For the last several days, at least 6,000 US soldiers along with approximately 4,000 Iraqi soldiers (read: members of the Kurdish peshmerga and Shia Badr Army) were laying siege to the city of Tal Afar, near Mosul in northern Iraq. It is estimated that 90 percent of...
Remember Iraq
With all the attention being paid to the sorry aftermath of Hurricane Katrina most of the media, especially the 24/7 cable channels, don't seem to be able to focus on more than one story at a time, but perhaps we should be grateful that Natalee Holloway has...
The Imperial Delusion
Editor's note: Today's column is based on a speech delivered at Colorado College on Sept. 15, sponsored by the Robert and Janet Manning Endowed Fund for Political Science and the political science department. Why are we in Iraq? This question, I think, puzzles most...
Backtalk, September 16, 2005
Katrina and 9/11: Criminal IncompetenceThe incompetence was more learned behavior than criminal. Katrina exposed in New Orleans the effects of the evolution of the American mindset from rugged independence by local communities to a sense of dependency entitlement on...
America Has Fallen to a Jacobin Coup
The most important casualties of Sept. 11 are respect for truth and American liberty. Propaganda has replaced deliberation based on objective assessment of fact. The resurrection of the Star Chamber has made moot the legal protections of liberty. The U.S. invasion of...
The United Gates of America
Glimpse through the commentary pages of American newspapers and you are bound to run into a headline comparing the mess in American-occupied Iraq to the chaos in hurricane-devastated Louisiana. In fact, forget about the op-eds bashing the Bush administration and watch...
Covers for Peace
On the whole, I've been surprised and disappointed by the lack of well-known musicians stepping up to the microphone and singing out for peace lately, especially considering the resurgence of folk and Americana styles and artists (the traditional harbingers of "music...
Why This Soldier Can’t Support This War
I was a captain with the 2nd Battalion 4th Field Artillery during the invasion of Iraq. My active duty commitment to the military ended in May 2004. In January 2003, I requested a transfer to this battalion to fill an officer vacancy because it was the first battalion...
Next Stop: Syria
The pressure on Syria is being increased, and I wouldn't be at all surprised to see a "border incident" involving a shoot-out between Syrian and American troops. We may be in for a new Tonkin Gulf, leading to an extension of our "liberatory" efforts in the Middle...
Beyond the ‘Vietnam Syndrome’
"The specter of Vietnam has been buried forever in the desert sands of the Arabian peninsula," President George H. W. Bush said of the Gulf War victory in early 1991. He told a gathering of state legislators, "It's a proud day for America and, by...


