Friday, March 05, 2010
Sorry, Rove, Bush Did Lie About Iraq
March 5, 2010
George W. Bush’s political adviser Karl Rove claims “one of the biggest mistakes” of that presidency was not aggressively challenging critics who charged that Bush “lied” to the American people about the reasons for the Iraq War, an accusation that Rove insists was false and unfair.
Read on.
Thursday, March 04, 2010
Encountering a Tea Party Outrage
March 4, 2010
As a young German, I feel responsible for keeping the memory of the Holocaust victims alive. I am determined that no one, whom I can reach with my voice or through my writing, will forget about what happened between 1933 and 1945.
Read on.
How 'Free Market' Snookers Americans
March 4, 2010
Although some Americans worry about the growing power of the government, few understand the real power that controls their everyday lives.
Read on.
Bush/Cheney Pulled Torture Strings
March 4, 2010
George W. Bush’s White House stage-managed the Justice Department’s approval of torture techniques by putting pliable lawyers in key jobs, guiding their opinions and punishing officials who wouldn’t go along, according to details contained in an internal report that recommended disciplinary action against two lawyers.
Read on.Wednesday, March 03, 2010
Gates Replays His Cold War Message
March 3, 2010
Secretary of Defense Robert Gates gave a provocative and even dangerous speech at the National Defense University (NDU) last week that revealed the Cold War thinking of a key holdover from the Bush administration.
Read on.
Tuesday, March 02, 2010
Teaching Afghans False Iraqi Lessons
March 2, 2010
The United States military is attempting to transfer its recipe for “success” in the conflict in Iraq to the war in Afghanistan.
Read on.
The Woeful Washington Post
March 2, 2010
The Washington Post’s editors never tire of basking in the faded glory of Watergate, a scandal that occurred nearly four decades ago. Some outsiders also still call the Post “liberal.” But the reality is quite different as the Post routinely takes neocon stances and has become a scandal onto itself.
Read on.
Sunday, February 28, 2010
The NYT Veers Neocon
February 28, 2010
Many American progressives don’t want to recognize how bad the U.S. mainstream news media has become. It’s easier to praise a few exceptions to the rule and to hope that some pendulum will swing than to undertake the challenging task of building a new and honest media infrastructure.
Read on.
A Soldier's Cowardice: Going to War
February 28, 2010
An author that every prospective soldier (and their loved ones) needs to read is Tim O’Brien.
Read on.
Saturday, February 27, 2010
Vermonters Take on Nuclear Power
February 28, 2010
A driving snowstorm could not keep Vermonters away from the statehouse in Montpelier as the Vermont Senate convened a historic debate and then voted on the future of the state’s aging nuclear power plant.
Read on.
Ahmadinejad Won, Get Over It!
February 27, 2010
Many in the West may agree that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is an unpleasant politician with a rhetorical tendency to bluster about Iran’s power and to foolishly question the historical accuracy of the Holocaust, but that doesn’t answer the crucial question of whether he was democratically reelected.
Read on.
Friday, February 26, 2010
Two Legal Foes Back Gay Marriage
February 26, 2010
Watching this week's "health summit" in Washington, with both sides barely repressing the urge to turn the Blair House event into the Potomac version of mixed martial arts cage fighting, was discouraging.
Read on.
Iran Captures a 'Good' Terrorist
February 26, 2010
The Iranian government is celebrating the capture of Abdolmalek Rigi, the leader of a violent group called Jundallah (Arabic for Soldiers of God), which Tehran says is a terrorist organization supported by the United States, Great Britain and Israel.
Read on.Iraqi View of 'Hurt Locker,' 'Avatar'
February 26, 2010
James Cameron's "Avatar" and Kathryn Bigelow's "The Hurt Locker" had battled for best film and best director at the BAFTA awards.
Read on.
Thursday, February 25, 2010
Parallels of Conquest, Past and Present
February 25, 2010
After the Battle of Hastings in 1066, William the Conqueror’s army buried its fallen comrades, but left the corpses of the English defenders to rot in the fields.
