those who think he foiled Gore's 2000 run: Gore sabotaged himself (of course, he's reinvented himself since).

Monday, June 25, 2007
"Pushing the Envelope on Presidential Power"
Read the second installment in the crucial Washington Post series "Angler: The Cheney Vice President." No, not "anger" -- "angler." As in fishing for more power than there is fish in the sea.

Monday, June 25, 2007
How Are Militant Groups Sneaking Past the Giant Security Dragnet Around Baghdad?
Bobby Ghosh in Time magazine answers his own question: "Most of the tactics are designed to exploit the ineptitude of Iraqi security forces -- the 30,000 soldiers and 21,000 police who are meant to support U.S. troops. Lacking in training, equipment and motivation, the Iraqis are the soft underbelly of the surge."

Monday, June 25, 2007
World Nuclear Report Card Just Released
The Carnegie Endowment's Nonproliferation Program has just released its report on universal compliance. Some samples: "Obligation One: Make Nonproliferation Irreversible -- D. Obligation Two: Devalue the Political and Military Currency of Nuclear Weapons -- F. Obligation Three: Secure all nulcear materials -- C-." You get the idea.

Sunday, June 24, 2007
Stop Flying -- Really
(3 comments) Environmental writer George Monbiot has a "challenge for those concerned about global warming: Stop flying," writes Phoebe Connelly at In These Times. "Of all the harmful things you can do to the earth, it's hard to top traveling on a plane. Flying from, say, New York to London emits more than one ton of carbon dioxide per passenger."

Sunday, June 24, 2007
Is Gates Really an Improvement Over Rumsfeld?
"It was a failed administration's ritual scapegoating, the ousting last winter of its ruinous secretary of defense," writes Roger Morris on Asia Times Online. "Gates personifies older, equally serious, if less recognized, less remembered abuses" than Rumsfeld.

Sunday, June 24, 2007
Taking the Low Road for Hillary
This site, writes Peggy Noonan on Wall Street Journal Opinion, "appears to be the subterranean part of Hillary's campaign, the part that quietly coexists with the warm, chuckling lady playing the jukebox with her husband." It carries on a serious vendetta against Obama.

Sunday, June 24, 2007
CIA to Air Decades of Its Dirty Laundry
(2 comments) According to The Washington Post, "The CIA will declassify hundreds of pages of long-secret records detailing some of the intelligence agency's worst illegal abuses -- the so-called "family jewels" documenting a quarter-century of overseas assassination attempts, domestic spying, kidnapping and infiltration of leftist groups from the 1950s to the 1970s." There's got to be an ulterior motive.

Wednesday, June 20, 2007
"We Know More About Killing Than Living"
During the Cold War, said former senator Sam Nunn in a landmark speech before the Council on Foreign Relations, "Thousands of men and women thought deeply and worked diligently on both sides of the Iron Curtain to prevent nuclear war. In the future, it won't be enough to be lucky once or twice. If we're to avoid a catastrophe, all nuclear powers will have to be capable, careful, rational, and lucky –- every single time."

Wednesday, June 20, 2007
Michael Moore Finally Speaks About 9/11
(1 comments) "I've had a number of firefighters tell me over the years and since Fahrenheit 9/11 that they heard these explosions," Michael Moore told reporters, "that they believe there's MUCH more to the story than we've been told. I don't think the official investigations have told us the complete truth -- they haven't even told us half the truth."

Wednesday, June 20, 2007
Fatah and US Close the Door on Democratic Debate
(1 comments) "In the last few days, Hamas has made several overtures towards Fatah," writes Paul Woodward at War in Context, and "acknowledges Mahmoud Abbas' legitimacy and authority as Palestinian president; Hamas officials are calling for dialogue with Fatah -- it is Fatah's own leadership under American direction with Israeli and allied support that has firmly closed the door on democratic debate -- at least for now."

Wednesday, June 20, 2007
At Least They Found 140,000
From a New York Times editorial: "The post-Watergate law requiring the preservation of presidential records has proved to be no match for the Bush White House's stealthy use of back-channel e-mails via the Republican National Committee's computer system. Smoking C-drive or not, the nation must ask what made this veiled communication system so necessary."

Wednesday, June 20, 2007
Was Recent Attack on Shia Shrines in Samarra Orchestrated by Negroponte?
(1 comments) "The US Deputy Secretary of State reportedly planned the attack on the holy Shia shrines in Samarra to help topple the Iraqi government," according to Press TV. "John Negroponte plotted the attack during an unannounced trip to Iraq on June 12."

Tuesday, June 19, 2007
Puncturing the Ronald Reagan Myth
(3 comments) "The canonization of Ronald Reagan rests crucially on one thing Reagan himself did well: forgetting the facts. It seems timely to exhume a few." Read "The Enduring Lies of Ronald Reagan" by Susan J. Douglas at In These Times.

Tuesday, June 19, 2007
Startling Population Decline in American Birds
(4 comments) In the past 40 years, writes Verlyn Klinkenborg in The New York Times about an Audubon Society report "we have killed all those millions of birds or, let us say, unintentionally caused a dramatic population loss, simply by going about business as usual. What they actually need to survive, it turns out, is a landscape that is less intensely human."

Tuesday, June 19, 2007
Israel's Tech Boom Preys on Our Insecurities
"The key to Israel's supergrowth is not mysterious," writes Naomi Klein in The Nation. "Many of the country's young entrepreneurs are using Israel's status as a fortressed state, and its occupation of Gaza and the West Bank, as a kind of twenty-four-hour-a-day showroom -- a living example of how to enjoy relative safety amid constant war. Now Israel is exporting that model to the world."

Tuesday, June 19, 2007
Gaza: Another Mess Made in the USA
"Hundreds of Palestinians have died and thousands more have had their lives ruined by the brutal arrogant folly of Rice, Abrams and company," writes Time's Tony Karon at The Rootless Cosmopolitan.

Monday, June 18, 2007
James Kuntsler: Iraq Is Not a War
(1 comments) "It seems to me you can call the situation in Iraq a lot of things, but it's not a war," writes James Kuntsler on Atlantic Free Press. "We're involved in Iraq because we don't want to begin thinking about modifying our behavior at home. We are desperate to preserve our access to Middle East oil because that is the only way we can keep running our society the way we're used to running it."

Monday, June 18, 2007
An Invisible 500-pound Gorilla Haunts the Missile-defense Debate
(2 comments) "That the MAD 'era' ended in 1991 would be news to U.S. and Russian nuclear launch commanders," writes Alexander Zaitchik in The eXile. "Since the end of the Cold War, neither side has even for a moment removed its missiles from their pre-'91 hair-trigger footings. While burying MAD is a worthy and necessary goal, there is a right way to do it, and the American way."

Friday, June 15, 2007
"Talibanization" of Pakistan an Old Story
"There has been an awful lot of talk in the Western press about the frightful and new 'Talibanization' of Pakistan," writes Philip Smucker on Asia Times Online. "But the radicalization of Pakistan has been a long time coming and the West, particularly the United States, is probably as culpable as Pakistan's generals in the matter."

Friday, June 15, 2007
America Experiencing "Significant Shrinkage"
Remember George Costanza? This shrinkage, though, is America's loss of height vis a vis Europe. Something, Paul Krugman of The New York Times writes, "has caused Americans to grow richer without growing significantly taller. It's not the population's changing ethnic mix due to immigration: the stagnation of American heights is clear even if you restrict the comparison to non-Hispanic, native-born whites."

Friday, June 15, 2007
US Army Engulfed by "Tidal Wave of Unsustainable Demands"
"No commander in chief in American history has cared less about the overall health of America's Armed Forces," writes historian Andrew Bacevich at American Conservative magazine. He should know: He lost his son in Iraq last month.

Friday, June 15, 2007
Death Penalty for "Enhanced Interrogation Techniques"?
"Before there were 'enhanced interrogation techniques,' there was verschärfte Vernehmung developed by the Gestapo," writes Scott Horton on Harper's website. But the Bush Administration techniques are "generally more severe and include a number of practices that the Gestapo expressly forbade [on paper already]." It's now officially okay to compare bush & Co. to the Nazis.

Thursday, June 14, 2007
The New Day After
Former Secretary of Defense William Perry and others just released a report called "The Day After" about how to prepare for and survive a nuclear attack by terrorists. Jayne Vaynman at Arms Control Wonk writes: "Perhaps the most interesting recommendation in the report is for a fallout shelter program. (No, this is a serious shelter comment, for once.)"

Thursday, June 14, 2007
We Didn't Win the Cold War, We Survived It by Dumb Luck
(1 comments) "What winning the Cold War really meant," writes Paul Woodward at War in Context, "was that by luck rather than design, we didn't all get incinerated." A courageous president "would have championed a movement for global nuclear disarmament." (Remembering, of course, that a "courageous president" is a contradiction in terms.)

Thursday, June 14, 2007
To the Bitter End
Democrats are right to push for an end to the Iraq war. But don't expect the troops to be grateful. The Dems, writes Spencer Ackerman in The Washington Monthly, should "acknowledge that many fighting men and women want to stay in the battle and would be willing to do so for years longer. There's nothing wrong with saying that, nor in emphasizing that this is part of what makes us so proud of our military."

Wednesday, June 13, 2007
Lieberman's Bomb-Iran Talk Part of a Coordinated Offensive
"U.S. Sen. Joseph Lieberman's call for cross-border raids into Iran appears to be the culmination of a two-week long campaign by proponents of war to put the military option center-stage in the U.S. debate over Iran once more," writes Trita Parsi at AntiWar. Everybody's favorite jellyfish lashes out again with his stinging tentacles.

Wednesday, June 13, 2007
In Defense of Itself: Missile Defense Speaks Out
"With so much talk about missile defense, we thought it was time to talk to missile defense," writes Alexander Zaitchik, who "called Max the Missile Defense Main Frame at its base in Fort Greeley, Alaska. In a wide-ranging interview conducted over a secure military phone line, we found the system good-natured, forthcoming and racked by self-doubt."

Wednesday, June 13, 2007
House De-Funds, Senate Funds New Nuke Program
On Monday, writes writes Kyle Atwell at the disarmament blog Nukes of Hazzard, "The Senate Arms Services Committe allotted just over $195 million for the Reliable Replacement Warhead program, a 165% increase from the president's request [!] of $118.8 million. This is a big difference from the House Appropriations Committee, which put the brakes on RRW by eliminating all funding for the program."

Wednesday, June 13, 2007
"The US Is a 12-Year-Old with a Shotgun"
(4 comments) If we attacked Iran, said historian Gwynne Dyer in an interview, it "would actually convince a great many people that the United States is congenitally a rogue state. A senior Japanese diplomat said to me 'You know the United States is a twelve year old with a shotgun.' And what he meant was that [on its way down, the US] is becoming extremely erratic."

Wednesday, June 13, 2007
Afghan Mothers Use Opium as Surrogate Medicine
More and more people in Afghanistan are using opium as a painkiller due to a severe lack of medical supplies in the country, according to Germany's Der Spiegel. Some mothers are even giving it to their children, much to the concern of the UN.

Wednesday, June 13, 2007
"The Clowns Are Once Again Spilling out of the Volkswagen"
"Lately, the Neocons seem all over the public airwaves," writes Matt Taibbi. "Even worse, a few are still in office and seem to be cooking up a last-minute encore before the curtain finally comes down in '08."

Monday, June 11, 2007
Is America's Greatest Gift to the World "Psychological Disorder"?
"It is curious that so many Arabs remain envious of the American way of life at a time when the US has demonstrated such contempt for the Arab people. The truth is that the idea of America retains a dazzling allure -- though America is afflicted by a chronic moral and spiritual malaise," writes an Englishman for Arab News.

Monday, June 11, 2007
Are There Any Candidates Out There Who Pass the Smell Test?
"Talk of authenticity, it seems, lets commentators and journalists put down politicians they don't like or praise politicians they like, with no relationship to what the politicians actually say or do," writes Paul Krugman of The New York Times. "Here's a suggestion: Why not evaluate candidates' policy proposals, rather than their authenticity? And if there are reasons to doubt a candidate's sincerity, spell them out."

Sunday, June 10, 2007
US Troops Form Uneasy Alliance with Sunni Militants Against Al Qaeda
Joshua Partlow of The Washington Post reports: "The American soldiers in Amiriyah [Baghdad] have allied themselves with dozens of Sunni militiamen who call themselves the Baghdad Patriots -- a group that American soldiers believe includes insurgents who have attacked them in the past -- in an attempt to drive out al-Qaeda in Iraq."

Sunday, June 10, 2007
Is There a 'Foxification' Underway at Al Jazeera Television?
Asks Danny Schechter at Media Channel. "Sources inside Al Jazeera who are in a position to know what is going on now confirm to MediaChannel that there is an internal struggle underway that may dilute Al Jazeera's independence and steer it in a more pro-western, pro-US direction," he writes.

Sunday, June 10, 2007
Clinton on Gore
Writes prominent blogger Andy Ostroy: "When I found myself literally standing next to a surprisingly unengaged Clinton as we were about to watch an Air America promotional video on [new Air America owner] Green's large-screen television, I leaned over and asked him 'Do you think Gore's going to run?'" Go to the Ostroy Report for Clinton's answer.

Sunday, June 10, 2007
The Sex Pistols: Still Rotten After 30 Years
"This year marks the thirtieth anniversary of the Sex Pistols' debut album, 'Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols,'" writes John Leland in Rolling Stone, "but on this occasion Lydon was choking on another milestone, the band's imminent induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame (they didn't attend)."

Friday, June 8, 2007
President Bush Meets with Sarkoczy at G-8 Despite Stomach Bug
(1 comments) Chris Floyd at Atlantic Free Press reports that, "White House counselor Dan Bartlett said doctors are keeping an eye on him but that Bush's illness -- whether a stomach virus, a light touch of food poisoning or something else -- is 'not serious'." "Something else"? Could that be a. . . hangover? (Not sure of provenance of picture accompanying this article, but check it out.)

Friday, June 8, 2007
Blackwater Plumbs New Depths of Shame in Fallujah Contractors Case
(1 comments) After Blackwater lost a series of appeals to the families of four American security contractors who were burned, beaten, and dragged through the streets of Fallujah, it's now now changed its tactics and is suing the dead men's estates for $10 million to silence the families and keep them out of court.

Friday, June 8, 2007
Does Terrorism Really Work?
(1 comments) "This emerging consensus [that it does]," writes Max Abrahms in International Security magazine, "lacks a firm empirical basis." It's attacks on the military, not civilians, that have the potential to affect government policy, he maintains. In other words, civilians are always expendable. But attack military personnel and installations and you're history.

Thursday, June 7, 2007
New Iraqi Militants Video Casts Them in Same Light as WWII Partisans
"By moving some of the most lengthy passages of the video into the outdoors -- a particularly inviting, peaceful place," writes Phillip Kennicott in The Washington Post, "the video [makes] these fighters look more like what we would call partisans, part of a long tradition of men who have taken to the hills, or the forests, or the jungles, to fight an alien enemy."

Thursday, June 7, 2007
Replace Rosie with. . . Stephanie Miller!
In Buzzflash interview with the "stand-up comic of progressive radio," she says, "I sort of speculate that Barry Goldwater and my dad [his VP candidate Bill Miller] would be like a lot of people in the party, just feeling like this is not my party anymore. My contention is that this party's moved so far to the right, I think we're all kind of in the center now. I don't feel like I'm some crazy liberal."

Thursday, June 7, 2007
Wait 'Til You See What Happens After a City Goes Missing
(3 comments) "If you think the post-9/11 smorgasbord of Abu Ghraib, illegal domestic wiretapping, and attacks on media and academic critics were bad, wait 'til you see what happens after a city goes missing" due to a nuclear terrorist attack, writes Hugh Gusterson on The Bulletin (Online) of the Atomic Scientists.

Wednesday, June 6, 2007
It's Too Early to Relax and Assume Bush & Co. Won't Nuke Iran
(3 comments) "The neocons think that by bombing Iran the US will provoke Iran to arm the Shiite militias in Iraq," writes Paul Craig Roberts for Lew Rockwell. That would "destroy the US military edge, leaving divided and isolated US forces subject to being cut off from supplies and retreat routes. With America on the verge of losing most of its troops in Iraq, the cry would go up to 'save the troops' by nuking Iran." Don't put it past 'em.

Wednesday, June 6, 2007
Graduates: Where Are the Jobs?
(3 comments) "Year after year," writes a college student on the op-ed page of The Baltimore Sun, "as I see friends graduate from reputable schools and watch all but a select few struggle to find jobs, I can't help but reflect on how horribly my generation has been misled. We've been duped -- told that if we worked hard in high school and gained acceptance to a good college, the world would be ours."

Wednesday, June 6, 2007
"GOP to Bush: Don't Let the Door Hit You on the Way Out"
The clever title of John Nichols's The Nation column sums up the Republican candidates' attitude to Bush in the latest debate. Even worse, "The crowd at New Hampshire's St. Anselm College, which was made up of Republicans and independents who said they expected to vote Republican in next January's presidential primary, repeatedly applauded the banging on Bush."

Wednesday, June 6, 2007
Did You Know Al Qaeda's No. 3 Communicator Is an American?
(6 comments) "Adam Gadahn -- now known as Azzam al-Amriki (Azzam the American) -- has emerged as the third-most-important spokesman among al-Qaeda leaders, after Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri," writes former CIA man Michael Scheuer on Asia Times Online. The subject of an extensive New Yorker profile in January, Azzam "is the sledge that drives home the spike of bin Laden's messages for Americans." Catch his videos online!

Monday, June 4, 2007
Just So Much Master Debating on Iraq
"Iraq: We broke it, we own it. Or, rather, we should own it," writes Ward Harkavy at Bush Beat. "But judging from the Democratic presidential candidates' debate last night in New Hampshire, there's still too much arguing about who's responsible."

Monday, June 4, 2007
Tom Tomorrow: Bully of the Beach Starring Harry Reid and George Bush
(1 comments) "Hey, quit kicking sand in our faces. He's such a nuisance. And the worst president in history." Cartoonist Tom Tomorrow is heating up for the summer.

Monday, June 4, 2007
Dems "Blitzed" by CNN
"Despite the fact that this was a two-hour debate, moderator Wolf Blitzer acted throughout the night as if he was hosting 'Beat the Clock'," writes John Nichols at The Nation. "Of course, a moderator must keep a crowded field under control. But the candidates weren't the ones who were off the leash. Rather, it was the CNN anchor who repeatedly interrupted contenders."

Monday, June 4, 2007
Even Abu-Ghraib General Gives Up on Iraq
Even General Ricardo Sanchez, who ranks up there with Paul Bremer as one of Iraq's leading anti-heroes, says the United States can forget about winning the war. He told Agence France Presse that, "I am absolutely convinced that America has a crisis in leadership at this time."

Sunday, June 3, 2007
The Summer of Hate
"Forty years ago, the world seemed to be singing in tune," writes Pepe Escobar on Asia Times Online. "On June 1, 1967, in London, the Beatles released their eighth and arguably most influential album, 'Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.' It marked the beginning of the Summer of Love. Today we have George Bush mulling an attack on Iran. Call it the summer of hate."

Sunday, June 3, 2007
Western Media Makes Fake Case for Russian Cyber War Against Estonia
(1 comments) "By hyping the so-called first massive cyberstrike by a superpower on a tiny, defenseless neighbor," according to Mark Ames and Alexander Zaitchik in The eXile and on Alternet, "the Western media have played into a sleazy Estonian PR stunt, designed to deflect the world's attention from the country's mistreatment of its Russian-speaking minority."

Sunday, June 3, 2007
Is Google's Latest Feature an Invasion of Privacy?
"Google's new Street View, a new Google Maps feature that uses vehicle-cameras to take 360-degree street level views of major urban areas, captured all sorts of urban ephemera in the process from tabbies in windows to red light runners," according a Wired blog. Click on the link to see some of them (and submit your own).

Friday, June 1, 2007
Scott Ritter 'Outs' the Question of Armed Insurrection Against the Bush Administration
(1 comments) Does the Bush administration's "long train of abuses and usurpations" warrant violent overthrow? According to Scott Ritter, writing on Truthdig, open revolt, not to mention impeaching Bush, are less critical than repudiating the "unitary executive" theory.

Friday, June 1, 2007
Senate Intelligence Committee to White House: Scrap Abusive Interrogations
(1 comments) "The Senate Intelligence Committee has signaled to the White House that an infamously abusive secret CIA program to interrogate high-level al-Qaida types may have to be scrapped, given 'the damage the program does to the image of the United States abroad,'" writes Mark Benjamin on Salon, calling it "a stinging rejection."

Friday, June 1, 2007
Dirge for a Surge
"The new conventional wisdom is that Bush, however grudgingly, has now accepted key recommendations of the bipartisan Iraq Study Group (ISG)," writes Jim Lobe on AntiWar. There's a growing conviction "that the continued deployment of U.S. troops at current levels through 2008" is no longer politically viable.

Thursday, May 31, 2007
The Way Out of Iraq Is Through Iran
Linking forces with Iran could minimize the costs of withdrawal from Iraq, according to one-time National Security director General William Odom. "A rapprochement with Iran," he maintains, "is the key to restoring regional stability as the US withdraws from Iraq."

Thursday, May 31, 2007
Al Qaeda's Attacks on Saudi Oil Transport System May Spread to Its Electrical Grid
Al Qaeda's recent attacks on Saudi Arabia's oil transport system have been unable to inflict serious damage (although it was a close call last year)," writes John Robb on Global Guerillas. "However, we can't expect that to last. Since warfare is minds in conflict, we can safely bet that adaption will happen. One potential avenue of innovation we can expect to occur is a focus on Saudi Arabia's electricity system."

Thursday, May 31, 2007
It's Bilderberger Week!
"Attention, planet Earth: Your future is being decided today at the annual Bilderberg Group conference," writes Ward Harkavy on Bush Beat. "Conspiracy theorists have long thought that the Bilderbergers were a shadowy cabal of pols and industrialists trying to rule the planet and even establish a New World Order. They may be right."

Thursday, May 31, 2007
Can't Figure Out Tony Blair?
You're not the only one. But, at the end of the day (as the British say), author and activist Gavin Evans has isolated his character defects: "First, an attitude to power and money that is, frankly, craven; Second, a profound cynicism about those who had made him their leader; Third, an inability to reflect on his own motives."

