Subjects Archives: War

  • Gaza: Live from the Freedom Flotilla

      Update “Israel Attacks Turkish Free Gaza Ship: 16 Killed, According to Israeli Army Radio.” For more information, visit <www.ihh.org.tr>, <www.witnessgaza.com>, and <www.freegaza.org>. | Print  

  • Only 2 Dems against $60B for AfPak War

    The vote to send another $60B of taxpayers’ money to pay for Obama’s AfPak occupation was 67-28-5.  But almost all the no votes were conservative Republicans.  Only two Democrats, Feingold (WI) and Wyden (OR), voted against.  Three Republicans and Lincoln (AR) and McCaskill (MO) did not vote. To their shame, the other 15 Dems and […]

  • Obama Steps Up America’s Covert War against Iran

    When, in an Op Ed published in the New York Times in May 2009, we first criticized President Obama’s early decision to continue covert anti-Iranian programs he inherited from George W. Bush, some expressed disbelief that Obama would undermine his own rhetoric about engaging Tehran in a climate of mutual respect by conducting a dirty […]

  • India: This War Can’t Be Won by Mines and Bullets

    Whether Operation Green Hunt actually exists or is, as P. Chidambaram insists, a figment of the media’s imagination, Monday’s deadly Maoist attack on a bus in Dantewada suggests it is the hunted that are doing most of the hunting. Over the past six weeks, the Maoists in Chhattisgarh have killed more than 90 policemen or […]

  • Thailand: On the Brink of Civil War

    UDD Leadership Statement, 16:13 Bangkok Time, 14 May 2010: 1.  The government must stop the use of force, cease fire, and immediately withdraw troops back to barracks.  The government must end the state of emergency which has been an excuse to kill citizens. 2.  Parliament should be dissolved immediately, and Abhisit and Deputy Sutep must […]

  • What I Like Most about War

    What I like most about war is its budget. Tomás Rafael Rodríguez Zayas (Tomy) is a Cuban cartoonist. This cartoon was first published by Granma.  Translation by Yoshie Furuhashi (@yoshiefuruhashi | yoshie.furuhashi [at] gmail.com).  | Print

  • Mexico: A New Slogan for the Drug War

      New Slogan Federal Government: So that drugs won’t get to your children . . . WE ARE KILLING THEM FOR YOU. José Hernández is a Mexican cartoonist.  This cartoon — drawn on 23 March 2010 in response to Felipe Calderón’s war on drugs, especially the deaths of Juárezyouth and Monterrey Tec students as its […]

  • About The War Before

    In 1968, Safiya Bukhari witnessed an NYPD officer harassing a Black Panther for selling the organization’s newspaper on a Harlem street corner.  The young pre-med student felt compelled to intervene in defense of the Panther’s First Amendment right; she ended up handcuffed and thrown into the back of a police car.  The War Before traces […]

  • Why Are the US and Israel Threatening Iran? And Who Really Rules the World?

      Barack Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2009 while at the same time sending more troops to the Afghanistan War.  What has become of the promise of “change”? I am one of the few who are not disillusioned, because I had no expectations.  I had written about Obama’s positions and prospects even before […]

  • Sustained Downward Pressure on House Prices

    The Census Bureau reported on Monday that the vacancy rate edged up to 11.0 percent of all housing units in the first quarter of 2010, slightly above the year-round average of 10.9 percent for 2009.  The data showed a slight decline of 0.1 percentage points in the vacancy rate for ownership units compared with the […]

  • The Insanities of Our Era

    THERE is no alternative but to call things by their name. Anyone with minimal commonsense can observe without much effort how little realism remains in the current world. When United States President Barack Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, Michael Moore stated “Now please earn it!” That witty comment pleased a lot of people […]

  • An Open Letter of Reconciliation and Responsibility to the Iraqi People

      Two former soldiers from the Army unit responsible for the Wikileaks “Collateral Murder” incident have written an open letter of “Reconciliation and Responsibility” to those injured in the July 2007 attack, in which US forces wounded two children and killed over a dozen people, including the father of those children and two Reuters employees.  […]

  • Haiti: There Is Aid, and Then There Is US Aid

      EARTHQUAKE IN HAITI Soldiers Health Professionals Victims Assisted United States 10,000 550 871 Cuba 0 1,504 227,143 Source: Comparative figures of contribution to health in Haiti, as of 23 March 2010, based on Emily J. Kirk and John Kirk, “Cuban Medical Aid to Haiti” (CounterPunch, 1 April 2010) / Emily J. Kirk and John […]

  • Our Summer in Tehran

      (Phone Message) “Hey, Justine, I just wanted to say, ‘Come back safely.’” May 16, 2007.  Tomorrow morning, my son and I leave for Iran. (Phone Message) “Hi, Justine, I want you to be careful and maybe not mention to people that you’re Jewish.” (In-flight Announcement) “. . . We do ask you to respect […]

  • Civil Warfare in Central India

      Maoist guerrilla attack kills 75 security personnel in Dantewada, in the indigenous homelands of Central India.  Are security personnel cannon fodder in the ‘Maoist infested’ heartland of India?  Should the state send in the Air Force?  But what about collateral damage?  These are some of the loud speculations in the never-fail-to-miss-the-point mainstream media, the […]

  • The Afghanistan Paradox: Evaluating Prospects for a New Antiwar Movement

    The antiwar movement is all but dead and buried.  Turnout at the March 20th, 7th year anniversary of the Iraq invasion in Washington D.C. was pitiful, estimated at approximately ten thousand.  To make matters worse, approval of the war in Afghanistan has not fallen, but slightly increased in the last few months as U.S. marines […]

  • The United States, Iran, and the Middle East’s New “Cold War”

    The absence of US-Iranian rapprochement will perpetuate the new Middle Eastern Cold War, imposing costs on the United States, Iran and other regional and international players.  However, in strategic terms, the heaviest costs of continued US-Iranian estrangement are likely to be borne by the United States.  In particular, lack of productive relations with Tehran will […]

  • Ask Ms. Liberty: Advice for the Lovelorn and the War-Torn

    In today’s column, our Statue of Liberty once again gasses up her torch to answer two timely letters: Dear Green Lady, I am a gay soldier, trying to have safe sex at an air force base in Nevada.  It is really rough here with that Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy and all.  Also I got […]

  • A Cloward-Piven Strategy for Single Payer?

    With the passage in the House of the Obama administration’s health care reform bill, it would seem at first glance that the movement for national, single-payer health insurance has been seriously derailed.  After all, if all of the hype and adulation surrounding the bill’s passage is to be believed, the fight for universal health care […]

  • ObamaCare: If This Bill Were a Step Forward, We Would Support It

      If this bill were a step forward, we would support it. If we believed and evidence indicated that this bill could be “tweaked” into something better, we would support it. But this bill is a step backwards, a step away from single payer.  This bill further cements the privatization of health care, further enriches […]