Juan Cole

All Right, Not All Right Today at Informed Comment, we are going to play the game of “All Right, Not All Right,” known in Washington, DC, as “business as usual,” but otherwise castigated by the moral philosophers as hypocrisy. It IS all right for Bush campaign strategist Karl Rove to leak classified intelligence about the […]

President Talabani asks al-Maliki to Form a Government; 6 Dead in Sunday Mortar Barrage; 5 US Troops, 26 Iraqis Killed Saturday The guerrilla movement replied to the political developments in Iraq on Sunday morning raining 11 mortar strikes down on various parts of the capital. Three mortar shells fell in the Green Zone where parliament […]

17 Killed in Guerrilla Violence UN: thousands Detained Illegally Guerrilla violence took the lives of 17 Iraqis on Friday, with major bombings in Mosul and Baghdad. At Baiji, guerrillas captured 6 troops and executed them. Al-Zaman says that the guerrillas killed or wounded some 28 policemen alone on Friday. In one of the worst incidents, […]

Al-Maliki Acceptable, Say Kurds, Sunni Arabs The Financial Times reports on the reaction of the Kurdish and Sunni Arab blocs to the selection of Jawad al-Maliki, 56, as the candidate for prime minister of the United Iraqi Alliance: ‘ “We have no objection to Jawad al-Maliki,” said Iyad al-Samarrai, of the Sunni-led Iraqi Islamic party. […]

Maliki the Shiite Candidate Breaking news: CNN is reporting that United Iraqi Alliance has informally decided to replace Ibrahim Jaafari with MP Jawad al-Maliki of the Islamic Dawa Party as its candidate for prime minister. The formal decision will be made on Saturday. ——- Here are some documents from the Open Source Center of the […]

Jaafari seeks Party Re-Vote on his Candidacy AP reports that Ibrahim Jaafari, nominated in February for a second term as prime minister by the United Iraqi Alliance (Shiite religious parties), has agreed that a party convocation should reconsider his candidacy on Saturday. The meeting of parliament planned for that day has been put off. AP […]

Cost of War Heading toward One Trillion Dollars Some less ethical automobile salesmen will deploy a tactic called “low-balling.” The young naive couple comes in and sees a coupe they like. They think it is beyond their means, maybe in the $30,000s. He’ll quote them $26,000. There will be financing. They get excited. Maybe, just […]

WSJ: $20 Billion a Year in Lost Arab Tourism Meanwhile, hassling Arab visitors and making their visas difficult to get and being mean to them while they are here is costing the US $20 billion a year in lost tourism, and universities have lost $42 million in tuition money, and hospitals have lost wealthy Arab […]

20,000 Kidnapped? Parliament to Open Amid Continued Violence Guerrilla violence killed at least 19 persons on Wednesday in Iraq. Some reports say that among the victims were two school teachers in a Shiite district, who had their throats slit in front of their students, by terrorists. There are reports that local police are denying the […]