National Security State

By Rebecca Gordon | ( Tomdispatch.com ) | – – They’re back! From the look of the presidential campaign, war crimes are back on the American agenda. We really shouldn’t be surprised, because American officials got away with it last time — and in the case of the drone wars continue to get away with […]

The Surprising Reasons Washington’s ISIL Obsession obscures the Real Threats

contributors

By Tom Engelhardt | ( Tomdispatch.com) It’s time to panic! As 2015 ended, this country was certifiably terror-stricken. It had the Islamic State (IS) on the brain. Hoax terror threats or terror imbroglios shut down school systems from Los Angeles to New Hampshire, Indiana to a rural county in Virginia. The Dallas Symphony Orchestra, citing terror […]

Democratic Party

When did Justifying Large Scale Civilian Deaths in Bombardments become a Bipartisan Consensus?

contributors

By Stephen Zunes | (Foreign Policy in Focus) | – – There’s a bipartisan effort to justify the killing of civilians in the “war on terrorism.” There has been a lot of consternation expressed in the media at a series of statements by Republican presidential candidates during their most recent debate and elsewhere in which […]

Foreign Policy

Trump & GOP: Saber Rattling re: Iranians can never be too Aggressive

contributors

By Mahsa Alimardani | (Global Voices Online) | – – GOP candidate Donald Trump was the first to attack Iran early on in the [last] debate, calling it a “terrorist nation.”. The relationship between Iran and America is tenuous at best, and there is no better forum to exaggerate this difficult relationship than the debates […]

Featured

41% of Trump Supporters want to bomb Aladdin and Jasmine

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – Public Policy Polling asked US voters if they favored bombing “Agraba.” Some 30% of Republicans said “Yes!” Obviously, this is a a little bit of a trick, since voters being asked such a question assume it is a real policy issue. But wouldn’t you want to […]

National Security State

“No-Fly List” Riddled with Errors, impossible to Get off of

contributors

By Raymond Bonner | (Special to ProPublica) |- – This story was co-published with The Daily Beast. As the Senate debated a proposal earlier this month that would have barred gun sales to people on the government’s terrorism watch lists, Republicans decried the lists as unfair, unreliable and un-American. “There’s no due process or any […]

Iraq

Is the US Suddenly entering a Major new War in Iraq & Syria?

contributors

Paul Rogers | ( OpenDemocracy) | – – The spreading influence of ISIS is forcing Washington into a strategic decision: escalate. Suddenly, and without almost anyone noticing, the war against ISIS in Syria and Iraq is developing and growing rapidly. Some elements are already clear enough: they include the expansion of ISIS-controlled territory in Libya, […]

Israel Lobbies

The real Threat to Peace? Marco Rubio Is Winning the Neocon Primary

contributors

By Sina Toossi | (Foreign Policy in Focus) | – – With pundits and columnists dissecting and critiquing every word uttered by GOP front-runners Ben Carson and Donald Trump, comparatively little attention has been paid to the positions and affiliations of a far more electable Republican presidential candidate: Florida Senator Marco Rubio. Unlike Trump or […]

Barack Obama

Oh, no! Not another American war against evil!

contributors

By Ira Chernus | (Informed Comment) | – – This time, it’s the Islamic State (IS). After the attacks in Paris, Barack Obama, spokesman-in-chief for the United States of America, called that crew “the face of evil.” Shades of George W. Bush. The “evildoers” are back. And from every mountaintop, it seems, America now rings […]