Month: May 2008

Editorial note: This is an excerpt from a pamphlet published in 1996, Into the Bosnian Quagmire: The Case Against U.S. Intervention in the Balkans. We republish it now, in successive installments, because the rise of Barack Obama as the putative Democratic presidential candidate augurs the rise of a new liberal internationalism – the very same … Continue reading “Into the Bosnian Quagmire, Part 3”

Updated at 7:55 p.m .EDT, May 27, 2008At least 37 Iraqis were killed and 83 more were wounded in the latest attacks. One incident involved Iranian soldiers at the border. One American soldier was killed and two were wounded in a roadside bombing near Diwaniya on Sunday. Also, Shi’ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr has called for … Continue reading “Tuesday: 1 US Soldier, 37 Iraqis Killed; 83 Iraqis Wounded”

JERUSALEM – "Spin" was the chorus that predictably emanated from Israel’s parliament when the office of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert announced last week that Israel and Syria had initiated talks ultimately aimed at reaching a peace agreement. But to reduce the renewal of peace talks between Jerusalem and Damascus, after an eight-year hiatus, to mere … Continue reading “Israel Targets Iran Through Syrian Friendship”

Iraqi parliamentarians are increasingly concerned that they are being left out of talks between Iraqi and U.S. officials over a strategic deal to determine the future relationship between the two countries, at a time when the U.S. Congress failed to include a provision in a bill to fund the Iraq and Afghan wars last week … Continue reading “Iraq Deals Overshadowed by Rising Concerns”

You might think this article comes a little late since it’s being published after Memorial Day. But now that Memorial Day has come and gone, it’s worth thinking about what it represents and why the debate about Memorial Day is so crucial. “Debate,” you might say. “What debate?” Yes, there is a debate. On one … Continue reading “The Fight for Memorial Day”

The Germans call it die Flucht nach vorne – escaping forward. When the situation is desperate, attack! Instead of retreating, advance! When there is no way out, storm ahead! This method was successful in 1948. At the end of May, the Egyptian army was advancing on Tel Aviv. We – a very, very thin line … Continue reading “Escaping Forward”

Just because certain prominent neoconservative acolytes are no longer official members of the Bush administration does not mean that the movement has lost its institutional sway or its ideological commitment to war. Writing on these pages two and a half years ago, I warned that the neoconservative propensity for conflict is inscribed in the worldview … Continue reading “The Broad Reach of Neoconservatism”

Updated at 12:45 a.m. EDT, May 27, 2008At least 15 Iraqis were killed and 53 more were wounded in the latest violence. The most significant attack left two dozen casualties in Tarmiyah. Also, one American soldier was killed and two more were wounded during an IED attack today in Salah ad Din province. Another U.S. … Continue reading “Monday: 2 US Soldiers, 15 Iraqis Killed; 53 Iraqis Wounded”

In one of the most embarrassingly absurd, historically baseless, and astonishingly one-sided speeches any U.S. president has ever given, President Bush compared Iran to Nazi Germany in his speech to Israel’s Knesset. In doing so, the president repeated the same diatribes that Norman Podhoretz, the godfather of the neoconservatives, and Benjamin Netanyahu, the leader of … Continue reading “Iran Is No Threat, Unless Bush Makes It One”

To say that politics makes people stupid may be painting with too broad a brush, although there’s plenty of evidence of politically induced stupidity committed by people who really ought to know better. I have sometimes posited that going into government at almost any level automatically causes one to lose 50 IQ points. The first … Continue reading “Talking About Nothing”