Leon Hadar

The best thing you can say about Vice President Dick Cheney’s recent "hunting incident" is that, to the relief of members of his family, Cheney didn’t shoot himself in the foot. Unfortunately, you cannot say the same thing about the policies that officials in Washington and Jerusalem seem to be devising these days as part … Continue reading “A Perfect Geopolitical Storm Taking Shape”

One of the best television commercials I have seen in a while comes from Sprint promoting its “Fair & Flexible Plan” for cell phones. We see a pompous business executive discussing the Sprint plan and then telling his assistant that joining the plan is his way of “sticking it to the Man.” The assistant is … Continue reading “Guess Who’s Sticking It
to the Man?”

In a new film, Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World, comedian Albert Brooks is dispatched to South Asia by humorless Bush administration officials to look for, well, comedy in the Muslim world. Trying to cope with the depressing reality of a post-Sept. 11 world in which Americans now occupy some parts of an angry … Continue reading “Democracy Not an Export Item”

I was watching U.S. President George W. Bush during a live televised press conference as he was trying to give his interpretation of the victory of the radical Hamas movement in the Palestinian elections. And I was feeling kind of embarrassed for my president as he was making an effort to communicate to the world … Continue reading “Who Says Things Are Going Awry?”

Americans overwhelmingly lack confidence that Iraq will have a stable government in place within the next year, and more than half say that the war has not been worth its cost, according to a recent CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll. Fewer than one in five, or about 19 percent, of the 1,003 adults quizzed said they believe … Continue reading “Iraq: The End Is Not Near”

If you’ve been listening to the recent "democracy is the way to go" sermons by President George W. Bush and his advisers, you’ll have to conclude that embracing "democracy" – a concept that is open to different interpretations – is the cure for most of humanity’s ills, ranging from political violence and economic underdevelopment to … Continue reading “Guess What? Democracies Are Not Always Peaceful”

Washington’s Middle East project received another blow last week after Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon suffered a severe stroke. It is unlikely that the former Israeli general will be able to return to active political life. This means that U.S. President George W. Bush and his aides will find it even more difficult to juggle … Continue reading “Sharon’s Stroke a Blow to Bush’s Mideast Spin”

I‘ve been embarrassed a few times in the past with my predictions (for example, that it was going to be U.S. President John Kerry in 2004), but I’ve also been right on a few occasions (for example, my book, Quagmire: America in the Middle East, was published in 1992). So let me put my credibility … Continue reading “US Headed for Confrontation With Iran”

For several months – actually, since the U.S. invasion of Iraq – neoconservative propagandists have been trying to counter-spin the depressing reality in Mesopotamia that we’ve been watching on television by celebrating several "tipping points" that were supposed to mark the victory of freedom in Baghdad: The bringing down of Saddam Hussein’s statue in Baghdad; … Continue reading “Turning the Corner in Iraq – Yet Again”

Dreams "are chief nourishers in life’s feast," wrote Shakespeare in Macbeth. Indeed, while dreams offer a private means to explore inner reality and to gain unique, undeniable, personal experiences, psychologists also recognize that there is overwhelming evidence that dreams can be used to improve waking life, often immeasurably as storehouses of creativity. Many people often … Continue reading “Bush’s ‘Lucid Dreams’ Becoming Nightmares”