Read on.
Al Haig's Foreign Policy Blunders
February 25, 2010
The obituaries in the mainstream media failed to capture the full extent of the controversy and confrontation that marked Gen. Alexander M. Haig's political career in the White House during the Nixon administration and the State Department during the Reagan administration.
Read on.
Monday, February 22, 2010
BBC Depicts US/UK Torture Tolerance
February 22, 2010
If you’ve never heard of Craig Murray, then you have an excellent opportunity to get acquainted with the remarkable story of this flawed whistleblower by listening to "A Murder in Samarkand" on BBC’s Radio Four, an adaptation of Murray’s book about his years as British Ambassador to Uzbekistan.
Sunday, February 21, 2010
New Grist for Hype on Iran
February 21, 2010
Here we go again. A report issued by the new Director General of the U.N. International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Japanese diplomat Yukiya Amano, injected new adrenalin into those arguing that Iran is developing a nuclear weapon.
Al Haig & a 'Green Light' to Chaos
February 21, 2010 (Originally published in 1996)
In summer 1980, Iraq's wily president Saddam Hussein saw opportunities in the chaos sweeping the Persian Gulf.
Read on.
Saturday, February 20, 2010
Yoo Called Civilian Slaughter OK
February 20, 2010
Former Justice Department lawyer John Yoo argued that President George W. Bush’s commander-in-chief powers were so sweeping that he could willfully order the massacre of civilians, yet Yoo’s culpability in Bush administration abuses was deemed “poor judgment,” not a violation of “professional standards.”
Read on.
Upping the Bid on American Justice
February 20, 2010
That famous definition of a cynic as someone who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing has come to define this present moment of American politics.
Read on.
Thursday, February 18, 2010
US Media Replays Iraq Fiasco on Iran
February 18, 2010
Major U.S. news organizations, including the New York Times and the Washington Post, are engaged in a replay of the kind of slanted coverage that paved the way to war in Iraq, only this time regarding Iran.
Read on.
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Free Speech v Truth in Medals
February 16, 2010
Dozens of people have been arrested under the Stolen Valor Act, which punishes, by up to a year in jail, the wearing of any unearned military medal. It is still a crime even if no effort was made to profit from the adornment or dissembling about earning it.
Read on.
Duty to Warn: Lessons for Americans
February 16, 2010
Sixty-seven years ago, on Feb. 18, 1943, three courageous, patriotic German college students from Munich, the birthplace of the Nazi party, were arrested by the Gestapo on charges of treason, a crime that was punishable by death.
Read on.
Monday, February 15, 2010
On Health Care, Dems Lack GOP Grit
February 15, 2010
Over the past quarter century when the Republicans had a priority – from funding the Nicaraguan contras to passing massive tax cuts for the wealthy – they would use whatever legislative means necessary, including bending congressional rules to get their way, a marked contrast to how today’s Democrats are handling health-care reform.
Read on.
Can a Jewish Tradition Help Christians?
February 15, 2010
Just as I cannot allow my soul to be without worship, neither can I allow the inquiries of my mind to be denied. I have concluded that my spiritual health needs large doses of midrash just as I need regular worship.
Read on.
Sunday, February 14, 2010
NYT Sees UN-Syria Conspiracy Theory
February 15, 2010
The New York Times simply refuses to deal with “enemy” Muslim states with any sense of objectivity or fairness, reaffirming its deep-seated bias again on Sunday with the publication of a one-sided article about the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri on its fifth anniversary.
Read on.
Cheney Exposes Torture Conspiracy
February 14, 2010
If the United States had a functioning criminal justice system for the powerful – not just for run-of-the-mill offenders – former Vice President Dick Cheney would have convicted himself and some of his Bush administration colleagues with his comments on ABC’s “This Week.”
Read on.
Friday, February 12, 2010
Joking About Climate Change
February 12, 2010
There's a vintage “Bob and Ray” radio sketch in which Bob plays "Mr. Science," a parody of TV's "Mr. Wizard." He's trying to explain to his young protégé Sandy "the miracle of gas refrigeration."
