By Juan Cole The world has been treated to a whole series of “elections” in the Middle East recently. Iraq had parliamentary elections, Libya’s parliament voted for a new prime minister, and Egypt and Syria had presidential elections. This summer, Turkey will have elections. It would be nice if all these elections signaled a turn […]
How Reagan subverted the meaning of D-Day & the New Deal of the Greatest Generation
The following is an excerpt from Harvey J. Kaye’s The Fight for the Four Freedoms: What Made FDR and the Greatest Generation Truly Great (Simon & Schuster, 2014). On June 6, 1984, President Ronald Reagan went to Normandy, France, to speak at events…
Harvard confirms antique book is bound in human skin
Harvard University scientists have confirmed that a 19th century French treatise in its libraries is bound in human skin, Harvard University said this week, after a bevvy of scientific testing. Arsene Houssaye’s “Des destinees de l’ame” (On the destiny…
“In your Wild Dreams, what are you Looking for?” Rubaiyat of Jalalu’d-Din Rumi
Courtesy Anthony A. Lee, here are four poems from his and the late Amin Banani’s translation of the quatrains of the great Sufi mystic Mevlana Jalalu’d-Din Rumi: Jalalu’d-Din Rumi, 53 Secrets from the Tavern of Love: Poems from the Rubaiyat of Mevlana Rumi, Translated by Amin Banani and Anthony Lee (White Cloud Press, 2014) Truth […]
Georgia Courthouse is shot up by Sovereign Citizen after GOP backs Bundy, Open Carry
By Juan Cole That didn’t take long. The Georgia GOP rushed into law an ‘open carry’ provision in April allowing people to tote around guns in bars and churches (apparently these are felt to be complementary institutions in Georgia) and schools (these are apparently felt to be full of expendable if short people in Georgia). […]
On D-Day: Remembering the Muslim Troops who Fought the Axis
By Juan Cole One of the frustrations for a world historian is the unyieldingly parochial vision of the North Atlantic common among journalists and even many historians, and consequently among the public. The 17 world leaders gathering for the D-Day commemoration should by all rights include Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, Indian Prime Minister Narendra […]
Facial Hair, Patriotism and the Enemy in American History
By Juan Cole Media Matters for America put together a collage of Fox Cable News commentators smearing the father of Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl as having a Taliban-like beard and maybe even being a Taliban sympathizer. Thanks to MM4A for the Laura Ingram clip in which she says that if he weren’t so light-skinned he could […]
Is the Prisoner Swap Hysteria a sign of GOP War withdrawal Symptoms?
By Juan Cole The United States has been continually at war since October of 2001. In many of the succeeding years, until Dec. 31 2011, The US was at war in both Iraq and and in Afghanistan. Wars fulfill multiple functions for the US elite. They justify vast expenditures that benefit the political clients of […]
Faced w/ Global Warming Threat, Obama fudges EPA Carbon Reduction
By Juan Cole President Obama’s decision to unleash the Environmental Protection Agency on US carbon dioxide emitters is a sea change in environmental policy and is extremely welcome to any who care about the planet. But its real significance does not lie in the targets for carbon dioxide reduction Obama has set. Those are way […]
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