We know one thing about the Bush administration: despite the president's Veterans Day speech on the "irresponsibility" of "rewriting history," he and his top officials – possibly the greatest gamblers in our history – had no hesitation about writing their...
A Felon for Peace
She's just off the plane from Tulsa, Oklahoma, the cheapest route back from a reunion in the little Arkansas town where she grew up in the 1950s. For thirty years, she and her childhood friends have climbed to the top of Penitentiary Mountain, where the local...
Who Had the Real Intel on the War
This is the second of two pieces dedicated to shame and honor in the Bush era. The first was "The Wall of Shame." On Nov. 2, 2005, I found myself in a familiar situation – at a protest. This time, it was the New York version of the World Can't Wait nationwide...
The Wall of Shame
[Three weeks ago, Nick Turse wrote a dispatch, "Casualties of the Bush Administration," about government officials who resigned or retired in protest, or were forced over a cliff by this administration. It was, in essence, a proposal for a Wall of Honor. At the...
Bush’s Bad Business Empire
The Bush administration, with its crony corporations in tow, essentially sallied forth into the world with the collective mentality of a plunderer, ready to strip mine the planet. While its plans for global – and energy – domination (as well as the military...
The Forgotten War in Maysan Province
Since Guardian correspondent Rory Carroll was briefly kidnapped in Baghdad and the paper recalled its reporters while it reviewed the situation, there has a lively debate in the English press about the nature and limits of Western reporting in Iraq. Carroll himself,...
So Much for Strict Construction
Here is the key passage in Senator John McCain's anti-torture amendment to the 2006 Defense Appropriations Bill (which the Bush administration has threatened to veto if it arrives so amended): "No individual in the custody or under the physical control of the United...
The Tip of the Criminal Conspiracy
I. Lewis ("Scooter") Libby, immediately praised by the president ("Scooter has worked tirelessly on behalf of the American people and sacrificed much in the service to this country"), his resignation accepted with "deep regret" by the vice president ("He has given...
Smoking Guns and Red Herrings
Implosion update: And so they fall: Tom DeLay just weeks back. Harriet Miers yesterday. I. Lewis ("Scooter") Libby today. Prepare yourself. It's going to be a long, hard dive into deep waters that should, sooner or later, lead us back to the beginning. Think of...
Bush’s October Surprise
Those in the anti-fascist struggle of the 1930s who went off to fight in the Spanish Civil War were later termed "premature antifascists." Perhaps, in the same spirit, I might be considered a premature Bush-administration implodist. On Feb. 1, 2004, reviewing the week...