Read on.
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Terror 'Death Lists' Target Americans
February 11, 2010
Raising troubling comparisons to tactics employed by Josef Stalin and right-wing Latin American dictatorships, the U.S. government has created a “hit list” of Americans abroad marked for murder.
Read on.
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Why Afghanistan Really Fell Apart
February 10, 2010 (Originally published September 30, 2009)
Much of the U.S. conventional wisdom about how the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1989 led to the rise of the Taliban and the creation of al-Qaeda safe havens before Sept. 11, 2001, comes from the popular movie, “Charlie Wilson’s War.” But that represents a dangerous misperception.
Read on.
Reagan's Bargain/Charlie Wilson's War
February 10, 2010 (Originally published January 6, 2008)
What’s left out of a movie about history often interests only a few experts in the field. However, the release of one that chronicles the successful sub rosa American effort to bleed the Soviet Army in Afghanistan in the 1980s may prove to be an exception.
Read on.
US Ignores UK's Iraq War Evidence
February 10, 2010
Peter Dyer sums up well the sort of conclusions we can draw from the ongoing Chilcot Inquiry into Britain's role as sidekick launcher of aggressive war on Iraq:
Tuesday, February 09, 2010
Brits, Dutch Confront Illegal Iraq War
February 9, 2010
On March 18, 2003, on the eve of the invasion of Iraq, Elizabeth Wilmshurst resigned as Deputy Legal Adviser to the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), the British equivalent of the U.S. State Department.
Read on.
Palin, Psy-Ops & 'Condescending" Libs
February 8, 2010
In the 1980s, while a reporter for the Associated Press, I had the opportunity to chat over the phone with legendary CIA psy-war specialist Edward Lansdale. A mutual friend had set up the contact, which I hoped might lead to a more formal interview.
Read on.
Sunday, February 07, 2010
Shunning Howard Zinn's History
February 7, 2010
Progressive activists and writers continually bemoan the fact that the news they generate and the opinions they express are consistently ignored by the mainstream media, and thus kept from the masses of the American people.
Read on.
Friday, February 05, 2010
Lobbyists Ply GOP, Dem 'Retreats'
February 5, 2010
George Washington's birthday is approaching and with it will come the attendant mythology, hatchet and cherry tree, wooden teeth, throwing a silver dollar across the Potomac River - or the Rappahannock.
Read on.
Thursday, February 04, 2010
An Edgy 'Edge of Darkness'
February 4, 2010
While it’s certainly not going to win any awards, I recommend seeing “Edge of Darkness,” starring Mel Gibson, in his first onscreen role in many years.
Read on.
Why Obama Dodges CIA Reform
February 4, 2010
New presidents (and President Barack Obama is no exception) fall in love with three Washington institutions: the Pentagon, the Central Intelligence Agency and Camp David.
Read on.
Tuesday, February 02, 2010
The Right Gets Itself 'Wired'
February 3, 2010
In past years when I talked to American progressives about the growing media imbalance – as the Right gained dominance in books, magazines, newspapers, talk radio and cable TV – a typical response was, “well, the Left is stronger on the Internet.” But now even that advantage is disappearing, as should have been expected.
Read on.
Obama's Budget Ducks Pentagon Cuts
February 2, 2010
The results of the special election for the Massachusetts Senate seat once held by Ted Kennedy reverberated like a “shot heard ’round the world” — or at least one heard ’round Washington.
Monday, February 01, 2010
Answering Obama on Health Care
February 1, 2010
Last Friday – when President Barack Obama vanquished the entire Republican Caucus in question time in Baltimore – he said:
Read on.
Vietnam Replay on Afghan 'Defectors'
February 1, 2010
After waging an eight-year “dirty war” against the Taliban, the U.S. government is acknowledging that the “insurgent” enemy is part of the “fabric” of Afghan society and is encouraging low- and mid-level Taliban defectors to switch sides.
Read on.
