The New York Times reports that the “government” of Libya is hiding in a hotel room in Tunis: “Officials said there was agreement that the United States and its allies needed to find ways of shoring up Libya’s new government of national accord – established just this...
Fresh Rumors of US Military Activity; 162 Killed Across Iraq
US Foreign Policy Needs To Regain Some Old-Fashioned Subtlety
In the Republican and Democratic presidential debates, President Barack Obama's ultimate rejection of using force against Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad, for using chemical weapons against his own people, keeps being raised as an issue. In all cases, the debate...
Uncle Sam’s Suicide Squads
“Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy?” This first line of Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody” opens the latest trailer for the upcoming big-budget super-hero movie Suicide Squad. It poses a pertinent question, because, unfortunately for those of us in real life, the...
Iran Is Guilty of ‘Contempt of Empire,’ Nothing More
For all the fearmongering about Iran’s alleged danger to civilization, they are guilty merely of what should be called “Contempt of Empire.” I say “merely” with a slight caveat: the penalty for “contempt of Empire” mirrors the punishment dealt by many cops who deem...
Mass Grave Found in Ramadi; 167 Killed Across Iraq
Congress Is Writing the President a Blank Check for War
While the Washington snowstorm dominated news coverage this week, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell was operating behind the scenes to rush through the Senate what may be the most massive transfer of power from the Legislative to the Executive branch in our...
Failed States and States of Failure
Originally posted on TomDispatch. One of the charms of the future is its powerful element of unpredictability, its ability to ambush us in lovely ways or bite us unexpectedly in the ass. Most of the futures I imagined as a boy have, for instance, come up deeply short,...
Nationalism and Its Discontents: The Meaning of Trump
At the end of the cold war, a cadre of neoconservative intellectuals surveyed the debris of the fallen Soviet colossus and boldly proclaimed “the end of history.” The West, said Francis Fukuyama, writing in The National Interest, had won not only the cold war but also...


