Juan Cole

(By Juan Cole) President Barack Obama met late Friday with King Abdullah b. Abd al-Aziz of Saudi Arabia at the latter’s desert camp, flying out from Riyadh by helicopter. The tensions between Saudi Arabia and the United States have come about in part because Riyadh, after being skittish about George W. Bush’s muscular Neoconservatism in […]

Barack Obama

Is Pope Francis good for the Democrats? Obama in the Vatican

Juan Cole

(By Juan Cole) Could enormous popularity of Pope Francis spill over into American politics? Pope Francis is worried about inequality, a Democratic Party issue, and his statements and actions on the subject are a stunning rebuke to “evangelical Catholics” such as Paul Ryan, who tend rather to celebrate economic inequality or to deny it or […]

Egypt

Egypt: Al-Sisi’s run for President: Bonapartism and Gulf Oil Money

Juan Cole

(By Juan Cole) Egypt’s Brig. Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, 59, on Wednesday resigned his military commission and announced that he will run for president. He was given a long spot on Egyptian television to make the announcement, still wearing his uniform (he said it was the last time he would be seen in it after […]

Eastern Europe

Is Russia a “Regional Power” or “Geopolitical Threat”? Obama argues with Romney from the Hague

Juan Cole

(By Juan Cole) The peculiar American two-party system followed President Obama to the Hague on Tuesday, where he gave a joint press conference with the Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, leader of a Neoliberal, market-oriented party with a secular orientation. Obama was asked about the Ukraine, and replied from across the Atlantic to Mitt Romney’s […]

Featured

Egypt Shocks the World with Plan for Mass Execution of 528 Muslim Brothers

Juan Cole

(By Juan Cole) An Egyptian court in the provincial center of El Minya on Monday shocked the world by sentencing 528 persons to death in the killing of a policeman and engaging in vandalism last August. Only 147 of the suspects are actually in custody. The rest were sentenced in absentia. The accused were seen […]

Featured

Why Romney is Wrong that Obama’s Syria Policy Emboldened Putin

Juan Cole

(By Juan Cole) On Face the Nation on Sunday, Mitt Romney slammed President Obama’s policies toward Russia as “naive” and called the country a “geopolitical adversary” of the US. He also seemed to suggest that Obama’s Syria policy emboldened Russia. He said: “”Well, there’s no question but that the president’s naivete with regards to Russia, […]

Featured

ABC: Bush’s Neocon Spokesman for Illegal US Occupation of Iraq Slams Russia for Crimea

Juan Cole

It just baffles me that failed Neocons like Dan Senor are still given a hearing inside the Beltway. ABC News actually interviewed Senor, the spokesman for the Bush administration’s illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq on the Crimea crisis! Senor had the unmitigated gall to blame President Obama for “Iraq unraveling”!! Let’s see. The American […]

Climate Change

5 Signs Solar Power is Taking over the World

Juan Cole

(By Juan Cole) Burning fossil fuels (coal, natural gas and oil) is putting 32 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide annually into the atmosphere. Since CO2 is a greenhouse gas that traps heat from the sun on earth and prevents it radiating back out to space, this unprecedented human output is causing climate disruption, a […]

Dissent

Top attempts by Dictators to Shut down Twitter in Mideast (including Turkey’s PM Erdogan)

Juan Cole

(By Juan Cole) Trying to close down social media such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube has been a desperate ploy of dictatorial regimes throughout the world. It doesn’t work very well, since typically users find workarounds. But what is interesting is why authoritarian regimes make the attempt in the first place. At midnight last night, […]