Wednesday, May 30, 2007
Our Democratic Immune System Compromised by Bush-Cheney Virus
"Normally, our democratic immune system would have repudiated the incipient Cheney-Bush virus," writes John Henry Clippinger on Huffington Post. "But our immune system has become severely compromised over the years." He concludes that, "A level of activism and restructuring not seen since FDR will be needed."

Wednesday, May 30, 2007
Heckuva Job, Department of Homeland Security
The DHS, writes Philip Giraldi on AntiWar, "has morphed into one of the world's most bloated and inefficient bureaucracies, possibly rivaling the 600,000 employees of the Indian Postal Service." He adds, "Making sense of Homeland Security might well be beyond the capability of any human being."

Wednesday, May 30, 2007
The Memorial Day Ambush
"First, they shot down a helicopter with small arms fire," writes Juan Cole on Informed Comment. "Two servicemen died in the crash. The guerrillas knew that a rescue team would come out to the site. So they planted a roadside bomb that killed the rescuers. And, they knew that yet another rescue team would come out to see what happened to the first. So they planted roadside bombs and destroyed the second team, as well."

Tuesday, May 29, 2007
How Christians Rationalize Killing in War
(12 comments) "People want to kill people, and they want biblical permission to do so." -- Wilma Ann Bailey. According to Ms. Bailey, Christians bend the sixth commandment -- "Thou shalt not kill" -- to their own purpose. It's about more than just murder.

Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Major Hispanic Groups Cast Gonzalez Overboard
Suffering from buyer's remorse, Brent Wilkes, executive director of the League of United Latin American Citizens, said, in The Washington Post, "I have to say we were in error when we supported him to begin with." Just like Rice and Powell have been anything but a "credit to their race," Gonzalez has been a disgrace to his people.

Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Beyond Irony: Eight US Troops Killed on Memorial Day
The U.S. military said at least eight soldiers were killed in Iraq on Memorial Day. An American helicopter went down in restive Diyala province, killing two soldiers. Also, three Western lecturers were abducted and 22 Iraqis were killed in a bus blast. Guess the insurgents didn't know it was a holiday.

Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Poll Shows Obama Would Fare Better Than Clinton vs. Republicans
"In the race for the Democratic Party presidential nomination, Barack Obama trails fellow U.S. Sen. Hillary Clinton in a national survey of likely Democratic Primary voters, but that same survey shows he would fare better against Republican opponents in General Election match–ups," according to a new Zogby International telephone poll.

Friday, May 25, 2007
Did the US Use Cluster Bombs in Iraq?
At a time when many nations are moving toward banning the use of cluster munitions, which pose a more serious threat to civilians than any other type of weaponry, the U.S. opposes new limits of any kind.

Friday, May 25, 2007
Permanent Bases: A Recipe for Permanent Terrorism
(2 comments) "While the White House has often denied having a Plan B for Iraq, it turns out that the Pentagon has thought about what to do if Plan A, the 'surge' doesn't work," writes Thomas Gale Moore on Antiwar. "Plan B would involve maintaining a series of military bases around Iraq with some 30,000 to 40,000 U.S. troops."

Friday, May 25, 2007
Surprise! Clinton and Obama Actually Vote Against War Bill
(6 comments) "Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama both voted no, reflecting anti-war fervor they face on the campaign trail," reports Agence France Presse. "'With my vote today, I am saying to the president that enough is enough,' Obama said later in a written statement. Clinton said in her own statement: 'I believe that the President should begin a phased redeployment of our troops.'"

Thursday, May 24, 2007
Monitored by Government, He Finds Best Defense Is a Good Offense
"I've discovered that the best way to protect your privacy is to give it away," says Hasan Elahi in an article in Wired. Targeted by the FBI, he takes dozens of digital photos of himself a day and throws them up on his Website to document his whereabouts.

Wednesday, May 23, 2007
Administration Claims Iran and Al Qaeda Working Together (!?)
"The claim now from 'top Bush officials' is that Iran has entered into an alliance with al Qaeda and is 'committing daily acts of war' against American forces," writes Chris Floyd on Atlantic Free Press. "As a casus belli, this beats the hell out of an 'imminent threat' from undiscovered WMD in Iraq."

Wednesday, May 23, 2007
John Conyers: Lay Blame for High Gas Prices at Feet of Bush Administration
(3 comments) Congressman Conyers writes that "rising gas prices are not being driven by increases in the cost of oil. In fact, a barrel of oil is actually $7 cheaper than it was this time last year. How is it possible for gas prices to reach record highs while the price of oil remains relatively stable?" He blames the administration's failure to enforce anti-trust laws.

Tuesday, May 22, 2007
Europeans Taller, Americans Stagnate (Blame Bush for That Too)
According to Germany's Der Spiegel, "For decades, it has been clear that average European heights have been increasing while those on the other side of the Atlantic have not. But why? A new study says it might have to do with health care and the social net."

Tuesday, May 22, 2007
CENTCOM's Admiral Fallon Saves the World!
(1 comments) "Admiral William Fallon," writes Gareth Porter on Asia Times Online, "expressed strong opposition in February to an administration plan to increase the number of aircraft-carrier strike groups in the Persian Gulf from two to three and vowed privately that there would be no war against Iran as long as he was chief of CENTCOM." This was followed by an administration shift away from confrontation in favor of diplomacy.

Friday, May 11, 2007
Al Qaeda's Zawahiri Courts American Blacks by Quoting Malcolm X
(4 comments) In his latest and most media-savvy video "Zawahiri identified al-Hajj Malik al-Shabazz -- Malcolm X -- as a fellow Islamic 'struggler and martyr'," writes former CIA agent Michael Scheuer (aka "Anonymous") on Asia Times Online. "Using what he claimed was Shabazz's analysis, Zawahiri identified Powell and Rice as 'house slaves', blacks who prospered because they were obedient and helpful to their masters."

Thursday, May 10, 2007
Cheney Greeted by Mortars and Demonstrations in Iraq
According to the estimable Juan Cole at Informed Comment: "Al-Hayat writes in Arabic that US Vice President Dick Cheney was greeted, on his surprise visit to Baghdad, by a rain of mortar shells on the Green Zone and by protests in several cities organized by Puritan Shiite followers of cleric Muqtada al-Sadr."

Thursday, May 10, 2007
Putin Slyly Compares US Policies to Third Reich's
"President Vladimir V. Putin seemed to obliquely compare the foreign policy of the United States to the Third Reich in a speech on Wednesday commemorating the 62nd anniversary of the defeat of Nazi Germany," reports The New York Times. "The comments were the latest in a series of sharply worded Russian criticisms of the foreign policy of the United States."

Wednesday, May 9, 2007
Russia Plans to Launch Nuclear Reactors -- Literally, into the Seas
"Floating nuclear power plants have been the wet dream of Russia's nuclear establishment for decades," writes Yasha Levine in Moscow's The eXile. "Finally, this April, the dream became reality. First in line: Indonesia, home to no less than 100 known terrorist groups, and famously surrounded by some of the most pirate-infested waters in the world."

Tuesday, May 8, 2007
Baghdad: The More Things Change. . .
the more they stay the same. "Time in Iraq tends to proceed in circles," writes Stewart Nusbaumer in The American Conservative. "The war of yesterday becomes the war of tomorrow, the other side of the river becomes your side of the river, their 20 war dead become your 20 war dead. It's change without really changing."

Tuesday, May 8, 2007
What's Climate Change without a Little Profit?
"The purpose of the Gazprom/World Bank event [recently held in Moscow] was to introduce Russia to Kyoto-era carbon suitors," writes Alexander Zaitchik in The eXile, "and to educate local industry about how best to profit from the growing trade in carbon credits. The global market for carbon reduction credits is worth more than $20 billion and booming."

Tuesday, May 8, 2007
Six Intending to Wage Personal Jihad on Fort Dix Arrested
(2 comments) "Six people have been arrested on allegations of plotting to kill soldiers at a New Jersey army installation," reports The New York Times. "Four of them were born in the former Yugoslavia, one was born in Turkey and one in Jordan. 'Allegedly they wanted to kill as many of the soldiers at Fort Dix as they could,' said a spokesman."

Friday, May 4, 2007
Haircut Aside, Edwards Is Actually Pretty "Deep"
(2 comments) "On Wednesday," writes Ari Nelber on The Nation's, "John Edwards continued his frontal assault on President Bush's Global War on Terrorism (GWOT), telling a Portland audience that he opposes the policy and the 'Bush language' that justifies Iraq, torture and Guantanamo."

Friday, May 4, 2007
The Loser of Last Night's GOP Debate? George Bush
(1 comments) The Nation's Marc Cooper writes that "the scorecard is in. The undisputed loser: George W. Bush [who] got exactly three quick mentions by the field of ten fellow Republicans."

Thursday, May 3, 2007
Matt Taibbi: Humiliation of Campaign Makes for a Pliable President
(1 comments) "It must be beneficial to the American power apparatus somehow," writes Rolling Stone's Matt Taibbi, to humiliate the candidates with media scrutiny, especially after the debates. "Maybe it's because while dignified human beings are unpredictable, an old turned-out whore can be counted on to do anything for forty bucks -- and these are the kinds of people we need in the White House."

Thursday, May 3, 2007
Army Brass Still Holds Vietnam Protest Against Joan Baez
(1 comments) From a New York Times editorial: "Last Friday, John Mellencamp gave a concert for injured soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. Ms. Baez, a friend who'd been invited by Mr. Mellencamp, did not. She was barred by Army brass. What is astounding is that somebody apparently could not get past the image of willowy Joan singing 'Blowin' in the Wind' nearly 40 years ago."

Thursday, May 3, 2007
Ann Coulter's Star Plummeting Among Conservatives
(2 comments) "Recent Coulter no-shows at high-profile events and the scrubbing of several of her recent appearances from the video collections of conservative events seems to suggest the Republican superstar could finally be in her 'last throes,'" writes Daniel Borchers on Brad Blog. "Has Ann Coulter reached her tipping point?"

Thursday, May 3, 2007
Ten-Point Nuclear Policy Platform for '08 Candidates Unveiled
. . . by the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation. "Our continued reliance on nuclear weapons," it begins, "only incites non-nuclear countries to acquire or develop nuclear weapons of their own." Few were aware, but Kerry had a pretty good nuclear policy in '04. Clinton, Edwards and Obama: Are you ready to step up to the plate?

Wednesday, May 2, 2007
Is the Middle East Really That Critical to US Interests?
(2 comments) "Despite its oil," reads the subhead to an article by Edward Luttwak, "this backward region is less relevant than ever, and it would be better for everyone if the rest of the world learned to ignore it." He writes that "the middle east should be allowed to have their own history -- the one thing that middle east experts of all stripes seem determined to deny them."

Wednesday, May 2, 2007
Mainstream Washington Post Columnist Acknowledges Kucinich v. Cheney
"Kucinich doesn't stand a ghost of a chance of making [the charges against Cheney] stick because Congress is not about to vote impeachment," writes Richard Cohen. "But no one who reads Kucinich's case against Cheney can fail to conclude that this is a rational, serious accusation." He concludes: "What Cheney has done is not impeachable. It is merely unforgivable."

Monday, April 30, 2007
Tenet's Apparent Sincerity Now No Excuse for Pre-War Blood Lust
If you saw George Tenet on "Sixty Minutes" last night you might have been moved by his obvious passion. But, as The Village Voice's Ward Harkavy demonstrates with some choice quotes in his blog, the Bush Beat, Tenet appeared at the National Prayer Breakfast the day after Colin Powell's UN speech and joined in the administration's blood lust and drum beating.

Monday, April 30, 2007
We're Never Leaving
(4 comments) "For all the talk about timetables and benchmarks, one might think that the United States will end the military occupation of Iraq within the lifetimes of the readers of this opinion editorial," write Lewis Seiler and Dan Hamburg in The San Francisco Chronicle. "Think again." Just add the five new military bases we're building in Iraq to our 737 others around the world.

Monday, April 30, 2007
Rice Still Under Cheney's Thumb
"Over the past month it has become increasingly clear that Condoleezza Rice does not, ultimately, call the shots on foreign policy and national security questions," writes Scott Horton at Harper's. "The man in charge is named Dick Cheney. Rice continues to be little more than a distracting ornament when it comes to critical foreign policy issues."

Friday, April 27, 2007
Fox Grooms Successor to Ann Coulter -- and She's an Even More Twisted Sister
(1 comments) "Conserva-babe and star-in-the-making Rachel Marsden has a, um, colorful past," reads the Salon subhead. "What was Fox thinking?"

Friday, April 27, 2007
Paul Krugman: Back to the Gilded Age
"One of the distinctive features of the modern American right has been nostalgia for the late 19th century, with its minimal taxation, absence of regulation and reliance on faith-based charity rather than government social programs. Well, income equality is now back to Gilded Age levels."

Friday, April 27, 2007
Our Surge Dwarfed by Al Qaeda's
(2 comments) "By rushing into Iraq instead of finishing off the hunt for Osama bin Laden, Washington has unwittingly helped its enemies," according to a report by Bruce Riedel in Foreign Affairs. "Al Qaeda has more bases, more partners, and more followers today than it did on the eve of 9/11 -- and may even try to lure the United States into a war with Iran."

Friday, April 27, 2007
The Magic Has Taken Over the Magician
"Shias, Sunnis and Kurds are united in being able to use the Americans' presence to pursue separate and often conflicting political agendas," writes Hussein Agha in London's The Guardian. It's the people, not the players, that want us to go. "In this grim picture, the Americans appear the least sure and most confused. The magic has taken over the magician."

Wednesday, April 25, 2007
The Oliver Stone of Iran
"Jafar Panahi is known for directing intense human dramas that reflect the difficulties of ordinary Iranians," writes Reese Erlich on Truthdig. For example, "Offside," opening in the US, tells the story of Iranian women who dress up as men to attend soccer matches. "Panahi," Erlich adds, "has faced serious government hassles with all of his recent films."

Wednesday, April 25, 2007
It's Bush Who's the Real "Dead-Ender"
Donald H. Rumsfeld, the former Defense secretary, once described the Iraqi resistance as a few 'dead-enders'," writes Ronald Brownstein in The Los Angeles Times, "who refused to acknowledge that the world around them had changed. Increasingly that phrase applies as a self-portrait for the administration that Rumsfeld served. Forget 'the decider.' Bush has become the dead-ender."

Wednesday, April 25, 2007
Bush Bunker-Hunkering
(1 comments) "Something's got to give," writes David Ignatius in The Washington Post. "That's the sense around Washington this week as the news from Baghdad worsens and the president defiantly continues an Iraq policy that many military leaders question. Bush is hunkered down with his troop surge strategy, and the military is expected to pay the price."

Tuesday, April 24, 2007
George McGovern: Cheney Full of Hot Air
"Dick Cheney recently attacked my 1972 presidential platform," writes elder statesman George McGovern, "and contended that today's Democratic Party has reverted to the views I advocated in 1972. In a sense, this is a compliment, both to me and the Democratic Party. Cheney intended no such compliment. Instead, he twisted my views and those of my party beyond recognition."

Thursday, April 19, 2007
This Little McCain Won't Be Going to This Market
"Well I guess those Baghdad markets aren't as safe as Senator John McCain thought," writes Juan Cole on Informed Comment. Wednesday's suicide attack on a Shiite market killed 140 and injured at least as many. "The thing about reality and politics," writes Cole, "is that sooner or later, reality outstrips rhetoric, and then the politics is revealed for the lie it is."

Thursday, April 19, 2007
Lethal Empowerment
How, a New York Times editorial wonders, "after detailed tracking of the guns purchased for the ghastly spree, the lethal empowerment of such a troubled individual can somehow be pronounced entirely legal under the laws of a civilized nation."

Thursday, April 19, 2007
Lump Assault Weapons in with Bombs
(3 comments) "It's time to stop thinking of rapid-fire weapons and high-capacity magazines as part of the gun world," writes William Saletan on Slate. "They're part of the bomb world, because they give guns the sudden, mass killing power of bombs. Virginia Tech's football stadium seats 65,000 people. Imagine Cho in that stadium with a gun that sprays 15 rounds per second."

Wednesday, April 18, 2007
British Ask if Virginia Tech Is Enough to Put a Dent in America's Love Affair with Guns
(1 comments) The president of Virginia Tech described the shootings as "a tragedy of monumental proportions." But whether "it is of sufficient proportion to dent America's love affair with guns is quite another matter," writes Rupert Cornwell in London's The Independent. "Similar disbelief followed other mass shootings. But the practical effect has been very little."

Wednesday, April 18, 2007
Fear of Bush Going Solo Shouldn't Stop Us from Impeaching Cheney
"I get one call after another saying, 'Impeach the president,'" says Congressman John Murtha, D-Pennsylvania," writes The Nation's John Nichols in a column on Dennic Kucinich's plans to initiate impeachment proceedings against Cheney, who seems more vulnerable than Bush.

Tuesday, April 17, 2007
Kucinich Ready to Pull Impeachment Trigger on Cheney
(1 comments) Rep. Dennis Kucinich declared in a letter sent to his Democratic House colleagues this morning that he plans to file articles of impeachment against Vice President Dick Cheney. (Because of the shootings, it will be delayed a week.)

Monday, April 16, 2007
Amnesty International Calls on US to Go into Overdrive on Iraq Refugee Crisis
Amnesty International warns of a humanitarian crisis unless the more than three million people forcibly displaced by the conflict in Iraq are provided with relief. A stand-up president would ask every American town to sponsor an Iraqi family (once the men have been cleared of committing atrocities).

Monday, April 16, 2007
Juan Cole: Cheney Watches '24' Too Much
"Cheney has been watching the television show '24' too much," writes Juan Cole, "and says he is worried about terrorists getting a nuke. He is worried about the wrong thing. Slum kids with RPG-29s and GPS systems are the real threat to his plans." (Still, let's not get too casual about the prospect of terrorists with nukes, Juan.)

Monday, April 16, 2007
Springtime Brings Hope in Iran Nuclear Standoff
"We have been here before many times, with flickers of hope about an imminent breakthrough in the Iran nuclear standoff, only to be dismayed by subsequent developments extinguishing those hopes," writes Asia Times Online's Kaveh Afrasiabi, a leading commentator on Iran politics. "This time it may turn out different."

Friday, April 13, 2007
Wolfowitz Going the Way of Imus?
(1 comments) "In a chaotic day of revelations and meetings at a normally staid institution, Mr. Wolfowitz apologized for his role in the raise and transfer of Shaha Ali Riza, his companion, to a few hundred staff members assembled in the bank building atrium," reports Steven Weisman in The New York Times, "only to be greeted by booing, catcalls and cries for his resignation."

Thursday, April 12, 2007
Once a Sanctuary, Green Zone Runs Red with Blood
(1 comments) "An explosion has occurred in a canteen in the Iraqi parliament complex inside Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone," reports ABC News. "Two MPs are among the dead and at least 15 have been wounded. A leading Shiite law-maker, Hadi al-Amiri, has blamed poor security for the explosion."

Thursday, April 12, 2007
Ukraine President Delivers a Slap in the Face to the Administration
(3 comments) "Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko on Thursday rejected any discussion of deployment of US anti-missile systems to his country," reports Earth Times. The US had planned to "station the missiles by 2013 to counter a potential threat from Iran."

Thursday, April 12, 2007
Like Green Zone, Iraqi Hospitals Are a Failure as Safe Haven
(1 comments) "Insurgents fire mortars at hospital security forces and Shia militia roam the corridors looking for Sunni victims; power failures and roadblocks frequently cut it off from the outside world," reports The Scotsman. 2,000 Iraqi doctors have been killed. Another 12,000 have left the country. Death and destruction has reached the most intimate recesses of Iraqi society.

Thursday, April 12, 2007
Pulitzer Prize-winning Photojournalist Starts Second Year in US Custody without Trial
(1 comments) "Bilal Hussein belonged to a team of Associated Press photographers who received the profession's highest award –- the Pulitzer Prize –- for their coverage of fighting in the Iraqi city of Fallujah in 2005," writes Scott Horton at Harper's. "One year ago today he was seized by U.S. Forces in Iraq. He has been held in continuous custody since that time. No formal charges have ever been brought against him."

Tuesday, April 10, 2007
Rudy Giuliani's Foreign Policy "Experience"
(1 comments) "It would really stink if the media cedes Rudy the aura of foreign policy experience," writes Greg Sargent on TPM Cafe, "based on nothing more than the fact that he happened to be Mayor of New York on that clear day more than five years ago, rather than aggressively reporting on his lack of actual such experience. Anyone wanna take bets on which way it'll go?"

Tuesday, April 10, 2007
Iran Waving Bye-Bye to Petrodollars
(1 comments) "Iran is planning to stop using the U.S. dollar to price oil, with less than half of its oil income now paid in the U.S. currency, Iran's central bank governor said," according to the AP. He added, "that almost all of Iran's European clients and some of its Asian customers have accepted making payments in non-dollar currencies."

Tuesday, April 10, 2007
Bush and Blair Odd Men Out in Iranian Hostage Conflict
(1 comments) "Overnight, from constant vilification, the British and other European media have shifted gears to praise Iran's 'gesture of magnanimity' hailing the 'triumph of diplomacy over force' in causing an abrupt end to the two-week-long conflict between Iran and Britain," writes Kaveh Afrasiabi on Asia Times Online. "Without doubt, both domestically and externally, Ahmadinejad's government has been strengthened."

Friday, April 6, 2007
Is Sanjaya a Terrorist?
(1 comments) Find out in "The Axis of Idol." Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson takes a break from politics and war to comment on the Sanjaya phenomenon. He believes he gets votes because he's got "good looks, sharp-elbowed ambition and the 'it' factor that lets a performer connect with his or her audience. Does Janet Jackson have a great voice? Britney Spears? Justin Timberlake?"

Friday, April 6, 2007
Top Blogger Glenn Greenwald Makes ABC Look Like Fools Over Iran Uranium Enrichment Story
(1 comments) Greenwald criticizes ABC News for reporting that Iran's nuclear programming will be up and running in two years. The story was based, he writes, "on what ABC vaguely described only as 'sources familiar with the dramatic upgrade.' It did not include a single other piece of information about the identity of the 'sources'." And the MSM wonders why people don't trust it.

Friday, April 6, 2007
Wesley Clark: No Gulf War III
(1 comments) "I believe we can gain far more from Iran by dispensing some carrots -- and can also apply the sticks more effectively -- if we are in face-to-face dialogue," writes General Wesley Clark in Washington Monthly. "Dangling some carrots now in an unconditional dialogue with Tehran while the surge in Baghdad is only beginning could prove decisive."

