If, as expected, George W. Bush next week announces his intention to "surge" some 20,000 additional US troops to Iraq to pacify Baghdad and Sunni-dominated Anbar province, he may find himself in a tougher fight than he expected even a week ago. Not only are...
Clearing Decks or Rearranging Deck Chairs?
So what are we to make of all those apparently significant changes both in the Bush foreign policy team and his top military commanders? The question is whether he is clearing the decks for action or rearranging the deck chairs. Given that the Bushlet is supposed to...
Saturday: 130 Iraqis, 2 GIs Killed; 11 Iraqis, 2 Coalition Soldiers Wounded
Updated at 12:45 a.m. EST, Jan. 7, 2007 Although the week began relatively peacefully, violenge surged today, in part due to a renewed effort to control sectarian violence in the capital. At least 130 Iraqis were killed or found dead today and another 11 were wounded...
Backtalk, January 6, 2006
The Democrats' Agenda Thomas Moore said: "...the Constitution makes the president the Commander-in-Chief, giving him control over the military, Congress has little direct say over where and how the troops are deployed." Why has he not recommended that this...
Friday: 82 Iraqis Killed, 27 Wounded
Updated at 11:55 a.m. EST, Jan. 6, 2007 In Baghdad, Muslim clerics issued warnings that residents should be on the alert for increased attacks during what is called "Baghdad Liberation Day." Clashes did erupt in one neighborhood despite precautions. Overall today, 82...
The Surge to Nowhere
Every now and then, you have to take a lesson or two from history. In the case of George Bush's Iraq, here's one: No matter what the President announces in his "new way forward" speech on Iraq next week including belated calls for "sacrifice" from the man whose...
Failure Personified: Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice
After six years, the administration's foreign policy team is a wreck. The president's poll ratings look good only in comparison to those of the vice president. Both the original defense secretary and deputy defense secretary are gone, discredited by the Iraq...
Cakewalk Crowd Abandons Bush
Victory has a thousand fathers, but defeat is an orphan, said a rueful John F. Kennedy after the Bay of Pigs. George W. Bush knows today whereof his predecessor spoke. For as he prepares to "surge" 20,000 more U.S. troops into a war even he concedes we "are...
A Single Standard for Gerald Ford and Saddam Hussein
During the same week that former U.S. president Gerald Ford passed away, Iraqi authorities executed Saddam Hussein. As one might expect, official Washington's reactions to the two events were radically different. President Bush expressed sadness in the wake of Ford's...
Confronting the Empire
How it is that, having lost an election widely viewed as a referendum on the war, the Bush administration has the temerity to announce a "surge" in American forces engaged in active combat in Iraq? The answer was given by incoming chairman of the Senate Armed Services...


