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If this Makes you Angry, buy an Electric Car

Why Tiffany Caban’s Win for Queens DA is Good News For Progressive Dem Presidential Candidates

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – It is very close, with only an 1,100-vote margin and 3400 absentee ballots to be counted, but it appears to be that Tiffany Caban, the Democratic Socialists of America candidate for the Democratic primary district attorney for Queens, has won. If so, she will be the new district attorney. Democratic […]

Donald Trump

No, Iranian President Rouhani didn’t Call Trump “mentally Retarded”

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The New York Times and other Western news outlets reported on a speech of Iranian president Hassan Rouhani that expressed frustration with the US government in general and President Trump in particular, alleging that he called Trump “retarded.” There has been a long history of mistranslation from Persian in US […]

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Are Young Arabs Abandoning Religion?

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Arab Barometer in partnership with the BBC has interviewed a weighted sample of 25,000 people in the Arab world. One of the survey’s findings is the rapid decline in self-reported religiousness. About 30% of Tunisians say they are “not religious” in 2019, nearly doubling since 2013. The youth are […]

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Erdogan’s Agony: Has Istanbul just begun saving Turkish Democracy?

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Istanbul has clapped back for democracy big time, electing as mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu of the secular Republican Peoples Party. İmamoğlu had already won once, last May, with a margin of 15,000 votes. The increasingly dictatorial president, Tayyip Erdogan, of the center-right pro-Islam Justice and Development Party (AKP), argued that the […]

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Dear Trump: Iran doesn’t Have a Military Nuclear Program and Gave up Bomb-Making Potential

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Julian Borger at The Guardian reports that Trump said Saturday to reporters, “They’re not going to have a nuclear weapon. We’re not going to have Iran have a nuclear weapon. When they agree to that, they’re going to have a wealthy country. They’re going to be so happy, and I’m […]

Donald Trump

Trump cites “Proportionality” in Iran pullback, though He has often Violated It

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Trump in an interview Friday with Meet the Press attributed his decision not to go ahead with a strike on Iran to concerns about proportionality. He said he asked the Joint Chiefs of Staff just before the strike was to have been set in motion about the likely Iranian casualties. […]

Drones

Back from Iran War Brink: Trump wants to Walk back Iran Crisis that He created with Severe US Sanctions

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The warmongers on Trump’s national security team apparently convinced him to set in motion an aerial strike against Iran Thursday in retaliation for the downing of a US drone over waters claimed by Iran. Then at the last minute, Michael D. Shear, Eric Schmitt, Michael Crowley and Maggie Haberman at […]

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Yes, Liz Cheney, AOC is right that US is Running Concentration Camps for Refugees

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has been under fire for an Instagram message she sent out in which she characterized the holding facilities for refugees and other undocumented entrants into the US run by ICE and by private companies (for which it is a $2 billion a year industry) as “concentration camps.” Human […]