Friday, April 6, 2007
Right-Wing Poll Finds That Much of Public Expects a Hillary Clinton Administration to Be Corrupt
(2 comments) The Washington Post's Dana Milbank writes: "'Forty-five percent of likely voters are concerned that there will be high levels of corruption in the White House if Hillary Clinton is elected president'," says Harvey Fitton, president of Judidical Watch. Of course, he omitted "the 54 percent who are not concerned [about possible corruption]."

Friday, April 6, 2007
Freed Britons Face Questions About Their Compliant Behavior
(2 comments) Sarah Lyall writes in The New York Times that "the captives were repeatedly displayed on Iranian state television, sometimes looking relaxed and smiling. . . The images were jarring, verging on the bizarre." Since they don't seem to have been tortured, maybe, ambivalent about their mission, they genuinely were sorry

Thursday, April 5, 2007
Fred Thompson Eats Democratic Young
(1 comments) Doesn't he look kind of like Jabba the Hut? Top evangelical leader Richard Land like him though. According to the Hill, he said: "Fred Thompson reminds me of a Southern-fried Reagan."

Thursday, April 5, 2007
Can "The Note" Save Itself?
(1 comments) ABC News "announced that Mark Halperin, the high-profile and plugged-in director of ABC's political unit and author of the influential [if Bush-fawning] daily tip sheet The Note, was leaving his coveted position to become an ABC News analyst," writes Eric Boehlert at Media Matters. "The Note's been cribbing off Karl Rove's talking points for way too long. . . . Let's hope it gets back to its journalistic roots."

Thursday, April 5, 2007
Educators in England Shying Away from Holocaust to Avoid Inflaming Muslim Holocaust Deniers
(1 comments) "A government-backed study has revealed [that] some teachers are reluctant to cover the atrocity for fear of upsetting students whose beliefs include Holocaust denial. There is also resistance to tackling the 11th century Crusades." Even when taught, "Lessons in difficult topics were too often 'bland, simplistic and unproblematic'."

Thursday, April 5, 2007
Gonzalez Hunkers Down
(1 comments) According to The Washington Post, "Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales has retreated from public view this week in an intensive effort to save his job, spending hours practicing testimony and phoning lawmakers for support in preparation for pivotal appearances in the Senate this month, according to administration officials."

Thursday, April 5, 2007
White House Reeling from Strategist Dowd's Very-Vocal Defection
(1 comments) "Inside George W. Bush's inner circle, there are a couple of cardinal rules," write Holly Bailey and Richard Wolffe in Newsweek. "Be discreet. Be loyal to the boss, regardless of whether the boss is loyal to you. For more than a month now, Matthew Dowd -- Bush's pollster in 2000 and his chief strategist in 2004 -- hasn't just been breaking the rules; he's been shattering them to pieces."

Wednesday, April 4, 2007
Public Anxiety Over US Foreign Policy Approaching Red Line
(1 comments) From Foreign Affairs magazine: "The latest results from the Confidence in U.S. Foreign Policy Index show that public anguish over Iraq is spilling into other areas of U.S. foreign policy." Its "Anxiety Indicator" stands at 137 (100 is neutral). Most Americans now feel that "military force should be 'off the table' in dealing with Iran's nuclear program."

Wednesday, April 4, 2007
British Sailors' "Mandatory Vacation" Ends
(1 comments) Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad freed the 15 British naval personnel that Iranian forces captured. According to the BBC, "Television pictures showed the Iranian president smiling and chatting with the crew. He joked to one: 'How are you? So you came on a mandatory vacation?'"

Tuesday, April 3, 2007
Republican Insider Calls Bush "Dan Quayle in cowboy boots"
(2 comments) "Victor Gold, a friend of George H.W. Bush and the Cheney family, will release a book slamming the Bush administration entitled, 'Invasion of the Party Snatchers: How the Holy-Rollers and the Neo-Cons Destroyed the GOP,'" according to Raw Story. Meanwhile, he describes Cheney as a "megalomaniac."

Tuesday, April 3, 2007
Yet More of Iraq's Future Forfeited
(1 comments) "Nine children were among 12 people killed when a suicide bomber blew up a truck in the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk," according to BBC. "A further 192 people were injured in the blast, which happened when a bomber drove a truck laden with explosives into a barrier at a police station."

Tuesday, April 3, 2007
Administration Gone Kafka
(1 comments) The Washington Post's Eugene Robinson writes: "Here's what the Bush administration has done to the values, traditions and honor of the United States of America: An accused terrorist claims he confessed to heinous crimes so that agents of the U.S. government would stop torturing him, and no one is shocked or even surprised." As for the suspect, "I just said those things to make the people [torturers, that is] happy."

Monday, April 2, 2007
Krugman: Rising Creek of Income Inequality Will Sink Bush Administration
(1 comments) "In 1980, when Ronald Reagan won the White House, conservative ideas appealed to many, even most, Americans," writes The New York Times' Paul Krugman. "At the time, we were truly a middle-class nation. . . . Since then, however, we have once again become a deeply unequal society."

Monday, April 2, 2007
US Sowing Chaos in Iran with Its Psyops and Undercover Operations
(1 comments) "Unfortunately for Iran, the US psychological-warfare campaign seems to be working," writes Mahan Abedin on Asia Times Online. "As the war of words between Iran and the United States continues to escalate, the psychological-warfare campaign of the latter is assuming greater and more sinister proportions."

Monday, April 2, 2007
Mexican Who Blew the Whistle on Pedophilia in High Places Under Assault
(2 comments) "A crusade against pedophiles has made Lydia Cacho Ribeiro, [due] to be honored by Amnesty International, one of Mexico's most celebrated and imperiled journalists," writes Manuel Roig-Franzia, who profiles her in The Washington Post.

Monday, April 2, 2007
McCain May Be in Iraq, But He's Still Clueless
(3 comments) Has it come to this? John McCain, once considered the likely Republican candidate in 2008, has become a laughingstock. Reporter Michael Ware spoke to military sources about his remarks that an American could walk down the streets of Baghdad and "there was laughter down the line."

Friday, March 30, 2007
Let's Not Let Fred Dalton Thompson Sneak Up on Us
(4 comments) "The former Tennessee senator has less experience than all the other top GOP contenders," writes John Dickerson on Slate, "and yet he is being talked about as the savior for a party that is unhappy with its current crop of candidates. . . Thompson has not entered the race, but in television appearances two weeks ago, he hinted that he might." You probably remember him as the district attorney on Law & Order.

Friday, March 30, 2007
New York City Firefighters Throw Water on Giuliani's Presidential Bid
(1 comments) "While the former mayor of the nation's largest city was widely lionized for his post-9/11 leadership," reports the AP, "city firefighters and their families are renewing their attacks on him for his performance before and after the terrorist attack." Issues include firefighters' faulty radios and removing the WTC rubble at warp speed before all body parts were recovered.

Friday, March 30, 2007
Saudis Step Fill Diplomatic Vacuum Left by US
(1 comments) According to Time's Tony Karon, it's an open secret that the Saudis have choreographed a "complex and dramatic diplomatic dance" in the Middle East, especially with Palestine.

Friday, March 30, 2007
Has the Idea of Attacking Iran Gained Too Much Momentum to Stop?
(3 comments) "Where are our intellectual, political, and religious leaders?" asks Antiwar's Justin Raimondo. "Will no one arise to end our national nightmare and lead us to safety? Both political parties are equally complicit: not a single major declared presidential candidate has spoken out against this crazed course, which seems unalterable, and, at this point, inevitable."

Thursday, March 29, 2007
"A Face Only a President Could Love"
(1 comments) "Dick Cheney's public image has hardened into a grim caricature that longtime friends and colleagues don't recognize: when did the whiz kid with the lopsided smile who ran Ford's White House turn into the secretive, merciless, Machiavellian figure in the news today?" Todd Purdum's Vanity Fair profile from June 2006 bears revisiting.

Thursday, March 29, 2007
Day of Reckoning Approaches for Gonzalez
(1 comments) "Senator Charles Schumer finds it 'hard to believe' that embattled U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales can continue in office for much longer," writes Jason Horowitz in The New York Observer. Schumer also said that, "the credibility of the President and the people close to him is lower now today than it was a month ago, and that's going to [affect 2008]."

Thursday, March 29, 2007
Whistleblower Gets His Hands on WTC Blueprints and Releases Them
(7 comments) "The detailed architectural drawings make clear what official reports have apparently attempted to hide: that the Twin Towers had massive core columns, and those columns ran most of the height of each Tower before transitioning to columns with smaller cross-sections," reports 911 Research. In other words, the pancake theory spun by FEMA and NIST is deader in the water than ever.

Thursday, March 29, 2007
Castro Castigates US About Global Warming
(1 comments) "Ailing leader Fidel Castro published an article in state media Thursday criticizing U.S. environmental policies, emerging from months of silence on political matters," reports USA Today. "'Condemned to premature death by hunger and thirst more than 3 billion people of the world,' read the headline."

Wednesday, March 28, 2007
Thank You, Republicans Hagel and Smith
(1 comments) The AP reports: "GOP Sens. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska and Gordon Smith of Oregon sided with the Democrats, assuring them of the majority they needed to turn back a challenge led by Sen. Thad Cochran, R-Miss. 'The president's strategy is taking America deeper and deeper into this quagmire with no exit strategy,' said Hagel, the most vocal Republican critic of the war in Congress."

Wednesday, March 28, 2007
James Webb Working on Bill to Prevent President from Attacking Iran without Congressional Go-Ahead
(1 comments) "We do have an amendment on Iran coming up over the next couple of days," said Webb in an interview. "It's something that I have worked on for a good bit of time. I hope in all of the attention that's been given to the situation with my staff [aka the loaded gun], we don't lose sight of the importance of that legislation."

Wednesday, March 28, 2007
Do the Republicans Have a Death Wish?
(4 comments) Since the election, the Republicans, writes The Washington Post's Harold Meyerson, "have continued merrily along with their mission to politicize every governmental function and agency as if their allies still controlled Congress, as if the election hadn't happened. . . . What gives with the Republicans? How have they become so detached from reality?"

Wednesday, March 28, 2007
The Real "Surge" Is in Car Bombings
(1 comments) Car bombs "continue to evolve in horror and lethality," writes Mike Davis on Asia Times Online. "In January and March, the first chemical 'dirty bomb' explosions took place using chlorine gas," which was first used in World War I. It can be exported, too. New Jersey's two Democratic senators complained that the Bush administration, coddling the chemical industry, refuses to allow stronger safeguards to be implemented.

Tuesday, March 27, 2007
Apple Introduces a New Product: the iRack
(1 comments) Even though it's inherently unstable and full of bugs (sand flies, oddly). Watch this video.

Tuesday, March 27, 2007
Top Blogger Glenn Greenwald Goes Ballistic on Beltway Media
(2 comments) Washington media figures, like the Chris Matthews crowd, "admire and want to protect those who rule. . . and thus reflexively view scandals which entail accusations of true corruption by our political leaders. . . as frivolous and inherently false and unfair," writes Glenn Greenwald on Salon. These reporters, he writes, are "completely vapid" and "shallow."

Monday, March 26, 2007
One Iraqi Translator and Our Shameless Abandonment of Him
(1 comments) "On the day the American tanks rolled into Baghdad, Abather Abdul Hussein and his wife threw flowers," writes David Case in Mother Jones. "Literally." These days, however, "Abather and his young family are among the hundreds of thousands of Iraqis who have fled in fear for their lives."

Monday, March 26, 2007
Note to Administration: Drop Everything in Middle East -- Hugo Chavez Going Commie!
(7 comments) "President Hugo Chavez said Sunday that his administration plans to create 'collective property' as part of sweeping reforms toward socialism," reports the AP, "and that officials would move to seize control of large ranches and redistribute lands deemed 'idle.'. . . 'It's property that belongs to everyone and it's going to benefit everyone,' he said." With capitalism reeling, why not a fresh start for socialism?

Monday, March 26, 2007
Army Pads Its Battle-Ready Figures with Injured Troops
(1 comments) "Soldiers on crutches and canes were sent to a main desert camp used for Iraq training. Military experts say the Army was pumping up manpower statistics to show a brigade was battle ready," according to Mark Benjamin on Salon.

Monday, March 26, 2007
US Attack on Iran Imminent According to Kremlin
(3 comments) According to Webster Tarpley: "The long awaited US military attack on Iran is now on track for the first week of April, specifically for 4 am on April 6, the Good Friday opening of Easter weekend, writes the well-known Russian journalist Andrei Uglanov in the Moscow weekly 'Argumenty Nedeli.' Uglanov cites Russian military experts close to the Russian General Staff for his account." You may now officially freak out.

Friday, March 23, 2007
The Turks Are Coming! The Turks Are Coming!
(2 comments) "The US is scrambling to head off a 'disastrous' Turkish military intervention in Kurdish-controlled northern Iraq that threatens to derail the Baghdad security surge and open up a third front in the battle to save Iraq from disintegration," reports London's The Guardian. "Turkish sources said 'hot pursuit' special forces operations in Khaftanin and Qanimasi, northern Iraq, were already under way."

Friday, March 23, 2007
Iranian General Disappears -- Defection or Abduction?
(2 comments) A former Iranian deputy defence minister and Revolutionary Guard general has disappeared in Istanbul, amid reports that he has defected to the west and counter-claims from Tehran that he has been abducted.

Friday, March 23, 2007
Iran Seizes 15 British Naval Personnel in Iraqi Waters
(6 comments) "Iran seized 15 British naval 'routine boarding operations' in Iraqi waters, the U.K. Ministry of Defence said," according to Bloomberg News. Let's all hope that this doesn't prove to be the pretext that Bush and Blair are looking for to attack Iran.

Thursday, March 22, 2007
New York's Mayor Bloomberg Seeks to Re-Open 911 Fund for Those Since Sickened
(1 comments) Mayor Michael Bloomberg "asked Congress to reopen the government fund for victims of the Sept. 11 terror attacks -- and spare his city the prospect of losing billions of dollars in related lawsuits," reports the AP. "'The mere fact that their injuries and illnesses have been slower to emerge should not disqualify them from getting the help that they need,' Bloomberg said."

Thursday, March 22, 2007
First Congressman to Come Out as an Atheist
(1 comments) Last week, writes Ellen Goodman on Truthdig, aged California congressman Pete Stark "broke a political taboo. He became the first member of Congress to say publicly that he doesn't believe in 'a supreme being.' [He] denies that it takes courage to become the first admitted non-theist in the house. 'What is courageous,' he adds, 'is to stand up in Congress and say, 'let's tax the rich and give money to poor kids.'"

Wednesday, March 21, 2007
The Times's Kristof Crucifies Cheney
(1 comments) "Is Dick Cheney an Iranian mole?" asks New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof. He then recites a litany of favors Cheney has done for Iran's cause by his blundering.

Wednesday, March 21, 2007
South Africa, Presiding Over UN Security Council, Calls for "Time-Out" on Iran Sanctions
(1 comments) South Africa, current president of the UN Security Council, "has jolted the United Nations community by calling for a 90-day time-out on further UN [sanctions], combining this with the equally stunning blow of backing Iran's right to enrich uranium," writes Kaveh Afrasiabi on Asia Times Online. He calls for President Ahmadinejad to make his upcoming speech before the UN "fine-tuned to bolster South Africa's position."

Tuesday, March 20, 2007
Avalanche of Emails Reveals Extent of Justice Department's Involvement in Firings
(2 comments) "New e-mails released by the Justice Department reveal the in-depth conversations Department of Justice staff members had about the eight U.S. attorneys fired last year," reports ABC TV. That's 3,000 pages of conversations about attorneys targeted for dismissal. "There are no e-mails from Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, who reportedly does not use email." At least, he's smart about something.

Tuesday, March 20, 2007
Iranian Official Denies Today's Times' Report That Russia Insists on Suspension of Uranium Enrichment
(1 comments) "Ali Husseini Tash rejected the statements attributed, by New York Times, to the secretary of Russia's national security council, Igor Ivanov, in which he has allegedly made delivery of nuclear fuel to Iran conditional on the halt of enrichment activities by the latter," reports Iran's FARS news. "Tash reiterated that Ivanov has not made such remarks."

Tuesday, March 20, 2007
Military Ill-Prepared for War on Other Fronts -- But with Whom?
(1 comments) "The present state of affairs leaves the nation at grave risk, we are told," writes Chris Floyd on Atlantic Free Press. "Why? Because it leaves the United States somewhat hobbled in its ability to impose its will militarily on any nation or region it so chooses."

Tuesday, March 20, 2007
Who Is to Blame for the Mortgage Carnage and Coming Financial Disaster?
(1 comments) "Unregulated free market fundamentalism zealotry," replies Nouriel Roubini on his Global Economics blog. "Market economies are the best economic system," he adds, "but they work properly when private greed, manias, panics, stupidity and recklessness is tempered by sensible supervision and regulation."

Tuesday, March 20, 2007
Pat Buchanan Calls Out Nancy Pelosi on Iran
(5 comments) "If George W. Bush launches a pre-emptive war on Iran, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will bear full moral responsibility for that war," writes Buchanan. "For it was Pelosi who quietly agreed to strip out of the $100 billion funding bill for Iraq a provision that would have required President Bush to seek congressional approval before launching any new war on Iran. . . . just because the Israeli lobby jerked her chain."

Monday, March 19, 2007
The Hague: Say the Word and We'll Prosecute Bush and Blair
(3 comments) "The court's chief prosecutor," reports London's The Telegraph, "that he would be willing to launch an inquiry and could envisage a scenario in which the Prime Minister and American President George W Bush could one day face charges at The Hague. Luis Moreno-Ocampo urged Arab countries, particularly Iraq, to sign up to the court to enable allegations against the West to be pursued."

Monday, March 19, 2007
Why Hasn't Bush's Extended Family Contributed More to War Effort?
(4 comments) Bush family biographer Kitty Kelley notes that "Jenna Bush, one of the president's twin daughters, is writing a book on her all-expenses-paid trip to Panama, where she worked for a few weeks as an intern for UNICEF." When it comes to public service, she wonders, is that the best Bush's daughters, wife, brothers, sister, nieces and nephews can do?

Monday, March 19, 2007
Is the Administration Trying to Scuttle Its Agreement with North Korea?
(2 comments) "Administration hardliners may be fighting efforts to lift Treasury sanctions on North Korea's 'licit' funds as part of an effort to scuttle the nascent Six Party agreement" on the grounds that North Korea cheated, reports nuclear-industry blog Arms Control Wonk. But Ernst & Young audits found nothing to confirm wrongdoings on North Korea's part.

Monday, March 19, 2007
David Byrne on CDs vs. Digital
(1 comments) "Byrne gave a presentation entitled 'Record Companies: Who Needs Them?' at the South by Southwest music conference in Austin, Texas, Thursday," reports Reuters. "He predicted that digital sales would outstrip CD sales by 2012." That year will be the ''tipping point,'' much like the mid-to-late '80s when CDs overtook cassette sales. Once download sales became the norm, Byrne said, it will allow manufacturing and distribut

Wednesday, March 14, 2007
Washington Post Reports on Richard Thompson's New Anti-War Song
(1 comments) "I was looking at Web sites of military slang, because I like language and I find language interesting, and I love some of the language that was coming out of the Iraqi war, and I just started to put some of these phrases together," the 57-year-old British guitarist-songwriter told The Associated Press in a recent interview. (Actually, he's been doing it on his recent tour.)

Wednesday, March 14, 2007
Dan Rather: Journalism has 'lost its guts'
(2 comments) "I do not exclude myself from this criticism," Dan Rather said in a speech reported on CNet. "By and large, so many journalists -- there are notable exceptions -- have adopted the go-along-to-get-along (attitude)." Journalism, he added, has degenerated into a "very perilous state."

Wednesday, March 14, 2007
New Pretext for Attacking Iran: Women's Rights
(2 comments) To win American support for a military strike on Iran, Bush & Co.'s next move may be to accuse Iran of "horrible abuses against women," write Mark Ames and Alexander Zaitchik on The eXile. "Intent: to co-opt the important soccer mom demographic, while neutralizing liberals into silence lest they come off defending a nation of male chauvinist wife-beating pigs."

Wednesday, March 14, 2007
North Korea Mulls Re-Joining International Atomic Energy Agency
(1 comments) "'My visit has cleared the air and created a positive atmosphere for future relationship with the IAEA,' Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Mohamed Elbaradei said after his one-day visit to Pyongyang," reports Zee News. If North Korea can be diplomaticized, why can't Iran?

Tuesday, March 13, 2007
Afghanistan Has Had It with US and Nato "Collateral Damage"
(1 comments) "The fight against the Taliban in Afghanistan continues this spring. But as the number of civilian casualties rises, support for Western troops is dropping," according to Germany's Der Spiegel. "Twenty people are buried beneath the mound of earth at Abdullah Shah's feet: his wife Miamato, his three sons, 13 grandchildren, two daughters-in-law and a cousin." Extinguished by fire from an American "Warthog."

Tuesday, March 13, 2007
Army Would Have Paintballers Trade in Their Paint for Blood
(1 comments) "US Army recruiters are targeting teenage paintball enthusiasts in an attempt to fill the gaps in military ranks," reports London's The Telegraph. "Spotting the pastime's similarity to charging around Iraq in camouflage shooting real guns, the army hopes that some of the 'weekend warriors' can be tempted to make a more serious commitment to soldiering."

Tuesday, March 13, 2007
Was the Samarra Shrine Bombing Really the Start of the Civil War?
(2 comments) "Many Iraq specialists and defense analysts contend that this narrative of the mosque bombing is misleading," writes Thomas Ricks of The Washington Post. "Experts say the attack did not begin a civil war but rather confirmed the ongoing deterioration and violence in Iraq -- conditions the White House and the generals had resisted recognizing."

Thursday, March 8, 2007
George McGovern Would Take Nixon Over Bush Any Day
(2 comments) "There is no question in my mind that Cheney has committed impeachable offenses. So has George Bush," argues McGovern [in an article by John Nichols]. "Bush is much more impeachable than Richard Nixon was."

Thursday, March 8, 2007
House Democrats Plan Bill to Withdraw Almost All Troops from Iraq by Fall 2008
(1 comments) "House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's office announced plans for a Thursday news conference to unveil the measure, providing no details," reports the AP. "Pelosi and the leadership have struggled in recent days to come up with an approach on the war that would satisfy liberals. . . without driving away more moderate Democrats."

