Is War Good For the Economy?

The idea that warfare helps the economy is a prime example of Bizarro logic, which has pervaded our collective consciousness since the 9/11 terrorist attacks, ideological fallout from the explosion of national hysteria that followed. In Bizarro World, as we all know,...

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Fear of US-Sunni Ties Undercut Security Talks

The threat by the government of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki earlier this month to reject the U.S.-Iraq status of forces and strategic framework agreements was prompted in part by U.S. demands for access to bases that were unacceptable to a highly...

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Change We Can Believe In?

The slogan of Sen. Barack Obama's presidential campaign is "change we can believe in." It's clear that Obama believes we need to change course with regard to Iraq. In January 2007, he introduced legislation calling for removing combat brigades from Iraq by...

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Don’t Miss the Train

Improbably, an opportunity has arisen in Iraq for the U.S. to attain two of its most important goals, namely obtaining some legitimacy for the Maliki "government" and getting American troops out. This could be the last international express leaving Baghdad Central...

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Hitchens Demands an
Eye for an Eye

Did Hitler's crimes justify the Allies' terror-bombing of Germany? Indeed they did, answers Christopher Hitchens in his Newsweek response to my new book, Churchill, Hitler, and the Unnecessary War: "The stark evidence of the Final Solution has ever since been enough...

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Backtalk, June 24, 2008

Enough Already! Dear Mr. Raimondo, Your caveat about Tim Russert is well taken, painful as it is in a time of grieving. But the problem goes much deeper than a self-congratulatory press corps. The problem, it seems to me, is that our so-called free press is in fact a...

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How the South
Won the Civil War

We have been told endlessly that the U.S. Civil War was a good war, fought to free the slaves. About 110,100 Union soldiers were killed in action, and another 224,580 died from war-related diseases. An estimated 275,175 Union soldiers were wounded. In 1879, it was...

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