Tom Engelhardt

An editor in publishing for the last 25 years, Tom Engelhardt is the author of The End of Victory Culture, a history of American triumphalism in the Cold War era, now out in a revised edition with a new preface and afterword, and Mission Unaccomplished, TomDispatch Interviews With American Iconoclasts and Dissenters. He is at present consulting editor for Metropolitan Books, a fellow of the Nation Institute, and a teaching fellow at the journalism school of the University of California, Berkeley. Visit his Web site. This article originally appeared at TomDispatch.com. To stay on top of important articles like these, sign up to receive the latest updates from TomDispatch.com.

Baseless Considerations

Advice to a Young Builder in Tough Times I know. Times are tough. Here, in the United States, the bottom’s threatening to blow out of the housing market. Here, construction companies are laying off employees, and builders are wondering where their next jobs are likely to come from. But there’s still hope that can be … Continue reading “Baseless Considerations”

Why Did We Invade Iraq Anyway?

History… phooey! Or, more mildly, Americans traditionally aren’t much interested in it and the media largely don’t have time for it either. For one thing, the past is often just so inconvenient. On Monday, for instance, there was a front-page piece in the New York Times by Elisabeth Bumiller on Robert Blackwill, one of the … Continue reading “Why Did We Invade Iraq Anyway?”

American Disengagement

(Note to TomDispatch readers: A favor: In addition to everyone who bookmarks TomDispatch, over 18,000 of you now get e-mails letting you know whenever a new piece has been posted. [Many tens of thousands more read pieces from the site reposted elsewhere.] Most new readers sign up for those e-mails thanks to word of mouth, … Continue reading “American Disengagement”

(Un)Fair Game

Evidently, Blackwater, the now infamous private security company whose hired guns, working for the State Department, mowed down at least 17 Iraqis in a Baghdad square recently, wants to soften its image. (I wonder why?) The New York Times‘ Paul von Zielbauer just reported that the company has redesigned its logo. Once, according to him, … Continue reading “(Un)Fair Game”

Endgame for Iraqi Oil?

Before the invasion of Iraq, while millions demonstrated in the streets, often waving homemade placards with “No Blood for Oil” – or equivalents like “Don’t Trade Lives for Oil” and like “How Did USA’s Oil Get Under Iraq’s Sand?” – the Bush administration said remarkably little about the vast quantities of petroleum on which Saddam … Continue reading “Endgame for Iraqi Oil?”

12 Books in Search of a Policy

They came in as unreformed Cold Warriors, only lacking a cold war – and looking for an enemy: a Russia to roll back even further, rogue states like Saddam’s rickety dictatorship to smash. They were still in the old fight, eager to make sure that the “Evil Empire,” already long down for the count, would … Continue reading “12 Books in Search of a Policy”

Bush’s Pentagon Papers: The Urge to Confess

They can’t help themselves. They want to confess. How else to explain the torture memorandums that continue to flow out of the inner sancta of this administration, the most recent of which were evidently leaked to the New York Times. Those two, from the Alberto Gonzales Justice Department, were written in 2005 and recommitted the … Continue reading “Bush’s Pentagon Papers: The Urge to Confess”

Bush’s Faith Run Over by History

“I made my arguments and went down in flames. History will prove me right.” Yes, that was George W. Bush. No, he wasn’t talking about Iraq. The date was September 1993 and Bush, then managing general partner of the Texas Rangers, had voted against “realignment and a new wild-card system” at a Major League Baseball … Continue reading “Bush’s Faith Run Over by History”

With the Lost Boys in
Southern Sudan

“Starting from Zero” To the extent that the media spotlight is ever directed at Africa, it has focused on Darfur, in western Sudan, where several hundred thousand people have died in ethnic violence since 2003. Just next door, beyond the glare of the spotlight, however, is South Sudan, where an estimated 2.2 million people were … Continue reading “With the Lost Boys in
Southern Sudan”

Slum Fights: The Pentagon Plans for a New 100 Years’ War

How can we understand our world, if we have hardly a clue about the mini-worlds where planning for our future takes place? Just the other day, the Washington Post had one of the odder reports of the year. According to journalist Rick Weiss, demonstrators at protests in Washington DC and elsewhere have been independently reporting … Continue reading “Slum Fights: The Pentagon Plans for a New 100 Years’ War”