National Security State

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) — President Barack Obama’s State of the Union Address slighted foreign policy in favor of touting domestic progress and proposing new domestic initiatives. But there were some foreign policy highlights worth underlining. 1. Obama pushed back hard against hawks like Senator John McCain, who want to ramp up a […]

Barack Obama

Obama wants new Mil. Authority, but Special Ops already on Missions in 105 Countries in 2015

contributors

By Nick Turse | (Tomdispatch.com) — In the dead of night, they swept in aboard V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft. Landing in a remote region of one of the most volatile countries on the planet, they raided a village and soon found themselves in a life-or-death firefight. It was the second time in two weeks that […]

Militarization

How the US Nat’l Security State goes on Failing Upward

contributors

By Tom Engelhardt | (Tomdispatch.com) As 2015 begins, let’s take a trip down memory lane. Imagine that it’s January 1963. For the last three years, the United States has unsuccessfully faced off against a small island in the Caribbean, where a revolutionary named Fidel Castro seized power from a corrupt but U.S.-friendly regime run by […]

National Security State

National Shame: 50,000 Homeless Veterans Nationwide

contributors

ABC News | — “ABC News’ Bob Woodruff travels the country examining new efforts end homelessness among US veterans.” ABC News: “50,000 Homeless Veterans Nationwide” Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America’s website for donations can be found here.

African-Americans

The Other Torture Report: What the USA looks like to the World

Rebecca Gordon

(special to Informed Comment) — At long last – despite the attempts at sabotage by, and over the protests of the CIA, and notwithstanding the dilatory efforts of the State Department – the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence has finally issued the executive summary of its 6,300-page report on the CIA’s detention and interrogation program. […]

Iraq

How the Iraq Wars began with the Invasion of Panama

contributors

By Greg Grandin | (Tomdispatch.com) — As we end another year of endless war in Washington, it might be the perfect time to reflect on the War That Started All Wars — or at least the war that started all of Washington’s post-Cold War wars: the invasion of Panama. Twenty-five years ago this month, early […]

Central Intelligence Agency

Torture, Assassination and the Other Shoe: The Coming Great Senate Drone Report of 2019

contributors

By Tom Engelhardt | (Tomdispatch.com) | — It was December 6, 2019, three years into a sagging Clinton presidency and a bitterly divided Congress. That day, the 500-page executive summary of the Senate Intelligence Committee’s long fought-over, much-delayed, heavily redacted report on the secret CIA drone wars and other American air campaigns in the 18-year-long […]

Bill of Rights

“President Authorized Torture Techniques”: Cheney and Rove throw Bush under the Bus

contributors

Cenk Uygur “The Young Turks” | — “”Former President George W. Bush knew about and authorized the CIA’s use of harsh interrogation techniques, such as waterboarding, sleep deprivation and other controversial tactics, according to Karl Rove, Bush’s former top political adviser. A report released last week by the Senate Intelligence Committee asserted that Bush was […]

Bill of Rights

3 Ways the Mainstream Media let the Gov’t off the Hook on Torture

contributors

By Rebecca Gordon | (Tomdispatch.com — American Torture — Past, Present, and… Future? Beyond the Senate Torture Report By Rebecca Gordon It’s the political story of the week in Washington. At long last, after the endless stalling and foot-shuffling, the arguments about redaction and CIA computer hacking, the claims that its release might stoke others […]