Month: March 2005

Quote of the day: “‘I don’t think that the world gives us the luxury of picking areas,’ [Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Douglas] Feith said. ‘We have interests all over the world. I dare say that if anybody before September 11, 2001, was listing places that we would want to focus on as a matter … Continue reading “A One-Way Planet”

Approach my inferences in the following with caution. It can be dangerous to infer too much from experiences and anecdotes separated by a long period of time, especially when events have intervened that might offer a more satisfactory explanation. With that caution, however, I would like to advance the tentative hypothesis that the United States … Continue reading “Signs of Imperial Sclerosis?”

There is growing agreement among antiwar activists that the Bush administration’s two main political vulnerabilities on Iraq are personnel issues and the cost of the war. To the extent that we agree on this, we need to devise strategies and tactics that aim at those vulnerabilities. There is much good organizing on the first issue … Continue reading “Making Congress Listen”

The apparent decision by European leaders to delay the lifting of their 16-year-old arms embargo on China beyond June marks a clear-cut foreign policy victory for U.S. President George W. Bush, who made the issue a major priority in his visit to Europe last month. China itself may have inadvertently made Bush’s victory possible. Its … Continue reading “EU Decision to Delay China Arms Sales Big Win for Bush”

Counter-recruitment has become a key battleground in the effort to stop the war in Iraq and prevent future military adventures by President Bush and a compliant Congress. The U.S. Army admits that it expects to miss its recruiting goals this month and next and is working on a revised sales pitch appealing to the patriotism … Continue reading “The Battle for America’s Youth”

LONDON – Seventy-eight journalists were killed last year in the course of their work, a survey by the Vienna-based International Press Institute shows. The IPI 2004 review "Impunity Lives, While Journalists Die" published Tuesday also condemns the "overwhelming failure of the authorities in many parts of the world to properly investigate and prosecute the killers … Continue reading “78 Journalists Killed Last Year”

Six Years Later, Kosovo Still Wrong In the early hours of March 24, 1999, NATO began the bombing of what was then the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. For some reason, many in the targeted nation thought the name of the operation was "Merciful Angel." In fact, the attack was code-named "Allied Force" – a cold, … Continue reading “An Evil Little War”

Editor’s note: The following is a statement by Daniel Ellsberg on the recent indictment of Mordechai Vanunu in Israel for his violation of restrictions banning him from speaking to foreigners or giving interviews to foreign journalists. Ellsberg has just returned from Israel, where he had been invited to testify against these restrictions on March 16 … Continue reading “Daniel Ellsberg: Free Mordechai Vanunu”

A couple of tedious paragraphs into her paean to George Bush, scribbler Suzanne Fields divulges triumphantly that she hangs with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. These two Beltway Babes got together last week to dish “over a Danish and a cup of black coffee.” Their tête-à-tête inspired a serenade for the man whose testes, says … Continue reading “Second Thoughts, First Principles”

It looks like we have yet another color-coordinated “democratic” revolution: this time, the color is pink, and the country is the Central Asian nation of Kyrgyzstan, where about half the nation lives below the poverty line and the Kyrgyzstani leader, Askar Akaev, is another one of those Oriental despots left over from the old Commie … Continue reading “Kyrgyzstan’s ‘Revolution’”