Month: August 2005

What Americans should demand from their governments at all levels is accountability. Accountability is far more important than transparency, which can be easily faked. Accountability is not complicated. It simply means people must take responsibility for their actions. If the actions are successful, take responsibility; if they are a failure, take responsibility. This principle applies … Continue reading “Demand Accountability”

Note: On Tuesday, Aug. 16, 2005, in a radio interview on WFLA in Tampa Bay, Fla., Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld made the following statement: “[I]n my mind, I think of the number of people who are lost to traffic accidents in the United States in a given year. I think of any one … Continue reading “The Tide Is Turning, Mr. President”

The ugliness of the regime we have installed in Iraq has finally bubbled up to the surface, like the outbreak of an oozing syphilitic sore, and spilled over onto the front page of the Washington Post: “Shi’ite and Kurdish militias, often operating as part of Iraqi government security forces, have carried out a wave of … Continue reading “Why Are We In Iraq?”

To see Jewish settlers evicted from homes they have lived in for decades, taking weeping wives and children back to Israel, is heart-wrenching. To see Israeli settlers spit in the faces of Israeli soldiers and call them “Nazis” evokes only disgust. Who do these people think they are? Were it not for the Israeli army, … Continue reading “Sharon: Hero and Goat of Gaza”

A Young Man’s Death in IraqHello Mr. Engelhardt, I read Mr. Christensen’s account of the loss of his young friend in the Aug. 14 edition of the San Francisco Chronicle. I was very moved by it, and reread it several times. It provoked a series of issues that I feel are being inadequately addressed in … Continue reading “Backtalk, August 22, 2005”

Countries that rely on "diplomatic assurances" that other countries will not torture transferred prisoners "are either engaging in wishful thinking or using the assurances as a figleaf to cover their complicity," charges a new report from Human Rights Watch (HRW). "There is substantial evidence that in the course of the global ‘war on terrorism,’ an … Continue reading “The Ugly Truth About Prisoner ‘Rendition’”

Is realism finally, definitively, back in the driver’s seat of U.S. foreign policy? That’s the conclusion featured this week on the op-ed page of the nation’s most influential newspaper, the New York Times, in a column by the managing editor of the nation’s most influential foreign-policy journal, Foreign Affairs, published by the nation’s most influential … Continue reading “Realists Taking Over in Washington?”

Not being as intimately acquainted as some others seem or claim to be with the ineffable methods and motives of the universe, I would hardly say that it is providential that Cindy Sheehan had to leave Crawford to be with her mother in Los Angeles, who had a stroke. But it will be interesting and … Continue reading “A Real Peace Movement?”

Did you see where Russia and China are conducting "unprecedented" joint military exercises "involving air, sea and land forces"? Two countries possessing intercontinental ballistic missiles tipped with thermonuclear warheads! Thousands of them! All aimed at us! Some concerned observers suppose the Sino-Russian exercises were meant to forestall a threatened pre-emptive nuke attack by Bush-Cheney on … Continue reading “Sino-Russian Guarantees?”

Ray McGovern works for Tell the Word, the publishing arm of the ecumenical Church of the Saviour in Washington, DC, and is co-founder of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity. On Wednesday, he arrived home in Arlington, VA, after five days in Crawford, and shared these remarks with 300 neighbors at the close of a candlelight … Continue reading “There is Such a Thing as ‘Too Late’”