Part 1 of my presentation on the Arab Spring at the 2012 American Historical Association conference in Chicago. Thanks to Roger Owen and the National History Centerfor the kind invitation, and to respondents Leila Fawaz, Carolyn Eisenberg, and David Moburg. And to Rick Schenkman and the History News Network for the recording.
Ahmadinejad in Latin America
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has begun a four-nation tour in Latin America that will include Nicaragua, Cuba, Venezuela and Ecuador. In part, the trip is for propaganda purposes. With the European Union joining in an Israeli-inspired US boycott of Iran’s Central Bank, which in essence translates into a boycott of buying Iranian petroleum, Tehran is […]
Omar Khayyam (3)
This world that was our home for a brief spell never brought us anything but pain and grief; its a shame that not one of our problems was ever solved. We depart with a thousand regrets in our hearts. ___ For the life and thought of the Iranian humanist, Omar Khayyam, see the Stanford Encyclopedia […]
Tomgram: Thomas Frank, Why the Tea Party Needs Mitt
Still, my advice to you idealists of the right is this: get over it. Not for sell-out reasons like: Romney has the best chance of beating Obama. No. You should get behind the charging Massachusetts RINO (your favorite term for a Republican-In-Na…
Dear Republican Candidates, You Have us all Wrong
Dear Republican candidates: You are campaigning on talking points that do not actually appeal to us. Why are you doing that? Who told you we want these things? Dear Rick Perry: We don’t want our troops in Iraq. We don’t think President Obama was too quick to get them out. We think he was too […]
Omar Khayyam (2) [Whinfield 1]
At dawn a shout awoke us in that watering hole… you crazed carousing drunk! Get up and grab that bottle let’s finish what we started before fate starts to finish us. Trans Juan Cole from Whinfield 1 (Khayyam uses a lot of bawdy language, which embarrassed the Victorians. I think it sounds contemporary, like a […]
Why the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood’s Victory at the Polls May not be Decisive
The Muslim Brotherhood received a little over a third of the votes in the third round of elections for the lower house of parliament. Since the fundamentealist Nur (Light) Party, backed by the Salafis, also did well, Muslim religious parties will have a majority in the new parliament. There are four reasons for which this […]
World’s Stupidest Guerrillas Kill over 70 Shiite Pilgrims in Iraq
Guerrillas in Iraq staged a serious of bloody bombings targeting Shiites on Thursday. Shiite Muslims are on the move, meeting and going on pilgrimage to commemorate the 40th day after the anniversary of the martyrdom of Imam Husayn, the grandson of the Prophet Muhammad. He was struck down by imperial Umayyad armies in 680 at […]
Jahanpour: As US and Iran Confront Each other, where is the Diplomacy?
Dr. Farhang Jahanpour writes in a guest column for Informed Comment : The war of words between Iran and the West has reached dangerous proportions, and it may easily get out of hand. It is clear that the majority of people in the West and in Iran do not wish the hostilities to develop into […]
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