Militarization

By William D. Hartung | (Tomdispatch.com) President Obama and Senator John McCain, who have clashed on almost every conceivable issue, do agree on one thing: the Pentagon needs more money. Obama wants to raise the Pentagon’s budget for fiscal year 2016 by $35 billion more than the caps that exist under current law allow. McCain wants to […]

Bill of Rights

Top 5 Signs of the Decline and Fall of the American Republic

contributors

By Tom Engelhardt | (Tomdispatch.com) Have you ever undertaken some task you felt less than qualified for, but knew that someone needed to do? Consider this piece my version of that, and let me put what I do understand about it in a nutshell: based on developments in our post-9/11 world, we could be watching […]

Militarization

The Impotence of the Big Dick strain of American Nationalism

Juan Cole

By Nan Levinson | (Tomdispatch.com) Let’s face it: we live in a state of pervasive national security anxiety. There are various possible responses to this low-grade fever that saps resolve, but first we have to face the basis for that anxiety — what I’ve come to think of as the Big Dick School of Patriotism, […]

Barack Obama

Why is no one asking? Did GOP & Israel Lobbies write Iran Letter for the good of America?

contributors

By Hamid Zangeneh | (Informed Comment) People who worry about American national interests and security fall in one of the two categories: they either trust the President to advance national interests and security or not. The Republican authors and signatories of the letter to the Iranian leadership fall in the second category; they are the […]

Iran

Just How dangerous is Sen. Tom Cotton, Iran Letter Crackpot? You’d be Surprised

contributors

By Medea Benjamin and Nalini Ramachandran | (Foreign Policy in Focus) Hailing from Arkansas, 37-year-old Senator Cotton boasts the title of being the youngest member of the Senate, but he spouts the same old warmongering rhetoric of 78-year-old Senator John McCain. From Guantanamo to Iran, food stamps to women’s rights, here are 10 reasons why […]

Foreign Policy

Treason of the Wonks: How to Create a National Insecurity State

contributors

By Andrew J. Bacevich | (Tomdispatch.com) – Policy intellectuals — eggheads presuming to instruct the mere mortals who actually run for office — are a blight on the republic. Like some invasive species, they infest present-day Washington, where their presence strangles common sense and has brought to the verge of extinction the simple ability to […]

Domestic Surveillance

‘I would have come forward sooner’ – Snowden on NSA leak regrets

contributors

RT | – Former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden has frequently said that he does not regret blowing the whistle on the agency’s mass surveillance programs. However, he has now stated that he would change one thing if he could do it all again. He would have leaked the information earlier. Snowden made the […]

film

War Porn: Hollywood and War from World War II to “American Sniper”

contributors

By Peter Van Buren | (Tomdispatch.com) – In the age of the all-volunteer military and an endless stream of war zone losses and ties, it can be hard to keep Homeland enthusiasm up for perpetual war. After all, you don’t get a 9/11 every year to refresh those images of the barbarians at the airport […]

Bush

Jeb Bush on Foreign Policy: Peddling old Iraq Myths Again

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) – Jeb Bush gave a maiden foreign police speech in Chicago yesterday in which he mixed up Iran with Iraq and alleged with science fictional inaccuracy that Daesh (ISIS or ISIL) has 200,000 men under arms. The actual number of fighters is probably 20,000. His office later admitted that […]