Thursday, March 8, 2007
Bill Gates Comes Out in Favor of Keeping Estate Tax
(1 comments) Bill Gates said at a Senate hearing that he agreed with his father that the estate tax should not be eliminated. "The United States should retain a robust estate tax and dedicate its revenue to increasing economic opportunity for the next generation," said his father.

Tuesday, March 6, 2007
As if Firing Them Weren't Enough, Justice Department Threatens US Attorneys Too
(1 comments) "A high-ranking Justice Department official told one of the U.S. attorneys fired by the Bush administration that if any of them continued to criticize the administration for their ousters, previously undisclosed details about the reasons they were fired might be released," according to McClatchy Newspapers. Fearing retributions, the two prosecutors who described the call demanded anonymity.

Tuesday, March 6, 2007
Destined to be Shut Down, Walter Reed Left to Fend for Itself
(1 comments) "he Base Realignment and Closure Commission decided in 2005 to shutter this critical hospital," writes retired General Paul Eaton in The New York Times. ". . . when the commission decides you will close within a few years, money dries up real fast. It is no wonder that buildings fell into disrepair and recovering soldiers slipped off the radar screen."

Tuesday, March 6, 2007
The Administration Actually Fired Somebody?
(1 comments) "Imagine how surprised Army Secretary Francis J. Harvey must have been when Defense Secretary Robert Gates fired him last week over the shocking neglect of injured veterans at Walter Reed Army Medical Center," writes Eugene Robinson. "Gates, who cut his teeth in George Bush the Elder's administration, obviously didn't get the memo about how blatant malfeasance is handled by George Bush the Younger's crew."

Tuesday, March 6, 2007
US Spending More on Nukes Now Than During Cold War
(2 comments) "During the Cold War, spending on nuclear weapons averaged $4.2 billion a year (in current dollars)," writes Frida Berrigan in Foreign Policy in Focus. "Almost two decades after the nuclear animosity between the two great superpowers ended, the United States is spending one-and-a-half times the Cold War average on nuclear weapons."

Friday, March 2, 2007
Guess What? The Sanctions on Iran Are Working
(1 comments) "Tehran did not expect these sanctions, which have taken a toll," writes Pepe Escobar on Asia Times Online. "'The bottom line is that the elite are seriously worried about the flow of oil money into their accounts and the restricted uses to which they can now be put,' said a consultant." If Supreme Leader Khameini steps down or dies, a triumvirate might replace him, which would then proceed to marginalize Ahmadinejad.

Friday, March 2, 2007
Please, Just Make Him Go Away (Santorum, That Is)
(1 comments) "Former U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum said Thursday he has signed a deal to be a contributor on the Fox News Channel, offering commentary on politics and public policy," according to The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. He's also in talks with The Philadelphia Inquirer to write a regular column for it. He's the stain that just won't wash away.

Friday, March 2, 2007
Peter Pace Pipes Up Again
(1 comments) "The head of the US military declared 'categorically' Tuesday that the United States is not planning air strikes against Iran," reports the AFP. "'It is not true,' said General Peter Pace, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, when asked during an appearance in Congress about suggestions that the US military was preparing to launch air strikes on Iran."

Thursday, March 1, 2007
Senate Democrats Want to Hear Federal Prosecutors' Own Version of Why They Were Fired
(2 comments) "'This episode came like a thief in the night,'" [fired US Attorney David Iglesias] said of the Dec. 7 request for him to step down," according to the AP. "He added, 'Obviously, I tripped some wire.'" Yet they won't appear before the Senate unless subpoenaed. Do they fear for their families' safety?

Thursday, March 1, 2007
Iranian Artists, Writers, and Scholars Censure Last Year's Conference Questioning Holocaust
(2 comments) "More than 20 academics, writers and artists, many of whom live outside of Iran, signed a statement that was sent to The New York Times and circulated on the Internet last week, arguing that the gathering was an exercise in propaganda [that] harmed the academic image of Iranian universities and merely provided a pretext for warmongers." Yes, we know what it's like to have a loose cannon for a president.

Thursday, March 1, 2007
Kerry's Revenge
(3 comments) "In his confirmation hearing yesterday for an ambassadorship to Belgium, nominee Sam Fox got grilled by Senator Kerry for the $50,000 contribution he gave to the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth," reports Crooks and Liars. "It's rather surreal to hear a major Swift Boat funder tell Kerry that he's a hero for his military service." Revenge may not have been Swift, but it's sweet.

Thursday, March 1, 2007
Troop Surge Isn't for Iraq, It's for Iran
(1 comments) The great Gareth Porter writes on Antiwar that the surge "is related more to a strategy of increased pressure on Iran than to stabilizing the situation in Baghdad. The troop decision was described as putting the U.S. military in a better position to respond to attacks by Shi'ite forces on U.S troops in retaliation against a possible U.S. strike against Iran."

Thursday, March 1, 2007
While Cheney's Away, the Mice Will Play
(2 comments) "Did you notice?" asks Ray McGovern. "While Cheney was abroad, others persuaded the president to send representatives next month to a conference in Baghdad, in which representatives of Syria and Iran also are expected to participate to discuss the situation in Iraq. . . . Hurry! Before Cheney gets home."

Wednesday, February 28, 2007
Released Prisoner Sheds Light on CIA Black Sites
(1 comments) "Jabour had spent two years in 'black sites' -- a network of secret internment facilities the CIA operated around the world. His account of life in that system, which he described in three interviews with The Washington Post, offers an inside view of a clandestine world," write Dafna Linzer and Julie Tate.

Wednesday, February 28, 2007
Lakoff: For "All Options Are on the Table" Read "We'll Nuke You"
(3 comments) George Lakoff on Huffington Post writes: "If the Bush administration, for example, were to insist on a sure 'success,' then the 'attack' would constitute nuclear war. The words in boldface are nuclear war, that's right, nuclear war -- a first strike nuclear war." Nuclear war -- get it?

Monday, February 26, 2007
Seymour Hersh Interviews Hezbollah's Nasrullah
(2 comments) The Bush administration, reports the great Seymour Hersh in The New Yorker, "has significantly shifted its Middle East strategy. The 'redirection,' as some inside the White House have called the new strategy, has brought the United States closer to an open confrontation with Iran and, in parts of the region, propelled it into a widening sectarian conflict between Shiite and Sunni Muslims."

Monday, February 26, 2007
International Oscar Winners: Mirren from England and Whittaker Who Played Idi Amin
(1 comments) "But the night belonged to Dame Helen, the first Briton to scoop a best actress Oscar since Emma Thompson in 1992," reports London's The Independent. "'For 50 years and more, Elizabeth Windsor has maintained her dignity, her sense of duty -- and her hairstyle,' Dame Helen said."

Friday, February 23, 2007
Lieberman Pouting Again
(1 comments) He told the Politico on Thursday, "that he has no immediate plans to switch parties but suggested that Democratic opposition to funding the war in Iraq might change his mind." Lieberman himself said, "I hope we don't get to that point. . . That would hurt." He's a sensitive guy, you know.

Friday, February 23, 2007
What a Concept -- a Rainy Day Fund for the Federal Budget
(1 comments) "Because of the country's booming economy, the Chinese government has reaped handsome extra-budgetary revenues in recent years," writes Asia Times Online. "Beijing has now decided to set up a special fund to absorb such extra money so it can be spent to help balance the budget in bad fiscal years." Remember when the US had that kind of money?

Thursday, February 22, 2007
Watch Out, US -- Ahmadinejad and His Crowd Believe Iran Is Invincible
(6 comments) "Ahmadinejad and his supporters believe the Islamic Republic is unconquerable; with its ability to project power well beyond its actual size and resources," reports Mahan Abedin on Asia Times Online. "They believe that the culture of sacrifice born out of [the Iran-Iraq War] it has spawned, will ensure the survival of the Islamic Republic against all odds."

Thursday, February 22, 2007
Who Exactly Is Steering US Policy on Iran?
(2 comments) Bush? He may be the decider, but he's not a policy guy. Cheney, you'd think. But reports are he's becoming marginalized. "Nor is it clear that Rice calls the main shots on Iran," according to Asia Times Online. Indications are it may be Iran-Contra figure Elliott Abrams, now in the National Security Council.

Wednesday, February 21, 2007
Bush Calls Blair's Iraq's Withdrawal Plan a "Sign of Success." O-k-a-a-y
(1 comments) British Prime Minister Tony Blair is announcing that he will bring home 1,500 British troops from Iraq in the next few weeks, 3,000 by the year's end. "We're pleased that conditions. . . have improved sufficiently that they are able to transition more control to the Iraqis," is how an administration spokesman spun it.

Wednesday, February 21, 2007
Iran Ignores Deadline to Halt Uranium Enrichment
(1 comments) "The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is set to say that Iran has speeded up enrichment efforts rather than halting them, as demanded by the UN security council two months ago under a 60-day deadline, which ends today," reports London's The Guardian. President Ahmadinejad said that "his country would only stop its enrichment programme if Western nations did the same." He's got a point there.

Wednesday, February 21, 2007
Libby Ill-Served by Loose Cannon of a Lawyer
(1 comments) Defense lawyer Ted Wells, writes Dana Milbank in The Washington Post "may yet win an acquittal [but] it won't be because of the cohesion of his closing arguments. Libby was alternately portrayed as a man who told the truth, a man who inadvertently misspoke, and the victim of conspiracies involving everybody from President Bush to Tim Russert." Is this the best lawyer Cheney could buy for his buddy?

Wednesday, February 21, 2007
Bad News for Hillary -- Hollywood Digs Deep for Obama
(1 comments) "Checks from Hollywood's A-list stars such as George Clooney, Eddie Murphy and Barbra Streisand added up to an expected, one-night take of $1 million for Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama," reports the AP. Also present were Steven Spielberg, David Geffen, Tom Hanks, and Denzel Washington.

Tuesday, February 20, 2007
Does Bush Fancy Himself a Modern-Day Bismarck?
(2 comments) "As Congress debates and considers what to do about Iraq," writes H.D.S. Greenway in The Boston Globe, "the shadow of a far greater foreign policy mistake hovers over Iran." Bush may see himself as another "Otto von Bismarck who said that 'the great questions of our time are not decided by speeches and majority decisions. . . but by iron and blood.'"

Tuesday, February 20, 2007
It Was Rove, Not Rice, Who Received 2003 Iranian Peace Proposal
(1 comments) Karl Rove "received a copy of the secret Iranian proposal for negotiations with the United States from former Republican Congressman Bob Ney in early May 2003, according to an Iranian-American scholar who was then on his Congressional staff," writes Gareth Porter for IPS News. But Rice is not off the hook. Porter says it's "very unlikely [she] was not immediately made aware of the document."

Tuesday, February 20, 2007
When It Comes to Bush, It's No-Holds-Barred at Carnival Time
(1 comments) "Dubya brings out carnival knives," writes Skip Kaltenheuser on Asia Times Online. "In Torres Verdes [Portugal], the centerpiece -- not a float, the centerpiece -- was called 'Bushlandia'. [It] offered up Dubya as a primitive king in furs, wielding a jeweled club and a scepter with a golden skull. He wore a crucifix on which was a soldier."

Tuesday, February 20, 2007
Tale of the Two George W's
(1 comments) "Is there something in the water over at the White House?" asks a Baltimore Sun editorial. "People made fun of Hillary Rodham Clinton for channeling Eleanor Roosevelt, but yesterday President Bush went to Mount Vernon and compared the war in Iraq to the American Revolution and himself to George Washington [but] Washington would have been shocked and awed at the horrendous idea of freebooting around the Middle East."

Friday, February 16, 2007
Bush's Amen Chorus Falling Down on the Job
(1 comments) "It was, President Bush must have been thinking, a heck of a lot easier five years ago. Back in 2002, the president had a smoothly running lie factory humming along in the Pentagon, producing reams of fake intelligence about Iraq," writes Robert Dreyfuss. But now, "Bush stands nearly alone."

Friday, February 16, 2007
Opus Dei Wants Robert DeNiro to Pull a Mel Gibson
(1 comments) "Robert De Niro would be the preferred choice of actor to star in a new film being widely seen as the 'anti-Da Vinci Code,' a spokesman for the influential Catholic organisation Opus Dei has said," reports Raw Story. It might have more luck with Mel Gibson himself, who, when it comes to Catholic fascism, can match Opus Dei blow for blow.

Thursday, February 15, 2007
Straight from the Horse's Mouth: CIA Analysts on War with Iran
(1 comments) CIA legend Milt Bearden on weapons traffic from Iran to Iraq: "I don't know why anyone would be surprised by Iranian gambling in our Iraqi casino -- especially as there are time-honored rules. . . for proxy wars. The Soviets and Chinese armed our adversaries in the Korean and Vietnam conflicts. Nevertheless, successive American administrations never gave serious thought to attacking either China or the U.S.S.R."

Thursday, February 15, 2007
What Bush & Co. Want from Republicans
(1 comments) "The Bush team's main goal is to get everyone in GOP circles to repeat the White House talking points to the media, according to several GOP activists," reports US News & World Report. Regarding new ideas about Iraq, one Republican insider says of the White House, "They just get mad when we bring it up, so we leave it alone."

Thursday, February 15, 2007
Blogging on the Edge
(1 comments) "It is fair to say," writes Ammar Abdulhamid, "that blogging has indeed changed my life. It might even have saved my life, considering the international attention I got when I blogged about my various interrogation sessions in 2005 in the months leading up to my exile from Syria."

Wednesday, February 14, 2007
Where's Moqtada?
(1 comments) "A prominent leader of the Shiite Muslim militia led by Moqtada al-Sadr denied Wednesday that al-Sadr had headed to Iran," reports Deutsche Presse-Agentur. Supposedly al-Sadr remains in Najaf. Thus keeping the administration from charging Iran with giving him "sanctuary."

Wednesday, February 14, 2007
Bush & Co.'s Decline Gives UN Diplomats a Shot in the Arm
(1 comments) "The Bush administration's popularity and influence have never been lower," reports Niall Stanage for The New York Observer. "'Officially, of course, we were neutral, but just about everybody was pleased,' said Edward Mortimer, the former director of communications for Kofi Annan, referring to the Republican loss of both houses of Congress."

Wednesday, February 14, 2007
Douglas Feith's Alternate Universe
(2 comments) Dough Feith helped "create a preferred alternate universe, and then foist it on an unsuspecting country," writes Karen Kwiatkowski in "Pimp My War" on Lew Rockwell. He and his colleagues "whored out the American defense establishment, and if a few thousand soldiers and marines get beat up or even killed, well, at least the game goes on."

Tuesday, February 13, 2007
CNBC's Maria Bartiromo Headed for a Fall
(1 comments) ". . . her ability to gain entree into the exclusive and mostly male world of chief executives and financial titans has made her a valuable commodity to CNBC," reports The New York Times. "However, such ties have raised questions about her closeness to her sources."

Tuesday, February 13, 2007
General Pace Pulls the Rug Out from Under Bush & Co.'s Claims of Iran Meddling
(1 comments) "A day after the U.S. military charged Iran's government with shipping powerful explosive devices to Shiite Muslim fighters in Iraq to use against American troops, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said Monday that he hasn't seen any intelligence to support the claim," reports McClatchy News.

Tuesday, February 13, 2007
How Come North Korean Disarmament Is Suddenly So Easy?
(1 comments) "The deal marks the first concrete plan for disarmament in more than three years of six-nation negotiations," reports AP. Though "Making sure North Korea declares all its nuclear facilities and shuts them down is likely to prove difficult, nuclear experts have said." Got to give the devil (the Bush administration) his due.

Tuesday, February 13, 2007
Iran Involvement "Evidence" Backfiring on Administration
(2 comments) "Iranians are involved," Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Peter Pace told The Washington Post, "and it's clear that materials from Iran are involved." But he "would not say...that the Iranian government clearly knows or is complicit."

Tuesday, February 13, 2007
"Democracy Now!" Covers the Notorious Israeli "Art Students"
(1 comments) "Were Israeli agents tracking the 9/11 hijackers before September 11th?" asks Amy Goodman. Freelance journalist Christopher Ketcham talked to her about the so-called Israeli art students who tracked the hijackers in the US before 9/11.

Tuesday, February 13, 2007
Despite Vying for Government Nuke Contract, Top Los Alamos Scientist Would Eliminate Nukes
(1 comments) "Joseph Martz, leader of a team designing a new generation of warheads at the Los Alamos National Laboratory," reports James Sterngold for The San Francisco Chronicle, "said. . . he is troubled by how the debate on nuclear weapons policy in Washington is focused narrowly on the number of weapons needed for the future. . . rather than on how to eradicate them entirely."

Monday, February 12, 2007
Get to Know Barack Obama
(1 comments) . . . as he gets to know himself, in this revealing profile in Rolling Stone by Ben Wallace-Wells. "It can be incredibly frustrating [says Obama of Washington]. The maneuverings, the chicanery, the smallness of politics here."

Friday, February 9, 2007
Chris Matthews Will Save Us from War with Iran (Chris Matthews?)
(2 comments) On "Hardball" last night, he was like a tiger with Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA) about whether Congress would stop the administration from attacking Iran. The day before on Imus, he said, "I'm so sick of Southern guys with ranches running this country. I want a guy to run for president -- that doesn't have a f**king, I'm sorry. . . a ranch." (See Crooks and Liars for this one.) Guess we wrote you off too early, Chris.

Friday, February 9, 2007
Rice Has Another Reagan Moment
(3 comments) Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice claims she can't remember a proposal from Iran for dialogue with the United States in 2003 over everything from full cooperation on nuclear programs, acceptance of Israel and ending support for Palestinian militant groups. Exactly what does it take then to be graced with the honor of being stored in her memory bank?

Friday, February 9, 2007
Much of Washington Up in Arms About Bush & Co.'s Policy Toward Iraq and Iran
(1 comments) "Is there anybody in official Washington. . . who isn't sweating blood, popping pills, and wondering what in the world to do about our delusional leaders?" asks Tom Englehardt on Tom Dispatch.

Friday, February 9, 2007
The Haunting of an American Interrogator in Iraq
(2 comments) Eric Fair, a civilian Iraq interrogator comes clean in The Washington Post, where he recalls a detainee he'd deprived of "sleep during my 12-hour shift by opening his cell every hour, forcing him to stand in a corner and stripping him of his clothes. Three years later the tables have turned. . . His memory harasses me as I once harassed him."

Thursday, February 8, 2007
Administration Using the Same "Dance Steps" with Iran as with Iraq
(3 comments) Craig Unger reporting for Vanity Fair: "'It is absolutely parallel,' says Philip Giraldi, a former C.I.A. counterterrorism specialist. 'They're using the same dance steps -- demonize the bad guys, the pretext of diplomacy, keep out of negotiations, use proxies. It is Iraq redux."

Thursday, February 8, 2007
Who Needs Presidential Primaries? Candidates May Be in Place by End of 2007
(1 comments) "The tempo of the new political process," writes former presidential adviser Dick Morris, "driven by 24-hour cable news, Internet bloggers, conservative talk radio, and liberal NPR is so rapid that the nomination race cannot [wait] for Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire and South Carolina to get around to holding their votes in early 2008."

Thursday, February 8, 2007
NY Times: Bush's New Budget a Smokescreen for Making Tax Cuts Permanent
(1 comments) Also, editorializes The Times, the budget is "either hollowing out the government. . . or digging the country deeper into debt." It will "slash key entitlement programs and punish many of the country's most vulnerable citizens."

Thursday, February 8, 2007
Iran Tests Missiles Capable of Taking Out Warships in the Persian Gulf
(1 comments) "'These missiles,'" reports Reuters, 'with a maximum range of [220 miles], can hit different kinds of big warships in all of the Persian Gulf, all of the Sea of Oman and the north of the Indian Ocean,' senior Revolutionary Guards naval commander Ali Fadavi said."

Thursday, February 8, 2007
Has the Average American Sacrificed Anything for Iraq?
(1 comments) "The average American has not been asked to sacrifice for the Iraq war." On Atlantic Free Press Chris Martenson topples this myth. Any American with "savings, income, investments or who has bought anything over the past three years has sacrificed a significant portion of that money," he writes, "because of inflation brought on by excessive government spending on the Iraq."

Wednesday, February 7, 2007
Surge Catches Military Short on Equipment
(1 comments) In yet another dirge for the surge, General Peter Pace told Senate Armed Services Committe that the military has about 41,000 armored vehicles in Iraq -- fewer than will be needed "to cover all of the troops that are deploying."

Wednesday, February 7, 2007
Bush Is Not the Only Lame Duck
(1 comments) According to Kurt Andersen in New York Magazine, we're living in the age of lame-duckism, where dying things won't go away.

Tuesday, February 6, 2007
How to Bush-Proof Your Portfolio
(2 comments) "For years, if you asked me if you should put money overseas, I would have scorned the proposal," writes mainstream financial analyst James Cramer. "Not any longer. This president has made our nation an investment pariah."

Tuesday, February 6, 2007
Influential Brits Lean on Blair to Talk Bush Out of Iran
(1 comments) Leading British think tanks, Oxfam, and religious groups are imploring British Prime Minister Tony Blair to use his influence to urge the United States to talk to Tehran.

Tuesday, February 6, 2007
Many Corporations -- Even Drug Companies -- Lining Up with Hillary Clinton
(1 comments) Drugmaker Roche gave the maximum allowed to her 2006 campaign. Rupert Murdoch threw a fund-raising event for her. Even Morgan Stanley's CEO backed her. Says a former Republican National Committe head, "She is every bit as smart as her husband [and] meaner."

Monday, February 5, 2007
By 2012, Bush & Co. Expect $61 Billion Budget Surplus
(1 comments) Yes, you read that right -- surplus not deficit. That's despite trying to make his tax cuts permanent. Not to mention this year's proposed budget of $2.90 trillion. In other words they plan to cut programs back drastically.

Monday, February 5, 2007
Even Arch-Conservative Dick Armey Regrets Voting for Iraq War
(1 comments) The former Republican House minority leader told the McClatchy Washington bureau that, "Had I been more true to myself and the principles I believed in at the time, I would have openly opposed the whole adventure vocally and aggressively. . . I would have served myself and my party and my country better, though, had I done so." That's one maxima culpa.

