Jim Lobe

In the old Hollywood westerns, the white settlers circle the wagons to defend themselves against attacks by the Indians until the U.S. Cavalry can arrive to rescue them and chase off their assailants. But in Washington over the last few days it seems that the Cavalry has joined the Indians. US President George W. Bush, … Continue reading “Bush Circles Wagons, But Cavalry Has Joined the Indians”

To understand the impact in the United States of the photos of U.S. military personnel abusing Iraqi prisoners, it is necessary to recall what then-Secretary of State Elihu Root said in 1899, as the country first emerged as a global power in the Spanish-American War. The American soldier, he said, is “different from all other … Continue reading “Perhaps Not So Exceptional After All”

Six months before an election in which the state of Florida may again play a decisive role, U.S. President George W Bush on Thursday announced new measures to tighten the 44-year-old US embargo on Cuba and hasten what he called “democratic change” on the Caribbean island. Most of the measures, which were urged by an … Continue reading “Bush Tightens Cuba Embargo”

With the scandal over the abuse of prisoners in U.S. military custody in Iraq still growing, the administration of President George W. Bush appears to be shaken to its very core. While the immediate question is whether Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld could be sufficiently persuasive in Congressional testimony scheduled Friday to survive the fast-spreading calls … Continue reading “Rummy on the Rocks”

Some 60 former U.S. diplomats and other government officials who served overseas have signed a letter to President George W Bush protesting his support for the Israeli government’s position in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The letter was inspired by a similar protest signed by 52 former British ambassadors and senior government officials and sent to Prime … Continue reading “60 Ex-Diplomats Protest Bush’s Alignment with Sharon”

More than two dozen journalists have been killed in Iraq since last year’s launch of the U.S.-led invasion, making the Middle Eastern nation the world’s most dangerous journalist assignment by far, according to the New York-based watchdog, Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). Iraq thus ranked number one among the Ten World’s Worst Places to Be … Continue reading “Iraq is World’s Most Dangerous Journalistic Assignment”

When in 1970 Life magazine published photos taken by Senator Tom Harkin, then a lowly congressional aide, of the infamous “tiger cages” in which suspected Viet Cong men, women and even children were kept secretly – and crippled – by the U.S.-run South Vietnamese prison system, it was another nail in the coffin of a … Continue reading “From Fallujah to Photos, One Fiasco After Another”

The tiny Martha’s Vineyard hamlet of Tisbury, Massachusetts, this week became the 300th local or state government to denounce the USA Patriot Act, even as President George W. Bush was campaigning for Congress to make the Act permanent before its expiration next year. Tinsbury’s voters Tuesday joined New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago – the … Continue reading “300 Local Governments Slam PATRIOT Act”

John Negroponte, the Bush administration’s nominee to become Washington’s first ambassador to Iraq since last year’s invasion, was talking about how much “sovereignty” the country’s new government will enjoy after Jun. 30, when U.S. military forces will remain in control of security. “When it comes to issues like (the siege of) Fallujah,” said Negroponte, currently … Continue reading “Congress Ignores ‘Dirty War’ Past of New Iraq Envoy”

One year after President George W Bush declared the end of major combat in Iraq, the United States appears to be teetering on the brink of strategic defeat in its Mesopotamian adventure. Even as Bush on Friday reiterated his ambition to bring “freedom and democracy” to Iraq and the Middle East, a series of recent … Continue reading “US On the Brink Over Iraq”