A guest post from Daniel Luban:
I have no desire to bore the reader with endless discussion of the Amalek controversy, so I will just weigh in with one final comment on the controversy and Jeffrey Goldberg’s response to it. First, Andrew Sullivan’s post on the controversy is worth reading, and reiterates the same basic point [...]
Today is the 123rd birthday of Randolph Bourne, the antiwar writer and intellectual for whom the Randolph Bourne Institute, which operates Antiwar.com, is named.
Bourne was a major opponent of the First World War, and died during the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic at the young age of 32. Despite his short life he managed to [...]
Does President Obama have a vested interest in covering up the crimes of the Bush administration?
His decision to block the release of photos of U.S. troops abusing detainees in Iraq and Afghanistan is a reminder that the nation may still be running on “Cheney time.”
As long as the photos are not released, former Bush [...]
I stopped by the Visitors Center at Manassas Battlefield Park last month and was struck by a quote capturing Georgia private B. M. Zettler’s reaction to being enmeshed in the battle of Bull Run:
“I felt that I was in the presence of death. My first thought was, ‘This is unfair – someone is to blame [...]
… for detonating a nuclear bomb comparable to the one dropped at Hiroshima, then what about Truman and the crew of the Enola Gay?
How was Harry’s decision any different than Kim’s? After all, as David Kramer recently noted, if Truman executed 144,000 Japanese civilians by firing squad, his actions would have been described [...]
Originally Posted @TAC
I had always revered Rolling Thunder — the romantic vision of a Band of Brothers, refugees from a South Asian hellhole whose common experience, really, was the only thing separating them from a certain reckless breed of motorcycle gang. Their annual sojourn to the National Mall for Memorial Day, emblazoned in leather with [...]
Former U.S. soldier Steven Dale Green was just sentenced to life in prison for his war crimes while “serving” in Iraq. It seems that Pfc. Green and three of his soldier friends went to the home of a 14-year-old Iraqi girl, killed her family, gang raped her, shot her in the face, and then set her body on [...]
Radio host “Mancow” has apparently been defending the water torture. Perhaps those days are now over.
Watch Christopher Preble (Cato) and Jacob Hornberger (Future of Freedom of Foundation) stand up for morality and truth in the face of Max “(Your) Blood and Guts” Boot and some other loser. Heroic. And overdue.
Rachel Maddow, on the other hand, appears to be a keeper. In the clip below, she explains how President Obama, principled opponent of prosecuting or even investigating past crimes, plans to lock people up for future crimes. Forever.
To be fair, that is literally progressive.
I have to label this “humor” for people who either don’t get it or find it in bad taste. I have no taste, so here is a “news report” from The Onion:
Army Holds Annual ‘Bring Your Daughter To War’ Day
From Jeremy Scahill at The Nation today, a synopsis of explosive testimony before the Senate Democratic Policy Committee regarding contractor Kellogg, Brown and Root (former Halliburton subsidiary and by far the largest beneficiary of federal wartime funding, ever). According to the story, KBR received more than $80 million in bonuses for installing electrical writing in [...]
