Ron Rosenbaum, journalist (the New York Observer, Slate.com), author, and one of the few liberals to sign on to the ill-fated Pajamas Media fiasco, is damned mad: Will all the pundits who relied on the discredited 2007 NIE on Iran now admit that they were wrong? That they bought into and kept citing, without any serious questioning, the now clearly politically … [Read More]

The latest message from Osama bin Laden—an audio recording posted on jihadist Websites—is truly scary. Not because he threatens us with death and destruction, though he does. Not because he vows that the 9/11 attacks were just the beginning, though this is strongly implied. And not because he’s the kind of guy who gives evil a bad name. Although few would … [Read More]

On September 11, 2001, nineteen hijackers, wielding nothing more lethal than box-cutters, commandeered four airliners, and turned them into lethal missiles, three of which managed to hit their targets—the World Trade Center and the Pentagon—while a fourth crashed in a field before it could strike its intended target—the White House. One of the hijackers had been in the United States since … [Read More]

I write these words on September 3, 2009, seventy years to the day since Britain and France declared war on Germany—an occasion observed, if not exactly celebrated by the leaders and opinion-makers of the West, as the beginning of “the good war.” The War Party just loves WWII because it’s the one war where all agree we had no choice but … [Read More]

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC), which usually concerns itself with “consumer protection” issues, is now taking an interest in the journalism industry. The financially strapped New York Times reports: “The commission is planning two days of workshops in December–titled From Town Criers to Bloggers: How Will Journalism Survive the Internet Age?”–to examine the state of the news industry.” This ominous development … [Read More]

In those heady days of 2003, when the War Party was really feeling its oats and the neocons, the “warbloggers,” and the television talking heads were triumphantly hailing the invasion of Iraq as an unqualified success, one Iraqi pretty much summed up the Arab response to the “liberation,” as reported by the New York Times: “In the giddy spirit of the … [Read More]

An American president is launching the most ambitious, the most expensive, and certainly the most dangerous military campaign since the Vietnam War—and the antiwar movement, such as it is, is missing in action. After a long and bloody campaign in Iraq and the election of a U.S. president pledged to get us out, our government is once again revving up its … [Read More]

In Britain, they’re getting antsy about Obama’s war – the “Af-Pak” [.pdf] war, that is. Without the poodle Tony Blair to cover for us, Britain’s ruling Labor Party – decisively smacked down in the recent elections to the European parliament – is grumbling about being stampeded by the United States into fighting another unpopular war. The House of Commons Foreign Affairs … [Read More]

The great foreign policy initiative unleashed by the Obama administration, the one that is supposed to earn our new president a place on Mount Rushmore, is a resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian question. This issue has bedeviled American presidents starting with Jimmy Carter and continuing through Bill Clinton, with interregnums marked by Republicans in the White House. Reagan never pushed the issue, … [Read More]

Have Israel and its supporters gone over the edge? As Israel defies the US on settlement policies and its continuing mistreatment of the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, a recent poll shows the American public is undergoing a significant shift in its historically pro-Israel views: According to the survey of 800 registered voters, which was conducted June 9-11 by … [Read More]