Monday, February 5, 2007
Thought the Super Bowl Commercials Were Too Violent? So Did the Times
(1 comments) "No commercial that appeared last night during Super Bowl XLI directly addressed Iraq," writes Stuart Elliott for The New York Times. "But the ongoing war seemed to linger just below the surface. . . . More than a dozen spots celebrated violence in an exaggerated, cartoonlike vein that. . . often came across as cruel or callous."

Friday, February 2, 2007
Ten (Got That? 10) Americans Die in Iraq in One Day
(3 comments) "The deaths underscore the surging nature of sectarian violence and the increasing lethality of roadside bombs, which claim the most American lives in Iraq despite efforts to bolster armor and use high-technology devices to disable bombs," reports The Washington Post. The nightly roll call at the end of "PBS News Hour" makes it real. Rips your heart right out of your chest, in fact.

Friday, February 2, 2007
You Too Can Zap TVs on Super Bowl Sunday!
(2 comments) "The TV-B-Gone, which fits in the palm of the hand, is a universal remote whose sole purpose and power is to shut down televisions," writes Christopher Ketcham on Counterpunch. He interviews its inventor, who says that when he zaps a TV off in a public place, "I notice people's shoulders and arms relax -- the body language changes completely."

Friday, February 2, 2007
Century of Devastation
(1 comments) "UN scientists have delivered their starkest warning yet about global warming, saying fossil fuel pollution would raise temperatures this century, worsen floods, droughts and hurricanes, melt polar sea ice and damage the climate system for a thousand years to come," reports Agence France Presse. Greenhouse gases will cause climate disruptions "for more than a millennium."

Friday, February 2, 2007
Hillary Clinton Introduces Notion of Negotiating with Iran to Israel Lobby
(2 comments) Stepping into the lion's den, Sen. Clinton reminded the American Israel Public Affairs Committee that we must talk to Iran. Of course, she didn't dare rule out a military strike.

Friday, February 2, 2007
E.J. Dionne Pays Tribute to the "Happy Agitator" -- Molly Ivins
(1 comments) "More than just about any other columnist I can think of," writes Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne, "Molly was a genuine populist. . . She believed in lifting up the underdog and hated it when the wealthy made excuses for injustice." She wrote about Ronald Reagan that "if he gets even more sedate, we will have to water him twice a week."

Thursday, February 1, 2007
Final Volume of That Blowback Man's Trilogy Published
(1 comments) Writing on Tom Dispatch, Chalmers Johnson whets our appetite for Nemesis: The Last Days of the American Republic: "As a CIA term. . . 'blowback' does not just mean retaliation for things our government has done to. . . foreign countries. It refers specifically to retaliation for illegal operations carried out abroad that were kept totally secret from the American public." Thus don't we understand others' beef with us.

Wednesday, January 31, 2007
Dick Cheney in Ba-Da-Boom Land
(1 comments) "If you've been following the Lewis 'Scooter' Libby perjury trial, I can understand how you might confuse Dick Cheney with Tony Soprano," writes Eugene Robinson in The Washington Post. "You see [him and his staff] hunkered down in their office suite, much like Tony and crew in the back room of the Bada Bing, plotting ways to cover their behinds and do in their rivals."

Wednesday, January 31, 2007
Looks Like Bush, Not Cheney, Made Sacrificial Lamb of Libby
(2 comments) "Copies of handwritten notes by Vice President Dick Cheney, introduced at trial by defense attorneys for former White House staffer I. Lewis 'Scooter' Libby," report Truthout's proprietor, Marc Ash, and top reporter, Jason Leopold, "would appear to implicate George W. Bush in the Plame CIA Leak case." That can't be good.

Tuesday, January 30, 2007
Middle-East Doesn't Know Which to Fear More -- US or Iran
(1 comments) The Washington Post's Anthony Shahid quotes a Saudi academic: "There is one thing important about the ascendance of Iran here. It does not reflect a real change in Iranian capabilities, economic or political. It's more a reflection of the failures on the part of the U.S. and its Arab allies in the region."

Monday, January 29, 2007
Cheney Says Aircraft Carrier in Persian Gulf Sends Iran "Strong Signal"
(1 comments) Like what -- that we're going to blow it to kingdom come because we're sick of Ahmadinejad's face? Countries in the Middle East "want us to have a major presence there," Cheney said.

Monday, January 29, 2007
Battle in Najaf Date Orchard Yields Multiple Fatalities
(1 comments) In combat more reminiscent of a traditional battle than guerilla warfare, the US claimed to have killed 250 while losing two. The New York Times reported: "The precise affiliation of the militants was unclear." Isn't it always?

Monday, January 29, 2007
Hillary Clinton Urges President Not to Pass the Buck on Iraq
(1 comments) Hillary Clinton said Sunday that "President Bush has made a mess of Iraq and it is his responsibility to 'extricate' the United States from the situation before he leaves office," reports the AP. "It would be 'the height of irresponsibility' to pass the war along to the next commander in chief, she said."

Monday, January 29, 2007
Bob Herbert: Protesters Kept the Faith
(2 comments) "They still believed, after all the years and all the lies, that they could make a difference," writes Bob Herbert of The New York Times. "They still believed their government would listen to them and respond."

Monday, January 29, 2007
Iran Above-Board in Its Planned Assistance to Iraq
(1 comments) According to The New York Times, Iran's ambassador to Iraq said, "Iran was prepared to offer Iraq government forces training, equipment and advisers [and is] ready to assume major responsibility for Iraq reconstruction." Included in the plan is an Iranian national bank branch in Baghdad.

Monday, January 29, 2007
Iran a Nuclear Power? In Its Dreams
(1 comments) In a groundbreaking article in London's The Observer, Peter Beaumont writes that, due to the interruption of its procurement networks, "Iran's efforts to produce highly enriched uranium, the material used to make nuclear bombs, are in chaos and the country is still years from mastering the required technology." But, oblivious to Saddam Hussein's fate, they boast like he did of nuclear capability.

Monday, January 29, 2007
Civil War in Iraq Likely to Bleed Through Its Borders
(1 comments) It will "spill over into neighbouring countries, resulting in mass deaths and refugee flows, serious disruption of Gulf oil supplies and a drastic decline in US influence in the region," reports Guy Dinmore in the Financial Times. That's the conclusion of the Brookings Institution, which advocates, in part, "an international contact group including Syria and Iran; and. . . 'safe havens' for refugees."

Friday, January 26, 2007
Other People's Kids
(1 comments) A rule of Texas high-rollers during the savings and loan crisis, writes Steven Pizzo on Atlantic Free Press, was to "never place your own money into risky deals. Instead use what they called 'OPM,' Other People's Money. In the case of the S&L debacle, the money stolen and squandered was taxpayer insured savings. That's precisely the kind of deal Bush has had going in Iraq. . . OPK -- Other People's Kids."

Thursday, January 25, 2007
Calling Flash Gordon: Your Ray Gun Is Ready
(2 comments) "The military calls its new weapon an 'active denial system,' but that's an understatement," reports the AP. "It's a ray gun that shoots a beam that makes people feel as if they are about to catch fire." Guess that's better than a death ray, anyway.

Thursday, January 25, 2007
Watergate's Carl Bernstein: Bush Worse Than Nixon
(2 comments) "As a (Republican) bumper-sticker of the day proclaimed, 'Nobody died at Watergate,'" Carl Bernstein said in The Washington Post. "If only we could say that about the era of George W. Bush, and that our elected representatives in Congress and our judiciary had been courageous enough to do their duty and hold the President and his aides accountable."

Thursday, January 25, 2007
Blunders in Iraq? "Hogwash," Cheney Says
(3 comments) "Bottom line is that we've had enormous successes and we will continue to have enormous successes," the vice president told Wolf Blitzer. The only success Cheney has had is with his flawless imitation of Baghdad Bob (remember him?).

Thursday, January 25, 2007
Under Pressure from Libby, ex-CIA Official Identified Plame as Agent
(2 comments) "Summoned out of a meeting with the CIA director to take I. Lewis 'Scooter' Libby's urgent call later that same afternoon, then-Associate Deputy Director Robert Grenier said he relayed all he had learned about former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV," reports The Washington Post. Including Wilson's wife Valerie Plame's agent status.

Wednesday, January 24, 2007
Will Hillary Do in a Pinch?
(2 comments) In The Atlantic, Joshua Green chronicles "How Hillary Clinton turned herself into the consummate Washington player." Could you vote for her? Look to your heart. Does she have a heart? Read this piece and find out.

Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Grappling with the Nuclear Genie
(2 comments) "If we don't come to grips with the dead-end of the nuclear double-standard," reports Alexander Zaitchik for AlterNet, "and begin soon the brave and historic grapple with the nuclear genie, we race toward a climax as awful as it is certain. The writing -- and the clock -- is on the wall."

Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Defense Department Lays Off Case Workers for Injured Soldiers
(2 comments) "Defense Department officials have laid off most of their case workers who help severely injured service members," reports Karen Jowers at Army Times. They served as "advocates for wounded service members who have questions or issues related to benefits, financial resources . . . all forms of support other than medical care."

Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Liberal and Labor Organizers Unite to Hold Democrats to Their Word
(3 comments) "Anti-war activists. . . have already mobilized, pressuring Democrats and Republicans to denounce President Bush's troop boosting plan for Iraq," reports the AP. Now, "an influential group of organizers from labor and the liberal movement are banding together to hold Democrats in line on populist issues such as expanded health care, trade restrictions and worker protections."

Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Republicans Distance Themselves from Troop Surge
(2 comments) "Sen. John W. Warner (R-Va.). . . endorsed a new resolution opposing President Bush's buildup of troops in Baghdad, as even some of the most loyal Republicans scrambled to register their concerns and distance themselves from an unpopular policy," reports The Washington Post.

Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Doctors and Hospitals Pressuring Patients without Insurance to Pay with Credit Cards
(3 comments) "Some doctors and hospitals are teaming up with financial-services companies to market credit cards to patients, reducing healthcare providers' dependence on bill collection, and causing more low- and middle-income consumers to pay interest on their medical debts," reports Christopher for The Boston Globe.

Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Arnold Greenspan's Disgraceful Legacy
(3 comments) Warned he was igniting an unsustainable asset bubble, Greenspan advised consumers to switch to adjustable mortgages right before raising interest rates, reports Chris Martenson for Atlantic Free Press. And that's the least of it. Fun, easy-to-understand graphs make it clear.

Monday, January 22, 2007
Despite His Stature, Artist Botero's Abu Ghraib Paintings Shunned by Major American Museums
(3 comments) "The 73-year-old Colombian artist spent 14 months painting a series of 80 drawings and paintings that depict pain, degradation and torture -- all in the style of his more popular work," reports The San Francisco Chronicle. "'People would forget about Guernica were it not for Picasso's masterpiece,' he said. 'Art is a permanent accusation.'"

Monday, January 22, 2007
Twin Baghdad Bombings: At Least 78 Dead, Twice as Many Wounded
(2 comments) "Monday's first blast, a parked car bomb, tore through stalls of vendors peddling DVDs and secondhand clothes," reports the AP. "Seconds later, a suicide car bomber drove into the crowd."

Monday, January 22, 2007
27 Americans Killed Over the Weekend in Iraq
(2 comments) Gunmen who stormed the provincial governor's office in the Shiite holy city of Karbala, reports The New York Times, during a meeting between American and local officials were wearing what appeared to be American military uniforms in an effort to impersonate United States soldiers.

Monday, January 22, 2007
Krugman: Bush's Health Care Proposals Parrot Right-Wing Think Tanks
(2 comments) "At most, the Bush plan might induce some of those [without insurance to buy it], while in the process -- whaddya know -- giving many other high-income individuals yet another tax break," writes Paul Krugman of The New York Times. "While proposing this high-end tax break, Mr. Bush is also proposing a tax increase -- not on the wealthy, but on workers who, he thinks, have too much health insurance."

Monday, January 22, 2007
Bush Rejected al-Maliki's Plea to Let Iraqis Handle Security in Baghdad
(2 comments) "Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki had a surprise for President Bush when they sat down with their aides in the Four Seasons Hotel in Amman, Jordan," reports The Washington Post. "Firing up a PowerPoint presentation, Maliki and his national security adviser proposed that U.S. troops withdraw to the outskirts of Baghdad and let Iraqis take over security in the strife-torn capital." Thanks, but no thanks, said Bush.

Monday, January 22, 2007
Bush Declared Sunday "Sanctity of Human Life" Day
(2 comments) "I swear, I'm not making this up," says our own Bob Geiger. As if his health care proposals weren't bizarre enough.

Friday, January 19, 2007
North Korea, US Lay Groundwork for Wider Talks
(2 comments) Bush & Co. finally go the diplomatic route with North Korea. US envoy Christopher Hill said the talks he and his North Korean counterpart just concluded "laid the foundations for progress when six-nation nuclear negotiations talks resume," according to the AP.

Friday, January 19, 2007
Israel Denies Rumored Talks with Syria
(2 comments) "Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Tuesday that no government officials were involved in secret contacts with Syria," reports Israel's Haaretz, "responding to a Haaretz report that understandings on a peace agreement between Jerusalem and Damascus were formulated in a series of secret meetings in Europe between September 2004 and July 2006."

Friday, January 19, 2007
Weapons for Iraqi Soldiers Siphoned off to Black Market
(2 comments) "Army numbers are swelled with 'ghost soldiers' who appear on rosters but do not exist," yet receive arms, reports The Times of London. "'Corruption is like termites,' said the eputy chief of staff for the Iraqi Armed Forces. 'They eat from within and affect the morale of the soldiers.'"

Friday, January 19, 2007
Cheney's State within a State
(2 comments) "With the departure of his longtime friend Donald Rumsfeld, John Bolton's resignation as U.N. ambassador, and Democrats taking over Congress, times seem grim for the Dick Cheney wing of the Bush administration," reports Laura Rozen in The Washington Monthly. But he "has long surrounded himself with impeccably loyal aides who. . . have also installed like-minded allies throughout the government."

Friday, January 19, 2007
Nukes Just Another Weapon to Today's Pentagon
(3 comments) "At no point since the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima on August 6th, 1945, has humanity been closer to the unthinkable, a nuclear holocaust," writes Michel Chossudovsky on GlobalResearch, echoing the Doomsday Clock. "The distinction between tactical nuclear weapons and the conventional battlefield arsenal has been blurred. America's new nuclear doctrine is based on 'a mix of strike capabilities'."

Friday, January 19, 2007
Cheney: a Black Hole
(3 comments) "To outside observers, Cheney has been the political equivalent of a black hole -- exerting a powerful but mostly invisible force on decisions," writes David Ignatius in The Washington Post. He's been a "gravitational weight that sucked in other personalities and entire branches of the government without emitting light."

Friday, January 19, 2007
American War Dead in Iraq Are the "Strange Fruit" of 9/11
(2 comments) Reflecting on the American military dead, eminent journalist and commentator Chris Floyd calls them the "strange fruit" (like Billie Holiday's lynching victims) of 9/11. He reminds us that "without the deliberate manipulation of the fear and exaggeration. . . generated by the 9/11 attacks, not a single American soldier would have perished in Iraq."

Thursday, January 18, 2007
Israel and Syria Talking -- with Cheney's Apparent Approval
(2 comments) Guess you're never too old to become a statesman. If there's hope for Cheney, there's hope for anyone.

Thursday, January 18, 2007
Bush & Co. Snubbed Major Iranian Concessions in 2003
(2 comments) "Tehran proposed ending support for Lebanese and Palestinian militant groups and helping to stabilise Iraq following the US-led invasion," reports the BBC. "Offers, including making its nuclear programme more transparent, were conditional on the US ending hostility. But Vice-President Dick Cheney's office rejected the plan, the official said."

Thursday, January 18, 2007
Senate Actually Follows Through and Presents Bipartisan Measure to Halt Troop Build-up
(2 comments) "A bipartisan group of senators announced a formal resolution of opposition yesterday to President Bush's buildup of troops in Iraq," reports The Washington Post. "The nonbinding resolution. . . moves Congress a major step closer to a public confrontation with the Bush administration over war policy."

Thursday, January 18, 2007
"Patron Saint of Political Satire" Art Buchwald Dies
(2 comments) The child of foster homes, he took "humorous jabs at Washington politicians in syndicated columns for decades," CNN reports. Where would the likes of Molly Ivins and Maureen Dowd have been without him?

Thursday, January 18, 2007
More and More Americans Get the News Online
(2 comments) "Americans are increasingly using the internet as their primary source of political news, a study has found," reports the BBC. "'Broadband is now part of the rhythm of people's lives, including the civic rhythm,' said report author Lee Rainie."

Thursday, January 18, 2007
To Hasten Apocalypse, Evangelicals Lobby for Attack on Iran
(3 comments) "Biblical literalists, convened together through San Antonio megapastor John Hagee's Christians United for Israel (CUFI), are now seeing the fruits of their yearlong campaign to convince the Bush administration to attack Iran," reports Sarah Posner in a hair-raising article on AlterNet.

Tuesday, January 16, 2007
Has the War with Iran Already Started?
(2 comments) Asks Haaretz' US correspondent, Shmuel Rosner. "It is high noon," he writes. "If Tehran doesn't stop its nefarious [sic] activities. . . someone, somewhere, is going to pull the trigger.

Tuesday, January 16, 2007
Nation Desperate for a Savior Like FDR (or Even Reagan)
(4 comments) "There is widespread agreement among Americans surveyed that the nation is in a state of crisis," reports pollsters Zogby International. "Respondents nationwide said Reagan's qualities are most sought after, with FDR a very close second."

Tuesday, January 16, 2007
Iraq's 'Kalashnikov Index'
(2 comments) As Iraq "sinks ever deeper into chaos," reports Germany's Der Spiegel, "there is only one business that continues to boom: the weapons trade. The daily fluctuating price for arms, know here as the 'Kalashnikov Index,' is considered by many Iraqis as the most reliable indicator of what the future may bring." Prices remain high in expectation of more conflict.

Tuesday, January 16, 2007
Gore Rules Out Presidential Run
(2 comments) "I'm involved in a different kind of campaign," Al Gore explained to Reuters, referring to global warming. He might feel differently, though, if swept up in a tide of popular support.

Tuesday, January 16, 2007
John Edwards Echoes Martin Luther King: "Silence Is Betrayal"
(2 comments) "Edwards," writes Melinda Henneberger on HuffingtonPost, not only opposes the "president's plan to send 21,500 more troops into Iraq but has argued that it is time to bring 50,000 home." His MLK day speech was also a challenge to Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton to step up to the plate on Iraq.

Tuesday, January 16, 2007
University in Baghdad Targeted: 65 Dead
(2 comments) "The strike at Mustansiriya University was a dual bomb attack," CNN reports. "The suicide bomber detonated a vest at the back entrance of the school, and a parked car exploded at the main gate."

Tuesday, January 16, 2007
The Cost of the Iraq War to Your Community -- Literally
(2 comments) Want to know what your community is paying in taxes and debt to support the Iraq war? Visit Cost of War. For example, small, historic Tarrytown New York owes, as of this instant, $29,805,0404.

Tuesday, January 16, 2007
An Attack on Iran: Don't Panic Yet (But Keep Up the Pressure on Congress)
(2 comments) The "careful wording used and the explicit caveats issued by administration officials belied the impression of menace against Iran that Bush and Rice had clearly sought to convey," writes respected historian and commentator Gareth Porter. No air strikes yet, but continue to call your representatives and senators to express your opposition to an attack on Iran.

Tuesday, January 16, 2007
US Upping Its Ruthlessness Quotient in Iraq
(2 comments) "In real estate, the three important considerations are location, location, location," writes Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX). "In Iraq, the three conditions are occupation, occupation, occupation. Nothing can improve in Iraq until we understand that our occupation is the primary source of the chaos and killing."

Friday, January 12, 2007
What if Bush Were President During the Cold War?
(2 comments) Things might have heated up. As The Washington Post's Eugene Robinson writes, "He probably would have disconnected the hotline to the Kremlin, or at least kept Leonid Brezhnev on permanent hold." Or worse.

Thursday, January 11, 2007
Any Resemblance Between Bush's Speech and LBJ's Is Purely. . .
(2 comments) coincidental? Maybe not. Will Bunch of Philadelphia's The Daily News finds disturbing similarities between Bush's speech and the state of the union speech Lyndon Johnson gave exactly 40 years ago to the day.

Thursday, January 11, 2007
Condi Caves Again
(2 comments) "After signaling support for James Baker's Iraq proposals," explains Sidney Blumenthal in Salon, Secretary of State Rice "caved and stood faithfully by the president's failing policies -- assuring her irrelevance, and that of the State Department."

Tuesday, January 9, 2007
Taliban Awash in Cash
(3 comments) Since 9/11, the US has frozen bank accounts. But it can't stop funding for extremist groups through the traditional Islamic hawala (paper-free transfer) system or through direct contacts. In other words, good-old undeclared income.

Tuesday, January 9, 2007
Our New Iraq Commander's Mission Already Looks Like a Lost Patrol
(4 comments) Gen. David Petraeus, writes Slate's eminent commentator, Fred Kaplan, finds himself "in much the same situation [as when he first commanded troops in Iraq] -- loaded with enormous responsibility, the right skills, but not enough resources, either in money or, especially, in troops."

Monday, January 8, 2007
North Korea? Iran? Not Crises, But Opportunities
(4 comments) If we want North Korea and Iran to take us seriously on nukes, we need to heed our obligations to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.

Friday, January 5, 2007
More About John McCain Than You Ever Wanted to Know
(3 comments) From his disappointing compromise on habeas corpus and the Military Commissions Act to his explanation of his seemingly self-defeating stance on Iraq. By Todd Purdum in Vanity Fair.

Friday, January 5, 2007
Oh No She's Not
(3 comments) Going to get away with it, that is. "Exactly what did you not know then, Senator?" asks Colin Shea on Freezerbox of Hillary Clinton. "That Iraq had no nuclear capacity and no prospect of achieving it? . . . One might expect a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee [to know that]."

Thursday, January 4, 2007
Pentagon Deploying Second 'Strike Group' to Persian Gulf
(3 comments) The Pentagon will send a second aircraft carrier, the USS John C. Stennis, and its escort ships to the Persian Gulf, defense officials said, partly as a warning to Syria and Iran. It will join the USS Dwight Eisenhower, already there. Can you spell "provocation," kids?

Thursday, January 4, 2007
US Cuts Nuclear Weapons, But Expands Capacity to Build Them
(3 comments) Presidents Bush and Putin signed a treaty in 2002 calling for each country to cut nuclear inventories by 2012. But the US is exploiting a loophole and beginning to build a better bomb so it doesn't need as many!

