Updated at 7:37 p.m .EDT, Sept. 2, 2009
At least four Iraqis were killed and 16 more were wounded on a day marked by significant political and security news concerning a British hostage, U.S. contractors, Iraq’s death row and political squabbles in northern Iraq.
read moreThe Ghost of 9/11
The idea that the U.S. must fight in Afghanistan is buttressed by an all-too-familiar theme, whether it be uttered on the Left (Obama) or the neocon Right (Bill Kristol): the former says we must fight to prevent al-Qaeda from reestablishing "safe havens" so...
Japanese Landslide a Mixed Bag for US
Almost two decades after their bubble economy turned to economic stagnation, Japanese voters have dealt a hammer blow to their corrupt one-party political system. After more than a half century of dominance, the Liberal Democratic Party was trounced by the surging...
Luster Is Off Obama’s ‘High Moral Ground’
Back in April, the U.S. government snatched Raymond Azar out of Afghanistan. His waist, wrists, and ankles were shackled; he was stripped naked and photographed, made to wear headphones, blindfolded, hooded, and stuffed into an executive jet and flown to the United...
The More Things Change
A presidential candidate opposed to the Iraq War is elected and enters the Oval Office. Yet six months later, there are still essentially the same number of troops in Iraq as were there when his predecessor left, the same number, in fact, used in the original invasion...
Steve Rosen Accuses AIPAC of Espionage
Steven J. Rosen's defamation lawsuit against the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) is now entering a critical phase. A series of cross-filings stakes out the critical court terrain. Rosen intends to show that obtaining and leveraging classified U.S....
Group Charges Complicity by CIA Medics in Torture
Did physicians and psychologists help the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency develop a new research protocol to assess and refine the use of waterboarding or other harsh interrogation techniques? This is the question being raised in a new report by a leading human...
Tuesday: 4 Iraqi Killed, 12 Wounded
Updated at 8:05 p.m. EDT, Sept. 1, 2009
Four Iraqis were killed and 12 more were wounded in very light violence. Four of the wounded were previously unreported casualties from a bombing yesterday. Meanwhile, Iraq scheduled a national census for October of next year, hoping that the late date with thwart any sectarian tensions in the oil-rich north.
read moreMullen’s Mulligans
In golf and other sports, a "mulligan" is a second chance to get something right, sometimes referred to as a "do-over." In most sports, one do-over is all you get, and sports are just games. In war, humanity's deadliest undertaking, the folks in...
We Need a Special Prosecutor for Blackwater and Other CIA ‘Contractors’
Some parts of Blackwater's clandestine work for the CIA have begun to leak out from behind the iron curtain of secrecy. The company's role in the secret assassination program and its continued involvement in the CIA drone attacks that occur regularly in Afghanistan...
