With the health care debate preoccupying the mainstream media, it has gone virtually unreported that the Barack Obama administration is quietly supporting renewal of provisions of the George W. Bush-era USA PATRIOT Act that civil libertarians say infringe on basic...
The U.S. government's decision to bring five high-profile terror suspects to the United States to face trials in a civilian court has drawn reactions ranging from praise to condemnation to confusion. While human rights advocates are generally applauding the decision...
This week begins with a significant new straw in the political wind for President Obama to consider. The California Democratic Party has just sent him a formal and clear message: Stop making war in Afghanistan. Overwhelmingly approved on Sunday by the California...
It's tough to tell what's going to happen with Af-Pak. We get so many conflicting reports. For a time, we heard that President Obama was leaning toward sending 30,000 additional troops there, and that Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of...
Who would have thought a year ago that most of the issues of conflict in America's foreign relations would be made worse during the first year following Barack Obama's election as U.S. president? Even those disputes or differences that were appeased or quiet a year...
Human rights advocates and legal scholars are voicing sharp criticism of President Barack Obama's revisions to the George W. Bush administration's Military Commissions Act of 2006, characterizing them as unnecessary and saying the new law will lead to further delays...
Mahmoud Abbas is fed up. Last week he withdrew his candidacy for the coming presidential election in the Palestinian Authority. I understand him. He feels betrayed. And the traitor is Barack Obama. A year ago, when Obama was elected, he aroused high hopes in the...
U.S. President Barack Obama's extraordinary efforts since his first days in office to reassure Muslims in the Greater Middle East about U.S. intentions in the region have suffered a series of setbacks that threaten to reverse whatever gains he has made over the past...
In the face of an outraged Arab world, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton backed off on her congratulation of Israel for merely pledging to limit settlement construction in the occupied West Bank. Previously, President Barack Obama, originally appearing to be much...
Our new counterinsurgency doctrine [.pdf] is obsolete before it has even been tried. If you have a high tolerance for asininity, go directly to the Web site of "President" Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan and feast your eyes on the litany of congratulations...
