Asia

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The rash of headlines blaring that the coronavirus has now killed more than died in the Vietnam War betrays an incredible amnesia and national tunnel vision that takes the breath away. Implicitly, these comparisons are with the 58,220 US military personnel who died fighting in Vietnam. But somehow the over […]

China

Medieval Guilt by Association? Trump/ Miller denied Stimulus Checks to US Citizens whose Partners lack SSN

Martin Powers

Ann Arbor (Special to Informed Comment) – According to the Chicago Sun-Times Trump is being sued for denying stimulus checks to U.S. citizens who file jointly with spouses lacking a social security number. Assuming the administration regards unregistered aliens as “illegal”, this would be tantamount to guilt by association for their spouses. Many legal immigrants […]

China

Trump trots out Blaming China for his own Pitiful Covid-19 Failures

Reese Erlich

The Republican Party is trying to shift blame for President Donald Trump’s disastrous coronavirus policies onto China. Chinese communists, Republican leaders claim, hid the pandemic from the public, allowing it to spread worldwide. Trump has even given credence to the conspiracy theory that China intentionally developed the virus in order to kill Americans. Scapegoating China […]

Epidemics

The Curse of Casteism in a Plague Year: Rightwing Indian Gov’t AWOL as Lockdown devastates Poor, Dalits

contributors

By Sanjana Krishnan and Rahul Jambhulkar | – As we rose to another day of peaceful quarantine in the West, we received a message from India. It was an urgent plea to help 80 families of Dalit (ex-untouchable) daily wage earners in an urban slum in Nagpur city in Central India. The families had run […]

China

Will the Middle East be the Epicenter of the Looming US – China Cold War?

Middle East Monitor

By Nasim Ahmed | @Nasimbythedocks | – ( Middle East Monitor ) – Calls for China to be held to account for the spread of the coronavirus Covid-19 have the potential to push Washington and Beijing into a new Cold War. If this happens, the Middle East will find itself at the centre of events […]

Colonialism

1918 flu pandemic killed 12 million Indians, and British overlords’ indifference strengthened the anti-colonial movement

The Conversation

By Maura Chhun | – In India, during the 1918 influenza pandemic, a staggering 12 to 13 million people died, the vast majority between the months of September and December. According to an eyewitness, “There was none to remove the dead bodies and the jackals made a feast.” At the time of the pandemic, India […]

Donald Trump

How did we Become so Backward? S. Korea had US Equivalent of 1,311 Coronavirus Deaths as we hit 16,000

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The US is heading for having the highest number of coronavirus cases in the world next week. Admittedly the US is a big country and it still won’t have the highest number of cases per capita. But it won’t even be in the running for the country with the fewest […]

China

The Real Danger behind Trump’s “China Virus” Mantra

Martin Powers

Ann Arbor (Special to Informed Comment) – The “China-Virus” mantra illustrates well this administration’s habit of responding to challenges by branding people as ethnic, religious, or political types ranked good or bad, us or them. Not a few have dismissed this practice, rightly, as racist, scapegoating, or just off the point, but the administration’s groupthink […]

Afghanistan

Trump boasted he “Obliterated” ISIS in Afghanistan; Then ISIS Massacred a Shiite Wedding Party

Brian Glyn Williams

By Brian Glyn Williams and Javed Rezayee | – Williams, Boston/Bamiyan. On November 13th yet another suicide bombing shredded the lives of people across the globe in a land whose seemingly endless conflict has once again been forgotten by many, if not most Americans. But, as devastating as that blast that took the lives of […]