Joe Biden

(Counterpunch) – American foreign policy today is in a reactionary death spiral. Never has a new “national security” policy paradigm been more desperately needed, yet there is not even a glimpse of salvation on the horizon—wherever you look you will find policies that speak to the past and offer little hope for a viable global […]

Democratic Party

Three Reasons to be Hopeful Democrats will Still Pass Key Parts of Build Back Better

OtherWords

By Karen Dolan | – ( Otherwords.org ) – There’s no getting around it: 2021 has been a tough year. As with 2020, many of us are glad to see its back end. Do let the door hit you on the way out. Yet, there is more than just Senator Joe Manchin’s coal and Omicron […]

Anti-Vaccination

Without Biden’s Vaccination Program, a Million and a Half Americans would have died in 2021 and 12 mn would have been Hospitalized

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – President Biden made a major pandemic policy speech on Tuesday, pleading with Americans to get vaccinated, and, indeed, to get the three-shot course that is now standard. He notes that 400,000 people died from COVID-19 in 2021, almost all of them unvaccinated. He is backed up by medical professionals. Augusta […]

Carbon Footprint

Don’t care about the Build Back Better Act? Hearing People’s personal Stories might change that

The Conversation

By Angela Bradbery | – When U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., said that he wouldn’t support President Joe Biden’s signature Build Back Better Act, he set off a wave of breaking news alerts. It was fitting. For months, media coverage has breathlessly focused on the behind-the-scenes wrangling and hour-by-hour negotiations around the legislation. How much […]

Climate Crisis

Revenge is a Dish best Served Green: Biden could get around Manchin with GOP Senators Supporting Wind, Solar, Battery

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Senator Joe Manchin has attempted completely to shoot down the Build Back Better bill, underlining the thin legislative margin with which President Biden has to work. With a 50/50 Senate, Biden’s legislative agenda going forward will need to be bipartisan. The successes this approach can garner are apparent in the […]

Iran

To Succeed in US Foreign Policy, Biden needs a clean Break with Trump

Medea Benjamin and Nicholas J.S. Davies

( Code Pink) – The Biden presidency is still in its early days, but it’s not too early to point to areas in the foreign policy realm where we, as progressives, have been disappointed–or even infuriated. There are one or two positive developments, such as the renewal of Obama’s New START Treaty with Russia and […]

Climate Crisis

“Given me a Lever and I will Move the Earth:” Biden orders greening of Federal Gov’t, buying of EVs and Solar Panels

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The ancient Greek mathematician Archimedes of Syracuse (d. 212 BC), speaking of the power of the lever, said, “Give me a place to stand on, and I will move the Earth” (δῶς μοι πᾶ στῶ καὶ τὰν γᾶν κινάσω). In the US economy there are few more powerful levers than […]

Featured

To Avoid another War Biden must get US Troops, caught in Israel-Iran Crossfire, out of Syria

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Eric Schmitt and Ronen Bergman at the New York Times report that a drone strike on a US base in eastern Syria last month has been assessed by the Pentagon as retaliation for Israeli airstrikes on Iranian bases in Syria. US troops abandoned the base before the strike, based on […]

Democracy

In the Middle East, the US was Never about Democracy Promotion

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – How much of the blame should U.S. policy take for the decline of democracy in the twenty-first century, with the reversions to dictatorship and the rise of illiberalism in older democracies? In a fine article at the New York Times, Max Fisher discusses how an NYT team mined data at […]