Has the Left Made Peace With the Warfare State?

As a perpetual emotion machine — producing and guzzling its own political fuel — the “war on terror” continues to normalize itself as a thoroughly American way of life and death. Ongoing warfare has become a matter of default routine, pushed along by mainline media and the leadership of both parties in Washington. Without a … Continue reading “Has the Left Made Peace With the Warfare State?”

We Are All Humanitarian Interventionists

A “happy holidays” email from The Atlantic’s ubiquitous self-promoter Steve Clemons last week suggests that any unified right-left movement to end America’s wars of choice might be unattainable. Normally I do not read Clemons, but on this occasion I persevered and was rewarded with a bit of political folderol that was too deliciously bizarre not … Continue reading “We Are All Humanitarian Interventionists”

Hypocrites, Left and Right

I love hate to say I told you so, but not that much. Human Rights Watch reports that forces loyal to Moammar Gadhafi are not systematically slaughtering civilians, but are targeting the rebels. Civilians caught in the crossfire account for noncombatant deaths, and the numbers are rising: but this isn’t genocide. Furthermore, as I maintained … Continue reading “Hypocrites, Left and Right”

Liberals March to War

Well, that didn’t take long. Now that President Barack Obama has intervened in Libya, his army of apologists is mobilizing to defend his “humanitarianism,” declaring that his war isn’t at all like Bush’s wars. It’s something new, and different – and admirable. I’m not at all surprised. Are you? The anti-interventionist veneer of most American … Continue reading “Liberals March to War”

Getting Beyond ‘Left’ and ‘Right’

Editorial note: What follows is the transcript of a speech given in Danbury, Conn., and Boston, Mass., under the auspices of the Ridgefield Liberty Forum and the Boston chapter of ComeHomeAmerica.org, respectively. We’ve just had an election in which no mention was made of the two wars we are now fighting. Now that may seem … Continue reading “Getting Beyond ‘Left’ and ‘Right’”

The Democrats’ War Tax

Sen. Carl Levin has a solution to the problem of how to finance our losing, futile war in Afghanistan – a war we are fighting to support what has now been officially deemed the second most corrupt government on earth: he wants a war tax. An "additional income tax to the upper brackets, folks earning … Continue reading “The Democrats’ War Tax”

The New Neocons

The last futile, expensive, and grotesquely immoral war launched by the United States was authored by those ideological shape-shifters and creatures of legend, the neoconservatives (neocons for short), whose storied history has been the subject of endless books, articles, and memoirs. There’s even a documentary film in which the aforesaid neocons tout their own intellectual … Continue reading “The New Neocons”