According to Transparency International’s 2019 Corruption Perception's Index, the US is the world’s 23rd least swindling state. A bit better than Bhutan, but not quite as honest as Uruguay or the United Arab Emirates. So much for "We’re number one! We’re number...
‘I Pity The Fool’: Mr. Max Boot on Joe Biden’s Foreign Policy ‘A-Team’
Dream with me. Imagine an America where even marginal accountability reigned. A land of appropriate consequences for war-criminal cheerleaders. A country where going 0 for 4 on "freedom" wars – Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria – got pundits and policymakers...
Lebanon: Inconvenient Truths About Syria, Iran, Hezbollah, and the Shia ‘Street’
This is the fourth segment in the author’s backstory series – "Lebanon: Bellwether, Battleground, and Bastard Child" – in the wake of the August 4, 2020 Beirut port explosion. Check out parts one, two, and three, plus stay tuned for upcoming segments at...
Lebanon: The Top Ten Myths About the Country and its Conflicts (Part Two)
This is the third segment in the author’s backstory series – "Lebanon: Bellwether, Battleground, and Bastard Child" – in the wake of the August 4, 2020 Beirut port explosion. Check out part one and two, plus stay tuned for upcoming segments in Antiwar.com...
Lebanon: The Top Ten Myths About the Country and Its Conflicts
This is the second segment in the author’s backstory series – "Lebanon: Bellwether, Battleground, and Bastard Child" – in the wake of the August 4, 2020 Beirut port explosion. Read part one here. Stay tuned for upcoming segments in Antiwar.com "Lebanon...
Lebanon: Bellwether, Battleground, and Bastard Child of the Mideast
When I was a kid, "Beirut" became a cultural shorthand for any chaotic and violent urban setting. In the 1990s, my hometown rappers – the Wu Tang Clan – repeatedly shouted out the Lebanese city (plus one of its civil war antagonists, the P.L.O. – Palestinian...
I Was Wrong: Congress Isn’t Cowardly; It’s Evil!
Sometime during my "brief" spell as an imperial-accomplice, zombie-flicks became all the rage. So did tweeting and texting, by the way – which I learned the hard way when a phone bill ran to several hundred bucks after returning from my first failed...
The Russians Are(n’t) Coming!: Paul Reveres, the Washington Hawks Are Not
In America’s Emerald City these days, if there’s even a hint of a war-wind-down, imperial-deescalation, or military budget-cuts, Washington’s (non-dribbling) Wizards have a ready response: Russia! Indeed, these military's magicians have a far-simpler and more...
All Civilian Lives Are Equal, But Some Are More Equal Than Others
Planet Earth circa 2020: this is Orwell’s world; we’re just living in it. Who better to resurrect in this pandemic-protest moment than a leftist so lefty he ditched a life of relative English privilege to fight Franco’s fascists in the Spanish Civil War – only to turn...
Modi’s ‘New’ India: Notch or Knot on China’s Belt (and Road Initiative)
File it in the rapidly-brimming "biggest-stories-of-2020-you-haven’t-heard-about" folder. Amidst the madness merger of pandemic and protests – both of which Trump’s minions have blamed on China – there’s been scant attention paid to a brewing conflict...