By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – Donald Trump picked a fight with almost everyone but his buddy Vladimir Putin this weekend. His continued tweaking of China over its claims on Taiwan produced a sharp rebuke from Beijing. John Brennan, head of the CIA, pushed back against Trump’s branding of the agency as […]
In the Age of Trumpian Reaction, is MLK’s Legacy to the 99% being Reversed?
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – Reaction has two main meanings in English. One is to respond to some new situation (not specifying the nature of the reaction). The other is to resist some innovation. In this second sense, a reactionary is one who wants to go back to a previously existing […]
5 Images that refute Trump’s attack on Hero John Lewis
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – It began when Rep. John Lewis (D-GA) announced that he would not attend the inaugural of Donald J. Trump because he did not consider him a legitimate president. Lewis, sometimes called “the conscience of Congress,” emerged to prominence as a very young man in 1963-66 as […]
From Syria to Sanctions, Flynn-Russia Quid Pro Quo?
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – The headlines about Trump and his team on the one hand and the Russian Federation on the other are coming fast and furious. The items are often, however, merely isolated data points. Can we draw them together? First, while the Obama administration was imposing sanctions on […]
All the President’s Deniers
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – This week, we’ve seen a parade of Donald J. Trump’s far-right cabinet appointees attempting to tone themselves down (with help from pliant GOP senators) for the general public with half-truths and evasions. They were not challenged on some key issues. Rex Tillerson, CEO of ExxonMobil, didn’t […]
Trump does Poor imitation of Tin-Pot Dictator at “Press Conference”
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – In his first news conference in months, president-elect Donald J. Trump engaged in a series of petulant tirades. For anyone like myself, who has lived under dictators in the global South, his performance was unpleasantly reminiscent of their authoritarian publicity techniques. Instead of letting a wide […]
Informed Comment Fundraiser Success- with Profound thanks
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – Many, many thanks to everyone who contributed during the annual IC Fundraiser! I’m bowled over by your generosity, and pledge to keep Informed Comment at the cutting edge of analysis of both foreign and domestic policy! Am enclosing a photo I took last fall in Istanbul […]
For Russian hold on Trump, follow the Money, not the Sex tapes
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – Buzzfeed has published the unverified allegations by a former MI6 analyst with good Russian contacts, contained in a two-page hitherto secret annex to the US intelligence community’s report on Russian hacking and interference in the 2016 election. These two pages have circulated in Washington for months. […]
Welcome to Psychopathocracy
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – We are now on the brink of a new form of government, undreamed of by Aristotle, who spoke of monarchy, aristocracy and democracy. We are headed to a psychopathocracy, which has something in common with the degraded form of classical regime types that Aristotle warned against (he thought monarchy can […]
© 2025 All Rights Reserved