I see innumerable news articles detailing the latest revelations from Edward Snowden, and a blizzard of pieces calling for leniency or a pardon for the world’s most famous whistleblower – but in the comments sections, including of my own columns on the subject, I find...
Special Ops Goes Global
Originally posted at TomDispatch. It’s said that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. So consider the actions of the U.S. Special Operations Command flattering indeed to the larger U.S. military. After all, over recent decades the Pentagon has done...
Clashes, Bombs, Shootings in Iraq: 96 Killed, 98 Wounded
U.S. Watching Fallujah From Sidelines
Somewhere around various parts of the world, reassigned US military commanders must be shaking their heads at the events overtaking Fallujah, Iraq. Few cities outside Baghdad gave coalition forces more headaches during the war's rollout: controversial shootings...
War in Afghanistan: The Jig Is Up
The last several years of US operations in Afghanistan have been an exercise in mondo message management. If it were a sport, it would be the highlight of the ESPN X Games. Between Afghanistan and the "war of perception" in Iraq, students of so-called...
The West’s Mistakes
Goodies against baddies; democratic pro-Europeans against authoritarian pro-Russians; colored revolutions being the forerunners of Arab springs, Ukrainian, Georgian, and Kyrgyz demonstrators craving freedom, just like Iraqi, Syrian, and Lebanese demonstrators. These...
Attacks Across Iraq Leave 45 Dead, 78 Wounded
Iraq: The ‘Liberation’ Neocons Would Rather Forget
Remember Fallujah? Shortly after the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the US military fired on unarmed protestors, killing as many as 20 and wounding dozens. In retaliation, local Iraqis attacked a convoy of US military contractors, killing four. The US then launched a full...
The Fight of Our Lives
The idea that this country is on a fast track to fascism was never taken very seriously by Americans, and for a very good reason: we have a Constitution that, whatever problems we’ve had living up to it, has generally been a bulwark against the imposition of anything...
American Jihad 2014
Originally posted at TomDispatch. In a 1950s civics textbook of mine, I can remember a Martian landing on Main Street, U.S.A., to be instructed in the glories of our political system. You know, our tripartite government, checks and balances, miraculous set of rights,...