Thursday, January 4, 2007
Missing in Action: That Certain "Soft" Investment
(4 comments) The US throws tons of money at African countries to shore up their militaries (a "hard" investment) and protect our oil interests. But, Ricardo Rene Laremont writes in Bitter Lemons International, it's "new educational. . . and advanced health care delivery systems that will convert the enemies of America into friends."

Thursday, January 4, 2007
Iran's President to "Push the Button"
(4 comments) No, not that button -- but close. The New York Times reports: "President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad warned Wednesday that Iran would. . . soon start producing nuclear fuel on an industrial scale. . . 'Very soon we will push the button on nuclear fuel production for industrial uses,' Mr. Ahmadinejad said in a speech."

Wednesday, January 3, 2007
Are You My Enemy?
(3 comments) (Apologies to famous children's book author P.D. Eastman.) Historian and commentator Gareth Porter writes in Asia Times Online: "Bush appears to be poised for a 'surge' [but he's] unwilling to identify which of the several forces [emphasis added] in Iraq would be the target of those additional US forces."

Wednesday, January 3, 2007
Is bin Laden Dead?
(4 comments) Don't know about the man, but the rogue elephant is. "Surprisingly," writes Al Qaeda chronicler Brad Berner, "neither conspiracy theorists nor the Bush administration attempted to use the event to sell books-videos or for political gain." He reminds us, though, to ask the key question: "Why has the ideology [the real bin Laden] espouses become popular?"

Wednesday, January 3, 2007
Busted: Saddam's Execution Videographer
(3 comments) "The government has arrested the person who made the video of Saddam's execution," an adviser to Iraq Prime Minister al-Maliki said. A prosecutor present at the execution said, "I saw two of the government officials who were [present] taking all the video of the execution."

Tuesday, January 2, 2007
"We could not clear and hold"
(3 comments) . . . acknowledged national security adviser Stephen J. Hadley about Iraq. In 2007 the administration sought to turn over security to Iraqis. But, The New York Times reports, "the plan collided with Iraq's ferocious unraveling, which took most of Mr. Bush's war council by surprise."

Tuesday, January 2, 2007
Saddam Execution Video Sounds Alarm for Sunnis
(3 comments) Perhaps, writes Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson, "the anonymous videographer wanted to show Sunni insurgents -- and the rest of the Muslim world. . . just how much is at stake in the civil war, and why Sunnis view the insurgency as a matter of survival. . . . If they can hang the fearsome Saddam Hussein like a dog, they can do the same to any of us."

Tuesday, January 2, 2007
Democrats to Republicans: Go, Talk Among Yourselves
(4 comments) "Democrats are planning to largely sideline Republicans from the first burst of lawmaking," reports The Washington Post. Measures they intend to pass in the first 100 hours include: "tightening ethics rules for lawmakers, raising the minimum wage, allowing more research on stem cells and cutting interest rates on student loans."

Tuesday, January 2, 2007
American Embassy to Iraqis: Don't Look to Us for Asylum
(3 comments) "Until recently," reports The New York Times, "the Bush administration had planned to resettle just 500 Iraqis this year, a mere fraction of the tens of thousands of Iraqis who are now believed to be fleeing their country. . . 'I don't know of anyone inside the administration who sees this as a priority,' said a refugee advocate."

Tuesday, January 2, 2007
Sen. Lugar, an Honorable Republican, Advises Bush to Consult New Congress on Iraq
(3 comments) If he doesn't, warns outgoing chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Richard Lugar, Bush will face investigation and subpoenas. Lugar agreed with Fox News host Chris Wallace's assertion that if Bush doesn't consult Congress, "It could get ugly."

Friday, December 29, 2006
Alexander Cockburn: Ford Our Greatest President?
(4 comments) Ever the contrarian, Cockburn writes: "Here at CounterPunch it has always been our position that Gerald Ford was America's greatest President. Transferring the Hippocratic injunction from the medical to the political realm, he did the least possible harm." Still, a trace of Cockburn's tongue can be seen in his cheek.

Friday, December 29, 2006
Trump on Bush: "The worst and by far the dumbest president"
(3 comments) The queen of irony, The New York Times' Maureen Dowd interviewed a no-holds-barred Donald Trump, who also said, "You see children going into school in Baghdad with no arms and legs -- I don't think Bush's kids should be having lots of fun in Argentina."

Friday, December 29, 2006
Homeless in Iraq
(3 comments) 1.6 million Iraqis have been displaced since the war began. Aside from sectarian strife, the blame can also be laid at the feet of greedy landlords, freed from rent control once the US "liberated" the country. Plans to alleviate the situation are almost nil. Special thanks are due Bush & Co. for abandoning the reconstruction of the country.

Friday, December 29, 2006
Cindy Sheehan's Civil Disobedience Results in Another Arrest
(3 comments) Sheehan was arrested for blocking the road leading to President Bush's ranch. She and her fellow protesters lay in the road for 20 minutes before they were taken into custody.

Friday, December 29, 2006
Ostroy Report Returns with Commentary on Senseless Death
(3 comments) Popular blogger Andy Ostroy, whose wife was murdered in New York City a few months ago, writes: "Unfortunately, as many of you know, I know a lot about senseless death. And nothing ignites my passion more these days than seeing so many young men and women dying for an unjust cause. It's time for the carnage to stop."

Thursday, December 28, 2006
Ford Condemned Former Aides Cheney and Rumsfeld for Iraq
(3 comments) "Rumsfeld and Cheney and the president made a big mistake in justifying going into the war in Iraq," the late President Gerald Ford told Bob Woodward in a 2004 interview. He also said, "And I just don't think we should go hellfire damnation around the globe freeing people, unless it is directly related to our own national security."

Thursday, December 28, 2006
Americans Running Out of Patience, Iraq Running Out of People
(3 comments) . . . between deaths -- 134 yesterday -- and exile. Also seven American soldiers, not to mention two Latvians.

Thursday, December 28, 2006
"Tomorrow" Officially "Begins Today" for John Edwards
(3 comments) . . . to quote his campaign slogan as he throws his hat in the ring, pinning his hopes on domestic issues. John Edwards -- a genuine human being running for president. What a concept!

Thursday, December 28, 2006
Amy Goodman: Let's Not Forget Murdered Journalists
(3 comments) "When you step off the elevator at the Reuters news offices in Washington, D.C.," writes Amy Goodman, "you see a large book sitting on a wooden stand. Each entry describes a Reuters journalist killed in the line of duty. Such as Taras Protsyuk. The veteran Ukrainian cameraman was killed on April 8, 2003, the day before the U.S. seized Baghdad."

Wednesday, December 27, 2006
Bush's "New Way Forward" Could Lead to Strike on Iran
(5 comments) Bush & Co., writes the great Chris Floyd, "love to be thwarted diplomatically –- which is why all their diplomatic efforts are so lame-brained, half-hearted, and transparently geared toward ultimate failure; they want to leave open at all times an excuse for military action."

Wednesday, December 27, 2006
London's The Guardian: Iraq Has Turned into "Grand Guignol"
(3 comments) A horror show, in other words. "The British occupation army's assault on its own police force in Basra confirms Iraq as a far greater disaster than Suez," writes Roy Hattersley. Even "just plain farce" will suffice.

Wednesday, December 27, 2006
Approaching Execution, Saddam Goes All Christ-Like on Us
(3 comments) "Saddam Hussein, due to be hanged within 30 days, said in a letter made public on Wednesday that his execution would be a sacrifice for his country and called on Iraqis to unite and fight U.S. forces," reports Reuters. "If my soul goes down this path (of martyrdom) it will face God in serenity," he wrote.

Wednesday, December 27, 2006
Israel Constructing Yet More New Housing on West Bank
(4 comments) From The Los Angeles Times: "Israel has approved construction of new housing for Jewish settlers in the West Bank, officials said Tuesday, drawing protests from Palestinian leaders and Israeli peace activists who said the decision violates a 3-year-old pledge to the United States to freeze settlement activity." It never learns.

Wednesday, December 27, 2006
White House Stockpiling Lawyers
(3 comments) "President Bush is bracing for what could be an onslaught of investigations by the new Democratic-led Congress by hiring lawyers to fill key White House posts," reports The Baltimore Sun. One law school professor called it an attempt to "slow down or resist oversight before the oversight can get organized."

Friday, December 22, 2006
CIA Takes a Big, Black Sharpie to New York Times Op-Ed on Iran
(3 comments) Today The New York Times ran an op-ed that the CIA had redacted (blacked out). Policy wonks Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann must have struck a nerve with their hard-hitting critique of the administration's policy toward Iran.

Friday, December 22, 2006
First Draft of Draft Drawn Up
(3 comments) "The Selective Service System is making plans to test its draft machinery in case Congress and President Bush need it," reports the AP. "The agency is planning a comprehensive test. . . of its military draft systems, a Selective Service official said." But, "The test itself would not likely occur until 2009." Somehow, that's not too reassuring.

Thursday, December 21, 2006
David Corn: Bush and Cheney Are in the Bunker
(4 comments) "I'm sleeping a lot better than people would assume." -- George W. Bush. "This is scary," writes The Nation's David Corn. "The president of the United States of America has created a hellish disaster that has resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians and thousands of American soldiers, and he's resting well."

Thursday, December 21, 2006
Bush Still Thinks All Americans Are Capable of Contributing Is Shopping
(3 comments) "Today, President Bush held a news conference where he discussed the 'way forward' for the economy in 2007," reports Think Progress. "New York Times columnist Paul Krugman notes that 'the odds are very good -- maybe 2 to 1,' that the U.S. will teeter toward a recession in 2007. Bushs solution? 'Go shopping more.'"

Thursday, December 21, 2006
76 Bodies in One Day Sets New Iraq Benchmark for Horror
(3 comments) "The bodies of 76 unidentified people were recovered in Baghdad on Wednesday, police said, the highest 24-hour toll for the anonymous slayings that have become a grim part of life in the capital," reports The Los Angeles Times.

Thursday, December 21, 2006
Generals: More Troops = Step Backward for Iraqi Security Forces
(3 comments) "Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, visiting Iraq on his second day in office, said Wednesday that senior commanders had expressed their concern to him that sending more American troops to Iraq might delay the Iraqi government from taking responsibility for its own security," reports The Washington Post.

Thursday, December 21, 2006
CentCom Commander Abizaid's Departure Paves Way for Bush's "Surge"
(3 comments) "The debate over sending more U.S. troops to Iraq intensified yesterday as President Bush signaled that he will listen but not necessarily defer to balky military officers, while Gen. John P. Abizaid, his top Middle East commander and a leading skeptic of a so-called surge, announced his retirement," reports The Washington Post. "The president seems lost within his own rhetoric," Harry Reid said.

Wednesday, December 20, 2006
1,000 Active Duty Troops Formally Oppose Occupation
(3 comments) "For the first time since Vietnam, an organized, robust movement of active-duty US military personnel has publicly surfaced to oppose a war in which they are serving," writes Marc Cooper in The Nation. Appeal for Redress, brainchild of Navy seaman Jonathan Hutto, plans to petition Congress to withdraw American troops from Iraq.

Wednesday, December 20, 2006
Once Out of Office, Unpopular President Will Need Heavy Secret Service Detail
(5 comments) The White House sought $5 million in the 2007 budget to begin hiring and training the Secret Service detail that will protect Bush after he leaves office, as well as protect 2008 presidential candidates. "I think he has gained a lot of enmity," said a former Secret Service agent. "There are a lot of people who resent this president, both externally and internally."

Wednesday, December 20, 2006
Are American's Troop Deaths in Iraq a Waste?
(3 comments) Sure, they're sitting ducks. Hung out to dry. Victims of a failed policy. But there's always dignity and purpose to a death on the job. "You get in the humvee every day because that's the job that's feeding your family," says one soldier in Anna Mulrine's eloquent account of the death of a soldier in U.S. News & World Report.

Tuesday, December 19, 2006
Even Conservatives Are Relieved Bush's Authority Was Undermined by the Election
(3 comments) "The recent election feels like something more intimate than a personnel change," writes conservative commentator Christopher Caldwell in The New York Times. "It feels like the beginnings of an escape from a twisted relationship."

Tuesday, December 19, 2006
NASA Proposes to Mine Safe Nuclear Fuel on the Moon
(3 comments) NASA's planned moon base announced last week includes plans to mine for Helium-3, a safe fuel for fusion reactors. Needless to say, Russia and China have similar designs on the moon. Thus providing a great opportunity for a cooperative venture. (Ha, ha.)

Tuesday, December 19, 2006
Gates Doesn't Echo Baker, as Expected, But Bush
(3 comments) When Senate Democrats voted unanimously to confirm Robert Gates as Defense Secretary, reports the esteemed Robert Parry, they thought he would represent the views of James Baker and other "realists" from George H.W. Bush's administration. But since then Gates has echoed Bush in signaling "that they have no intention of extricating the U.S. military from the Iraq quagmire."

Friday, December 15, 2006
Major New Player Debuts on the Political Web
(3 comments) In its own words: "IraqSlogger is the world's premier Iraq-focused Web site. [It] reports on traditional topics as well as. . . black market prices in Baghdad, the buzz on Iraq's streets, the latest graffiti in Iraq. . ." Its founder is Eason Jordan, the former CNN news chief forced to resign when he commented that US troops in Iraq are targeting journalists.

Friday, December 15, 2006
Southern Methodist University Alumni, Professors Up in Arms Over Proposed Bush Library
(3 comments) In fact, the idea that Southern Methodist University would host the George Bush Library offends Methodists -- the leading religion in America during Abraham Lincoln's time -- in general. Besides his, no doubt, heavily redacted papers, what books would he include? "My Pet Goat," "The Purpose-Driven Life"? George to Laura: "Read any good mysteries, lately?"

Friday, December 15, 2006
Blair's Lies Laid Bare
(3 comments) London's The Independent reports that Carne Ross, Britain's chief negotiator at the UN, made it clear that Tony Blair "must have known Saddam Hussein possessed no weapons of mass destruction. He said that during his posting to the UN, 'at no time did HMG [Her Majesty's Government] assess that Iraq's WMD (or any other capability) posed a threat to the UK or its interests.'"

Friday, December 15, 2006
As Usual, Secretary of State Rice Schizoid About Diplomacy
(3 comments) Yesterday, reports The Washington Post, she "rejected a bipartisan panel's recommendation that the United States seek the help of Syria and Iran in Iraq, saying the 'compensation' required by any deal might be too high. 'If they have an interest in a stable Iraq, they will do it anyway,' she said."

Friday, December 15, 2006
Russian Criminal Leverages His Life of Crime into TV Stardom
(3 comments) "Bondar" brought his "own lowlife hustles. . . to the screen with all the verisimilitude of real goons playing real goon," reports The Washington Post. His series "for all its professional deficiencies, had a raw, brutal appeal, a kind of real-life 'Sopranos' on YouTube."

Friday, December 15, 2006
McCain Sees War as Long-Term Strategy to Win the Election
(3 comments) "McCain wants this stupid, pointless, sucker's war to drag on, maybe even get worse," writes The Buffalo Beast's Al Uthman. "He needs something to rescue us from. He can't win without it. And hey, what's a few thousand more corpses if it means he gets to be president?"

Thursday, December 14, 2006
Naval Interrogators Master Art of Non-invasive Lobotomy
(3 comments) "Unlawful enemy combatant" Jose Padilla "appears to have lost his mind," under US custody, reports the great English journalist George Monbiot. "I don't mean this metaphorically," he adds. "I mean that his mind is no longer there."

Thursday, December 14, 2006
Never Mind North Korea and Iran, US and Russia Still Armed to the Teeth with Nukes
(4 comments) "There is something totally absurd and even criminal," writes Russian policy expert Sergei Plekhanov, "about the fact that the giant machines of nuclear omnicide, created in the last century on the basis of bankrupt Cold War premises, are still standing ready for war, 24/7, waiting for orders from their commanders in chief."

Thursday, December 14, 2006
Soy Not for Boys
(3 comments) "Soy is feminizing, and commonly leads to a decrease in the size of the penis, sexual confusion and homosexuality," writes Reverend Jim Rutz for WorldNetDaily. "That's why most of the medical (not socio-spiritual) blame for today's rise in homosexuality must fall upon the rise in soy formula and other soy products." That's Rutz -- as in nuts.

Thursday, December 14, 2006
Democratic Senator Tim Johnson's Illness Could Swing Senate Back to Republicans
(4 comments) The South Dakota senator is recovering from surgery to stop bleeding in the brain. But his condition creates political drama about which party will control the Senate next month if he is unable to continue in office.

Thursday, December 14, 2006
If Not George, Who? Cindy Sheehan Pushes for Impeachment
(3 comments) "If George Bush isn't impeached then we should never impeach anyone else," declared Cindy Sheehan. "We should just take (the sections outlining the impeachment process) out of the Constitution. It is a meaningless clause of the Constitution."

Thursday, December 14, 2006
Iran Sanctions Delayed "Because I Said So"
(4 comments) "Because I said so," Russian Ambassador to the UN Churkin declared yesterday as Russia postponed talks on Iran sanctions. The US had offended the Russians by criticizing the jailing of a political opposition leader in Belarus. "It wasn't the best timing by the U.S.," said British Ambassador Parry. If it walks like sabotage. . .

Friday, December 8, 2006
Saudi Citizens Funding Sunni Fighters in Iraq
(3 comments) "In one recent case," reports Salah Nasrawi of AP, "an Iraqi official said $25 million in Saudi money went to a top Iraqi Sunni cleric and was used to buy weapons, including Strela, a Russian shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missile."

Friday, December 8, 2006
Filmmaker David Lynch Goes Public with Sympathy for 9/11 Truth Movement
(4 comments) His films like "Blue Velvet" and "Mulholland Drive" "are synonymous with the questioning of the nature of reality and thinking outside the box," writes Steve Watson on InfoWars.net. Appearing on Dutch television, Lynch played clips from and discussed the 9/11 Internet hit film "Loose Change."

Friday, December 8, 2006
Global Warming Know-Nothings Don't Even Deserve to be Called Skeptics
(4 comments) Creationists and those who refute global warming have experienced considerable success in their war on science. But, writes Ben Zaitchik on Freezerbox.com, "Every article that takes them seriously, every conference that invites them to speak is a victory for the profiteers at the expense of society."

Friday, December 8, 2006
Gallup World Poll Finds Muslim Moderates on Same Wave-Length as Radicals
(3 comments) But that's not as bad as it sounds. A Gallup World Poll reported in Foreign Policy magazine found that moderates don't have radical views. Instead, radicals are more moderate in their views than thought -- they just fear domination by the West.

Thursday, December 7, 2006
Iran Offered Assistance with Iraq if US Agreed to a Timetable for Withdrawal
(3 comments) On the eve of the Baker-Hamilton Commission's report, writes David Ignatius of The Washington Post, "Iran's national security adviser said. . . that a U.S. plan for removing 'occupation forces' from Iraq would be considered 'a sign of a change in strategy.' [In which case] 'Iran would definitely. . . use its influence to help solve the problem.'"

Thursday, December 7, 2006
US, Europe, China and Russia Remain at Odds Over Sanctioning Iran
(3 comments) Senior officials from France, Britain, Germany, Russia, China and the United States were unable to agree on the draft of a U.N. resolution sanctioning Iran. "Are we in a hurry or not?" French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy asked, according to Reuters. "Yes. . . the credibility of the United Nations Security Council is at stake." Uh, since when has it been credible?

Thursday, December 7, 2006
A Mega-Church Enters the 21st Century
(4 comments) "When Rick Warren, one of the nation's most popular evangelical pastors, faced down right-wing pressure and invited Sen. Barack Obama to speak at a gathering at his Saddleback Valley Community Church about the AIDS crisis," writes E.J. Dionne, "he sent a signal: A significant group of theologically conservative Christians no longer wants to be treated as a cog in the Republican political machine."

Thursday, December 7, 2006
Denial Won't Stop Recession
(3 comments) The developing recession, visionary economist Dean Baker reports, "would not have been so dire if economists had been. . . more interested in happy talk than economic analysis." He reminds us: "Not one of the 'Blue-Chip 50' forecasters saw the 2001 recession coming." He suspects the same bunch "will probably still be around to miss the next recession."

Tuesday, December 5, 2006
Neocons Follow Their Dreams -- Straight to Hell
(4 comments) On the occasion of John Bolton's ouster, Germany's Der Spiegel celebrates the demise of the Neocons with an article entitled "Bye-Bye, Blockheads."

Tuesday, December 5, 2006
Shiites and Sunnis Show Signs of Uniting to End Occupation
(3 comments) "Inter-communal reconciliation is precisely what Iraq needs. [It requires] that Iraqis come together on the one issue about which most of them agree: ending the U.S. occupation," writes the incomparable Robert Dreyfuss. "It is perhaps Iraq's last, best hope for ending its civil war."

Tuesday, December 5, 2006
Wayne Madsen Unimpressed by Politics of DiCaprio's Film "Blood Diamond"
(3 comments) "But some experts say it is impossible. . . to distinguish between nonconflict diamonds and 'blood' diamonds," writes Richard Johnson in The New York Post's Page Six. Then he reports that Wayne Madsen accuses the movie of being a "P.R. campaign" for the star and producer hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons's products. Madsen adds, "They should be saying, 'Don't buy diamonds at all'."

Monday, December 4, 2006
Pentagon Exaggerates Nuclear Threat China Poses
(3 comments) The U.S. military, as well as intelligence agencies, conservative think tanks and news organizations are exaggerating China's nuclear weapons capability to justify developing a new generation of nuclear weapons, according to the Federation of American Scientists. Likewise Chinese cite US upgrades as a rationale for modernizing theirs. M.A.D. -- Mutual Assured Destruction -- is back!

Monday, December 4, 2006
Bush Let's Senate Have It for Blocking Bolton
(3 comments) In a statement, the president said: "This stubborn obstructionism ill serves our country, and discourages men and women of talent from serving their nation." Bolton talented? Sure, if you call talking your wife into going to Plato's Retreat with you talented. Farewell, Johnny, we hardly knew ye.

Monday, December 4, 2006
Krugman: Why Do Washington Insiders Still Cringe at Lame Duck Bush?
(3 comments) "Look at what seems to have happened to the Iraq Study Group, whose mission statement says that it would provide an 'independent assessment'," writes Paul Krugman of The New York Times. "If press reports are correct. . . it watered down its conclusions and recommendations."