Sunday, January 31, 2010
America's Sad History with Haiti, Part 2
February 1, 2010
The Haitians have a saying in their native créole language: Piti, piti, wazo fe nich li. “Little by little, the bird builds its nest.”
Read on.
Accountability Again Put on Hold
January 31, 2010
No one disputes that Jay Bybee's name is at the bottom of memos that were, and to some extent still are, treated as laws which legalized aggressive war at the pleasure of a President and a variety of acts of torture.
Read on.
Yoo, Bybee Get Pass on Torture Memo
January 31, 2010
A long-awaited Justice Department watchdog report has backed off an earlier recommendation that two former senior officials – John Yoo and Jay Bybee – face disciplinary action for providing George W. Bush’s White House with legal advice that opened the door to torturing “war on terror” detainees, according to published reports.
Howard Zinn and Other Heroes
January 31, 2010
In less than a year the battle for truth has lost three of its most innovative and stalwart voices, historians John Hope Franklin, Ivan Van Sertima and Howard Zinn.
Read on.
Saturday, January 30, 2010
America's Sorry History with Haiti
January 30, 2010
With all the talk of America taking charge of Haiti for a while, it would be prudent for us to take a step back and review the history of our various interventions in Haiti, and the outcomes of those efforts.
Read on.
Friday, January 29, 2010
Remembering Howard Zinn
January 29, 2010
On Wednesday morning, before I learned that my friend Howard Zinn had died, I was being interviewed by the Boston Phoenix, in connection with the February release of a documentary in which he is featured prominently.
Read on.
Howard Zinn's 'War on Terror' Critique
January 29, 2010
The “largest lie,” wrote historian Howard Zinn who died Wednesday at age 87, is that “everything the United States does is to be pardoned because we are engaged in a ‘war on terrorism.’”
Read on.
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
What's Wrong with US Intell Agencies
January 28, 2010
It is time for serious soul-searching regarding the role of the CIA and the intelligence community. Last month's operational and intelligence failures led to the deaths of seven CIA officers in Afghanistan and might have resulted in nearly 300 deaths on a Northwest Airlines plane headed for Detroit.
Read on.
Obama Ignores Key Afghan Warning
January 27, 2010
Nothing highlights President Barack Obama’s abject surrender to Gen. David Petraeus on the “way forward” in Afghanistan more than two cables U.S. Ambassador Karl Eikenberry sent to Washington on Nov. 6 and 9, 2009, the texts of which were released by the New York Times.
Read on.
A Hockey Mom for Truth
January 27, 2010
As a concerned citizen, mother of four, small-business owner and a hockey mom (with no lipstick), I have studied politics and specifically talk radio for 12 years. It started when the Right impeached President Clinton.
Read on.
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
The Supreme Court's Partisanship
January 27, 2010
The U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark ruling that lets corporations spend all they want to punish political enemies and reward political friends is a reminder that the panel’s Republican majority has become one more potent weapon in the Right’s already intimidating arsenal.
Read on.
Bush Silences a Dangerous Witness
January 26, 2010 (Originally published December 30, 2006)
The hanging of Saddam Hussein was supposed to be – as the New York Times observed – the “triumphal bookend” to George W. Bush’s invasion of Iraq. If all had gone as planned, Bush might have staged another celebration as he did after the end of “major combat,” posing under the “Mission Accomplished” banner on May 1, 2003.
Read on.
Shiite Power Play Threatens Iraq Quiet
January 26, 2010
Since taking office, Barack Obama has had to deal with an economy in free-fall, a political crisis over health-care “reform,” and a rising Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan. So far, Iraq has been quiet enough that many in the media and public have redirected their attention to the wars du jour of Afghanistan, Yemen, and Somalia.
Read on.
Sunday, January 24, 2010
First, Fire All the Financial Failures
January 24, 2010
If President Obama wants to really understand why he got his ass handed to him in the Massachusetts Senate race — a defeat as shocking and strange as if Joe Lieberman was elected president of Iran — he might want to read one of the thousands of economic horror stories happening around the country every day, stories that have put most Americans in a very foul, desperate mood.
