Following Iran’s missile attacks on a two US airbase, one outside Baghdad and the second near Erbil in Iraqi Kurdistan, US President Donald Trump almost triumphantly announced that Iran is now standing down in their the two countries’ intensified conflict following the killing of Quds Force commander, General Qassem Soleimani, in an American drone attack […] More
A large number of people seem to believe that World War III has begun with the drone strike that killed Iran’s Quds Force commander, General Qassem Soleimani, on January 3. On December 27, a US military contractor was killed in a rocket attack in Iraq, and the US responded with a bombing campaign. Iraqis rioted and […] More
The year 2020 has started in the West as the year of maximum suspense. The various dramas of 2019 had built to a crescendo that seemed unrivaled in the sheer number of open questions with no obvious answer history had thrown into the arena. Everyone was aware of the conflicts and debates that would determine […] More
Yes, our infrastructure stinks, our schools are failing, this country’s a nightmare of inequality and there’s a self-promoting madman in the White House. So, isn’t it time to take pride in the rare institutional victories America has had in this century? Arguably, none has been more striking than the triumphal success of the American war system. Oh, you’re going […] More
As vice president to Barack Obama, whose proudest claim to honor and presidential stature was the assassination of Osama bin Laden in 2011, Joe Biden understands what it means — at least in terms of political marketing — to fulfill the requirements of justice. Commenting on the US drone strike on January 3 that killed […] More
The assassination of the commander of Iran’s Quds Force, Major General Qassem Soleimani, by the United States on January 3, along with his right-hand man in Iraq, Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, was a surprising move for many. Soleimani’s assassination increased pressure on President Donald Trump in Washington and has already intensified concerns about a new war […] More
Scott Morrison is the prime minister of Australia. Over the past few months, parts of his country have gone up in flames. Hundreds of homes have been lost in widespread bushfires, and a number of Australians have lost their lives in the inferno. Apparently, the catastrophe at home did not trouble the prime minister. He spent his vacation […] More
When people live (and die) with a binary vision of the world, the same object may end up with two opposite meanings. This tends to be the norm in wartime, but the trend toward reducing everything to a binary opposition has increased radically in recent years, even in times of peace. The instinct to label […] More