Monday, December 4, 2006
DC Radio Host Lures Bigots Out of Their Lairs
(3 comments) "When radio host Jerry Klein suggested that all Muslims in the United States should be identified with a crescent-shape tattoo or a distinctive arm band, the phones," writes Bernd Debusmann of Reuters, lit up with favorable reactions. Until Klein revealed it was a hoax: "I can't believe any of you are sick enough to have agreed for one second with anything I said."

Monday, December 4, 2006
Re-elected by a Wide Margin, Hugo Chavez Pleges to Intensify Both Socialism and Anti-US Initiative
(3 comments) Yet, despite his authoritarianism, he still comes off like a saint compared to our president. Chavez said Venezuelans should expect an "expansion of the revolution" aimed at redistributing the country's oil wealth among the poor.

Friday, December 1, 2006
Taliban Honor Muslim Tradition by Reviving Drawing and Quartering
(4 comments) Not to mention disemboweling. Thus was Mohammed Halim brought back to the Middle Ages at Ghazni, the scene of fierce clashes between the Taliban and US and Afghan forces. His crime? Teaching Afghan schoolgirls.

Friday, December 1, 2006
Now It's Not Just Our Credit Rating We Have to Worry About but Our Terror Rating
(3 comments) Without their knowledge, millions of Americans and foreigners crossing U.S. borders in the past four years have been assigned computer-generated scores rating them as terror or crime risks. "Some privacy advocates call it one of the most intrusive. . . schemes yet mounted in the name of anti-terrorism efforts," reports Michael Sniffen.

Friday, December 1, 2006
Pope Concludes His Damage Control Campaign with Islam
(3 comments) The BBC reports that Pope Benedict XVI used his trip to Turkey to, in part, mend fences with Islam. "Many Turkish papers said he succeeded, with his moment of prayer in Istanbul's Blue Mosque hailed a 'great gesture'." Anything would have been an improvement after his comments in September.

Friday, December 1, 2006
US Refuses to Make Concessions to Iran in Return for Its Help Calming Iraq
(3 comments) Also, the al-Maliki government would be given a final chance to crack down on Shiite militias. Writes Juan Cole in his Informed Comment blog: "Bush is trying to set al-Maliki up for a confrontation with the Sadr Movement and is trying to keep the Shiite-dominated government in Baghdad from too openly embracing Iran. (That cow is already out of the barn, of course.)"

Friday, December 1, 2006
Besieging Ourselves
(3 comments) "American troops in Iraq sit on their Forward Operating Bases; in effect, we are besieging ourselves," writes military analyst William Lind. When they do venture out, "it is almost always to run convoys, which is to say to provide targets; to engage in meaningless patrols" or counterproductive raids.

Friday, December 1, 2006
Study Cuts the Rug Out from Under Bush & Co.'s Plans to Jump-Start Nuclear Weapons
(3 comments) The National Nuclear Security Administration had previously estimated that plutonium used in nuclear warheads grew stale after 50 years. But a new study doubles that estimate. Said California Senator Dianne Feinstein: "For those who don't want to see. . . a new generation of nuclear weapons developed, this is good news." Non-proliferation may not be de-proliferation. But it sure beats proliferation.

Thursday, November 30, 2006
Is the Administration Modeling Itself After Stalin?
(4 comments) "Newly leaked audiotapes of military tribunals held at the Guantanamo Bay concentration camp," writes the great cartoonist-slash-columnist Ted Rall, "shared the eerie quality of the Soviet show trials of the 1930s." A shadowy terrorist conspiracy; hearsay evidence; suspects beaten, abused, and tortured.

Thursday, November 30, 2006
US District Judge Actually Calls FEMA 'Kafkaesque'
(3 comments) No stranger to book learning, U.S. District Judge Richard J. Leon said FEMA created a 'Kafkaesque' process that capriciously cut off rental aid to Katrina victims. He summarily ordered the Bush administration to resume payments immediately.

Thursday, November 30, 2006
Forget the Base, Next Time Rove Should Get Out the Psychotic Vote
(3 comments) A new academic study demonstrates a direct link between mental illness and support for President Bush. Drawing on a survey of psychiatric outpatients, Christopher Lohse found that the more psychotic the voter, the more likely they were to vote for Bush. Of course, in general, they crave authoritative leaders.

Thursday, November 30, 2006
World's First Act of Nuclear Terrorism
(4 comments) Former Moscow hand Matt Taibbi sifts through the theories that have sprung up in the wake of Alexander Litvinenko's death. But, most important, he reminds us that it's the world's first instance of nuclear terrorism.

Thursday, November 30, 2006
Iraq Has Left Al Qaeda in the Dust
(3 comments) Nor is it any longer fueled by anger over Palestine, to the extent that it ever was, writes Michael Hirsch in Newsweek. It's bigger than all that. Failing to understand this, the Iraq Study Group and its findings are DOA.

Wednesday, November 29, 2006
Nobel Prize Winner ElBaradei Has Had It with Iran -- as Well as the West
(3 comments) While urging Western powers to back off, top UN nuclear official Mohammed ElBaradei directed most of his ire at Iran. "I want to emphasize that what we are doing is essentially giving a service to Iran," he said. By which he meant, coming clean would ward off UN sanctions.

Wednesday, November 29, 2006
Civil War -- or Revolution?
(3 comments) The US may have entrusted four of Saddam's Sunni generals "with the mission of toppling the Shi'ite-majority Maliki government," writes Pepe Escobar on AsiaTimesOnline. It would then finish off the Shi'ite militia. Phoenix-like, Saddam's Baathists rise from the ashes. . .

Wednesday, November 29, 2006
AsiaTimesOnline Reporter Survives Taliban Capture
(3 comments) "Syed Saleem Shahzad returned safely to his home in Karachi on Wednesday after being held for a harrowing six days in the captivity of the Taliban in Afghanistan," reports AsiaTimesOnline. One of the Middle East's foremost reporters, he was suspected of being a "spy" (aren't they all?). The Taliban: true know-nothings.

Tuesday, November 28, 2006
Emboldened Hezbollah Now Sharing Its Know-How with Shiite Militia in Iraq
(3 comments) "A senior American intelligence official said Monday that the Iranian-backed group Hezbollah had been training members of the Mahdi Army, the Iraqi Shiite militia led by Moktada al-Sadr," report Michael Gordon and Dexter Filkins in The New York Times.

Tuesday, November 28, 2006
US Occupation of Iraq a Widow-Maker -- to the Tune of 100 a Day
(3 comments) In an authoritative, comprehensive article on AlterNet.org, John Tirman of MIT's Center for International Studies debunks the administration and hard right's mythology about the killing floor Iraq has become.

Monday, November 27, 2006
Septa- and Octagenarians: WWII Seem Like an Eternity? Well, Iraq's Longer
(3 comments) Two benchmarks were achieved in Iraq, both equally draped in dishonor: 1. U.S. involvement in Iraq surpassed the length of America's participation in World War II. 2. Last week was the deadliest for sectarian fighting in Baghdad since the war began.

Monday, November 27, 2006
Pakistan Finally Admits US Bombed Madrasah (as in School)
(3 comments) Last month's bombing of a Pakistani Koran school (which killed 82) because it allegedly harbored terrorists was carried out by the United States, a Pakistani official has admitted. Oddly,it occurred during a visit to Pakistan by Prince Charles.

Monday, November 27, 2006
War-Weary Americans Turn Backs on Clint Eastwood's "Flags of Our Fathers"
(3 comments) "Clint Eastwood's 'Flags of our Fathers' was released with great marketing fanfare and received uniform critical appraisal, but to describe it politely, the box-office revenue disappointed," writes Steve Brozak of ABC News. "The American audience's reaction to 'Flags of Our Fathers' was the canary in the coal mine of our national will."

Monday, November 27, 2006
How Habeas Corpus Was Turned into a Corpse by a Specter
(4 comments) Lincoln did it too, the hard right argues. But, at the time, the White House actually faced capture by rebel troops. According to The New Yorker's Jeffrey Toobin, "Arlen Specter was an unlikely steward of the demise of habeas corpus." What's his excuse?

Monday, November 27, 2006
'South Park' Fuels 9/11 Truth Movement
(3 comments) A recent episode mocked everybody from the administration to 9/11 "conspiracy theorists." But the following day, traffic to the leading 9/11 site -- 911truth.org, run by a single mother of six -- multiplied by five times.

Wednesday, November 22, 2006
Disgraced Mega-Church Pastor Haggard Not Just a User, But an Addict
(3 comments) No recreational user, Ted Haggard was a full-fledged tweaker, argues Alexander Zaitchik in Freezerbox.com: "A lot of people have pointed to the dialogue in Haggard's spastic cameo in the documentary 'Jesus Camp,' in which Pastor Ted condemns homosexuality and tells a 12 year-old kid he's 'very cute.' But look beyond the words and the film depicts a man high on more than John 3:16."

Wednesday, November 22, 2006
"Bomb Iran" -- LA Times Runs Ultra-Hawkish OpEd
(4 comments) "WE MUST bomb Iran," raves Joshua Muravchik of the conservative American Enterprise Institute. "It has been four years since that country's secret nuclear program was brought to light, and the path of diplomacy and sanctions has led nowhere."

Wednesday, November 22, 2006
DARPA's Biggest Boondoggle -- the 'Nuclear Hand Grenade'
(6 comments) Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists reports on one of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency's follies, the ultra-micro hafnium bomb. It reveals how junk scientists gain the ears of national security officials too scared to ignore any idea, no matter how wacky, because the enemy may be working on it.

Wednesday, November 22, 2006
Halberstam: Reporters in Iraq Bravest War Correspondents Ever
(3 comments) Pulitzer-prize winning reporter David Halberstam called those covering Iraq today "the bravest correspondents that we have ever sent out to cover a war, because [there's] no safe zone in Iraq." Not only that but, "The crueler the war gets, the crueler the attacks get on anybody who doesn't salute or play the game."

Tuesday, November 21, 2006
India's King of Sting
(3 comments) No, not the cobra: Aniruddha Bahal -- the most feared reporter in India. Using spycams, as Alex Zaitchik reports in London's The Independent, he dramatically exposes corruption in the world's largest democracy -- and has even toppled its president.

Tuesday, November 21, 2006
Along with Other Innocents, Brave Iraqi TV Star Killed
(3 comments) Comic Waleed Hassan, whose satirical show courageously poked fun at the civil war and economic chaos, was killed by three bullets to the head on his way to work. Pressure is mounting on Bush to appeal to Syria and Iran for help.

Tuesday, November 21, 2006
Iraq's Sunnis Beside Themselves Over Arrest Warrant for Leader
(3 comments) "The arrest warrant issued last week by the Iraqi government for Sunni leader Dr. Harith al-Dhari [of the influential Association of Muslim Scholars] has sent shockwaves through the government, and galvanised much of the Sunni population," writes intrepid reporter Dahr Jamail. Heck, even the Shiites are up in arms about it.

Tuesday, November 21, 2006
Even Kissinger Despairs of Victory in Iraq
(3 comments) In addition, said Henry Kissinger, now an advisor to Bush & Co., the US must open talks with Iran and Syria. His comments "reflected a markedly more pessimistic view than Mr. Kissinger has expressed publicly in the past," reports The New York Times.

Tuesday, November 21, 2006
A Society That Sell Its Women Is Sowing the Seeds for Its Own Destruction
(3 comments) Rural misery and urban squalor drive Iran's women to prostitution in shocking numbers, writes Asia Times Online's Spengler. Worse, "The same networks that move female flesh across borders also provide illegal passage for jihadis, and the proceeds of human trafficking often support Islamist terrorists."

Monday, November 20, 2006
Sy Hersh: Don't Take Your Eyes Off Cheney with Iran for a Second
(3 comments) The legendary investigative reporter wonders about "The Next Act": Is a damaged Administration less likely to attack Iran, or more? In other words, don't count Cheney out.

Monday, November 20, 2006
Even NASCAR Dads Went South on Republicans
(3 comments) The president of a NASCAR track told former New York Times sportswriter Robert Lipsyte, "They liked the President's Top Gun performance, but they're not so gung ho anymore on Iraq because this is the crowd that joined the National Guard."

Monday, November 20, 2006
South Korean Internet -- Both Broadband Access and Netroots -- Shames Ours
(3 comments) "A tech-savvy government, the highest broadband penetration rate in the world, and a nation of restless young cyber-activists make South Korea the most fascinating media laboratory on the planet," according to London's The Independent.

Friday, November 17, 2006
US-India Nuke Deal Has Critics in Both Countries
(3 comments) In an overwhelming vote, the Senate agreed to send nuclear fuel and technology to India, in spite of its refusal to sign the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. But, as a former Indian ambassador to the US says, "It makes it appear as though we are being required to gang up with the United States against Iran."

Friday, November 17, 2006
British and US Forces Set Out in Search of Abducted US Contractors
(3 comments) But conflicting reports, like from China's The Standard, muddy the waters: "Iraqi police said they shot dead an American in civilian clothes and wounded another after the men killed two police officers who had stopped their unmarked vehicle."

Friday, November 17, 2006
Pursuit of Contractors in Sharp Contrast to Abandonment of Kidnapped US Soldier Two Weeks Ago
(3 comments) A young blogger on ProgressiveU.org writes: "Employees of the contractors -- priceless. Employees of the US military -- a dime a dozen."

Friday, November 17, 2006
Turns Out It Was Rice Who Leaned on Bush to Embrace Baker's Iraq Group
(3 comments) According to Mark Benjamin of Salon, Secretary of State Rice finally flexed her muscles. Quoting one of the Iraq Study Group's founders, he reports that it only, "happened with her going to the president. . . . It was remarkable that Condi Rice took the lead."

Thursday, November 16, 2006
To Bush & Co. Foreign Policy Is a Football Game -- and Now They're Giving Up Big Yardage
(3 comments) "For the past six years, the top officials in charge of US foreign and military policy have known how to play rough-and-tumble offensive American football," writes Michael Klare. They have finally decided to "send the defense on to the field for Team America." Bob Gates, presumably, is the middle linebacker; James Baker, the free safety.

Thursday, November 16, 2006
Didn't Bush Learn Anything from the Mid-Terms?
(3 comments) The president, reports London's The Guardian, "has told senior advisers that the US and its allies must make 'a last big push' to win the war in Iraq and that instead of beginning a troop withdrawal next year, he may increase US forces by up to 20,000 soldiers, according to sources."

Thursday, November 16, 2006
2008: Go Figure
(3 comments) A new Gallup poll finds Barack Obama trailing Hillary Clinton by only 12%. Meanwhile, Rudolph Giuliani actually leads John McCain by 2%. Even more surprising, Giuliani and McCain are about tied between conservative and moderate Republicans -- as are Clinton and Obama between moderate and liberal Democrats.

Wednesday, November 15, 2006
Ahmadinejad: We'll Talk to US if It Stops Being a Bad Boy
(3 comments) "We won't talk to [Israel] because it is a usurper and an illegitimate entity," said Iran's Mahmoud President Ahmadinejad. As for the US, "Should it correct its behavior, we will talk to them," he said.

Wednesday, November 15, 2006
Wonder Weapon or Widow Maker?
(3 comments) New from the Center for Defense Information: "Faster than the fastest helicopter, able to leap vertically to lift troops and supplies behind enemy lines, the Osprey is able to swoop, raptor-like, onto an enemy with deadly results. But throughout the V-22's development, 30 people have died -- and now this glitch-plagued program is poised to reveal fundamental flaws that may cost even more lives."

Wednesday, November 15, 2006
Reports That Al Qaeda Seeks Nukes Finally Hit Mainstream Media
(3 comments) Al-Qaeda and other Islamic extremists have sought to obtain chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear materials for use in terrorist attacks, the Associated Press, citing an anonymous British diplomatic source, reports. Just like Graham Allison ("Nuclear Terrorism") and Paul L. Williams ("The Al-Qaeda Connection") have been trying to tell us.

Tuesday, November 14, 2006
Iraq's Al Qaeda Chief: Rumsfeld Fled the Battlefield, Now Let's Blow Up the White House
(3 comments) The leader of al Qaeda in Iraq boasted it forced Rumsfeld to flee the Iraqi battlefield. Al-Masri then said, "I swear by God we shall not rest from jihad until we. . . blow up the filthiest house known as the White House."

Tuesday, November 14, 2006
Is Losing a Tonic for Bush?
(3 comments) The great journalist James Fallows wonders if the newfound clarity Bush has demonstrated in press conferences since the Democrats won Congress is a return to the "relatively glib Bush who governed Texas."

Tuesday, November 14, 2006
Shiite Militia Disrespects Science Even More Than Bush & Co.
(3 comments) Gunmen wearing Interior Ministry commando uniforms, likely stolen, kidnapped about 25 scientists and other staff members from a Baghdad research institute.

Tuesday, November 14, 2006
Run, Rudy, Run (Straight to Oblivion)
(3 comments) Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, known, CNN reports, "for his apt leadership [gag]" on 9/11, took the first step toward a possible 2008 presidential bid by filing papers "to conduct federal 'testing-the-waters' activities." He's conveniently overlooking the likelihood his candidacy would ensure a Democratic victory.

Monday, November 13, 2006
Maureen Dowd: Farewell to the "Deadbeat Daddy" Party
(3 comments) "This will be known as the year macho politics failed," writes The New York Times's Maureen Dowd. The president is trying to ride the new "Mommy vibe. He even offered Madame Speaker help with those new drapes."

Monday, November 13, 2006
Whoosh! Senator Feingold's Principles Go Right Over Washington's Head
(3 comments) When Russ Feingold introduced a resolution to censure President Bush for warrantless wiretapping, "the soul-less, oh-so-sophisticated Beltway geniuses could not even contemplate the possibility that he was doing that because he believed what he was saying," writes top blogger Green Greenwald. Driving the point home, Feingold announced he's not running for president.

Monday, November 13, 2006
Newsweek Cover -- "Father Knows Best" -- Humiliates Bush
(6 comments) In comparison to Bush Junior, Bush Senior, though also one of the worst presidents ever, is a paragon of wisdom, like Robert Young in the classic TV series "Father Knows Best." Reports Newsweek: "The 2006 vote does not suggest an eagerness for a sharp left turn [but] a plea for a shift from the hard right of the neoconservatives to the center represented by the old man in Houston."

Friday, November 10, 2006
Military Reactions to Gates Replacing Rumsfeld All Over the Ballpark
(4 comments) Reactions from soldiers interviewed by Army Times ranged from: "What that says is that no one is interested in winning the war" to "Will the lance corporal notice the changes at the top? Probably not" to "For us it's fantastic news."

Friday, November 10, 2006
George McGovern: If Dems Don't End War, They Won't Be in Power Long
(7 comments) George McGovern will meet with more than 60 members of Congress next week to recommend a strategy to remove U.S. troops from Iraq by June. "I think the Democratic leadership is wise enough to. . . follow the message that the election sent," he said. No matter what anybody says, McGovern mattered then -- and he matters more than ever.

Friday, November 10, 2006
Is Bush Really "open to any idea" on Iraq Now?
(3 comments) "By picking Robert Gates as defense secretary," writes David Sanger of The New York Times, "President George W. Bush has indicated that he is throwing open the door to his Iraq policy. . . Gates has sharply criticized the Bush administration's handling of the Iraq war and has made clear that he would seek advice from moderate Republicans." Yet, other reports brand Gates as strictly a yes man.

Friday, November 10, 2006
Bush's Swagger a Thing of the Past
(3 comments) "A precious and long-lost commodity has returned to American politics," writes Rupert Cornwell of London's The Independent. "It is called reality. For the past two years, we have been inhabiting a dream world, conjured up by the witchdoctors in the White House, and sustained by their Republican stooges who ruled Capitol Hill."

Friday, November 10, 2006
Which "I" Word Will Take Precedence? Investigation, Impeachment or -- Immunity?
(5 comments) Democratic Party leaders "chose to refrain from publicly uttering any 'i' words -- investigation, immunity, and above all, impeachment," writes former Congresswoman Elizabeth Holtzman. Even if impeachment is "off the table," according to Nancy Pelosi, "recent national polls and impeachment-ballot initiatives. . . show it is on Americans' table."

Friday, November 10, 2006
No Ill-Gotten Gains for Haggard's Boy Toy
(3 comments) Neither has Mike Jones received support from gay organizations, despite professing he was motivated by the Colorado amendment banning same-sex marriage. Ironically, any thanks he's gotten has come from members of Haggard's church for driving Haggard to seek help.

Thursday, November 9, 2006
Rangel Trying to Wrangle Cheney's Office from Him
(5 comments) "Mr. Cheney enjoys an office on the second floor on the House of Representatives that historically has been designated as the Ways and Means chairman's," 76-year-old Rep. Charles Rangel (D), who's in line for that position, mused. "And, I've talked with Nancy Pelosi. . . and I'm trying to find some way to be gentle as I restore the dignity of that office to the chair."

Thursday, November 9, 2006
We May Laugh at Borat's Country. . .
(3 comments) But repressive Kazakhstan has it all over the US in one respect. "Five countries of Central Asia [including Kazakhstan] recently established a Central Asian Nuclear Weapon Free Zone," writes David Krieger of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation. "Unfortunately, the United States has expressed its opposition to this new treaty."

Thursday, November 9, 2006
Superbug Brought Back by Iraqi Veterans Proliferating in British Hospitals
(3 comments) "A multi-resistant strain of A. baumannii," reports London's The Independent, "has been isolated from casualties returning to the UK from Iraq. . . US casualties returning to America had also been found to be carrying the superbug." Non-wounded vets too, like one we know.

Thursday, November 9, 2006
The Utter Failure of Bush & Co.'s Demented "Non-Proliferation" Strategy
(3 comments) The advanced plans for building nuclear weapons that the administration posted on a public website prompted veteran journalist Chris Floyd to write of its nuclear policy: "It is a record of astonishing recklessness and incompetence, one that has plunged the world into a new abyss of instability, insecurity and the ever-increasing likelihood of mass death and horror on an unfathomable scale."

Thursday, November 9, 2006
Robert Gates Tainted by Not Only Iran-Contra But Funding Al Qaeda
(3 comments) Blogger London Yank compiled a list on DailyKos of Gates's greatest hits and concludes: "We owe it to our troops in Afghanistan and Iraq not to put them under the command of a man implicated in financing and training the enemies they fight."

Wednesday, November 8, 2006
After the Ball Is Over -- Comes the Tab
(3 comments) The bottom line? $2.8 billion spent on the mid-terms. So much for the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform bill.

