* Jersey Boys. Brian Douglas Williams and Jonathan Stuart Leibowitz both went to high school in New Jersey and held common, low-level jobs before working their way to the top of their respective, and interrelated, professions. * “Finally someone is being held to...
iraq war
In Defense of Brian Williams, New Orleans’ Loyal Friend
Now He Really Is Under Fire The veracity of the leading network news anchor, Brian Williams of NBC Nightly News, is in question—by his own fault—and now the sharks and wolves smell blood. A feeding frenzy ensues. [ cross-posted at Daily Kos ] Williams has...
Obama Has Plans for ISIS; Now Congress Must Vote
The Guns of August, September, October . . . Our objective is clear: We will degrade, and ultimately destroy, ISIL through a comprehensive and sustained counterterrorism strategy. —Statement by the President on ISIL, Sept. 10, 2014 * Happy 9/11, everyone, on the...
Obama Sends Troops to Protect U.S. Embassy in Baghdad
ISIS supporters rally in Mosul, Iraq. BBC photo. * White House Considers Special Forces to Advise Iraqis; Smells Like “Early Vietnam” Again “The United States has provided a $14 billion foreign military aid package to Iraq that includes F-16 fighter jets, Apache...
How Many U.S. Soldiers Were Wounded in Iraq?
500,000 vets may suffer from PTSD, depression, or traumatic brain injury Dan Froomkin, senior Washington correspondent for Huffington Post, reports at Nieman Watchdog that the Pentagon’s figure of 32,226 wounded seriously undercounts the true casualty rate. Possibly...
As “End” of Iraq War Is Announced, U.S. Digs In, Warns Iran
* [ cross-posted @ Daily Kos ] * “In August [2002] a British official close to the Bush team told Newsweek: ‘Everyone wants to go to Baghdad. Real men want to go to Tehran.’ ” —Paul Krugman, “Things to Come,” March 18, 2003 * Where’s That “Mission Accomplished”...
Ten Years of U.S. War in Afghanistan
“While post-9/11 veterans are more supportive than the general public, just one-third (34%) say that, given the costs and benefits to the U.S., the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have both been worth fighting.” —Pew Research Center, “War and Sacrifice in the Post-9/11...
10th Year of Afghan War Begins
America Slogs On, “Dead or Alive” Briefly, sadly noted: Today, October 7, 2010, begins the tenth year of the U.S. war in Afghanistan. How’s that hunt for Osama bin Laden going? How’s that expansion into Pakistan going? How much taxpayer-supplied money has the U.S....
Is Katrina More Significant Than September 11?
Thoughts on Two American Traumas [ Cross-posted at Daily Kos. ] Between 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina, which do you think gets most attention, and why? What if the national focus on 9/11 is exaggerated and the nation should focus instead on 8/29—Hurricane Katrina—as the...
As Combat Troops Leave Iraq, Where’s Our National Security?
Out of Iraq, on to Afghanistan The last combat troops have left Iraq, as a convoy of the 4th Stryker Brigade rumbled in the wee hours of August 19, 2010, from Iraq toward U.S. bases in Kuwait. At the end of August, Operation Iraqi Freedom will end and 50,000 advisory...
Declare Independence from Endless War
“A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death.” —Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., “Declaration of Independence from the War in Vietnam,” Riverside Church, New York City,...
Tax Day: How Much Have You Paid for the War?
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HTPKxjgw5N4&feature=player_embedded Most likely you’ve paid $7,334 of the $1.05 trillion that has gone to the Afghan and Iraq wars since 2001. Here is Tom Englehardt’s compelling introduction at TomDispatch.com to a piece (below the...
“Kill the Bill” vs. “Stop the War”: A Tale of Two Protests
[cross-posted at Daily Kos] Has anyone besides us found it kind of odd that there’s been so much “fire and brimstone” about the health care reform bill compared to Bush’s Iraq War? The first thing we’ll say about the violence and threats following Congress’s passage...
Video Shows U.S. Killing of Reuters Employees in Baghdad
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RO9Cu91g3JI&playnext_from=TL&videos=WBaohbkRpJs&feature=rec-LGOUT-exp_fresh%2Bdiv-1r-4-HM WikiLeaks.org has released a formerly classified U.S. military video that shows the view from an Apache helicopter gunship as U.S....
Deeper into Afghanistan: 360 Degrees of Damnation
“we must rebuild our strength here at home . . . . the nation that I’m most interested in building is our own.” —President Obama, Dec. 1, 2009 We wanted to take time to try to make sense of President Obama’s speech at West Point last week in which he announced his...
Roll Up Sleeves, Pick Up Phone
All week we’ve been wondering Where are the f—ing Senate Democrats?! It’s as though the camera hogs have turned into groundhogs, frightened of their shadows, leaving Obama to do all the heavy lifting on the American Recovery and Investment Plan, better known as The Stimulus.
Get in Barack’s Face @ my.barackobama.com: Hold Firm on Iraq Withdrawal
We are confident that despite the media reports and rumors that Barack Obama is thinking of ‘refining’ his plan to end the war in Iraq, this does not mean he is retreating from his commitment. People are asking if Obama is backpedaling to the center, willing to relax his positions to win votes. (Arianna Huffington details “Seven Things Barack Obama Should Do to Keep from Blowing It” in a recent post on Huffington Post.) Incredibly, yet predictably, the McCain campaign claims that Obama is now coming around to McCain’s position on the war. Not bloody likely. The Republicans want to blur distinctions, but the candidates’ positions are starkly different.
Omigod! Infinite Iraqi Freedom! We’re Never Leaving!
As reported in The Guardian (UK), which has seen a confidential draft agreement covering the future of U.S. forces in Iraq, the U.S. has plans for an indefinite stay there. The agreement is intended to replace the existing UN mandate and authorizes the U.S. “conduct military operations in Iraq and to detain individuals when necessary for imperative reasons of security” without a time limit.
In Honor of the Dead
Four thousand and counting. And the Bush administration plans to maintain troop levels at their current numbers. To pull out now, they tell us, would dishonor the sacrifice of those who have already fallen.
Omigod! Operation Iraqi Freedom Isn’t Free!
As we reported in “Let the Eagle Soar” below, the Congressional Budget Office released a report Oct. 24 estimating that the total expenditures for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan could cost over $2.4 trillion over the next ten years—or $8,000 for every man, woman and child in the U.S. We hear often enough that “freedom isn’t free,” but we’re not sure we’re getting our money’s worth—especially when so many important priorities are neglected here at home.