Israel’s Reasoning Against Peace
With the resumption of settlement construction in the West Bank Monday, Israel's powerful settler movement hopes that it has scuttled peace talks with the Palestinians. It would be misleading, however, to assume that the only major obstacle to the success of the...
The Taliban: Forced Into Negotiation While Winning?
Although David Petraeus, the top American commander in Afghanistan, recently peddled the notion that senior Taliban chieftains had made contact with senior Afghan government officials about the possibility of starting reconciliation talks, such talk of peace in our...
Are Obama’s Hands Tied?
A splendid and courageous new book, Washington Rules: America's Path to Permanent War, by Andrew J. Bacevich of Boston University (and for many years previously, the U.S. Army), describes with lucidity the degree to which the power of the American presidency over war...
Obama: ‘The Generals Made Me Do It!’
All Washington is atwitter: the grand old man of the Court Historians, Bob Woodward, has come out with yet another “book” – i.e. another long-winded press release on behalf of the Powers That Be – explaining, “reporting,” and...
Tuesday: 3 Iraqis Killed, 24 Wounded
Sorry, You’re Under Surveillance
Orwell, Kafka, They could see; That government Would soon watch me. For governments keen on muzzling and thwarting opposition, terrorism is a God-sent cover. A nation subject to terrorist attack can get away with deception, surveillance, secret arrests, harassment,...
Riots Grip East Jerusalem
SILWAN, Occupied East Jerusalem - Tension, the twisted carcasses of gutted vehicles, buses with smashed windows, smoldering dumpsters, streets riddled with rubber-coated steel bullets and empty cartridge cases, tear gas, and air thickened with black soot from burning...
Palin and Beck Don’t Support the Troops
All the King’s Bull Feather Merchants
Uber-journalist Bob Woodward is once again telling us exactly what we need to hear long after we needed to hear it. On Friday, Sept. 24, two days before its release, Woodward's new book Obama's Wars was Amazon's number two best-selling book. It's amazing how many...


