The liberated Iraq: "We had to send [the security men] phone cards so they could call us. They said: 'Your son is being tortured – he will die if you don't pay.' So we paid and paid. What could I do? He is the last I have. I said I would sell myself in the streets,...
Eli Lake reports at the Daily Beast: ...Patrick Clawson, the director of research at the Washington Institute for Near Policy, said the signs point to Israel. “This sophisticated technique is uncharacteristic of the Iranian armed opposition and the Iranian government,...
McClatchy reports that Afghans aren't surprised by the video of U.S. Marines urinating on dead Afghans: In Afghanistan, while no major protests were reported the day after the video surfaced online — purporting to show four Marines standing in a semicircle and...
The Economist editorializes about the situation in Somalia and surprisingly implies an optimistic future. Somalia may now have its best chance of peace and security since 1991. If the government can consolidate its hold on Mogadishu, it will be a big step forward. The...
This video appears to show four Marines laughing while they urinate on Afghan corpses. One of them jokingly says "Have a great day, buddy." Warning: Graphic The individual who uploaded the YouTube video, which is becoming viral, is not known and the details in the...
(h/t to Kevin Hall) I touched upon similar issues here and here. Note also how this full spectrum dominance is being applied with renewed effort in Asia-Pacific, due to irrational fears of China.
A recent study found that nationalism "brings happiness." METHODOLOGY: Tim Reeskens, a sociologist from Catholic University in Belgium, and Matthew Wright, a political scientist at American University, categorized national pride into "ethnic nationalism," which is...
When Afghan President Hamid Karzai demanded last week that the U.S. cede control of the detention facilities at Bagram airbase, it was ironic, in a cynical way. Came forth the opportunity to pit Nobel Peace Prize winner Barack Obama against the leader of one of the...
As the airwaves are set ablaze about the Evil Iranian Menace sentencing to death a former U.S. Marine, Amir Mirzaei Hekmati, suspected of spying for the CIA, let us remind ourselves of our own government's trampling of individual rights. Over the weekend, the New York...