Read on.
Saturday, January 23, 2010
US Democracy's End of the Road
January 23, 2010
This past week had the feel of “game, set, match,” the end to a long string of miscalculations by the American Left and a crowning victory for the cynical American Right – a triple whammy of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling to unleash corporate campaign spending, Air America’s dissolution, and the Massachusetts Senate election.
Read on.
Friday, January 22, 2010
What Should Progressives Do Now?
January 22, 2010
Tragic events continuing out of Haiti make all the bad news for progressives this week wither in comparison. Nonetheless, over these last few days, for liberals in particular, there has been no joy in Mudville - aka American politics.
Read on.
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Massachusetts' Message of Stupid
January 21, 2010
Having grown up in Massachusetts, I never bought into the idea that the state was that much more liberal than most others. The dominant media there is not the center-left Boston Globe but the right and far-right talk radio shows that pervade the Bay State as they do the rest of the country.
Read on.
Hiding War Horrors from Americans
January 21, 2010
U.S. television networks have given the public a sanitized, largely bloodless view of the war in Iraq, an academic authority on communications writes.
Read on.
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
George W. Bush's Sci-Fi Disaster
January 20, 2010 (Originally published January 24, 2009)
In retrospect, George W. Bush’s presidency could be viewed as a science-fiction disaster movie in which an alien force seizes illegitimate control of a nation, saps its wealth, wreaks devastation, but is finally dislodged and forced to depart amid human hope for a rebirth.
Read on.
How Obama Lost His Way
January 20, 2010
President Barack Obama spent his first year in office trying to reassure the Washington/New York establishments that he was not going to upset their apple carts too much, that they shouldn’t panic, that he would – despite all the speeches – be more about continuity than change.
Read on.
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
Obama Knows Better on Afghan War
January 19, 2010
President Barack Obama recently expressed a reluctance to send U.S. forces to Yemen and Somalia, two “failed states” where al-Qaeda is active. Obama seemed to realize that such a U.S. military presence might make the terrorism problem worse.
Read on.
'Hardball' & Dumbed-Down US Politics
January 19, 2010
This past week, grappling with the twin top stories of Haiti’s earthquake tragedy and the Massachusetts Senate race, MSNBC’s Chris Matthews personified the strange mix of puffed-up self-importance and total lack of self-awareness that has come to define America’s media punditocracy.
Read on.
Monday, January 18, 2010
What Bush Did to Haiti
January 18, 2010
If a group of dedicated scholars, attorneys, journalists, and activists had tried to generate a comprehensive list of impeachable offenses committed by George W. Bush as President, one of them might have read something like this:
Saturday, January 16, 2010
Global Cooling? The Jellyfish Answer
January 16, 2010
There are certain newspaper headlines that catch your eye and stop you in your tracks.
Read on.
Friday, January 15, 2010
Lessons from America's Lost Decade
January 15, 2010
As the United States takes the measure of Barack Obama’s first year in the White House and looks beyond to what could be a difficult new decade, it might be useful to first stop and extract some lessons from the 2000s, which proved to be a lost economic decade for many Americans.
Read on.
Thursday, January 14, 2010
How Not to Counter Terrorism
January 14, 2010 (Originally Published June 18, 2007)
Given the effort that many of us have put into suggestions for reform, how satisfying it would be, were we able to report that appropriate correctives have been introduced to make us safer.
Read on.
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
Haiti and America's Historic Debt
January 13, 2010
Announcing emergency help for Haiti after a devastating 7.0-magnitude earthquake, President Barack Obama noted America’s historic ties to the impoverished Caribbean nation, but few Americans understand how important Haiti’s contribution to U.S. history was.
Read on.
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Cheney's Attack Shields Failures
January 12, 2010
Former Vice President Dick Cheney has been railing against President Barack Obama for being weak-kneed on terrorism and failing to interdict the BVD bomber’s recent attempt to blow up a plane.
