US politics

Cenk Uygur | (The Young Turks) – “”Three likely presidential candidates shared the stage Sunday night before a roomful of wealthy donors, engaging in a rapid-fire policy discussion that underscored sharp disagreement within the GOP over global affairs and national security. Republican Sens. Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz and Rand Paul took part in a largely […]

Economy

Attn. Tea Party: ‘How Immigrants (yes, Muslims and Latinos) can save Detroit & other Cities’

The Economist | — “From Detroit to Philadelphia to Baltimore, policy makers in America’s old industrial metropolises are struggling with the same problem: how to reverse the fortunes of decaying cities. Decades of economic decline and suburbanisation have left their city centres depressed and dangerous. But immigrants – whether students, migrants or refugees – could […]

5 Top Reasons Romney ought to have Withdrawn

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) – Likely the reasons Mitt Rimney decided not to run for a third time are financial – the big money just wouldn’t make another bet on a serial loser. But here is why he shouldn’t have even thought about running in a rational world: 1. In his famous slam […]

The Need for New Blood at State Dept.: Obama’s Problem with the ‘Vision Thing’

By Andrew J. Bacevich | (Tomdispatch.com) – En route back to Washington at the tail end of his most recent overseas trip, John Kerry, America’s peripatetic secretary of state, stopped off in France “to share a hug with all of Paris.” Whether Paris reciprocated the secretary’s embrace went unrecorded. Despite the requisite reference to General […]

Netanyahu & Boehner: How Israel went from being a Democratic to a Republican Project

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) — The audacity of Speaker of the House John Boehner colluding with the prime minister of a foreign country to undermine a sitting president is, I think, still not entirely appreciated. And the whole point of the plot with Binyamin Netanyahu is to stop a sitting president from successfully […]

New Saudi King to Obama: Lower-price Oil Policy won’t Change

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) – President Obama cut short his India trip to head off to Riyadh in the wake of the death last Thursday of King Abdallah of Saudi Arabia. Some 30 members of the Washington elite came along, of both parties, including Sen. John McCain and Rep. Nancy Pelosi. This love […]

Obama Win: Dem Senators Flip-Flop, Delay Iran Sanctions Bill

By Golnaz Esfandiari and Luke Johnson | (RFE/RL) WASHINGTON — A key U.S. senator says he and nine other senators are holding their support for a bill imposing new sanctions on Iran over its controversial nuclear program. U.S. Senator Robert Menendez (Democrat-New Jersey), co-sponsor of a bill that would impose new sanctions on Iran if […]

Corruption

Koch Bros To Spend Nearly A Billion Buying The 2016 Elections