The confirmation hearing in the Senate for Chuck Hagel, President Obama’s nominee for Secretary of Defense, was painful to watch because it displayed the tomfoolery, pretense, self-righteous know-nothingism, and embarrassing lack of contact with reality that dominate the landscape of America’s broken democracy. It was like watching a Nebraska ordinary Joe set upon by circus […]
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Iran
Obama’s Inaugural and the Danger of an Iran War
President Obama addressed the big issues of war and peace in his inaugural address, and despite the vagueness of some of his pronouncements, they contain strong clues to his foreign policy agenda in the Middle East. His announced policy will be one of ending US military engagements abroad, multilateral cooperation with allies to face security […]
President Obama needs to get us Out of Iran, too– not Just Iraq (Escobar)
Pepe Escobar writes at Tomdispatch.com: Let’s start with the obvious but important: on entering the Oval Office in January 2009, President Obama inherited a seemingly impregnable three-decade-long “Wall of Mistrust” in Iran-U.S. relations. To his credit, that March he directly addressed all Iranians in a message for Nowruz, the Iranian New Year, calling for an […]
Iran Sanctions may be ‘Crippling,’ but they are not ‘Working’ (Cher)
Ladan Cher writes in a guest column for Informed Comment On Iran and sanctions, a necessary clarification: “Crippling” is not synonymous for “working” In the tug-of-war between Iran and the United States, sanctions remain the Hail Mary approach to an ever-present picture in international politics: a nation wants to avoid military force but needs to […]
Candidate for CIA Chief Jane Harman Advocated Ethnic Breakup of Iran
CNN lists former California representative Jane Harman, now head of the Wilson Center in Washington, D.C., as a potential successor to Gen. David Petraeus as head of the Central Intelligence Agency. This idea is a very, very bad one. Harman is an Iran hawk who would be perfectly happy to give Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin […]
The Tesla S and World Peace: Can American Green Energy End the Gulf Oil Wars?
Petroleum makes the world go round, with 70% of it used to power automobiles. About a fifth of the world’s 90 million barrels a day of oil production comes out of the Persian Gulf/ Arabian Gulf. A large part of the US stand-off with Iran has to do with petroleum. The US doesn’t want a […]
Drone, Sanctions affecting Medicine, Intensify US-Iran Tensions
Among President Obama’s first decisions after his reelection was to further increase already severe sanctions on Iran. Just before that, Iran shot at a US drone it claims was spying on Iranian vessels in the Gulf. Russia Today reports: Obama’s sanctions regime, it is argued, is already damaging Iranian public health. Medicines are not getting […]
Romney: “Cry Havoc and Let Slip the Dogs of Iran War” (Goulka)
Jeremiah Goulka writes at Tomdispatch: The Dogs of War Are Barking: Mitt Romney’s Team Wants to Let ‘Em Loose in Iran It’s the consensus among the pundits: foreign policy doesn’t matter in this presidential election. They point to the ways Republican candidate Mitt Romney has more or less parroted President Barack Obama on just about […]
Iran still Suffers from the illegal Diplomatic Hostage-Taking of 1979 (Azad)
Armin Azad writes in a guest column for Informed Comment For more than three decades, there has been a government-organized demonstration in front of the former US Embassy in Tehran on November 4, though this year the rally was held early. The crowd gathers there to mark the anniversary of the militant Islamic students’ seizure […]
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