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Archives: US politics

The Violent “American Century”

By John Feffer | (FPIF) | Originally published in Korea Quarterly | - - The last near-century of American dominance was extraordinarily violent. Is it coming to an end? John Dower is…

Top 5 things Trump is doing to us Worse than insulting Mika

by Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | - - Yes, Trump's gratuitous Twitter insult to newswoman Mika Brzezinski was horrible. But US cable news and even a lot of print news are…

Back to Quagmire: Beware endless US Troop Escalations in Afghanistan

By Danny Sjursen | ( Tomdispatch.com) | - - We walked in a single file. Not because it was tactically sound. It wasn’t -- at least according to standard infantry doctrine. Patrolling…

Syria: Russians alarmed, Washington Befuddled, by White House threats

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | - - The unusual statement from the "White House" on Monday saying that there were indications that the Syrian regime was preparing to use poison…

Trump May Already Be Blundering into the Next Middle East War

By Jim Lobe & Giulia McDonnell Nieto Del Rio | ( FPIF) | First published in Lobelog | - - The possibilities for catastrophic miscalculation are skyrocketing in the Middle East, and…

Why it Matters that the World thinks US under Trump is Laughingstock

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | - - Pew Research Center has found that the confidence of the world public in the US willingness to do the right thing has plummeted…

N. American Scholars of Mideast react to SCOTUS Decision on Trump Muslim Ban

Middle East Studies Association of North America | - - On Monday, June 26, 2017, the United States Supreme Court issued a limited stay in the case that MESA has joined as…

Is Putin’s Russia the critical threat Americans believe it to be?

Ronald Suny | (The Conversation) | - - U.S. intelligence agencies – 17 of them – agree that evidence shows the Russian government hacked the Democratic National Committee and waged a campaign…

Trump’s Escalations of War in Syria—Sleepwalking into a Global Confrontation

By Reese Erlich | (The Progressive) | - - Syrian President Bashar al Assad claims to have won the war and that he is merely mopping up remaining rebel groups. With its…

Trump accuses Syrian of Planning Gas attack as Haley attacks Russia, Iran

Trump accuses Syria of Planning Gas attack as Haley attacks Russia, Iran

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | - - The Trump administration is making noise about striking Syria, on the grounds that Damascus is planning to use poison gas again. Trump's Neoconservative…

Trump Son-In-Law did not declare $285m Loan from Deutsche Bank

TeleSur | - - Jared Kushner was an adviser to the Trump campaign and an employee at his own real estate company when the firm received the loan. A real estate company…

America’s Special Ops Perpetual World War

Nick Turse | ( Tomdispatch.com ) | - - The tabs on their shoulders read “Special Forces,” “Ranger,” “Airborne.” And soon their guidon -- the “colors” of Company B, 3rd Battalion of…

Trump’s Folly: Oil is a Worthless Commodity and Saudi’s Crown Prince Knows It

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | - - Crude oil prices are cratering, down 20% this year, in the biggest 6-month free fall in years. As Annie Pei of CNBC notes,…

Green France: Macron bans Fracking and welcomes US renewables Scientists fleeing Trump

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | - - The French government wants to steal increasingly unemployed US green energy scientists, who are being systematically defunded by the Trump administration. After Trump…

What will Happen when Trump’s Dupes Find Out?

By Andrew J. Bacevich | ( Tomdispatch.com) | - - Forgive me for complaining, but recent decades have not been easy ones for my peeps. I am from birth a member of…

All Signs from Trump Point to a Coming Conflict with Iran

By John Feffer | Foreign Policy in Focus | - - Behind all of Trump's boneheaded policies in the Middle East is an unmistakable urge for confrontation with Iran. The Saudi war…

Trump’s Love Affair With the Saudis

By William D. Hartung | ( Tomdispatch.com) | - - At this point, it’s no great surprise when Donald Trump walks away from past statements in service to some impulse of the…

Russo-US dog fights over Syria?

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | - - Yara Bayoumi at Reuters reports on the complicated minuet being danced by Russia, the Syrian Air Force, and the United States. The Syrian…

What can today’s Activists learn from the Summer of Love and the New Left?

Ira Chernus | ( Tomdispatch.com ) | - - It’s the 50th anniversary of the Summer of Love. What better place to celebrate than that fabled era’s epicenter, San Francisco’s Golden Gate…

Don’t Slow Down on Impeachment

Robert Reich. | Yes! Magazine | - - The three previous presidential impeachment inquiries rested on less evidence of obstruction of justice than is already publicly known about Trump. The real reason…