Iraqi parliamentarians are attempting to strip Adnan Dulaimi of his parliamentary immunity. They charge that he is complicit with terrorists. Dulaimi leads the 44-member [Sunni Arab] Iraqi Accord Front in parliament. US forces found weapons and bombs in a house next to his. These developments came as a blow to hopes for reconciliation between Sunnis […]
Iraq, the Youth Vote, Women and Iowa
The conventional wisdom among the inside the beltway pundits is that Iraq is no longer a leading issue for American voters. This conventional wisdom is demonstrably untrue. First, some December polls (scroll down) show that it was the most important issue for 25% of likely voters, with other issues trailing substantially. In part it derives […]
Iraq in Iowa; Bomber Kills 10 in Diyala; Petraeus: US Cannot Organize Return of Refugees
Update: Zogby et al. is showing a last minute boost among voters for Obama and Huckabee in Iowa. But obviously many Iowans are undecided and the race is extremely volatile. Activists campaigning down to the wire in Iowa are invoking stances on the Iraq War. Joshua Holland argues that among the three leading Democratic candidates […]
Reading for Thursday
The Justice Department is going to investigate the destruction of videotapes of the interrogation of prisoners in US custody that showed torture. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi keeps asking what Bush has done that is impeachable. Shredding the constitution should count, and if that doesn’t then this should. Tom Engelhardt on how Bush took […]
36 Dead in Baghdad Bombing; 23,000 Civilians Killed in 07;
After having celebrated New Year’s Eve in style for the first time since 2002, Baghdad awoke on the first of the year to bad news. In a signature tactic of the Salafi Jihadis in Iraq, a suicide bomber detonated his payload at a Shiite commemoration for the departed in Zayouna, a mixed neighborhood of east […]
Pakistan Elections Postponed; PPP Threatens Street Protests; OSC: Al-Qaeda has not Claimed Bhutto Killing
Pakistan’s electoral commission announced Tuesday that the elections scheduled for January 8 will be postponed until February. The Pakistan People’s Party objected strenuously to the delay, and threatened to take to the streets with popular protests. Meanwhile, the caretaker government is furiously backtracking on its earlier claims that Benazir Bhutto died of a concussion. The […]
How Fleeting is Empire
The Maps of War site has a review of Middle Eastern empires beginning about 1800 BC. I’d have added a couple of phases at the end, including the Cold War divisions of states by their alliances with the US and the Soviet Union, and then the new US empire in Iraq and Afghanistan, plus bases […]
Musharraf’s Watergate? Physicians Coerced by Military; Nawaz: Musharraf Must Go
It looks increasingly as though someone in the military government in Pakistan may have been somehow complicit in the assassination of Benazir Bhutto. An attorney for the physicians who put out the story that Ms. Bhutto died of a concussion went to CNN on Monday and said that his clients were pressured by the military. […]
Turkey and Indonesia Muslim Success Stories Economic Upturn in Egypt
Here are some trends that I hope continue and deepen in 2008. Turkey and Indonesia are making strides as secular democracies in Muslim-majority countries, with impressive political participation on the part of the public, with elections that produce surprises for the powers that be, and with steady economic growth. The striking thing about both of […]
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