Wednesday, November 8, 2006
Control of Senate May Be Up in the Air for Weeks
(3 comments) Un-bate your breath. While Democrat Jim Webb leads Republican George Allen by 10,000 votes, a time-consuming recount seems likely. Unless, God forbid, the Supreme Court sees fit to step in and short-circuit the process like in 2000.

Wednesday, November 8, 2006
Ex-Rock Star John Hall Upsets Long-Time Congresswoman in Upstate New York
(3 comments) In a previous incarnation his band Orleans had hits with songs like "Dance With Me." Then he organized the "No Nukes" concert in 1979. Yesterday, in one of the least-likely Democratic victories, he upset Sue Kelly, long embedded in Congress.

Wednesday, November 8, 2006
How Does the Middle-East See the Election Results?
(3 comments) "After his Party's disgraceful defeat," writes AlJazeera, "President George W. Bush, who labeled Iraq, Iran and North Korea together as an 'axis of evil' nearly five years ago, is likely to face mounting pressure from his policy critics who say [those countries] instead became an 'axis of failure' born of his and the Republicans' mistakes."

Wednesday, November 8, 2006
London Calling: Bush Now the "Weakest Link"
(3 comments) The Times of London calls the election a "paradigm shift" as well as a "veritable earthquake that will have far-reaching implications for US policy and politics."

Wednesday, November 8, 2006
Even Iran Subject to Celebrity Sex Tape Syndrome
(3 comments) . . . but with far more dire consequences. "The career of a rising young Iranian actress has been left in tatters by the widespread distribution of a private film showing her having sex," reports London's The Guardian. As per Iranian law, she's liable to be lashed.

Wednesday, November 8, 2006
Ohio: Both Glitches and Without a Hitch
(3 comments) Long lines and broken voting machines greeted some Ohio voters, while others cast their ballots in record time. The Columbus Dispatch then proceeds to provide staff reports on how the voting played out statewide.

Wednesday, November 8, 2006
Santorum: Casey Wipes Him Out, State Wipes Him Off
(3 comments) "Sen. Rick Santorum, the No. 3 Senate leader who rode into office 12 years ago on an anti-incumbent swell, succumbed yesterday to a similar wave of voter discontent," The Philadephia Inquirer reports, "losing his seat in a landslide to Democrat Bob Casey Jr." That's one less deposit on the walls of the Senate.

Wednesday, November 8, 2006
Will Rove Pull One Last Rabbit Out of His Hat with Virginia?
(3 comments) Now might be a good time to revisit this account in The Atlantic Monthly of Rove's willingness, when challenged, to employ savage tactics. "Along with remarkable strategic skills," writes Joshua Green, he possesses a willingness to "fight in territory where conscience forbids most others."

Tuesday, November 7, 2006
Is the Rovian Empire About to Fall?
(3 comments) Top blogger Billmon writes that Republicans are "practically the definition of a political train wreck: A party (or, in this case, an organized crime family posing a political party) that is remarkably good at grabbing and holding on to power, but incredibly bad at actually running the complex machinery of a modern post-industrial state."

Tuesday, November 7, 2006
Election Eve Meeting of the Minds: Rush Limbaugh and Tony Snow
(4 comments) Respected commentator Glenn Greenwald sums up the conclusions of their summit meeting: "The situation in Iraq isn't just sunny and great -- it's 'miraculous.' Anyone who says otherwise is 'undercutting' the troops. Americans are only against the war because the media has brainwashed them with lies about how things aren't great in Iraq."

Tuesday, November 7, 2006
Olbermann Elbowed Out of Election Coverage
(3 comments) A Media Matters review found that Chris Matthews, Joe Scarborough, and Tucker Carlson have either hosted or contributed to 19 different segments in MSNBC's election coverage so far. Meanwhile, outside of his own program, "Countdown," Olbermann has not appeared at all.

Tuesday, November 7, 2006
No Reason to Accept Results of Election as Legitimate
(3 comments) The machinery of US elections is so far compromised -- by ballots hidden inside machines where voters can't see them, by vulnerability to gross manipulation, by insufficient testing and auditing, by the impossibility of meaningful recounts -- that we would be fools to have confidence in the official outcomes. Help Election Integrity.org restore democracy.

Tuesday, November 7, 2006
Even Republicans Experiencing Difficulty Voting
(3 comments) Representative Steve Chabot was said to be turned away for not having proper identification, and Rep. (Mean) Jean Schmidt could not get the scanner to accept her ballot.

Tuesday, November 7, 2006
Profile of a Robo-Caller
(3 comments) "You may have gotten a call from Gabriel Joseph III already," writes Daniel Schulman in Mother Jones. "It starts with one of those cheery robo-voices asking if you'll participate in a 45-second survey." You'll soon know that "you're dealing with a 'push poll' -- one of the dirtier, yet mostly legal, tricks in a political operative's bag."

Monday, November 6, 2006
Notorious Warmonger Washes His Hands of Iraq
(3 comments) Michael "Creative Destruction Is My Middle Name" Ledeen, of the conservative American Enterprise Institute, now claims, despite all evidence to the contrary, that "I opposed the military invasion of Iraq." One of the biggest rats yet to abandon the sinking ship.

Monday, November 6, 2006
Bush & Co. Even Brushed Aside CENTCOM's Warnings About Iraq
(3 comments) In 1999, the US Central Command, then led by General Anthony Zinni, conducted a series of war games called "Desert Crossing." It concluded that, even with 400,000 troops, an invasion of Iraq might have resulted in a failed state. When the US attack was imminent, a now-retired Zinni called CENTCOM and said, "You need to dust off 'Desert Crossing'."

Friday, November 3, 2006
Sequoia's Magic Yellow Button Sets New Heights in Brazen Vote Theft
(3 comments) "Just push the yellow button and you can vote as many times as you want," writes Brad Friedman of The BRAD BLOG, quoting an election official. "Not that we're in any mood to report more such stories, but this seems to be a big one. A very big one."

Friday, November 3, 2006
Top 'Gelical Quits Over Gay Sex Charge
(3 comments) Reverend Ted Haggard, head of that most mega of mega churches, New Life Church in Colorado Springs, stepped down. The influential evangelical could not, he claimed, "continue to minister under the cloud created by the accusations."

Friday, November 3, 2006
Back Off, Says Iran to US with Missile Test
(4 comments) Iran launched three new models of sea missiles in the Persian Gulf partly in hopes that the US would halt maneuvers in the region. "Our enemies should keep their hostility off the Persian Gulf," said Admiral Sardar Fadavi. Is this the first in a series of excuses Bush & Co. are looking for to attack Iran?

Friday, November 3, 2006
Why Haggard's Fall Matters
(3 comments) "The Mark Foley scandal inspired plenty of people to question their devotion to the Republican Party. But Foley is a politician," writes Lauren Sandler on Salon. Ted Haggard, meanwhile, is "the crony and the conscience" of his youthful parishioners as well as President Bush.

Friday, November 3, 2006
October's Over -- What Happened to Our Surprise?
(3 comments) The President's scare tactics disrespect voters, explains top Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson. "Call me naive," he writes, "but I never thought a president of the United States would stoop so low as to accuse current and prospective members of Congress. . . of being pro-terrorist." Remember, there's still four days left for a November surprise.

Friday, November 3, 2006
Once Again, Bush & Co. Set New Benchmark for Blundering
(3 comments) Last March, the federal government set up a Website intended to prove Saddam Hussein had nuclear weapons. But the Iraqi documents posted, International Atomic Energy Agency experts say, constitute a basic guide to building a nuclear bomb! Calling all terrorists -- get your free bomb plans here. The site, as you can imagine, is now down.

Friday, November 3, 2006
All Eyes Are on Election, But an Attack on Iran May Still Be Imminent
(3 comments) "That this would constitute folly piled on top of folly is no deterrent to the Bush administration," writes conservative military analyst William Lind. War with Iran could also, he notes, cut supply lines to our troops in Iraq and -- get this -- strand them there.

Thursday, November 2, 2006
Administration Abandons Kidnapped US Soldier to Savage Mahdi Army
(3 comments) Thanks are due Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad and National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley. They loyally passed along orders to US military police to stand down on the Baghdad blockade imposed after American soldier Ahmed Qusai al-Taiei was kidnapped.

Thursday, November 2, 2006
Boehner Makes Bonehead Call
(3 comments) In an attempt to defend Rumsfeld, House Majority Leader John Boehner, interviewed by CNN's Wolf Blitzer, appeared to lay the blame for the shape Iraq is in at the feet of the military. Democratic leaders Reid, Emanuel and Dean reacted as quickly as the hard right did when Kerry misspoke.

Thursday, November 2, 2006
Times Smacks Bush Upside the Head Big Time
(3 comments) In a piece entitled "The Great Divider," The New York Times editorialized: "As President Bush throws himself into the final days of a particularly nasty campaign season, he's settled into a familiar pattern of ugly behavior. Since he can't defend the real world created by his policies and his decisions, Mr. Bush is inventing a fantasy world in which to campaign on phony issues against fake enemies."

Thursday, November 2, 2006
Which Will Iraq Hemorrhage More -- Blood or Red Ink?
(3 comments) In January two economists -- one a Nobel Prize winner -- pegged the cost of Iraq at $2 trillion. They revisit their estimate and tack on another $267 billion.

Wednesday, November 1, 2006
"Morning After" Forensics
(3 comments) No, not a DNA test to determine paternity. But a Pentagon team tasked with identifying attackers should a nuclear bomb be detonated. Just in case, for example, terrorists who attack Moscow might want Russia to think the US did it and to retaliate in kind.

Wednesday, November 1, 2006
Hillary Grows a Backbone
(3 comments) In a major policy address, Senator Hillary Clinton called for a "sea change" in US foreign policy that would include direct talks with Syria, Iran and North Korea, as well as promote peace between Israel and the Palestinians. "Let us never negotiate from fear, but let us never fear to negotiate," she quoted JFK.

Wednesday, November 1, 2006
Ever Wonder How Insects Flap Their Wings So Fast?
(3 comments) Researchers from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and the University of Vermont have discovered a key molecular mechanism that allows tiny flies and other "no-see-ums" to whirl their wings at a dizzying rate of up to 1,000 times per second.

Wednesday, November 1, 2006
Grain Drain: Get Ready for Peak Grain
(3 comments) "Brace yourself for major price hikes in food," writes Wayne Roberts on Energy Bulletin.net, "as peak grains join. . . peak oil. Unless this year's harvest is unexpectedly different from six out of the last seven years, the world's ever-decreasing number of farmers do not produce enough staple grains to feed the world's ever-increasing number of people."

Tuesday, October 31, 2006
Children and Seminarians Among Dead in Pakistan Madrasa Strike
(3 comments) "It was being misused for militant activities," said a military spokesman, reports London's The Guardian. However, wailing men tugged corpses, including that of a seven-year-old boy, from the rubble in Chingai village.

Tuesday, October 31, 2006
North Korea Lured Back to Negotiating Table
(5 comments) North Korea has agreed to return to six-party talks, but it hasn't promised to refrain from nuclear testing. While optimistic, US Asst. Secretary of State Christopher Hill said, "I think it's self-evident they should not engage in such provocation." Self-evident indeed.

Tuesday, October 31, 2006
Bush and Blair, Joined at the Hip, Sinking Together
(3 comments) "Never in modern history has the solution to one problem resulted in the creation of so many larger problems, especially since the initial 'problem', Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction, turned out to be non-existent," writes Rupert Cornwell in London's The Independent.

Tuesday, October 31, 2006
The Middle East -- Bloated with People, Corruption and Bureaucracy
(3 comments) Distinguished journalist Chris Hedges spent 10 days living with an Egyptian family. He experienced the permanent state of poverty -- and fear -- in which many Middle-Easterners live.

Tuesday, October 31, 2006
Former 9/11 Commission Executive Director Has Rice's Ear
(8 comments) Iraq is a "catastrophic failure," Philip Zelikow whispers in Condoleeza Rice's ear. In direct contradiction to Bush & Co., he urges: Change detention policy, stop alienating Muslims, stop overreaching on world stage.

Monday, October 30, 2006
Indymedia Reporter Killed Covering Mexican Protests
(3 comments) William Bradley Roland, aka Brad Will, was shot by a paramilitary affiliated with the PRI party. He had been covering workers' protests against the PRI-controlled government of the state of Oaxaca.

Monday, October 30, 2006
Pakistan Kills Scores in Air Attack on Madrassa
(3 comments) However implausibly, a spokesman for the Pakistan military claimed no innocents were killed in an attack on a borderlands religious school suspected of harboring Al Qaeda and Taliban.

Monday, October 30, 2006
Did Israel Use a Weapon Enriched with Uranium on Lebanon?
(3 comments) Distinguished Lebanon-based, English reporter Robert Fisk writes that "scientific evidence gathered from at least two bomb craters in [Lebanon] suggests that uranium-based munitions may now also be included in Israel's weapons inventory -- and were used against targets in Lebanon."

Friday, October 27, 2006
As Long as Citizens Remain Ignorant, Governments Will Blunder into War
(5 comments) "Inevitably including nuclear war," writes David Krieger of Nuclear Peace Age. "The world's problems are too grave and dangerous to be left to governments."

Friday, October 27, 2006
US-India Nuclear Technology Exchange Not Yet a Done Deal
(3 comments) Bush & Co. may think cozying up to India will win its support for their designs on the world. But time may be running out for Congress to approve the deal. Meanwhile, by disrespecting the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, the administration is only inciting other states to as well.

Friday, October 27, 2006
Republicans Running on Torture
(3 comments) "Let the record show," rings out the voice of the distinguished Jonathan Schell, that the administration is "trying to turn the election into a referendum on torture," which, of course, it favors. You can't make this stuff up.

Wednesday, October 25, 2006
Hate Groups, Following in the Footsteps of David Dukes, Going the Electoral Route
(3 comments) Around the U.S., reports Alexander Zaitchik, right-wing radicals are running for everything from national political office to a county mosquito control board.

Wednesday, October 25, 2006
Did George Bush Really Just Buy 100,000 Acres in Paraguay?
(3 comments) The rumor was reported by no less than London's The Guardian. Is it the proximity to vast gas and underground water reserves? Or does he plan to seek sanctuary down there like those from a previous reich. (Hey, at least we didn't use the "N" word.)

Wednesday, October 25, 2006
Is the US Baiting Iran with War Games in the Persian Gulf?
(5 comments) "Tehran considers the US war games to be conducted in the Persian Gulf off the Iranian coastline," writes Michel Chossudovsky of GlobalResearch.ca, "as a provocation, which is intended to trigger a. . . confrontation between US and Iranian naval forces."

Wednesday, October 25, 2006
Grand Old Man of Environmental Activism Still Facing Down the Bulldozers
(3 comments) Renegade wildnerness novelist Edward Abbey based his most legendary character on Ken Sleight, who, writes his tenant in Moab, Utah, Christopher Ketcham, is still staring down developers.

Tuesday, October 24, 2006
Sacrificing a Nation's Well-Being at the Altar of Nuclear Arms
(3 comments) In a brilliant piece of satire titled "N. Korea Detonates 40 Years of GDP," The Onion demonstrates what a drain nuclear weapons are on not just impoverished, but any, nations.

Tuesday, October 24, 2006
Nobel Prize Winner ElBaradei Calls for World to "Bite the Bullet" and Negotiate with Iran and North Korea
(3 comments) The International Atomic Energy Agency head believes Pyongyang, for one, is playing its only trump card in a push for security assurances. "It's a cry for help in my view," he said.

Monday, October 23, 2006
A Candidate That's Actually Worse Than a Republican
(3 comments) The horror classic "Predator" boasted two future governors, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jesse Ventura. Now a third actor in the film, Sonny Landham, seeks the governorship of Kentucky. But, as Alexander Zaitchik reports, he pushes the maverick image to the brink. Of the Middle East, he says, "We need to commence genocide."

Monday, October 23, 2006
Daniel Ellsberg: Looking for One Good Man. . .
(3 comments) . . . or woman to not only equal, but surpass, his historic act. In a Harper's article he presumes to tell government officials: Never mind your jobs, risk prison to blow the whistle on Iran war plans. One person can still make all the difference.

Friday, October 20, 2006
With Pat Tillman's Birthday the Day Before Election Day, His Brother Finds His Voice
(3 comments) In an unexpectedly eloquent essay, Kevin Tillman writes of the administration and Iraq: "Somehow the same incompetent, narcissistic, virtueless, vacuous, malicious criminals are still in charge of this country. Somehow this is tolerated. Somehow nobody is accountable for this."

Friday, October 20, 2006
Kim Jong-il: I'm a Bad Boy
(3 comments) North Korean leader Kim Jong-il reportedly told a Chinese official that "he is sorry about the nuclear test" and does not plan additional tests. That dovetails with reports he was talked into it by his military.

Thursday, October 19, 2006
Voting Out Lawmakers Who Cast Their Ballots for Torture Is Not Enough
(3 comments) Congressmen who voted for the Military Commissions Act of 2006 have no business being public servants. In fact, writes journalist Christopher Ketcham, they should be banished "to forever wander among the barbarians." (We have seen the barbarians and they is us.)

Wednesday, October 18, 2006
Aping Iraqi Death Toll, US Military Hemorrhaging Troops
(3 comments) It's the middle of October and 70 US troops have already died in Iraq this month. Yes, it's a lost cause. No, their deaths are not a waste. They deserve the honor accorded any workingperson who dies on the job.

Wednesday, October 18, 2006
Madame Supertanker to the Rescue
(3 comments) Madame Supertanker, as top blogger Billmon calls Condoleeza Rice, stepped up to the defense of Japan. She warned Pyongyang that the US would use the "full range" (like Bush's "All options are on the table") of its power to defend Japan against an attack by North Korea.

Wednesday, October 18, 2006
To Bush, Estimating Iraqi Dead Is Like Counting Jellybeans in a Jar
(3 comments) Mark Morford, the San Francisco Chronicle's wild and wooly columnist, tries to get inside the president's head when he was questioned about how many Iraqis died. So many figures -- dead civilians and soliders, scandals, the deficit. Poor George's head is spinning.

Wednesday, October 18, 2006
Gitmo Guards Whaling on Detainees
(5 comments) On a recent visit, an AP reporter found the prison brims with hatred and abuse. One guard just "doesn't like having to take care of them or be nice to them."

Wednesday, October 18, 2006
Pro-Israeli Forces Irate Over Bone Rice Threw to Palestine in Recent Speech
(3 comments) Labeling it the most "anti-Israel speech in memory by a major US Administration official," the Zionist Organization of America called on Bush to distance himself from it.

Tuesday, October 17, 2006
US Population Passes 300 Million Today. Yikes!
(3 comments) Between births and deaths, we now have a net gain of one person every 11 seconds, or almost 8,000 daily. Time to fast-track that Mars colonization program!

Tuesday, October 17, 2006
It's Official: "Aggressive" Interrogation In, Habeas Corpus Out
(3 comments) Bush just signed the law which, while supposedly protecting detainees from torture, allows aggressive interrogation, but denies access to legal counsel. Can you say "totalitarianism," kids?

Tuesday, October 17, 2006
Blind Sheik's Lawyer Lynne Stewart Lucks Out
(3 comments) The radical lawyer with the tough-to-get-behind cause (passing the Blind Sheik's messages) was sentenced to only 28 months. She couldn't help gloating, though, that she wasn't awarded the "sentence the government wanted."

Tuesday, October 17, 2006
Virginia Senate Race Is Bush Versus Bush
(3 comments) That's how distinguished journalist James Ridgeway characterizes the Virginia Senate race. George Allen looks "more and more like the son's puppet." Jim Webb, meanwhile, places his faith in Bush Sr.'s man James Baker and his Iraq Study Group.

Tuesday, October 17, 2006
With Our Diplomacy MIA and Our Threats Hollow, What Has North Korea to Fear from Us?
(3 comments) Earlier this year, William Perry, Secretary of Defense under Clinton, went all ultra-hawk and called for a preemptive strike against North Korea. Now, with one-on-one talks off the table too, he says we're s**t out of options with Pyongyang.

Monday, October 16, 2006
Compared to 43, 41 Looks Like 16
(3 comments) The disdain that George H.W. Bush senior aides feel toward George W., who's repudiated everything his father stands for, is worse than imagined. "By comparison," an associate of Bush Sr. compares, "the old man looks better and better." Of course, not as good as 16 (Lincoln).

Monday, October 16, 2006
Former Conspiricist Oliver Stone Continues to Swing from the Right Side
(3 comments) Guess his film "World Trade Center" wasn't party-line enough. Now former gadfly Oliver Stone is basing a new film about Afghanistan on a book sympathetic to the president. Not only that, he's using a scriptwriter from ABC's embarrassing "Path to 9/11." Is Stone turning into a right wing propaganda hack?

Thursday, October 12, 2006
Is Al-Qaida More Dangerous Than on 9/11?
(3 comments) All we hear is how fragmented Al-Qaida has become. Yet RAND Corporation terror expert Bruce Hoffman asserts that "Al-Qaeda has a much deeper bench than we thought" and that it "still exercises command-and-control" over its far-flung cells.

Wednesday, October 11, 2006
Distinguished Journalist Not Afraid to Apply the "A" Word to Attack on Iran
(3 comments) An attack on Iran would unleash an "apocalyptic scenario," according to Chris Hedges, author of the classic "War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning." "Enjoy what is left," he writes, "of our beleaguered, dying republic and way of life."

Wednesday, October 11, 2006
Are the "Powers Behind the Curtain" Using Woodward to Eight-Six Bush & Co.?
(3 comments) Fearful that the administration will wreck the economy and pull a "catastrophic stunt, such as slinging nukes at Iran or North Korea," top Republicans, writes Online Journal's Bev Conover, want Bush out.

Wednesday, October 11, 2006
North Korea Test a Relief to Tehran
(3 comments) . . . because it takes the focus off Iran's program. "The international community's uncertainty about how to punish North Korea," writes Alissa Ruben in The Los Angeles Times, "seems to have reinforced [Tehran's] belief that it has little to fear by proceeding."

Tuesday, October 10, 2006
Pat Buchanan's Latest Bestseller -- and Background -- Steeped in Racism
(3 comments) It seems to have escaped those interviewing Pat Buchanan, a cable-news talk show regular himself, that his latest book (which we won't plug) is a "white nationalist tract," reports Alexander Zaitchik.