Jonathan Steele
Experts confirm that Iran’s president did not call for Israel to be ‘wiped off the map’. Reports that he did serve to strengthen western hawks.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2006/jun/14/post155 (more…)
http://www.slate.com/id/2194695/entry/2194697/
The 1988 race for the White House was the last campaign of the Cold War. By the time Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis and Vice President George H.W. Bush emerged in midspring as their parties’ nominees, Mikhail Gorbachev had begun his historic reforms, and the superpowers had signed a landmark arms-reduction deal. Still, the Berlin Wall and the Soviet Union remained intact, and the Democrats remained afraid of being tarred as squishy-soft. So when the Republicans met in New Orleans in August for their convention, with Dukakis far ahead in the polls, they set out—in the manner of many previous GOP campaigns—to paint their adversary as weak on defense and suspect in his devotion to country. (more…)
This article appeared in the July 7, 2008 edition of The Nation.
As the pain induced by higher oil prices spreads to an ever growing share of the American (and world) population, pundits and politicians have been quick to blame assorted villains–greedy oil companies, heartless commodity speculators and OPEC. It’s true that each of these parties has contributed to and benefited from the steep run-up. But the sharp growth in petroleum costs is due far more to a combination of soaring international demand and slackening supply–compounded by the ruinous policies of the Bush Administration–than to the behavior of those other actors. (more…)
Operations outside the knowledge and control of commanders have eroded “the coherence of military strategy,” one general says.
L ate last year, Congress agreed to a request from President Bush to fund a major escalation of covert operations against Iran, according to current and former military, intelligence, and congressional sources. These operations, for which the President sought up to four hundred million dollars, were described in a Presidential Finding signed by Bush, and are designed to destabilize the country’s religious leadership. The covert activities involve support of the minority Ahwazi Arab and Baluchi groups and other dissident organizations. They also include gathering intelligence about Iran’s suspected nuclear-weapons program. (more…)
WASHINGTON (AP) — Silent on central questions of gun control for two centuries, the Supreme Court found its voice Thursday in a decision affirming the right to have guns for self-defense in the home and addressing a constitutional riddle almost as old as the republic over what it means to say the people may keep and bear arms.