Read on.
Monday, January 11, 2010
Asking Europe for America's Answers
January 12, 2010
Whenever I write about U.S. politics, people ask me "Don't you have any good news?" ... But I do have good news, boatloads of good news, if Americans want to hear it.
Read on.
Do Republicans Deserve a Reward?
January 11, 2010
These days, I rarely open an e-mailed article from someone on the Left that doesn’t denounce President Barack Obama as a sell-out, a corporate tool, a coward or worse – with similar assessments applied to the Democratic leadership in Congress.
Read on.
Obama Picks CIA Insider for Inquiry
January 11, 2010
The Obama administration quietly announced Friday the appointment of John McLaughlin, former deputy CIA director, to head the internal investigation of the intelligence failures that led to the Christmas Day attempted bombing of a Delta airliner headed for Detroit as well as the events leading to the shootings at Fort Hood in November.
Read on.
Saturday, January 09, 2010
Hard Lessons from Decades Past
January 9, 2010
Decades, more than years or even election cycles, mark a nation’s course, just as 10-year spans become personal milestones, the big-3-0 or, in my case, the big 6-0.
Read on.
Friday, January 08, 2010
Answering Helen Thomas on Why
January 8, 2009
Thank God for Helen Thomas, the only person to show any courage at the White House press briefing after President Barack Obama gave a flaccid account of the intelligence screw-up that almost downed an airliner on Christmas Day.
Read on.
California's Dysfunctional Future Shock
January 8, 2010
A number of years ago, when I would travel to California on business with my friend the late journalist and comedy writer Eliot Wald, we always carved out time to visit a couple of those massive Los Angeles grocery chains, like Ralph's or Vons.
Thursday, January 07, 2010
Endless Double Standards on Cuba
January 7, 2010
More than 50 years now it is. The propaganda and hypocrisy of the American mainstream media seems endless and unwavering. They cannot accept the fact that Cuban leaders are humane or rational.
Read on.
The Botched 9/11 Intel 'Reforms'
January 7, 2010
One week after the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice told the press corps, "This isn't Pearl Harbor." No, it was worse.
Tuesday, January 05, 2010
Why Counter-Terrorism Is in Shambles
January 5, 2009
Question #1 – What lapses in the American counter terrorism apparatus made the Christmas Day bombing plot possible? Is it inevitable that certain plots will succeed?
The short answer to the second sentence is: Yes, it is inevitable that “certain plots will succeed.”
The Myth of the Three Wise Men
January 5, 2010
Since January 6 marks Epiphany, the first day of an extended season in the Christian Church calendar that takes traditional Christian believers all the way to the Lenten season. It is the season that celebrates the Christian gospel as light to a dark world.
Read on.
How Government Worsens Terror Risk
January 5, 2010
The botched attempt by a Nigerian, apparently trained in Yemen by al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, to conduct a suicide bombing on a plane as it neared Detroit has highlighted the U.S. government’s overzealous, ineffective and even counterproductive efforts to overcome terrorism.
Read on.
Monday, January 04, 2010
Afghan 'Dirty War' Escalates
January 4, 2010
On Dec. 31, I listened in dismay as an NPR “terrorism” expert condemned the suicide bombing that killed seven CIA employees in Afghanistan as especially hideous because the CIA victims were spreading economic development and democracy in the area as members of a Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT).
Read on.
Ellsberg on Vanunu's Re-Arrest
January 4, 2010
Mordechai Vanunu -- my friend, my hero, my brother -- has again been arrested in Israel on "suspicion" of the "crime" of "meeting with foreigners."
Read on.
Thursday, December 31, 2009
A Glimmer of Hope from the Past
December 31, 2009
Former Vice President Dick Cheney has decried President Barack Obama for not taking a more belligerent tone against terrorism, accusing him of making Americans less safe when he “pretends we aren’t at war with terrorists.” But Obama is not Dick Cheney, and thank goodness.
Read on.
The Danger of Defeatism
December 31, 2009
In 2004 I began speaking at rallies and forums around the country on issues of peace and justice, something I've done off-and-on ever since.
