Tom Engelhardt

An editor in publishing for the last 25 years, Tom Engelhardt is the author of The End of Victory Culture, a history of American triumphalism in the Cold War era, now out in a revised edition with a new preface and afterword, and Mission Unaccomplished, TomDispatch Interviews With American Iconoclasts and Dissenters. He is at present consulting editor for Metropolitan Books, a fellow of the Nation Institute, and a teaching fellow at the journalism school of the University of California, Berkeley. Visit his Web site. This article originally appeared at TomDispatch.com. To stay on top of important articles like these, sign up to receive the latest updates from TomDispatch.com.

Imperial Autism

The former Cockney flower-girl-turned-elegant- English-speaker Eliza Doolittle caught something of our moment in these lyrics from My Fair Lady: “Oh, words, words, words, I’m so sick of words…. Is that all you blighters can do?” Of course, all she had to do was be Pygmalion to a self-involved language teacher. We’ve had to bear with … Continue reading “Imperial Autism”

Launching Brand Petraeus

[Note for Readers: This is the third in TomDispatch’s “by the numbers” series, leading up to this week’s White House “Progress Report” from the U.S. commander in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus, and the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Ryan Crocker. The first, in July, was “Iraq by the Numbers“; the second, in August, was “Escalation by … Continue reading “Launching Brand Petraeus”

Soft Crimes Against Democracy

We live with an administration whose concept of domestic “freedom” went out with those “freedom fries,” briefly sold at the cafeterias of the House of Representatives. The Bush team has quite literally been a force for darkness. For those who remember the “memory hole” down which the bureaucrats of the Ministry of Truth dumped all … Continue reading “Soft Crimes Against Democracy”

Empire of Stupidity

[Note for TomDispatch readers: In the weeks when the first Gulf War was underway – it seems a lifetime ago – I began researching a book on the history of American triumphalism (which I came to call “victory culture”), especially as I had experienced it in my 1950s childhood. By the time I began writing, … Continue reading “Empire of Stupidity”

Pitching the Imperial Republic

It was the highest-tech military of its moment and its invasion of the Arab land was overwhelming. Enemy forces were smashed, the oppressive ruling regime overthrown, the enemy capital occupied, and the country declared liberated? then the first acts of insurgency began? George W. Bush’s invasion of Iraq in 2003? No, Napoleon Bonaparte’s invasion of … Continue reading “Pitching the Imperial Republic”

America on the Downward Slope

Pick up the paper any day and you’ll find tiny straws in the wind (or headlines inside the fold) reflecting the seeping away of American power. The president of the planet’s “sole superpower” and his top diplomats and commanders have been denouncing Iran for months as the evil hand behind American disaster in Iraq as … Continue reading “America on the Downward Slope”

Escalation by the Numbers

Someday, we will undoubtedly discover that, in the term “surge” – as in the president’s “surge” plan (or “new way forward”) announced to the nation in January – was the urge to avoid the language (and experience) of the Vietnam era. As there were to be no “body bags” (or cameras to film them as … Continue reading “Escalation by the Numbers”

The Benchmarks That Matter

Under the headline, “A War We Just Might Win,” the New York Times on Monday published an op-ed by Michael O’Hanlon of the Brookings Institution and Kenneth Pollack, both referred to as critics of the way the Bush administration has “handled” the war in Iraq. (Pollack had, in fact, been a major cheerleader for the … Continue reading “The Benchmarks That Matter”

The Withdrawal Follies

Withdrawal is now so mainstream. Last week, debate about it led to a sleep-in protest in the Senate and, this week, it’s hit the cover of TIME Magazine, of which there’s no mainer-stream around. The TIME cover couldn’t be more graphic. The word “IRAQ” is in giant type, the “I,” “R,” and “Q” all black, … Continue reading “The Withdrawal Follies”

Agency of Rogues

The secret prison was set up on a secure U.S. naval base outside the U.S. and so beyond the slightest recourse to legal oversight. It was there that the CIA clandestinely brought its “suspects” to be interrogated, abused, and tortured. That description might indeed sound like Guantanamo 2002, but think again. According to New York … Continue reading “Agency of Rogues”