Tuesday, December 29, 2009
Are Presidents Scared of the CIA?
December 29, 2009
In the past, I have alluded to Panetta and the Seven Dwarfs. The reference is to CIA Director Leon Panetta and seven of his moral-dwarf predecessors — the ones who sent President Barack Obama a letter on Sept. 18 asking him to “reverse Attorney General Holder’s Aug. 24 decision to re-open the criminal investigation of CIA interrogations.”
Read on.
Obama's Unheralded Nuke Progress
December 29, 2009
Attempting to make good on his pledge to reduce the role of nuclear weapons in the U.S. and other nations’ defense postures, and eventually eliminate them, President Barack Obama seems on the verge of reaching a new strategic arms reduction agreement with Russia.
Read on.
Monday, December 28, 2009
The Jesus Genealogy Myths
December 28, 2009
The Matthew gospel does not start the story of Jesus with his birth. Rather Matthew starts the story with a genealogy.
Read on.
'Avatar': a Metaphor for the 'Long War'
December 28, 2009
Let's face it, if James Cameron had made a movie with the Iraqi resistance as the heroes and the U.S. military as the enemies, and had set it in Iraq or anywhere else on planet earth, the packed theaters viewing "Avatar" would have been replaced by a screening in a living room for eight people and a dog.
Read on.
What the New Year Demands
December 28, 2009
The U.S. political battle lines for 2010 are already clear. Despite having caused many of the severe problems the country faces, the Republicans and the Right are again in the ascendancy, having shifted the blame for most of the troubles onto President Barack Obama and the Democrats.
Read on.
Thursday, December 24, 2009
Reader: A Christmas Story for Truth
December 24, 2009
The Christmas story was indeed a wonderful story to me for many years. However, when I found out it was just a made-up story, like “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs,” or “Pinocchio,” I was crushed. AND, that is what it is - a made-up story.
Read on.
Legal Challenges to US Health Reform
December 24, 2009
Does the United States Constitution allow Congress to force people to purchase a product (health insurance) from a private corporation, and fine them or tax them if they refuse?
Read on.
A Christmas Eve Battle for Freedom
December 24, 2009
This Christmas Eve marks the 172nd anniversary of a battle for liberty in 1837 on the banks of Lake Okeechobee, Florida, that helped shape the United States of America.
Read on.
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
The Snows of Christmases Past
December 22, 2009
We had our first snowstorm of the winter in Manhattan this past weekend and it served to remind me that I have not actually shoveled snow in decades - the result of living in a city where other people are hired to do it for you.
Read on.
Woodstock's Link to the War Machine
December 22, 2009
I’m proud of my small town’s worldwide association with peace. Many times during the 24 years that I’ve lived here, I’ve stood in peace vigils on the Village Green – and provided a bit of local color for visitors’ snapshots.
Read on.
'Gott Mit Uns': Christians Excusing War
December 22, 2009
When Gulf War I ended (during George Bush the Elder’s presidency), General Norman Schwartzkopf, the field commander, triumphantly proclaimed, “God must have been on our side!”
Read on.
Break the CIA in Two
December 22, 2009
After the CIA-led fiasco at the Bay of Pigs in April 1961, President John Kennedy was quoted as saying he wanted to “splinter the CIA into a thousand pieces and scatter it into the winds.” I can understand his anger, but a thousand is probably too many.
Read on.
Monday, December 21, 2009
How Myths Can Kill
December 21, 2009
Myths can be innocuous enough, providing pleasure and comfort to believers, for instance, the Jesus birth stories that are celebrated at Christmas or the legends of Abraham and Moses conveying God’s promised land to the Israelites.
Read on.
Winning Wars -- and Losing
December 21, 2009
Thus far, most of the supporters and opponents of escalating the U.S. war in Afghanistan have focused on whether or not it is possible to secure a military victory in that conflict. But they neglect considering the fact that, in war, even a winner can be a loser.
Read on.
