Joost Hiltermann writes in the New York Review of Books blog about his recent trip to Bahrain: Talking to dozens of people both in Manama and in smaller communities outside the capital, I was told again and again that the situation was becoming worse, not better:...
More than 600 U.S. troops are stationed across Honduras, engaged in an aggressive campaign in the so-called drug war. This piece from the New York Times yesterday explains that the strategy Washington is employing there draws from the "hard lessons learned from a...
Former NSA technical director William Binney: "...the real problem I see is that the DoJ is covering up for all the crimes that this administration and the previous administration has been committing against every one in the public." (h/t Kevin Gosztola)
The deal Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his right-wing Likud party struck last night may be the slickest politicking in recent memory. After threatening to hold early elections, Netanyahu formed a unity government with the main opposition party, Kadima,...
The Washington Post reported today that the U.S. has for years operated a secret program of releasing "high-level detainees from a military prison in Afghanistan as part of negotiations with insurgent groups." “We look at detainees who have influence over other...
Sen. John McCain, perhaps the leading figure pushing for intervention in Syria, was interviewed by Jake Tapper on ABC's "This Week": TAPPER: Is -- is there not -- do you not have any concern -- there are reports that some of the rebels in Syria are affiliated with Al...
Jose Padilla, the American citizen kidnapped by the Bush administration and detained and tortured for years without charge or trial, has been trying to sue John Yoo for a while now. Yoo of course was in the Bush administration's office of legal counsel who crafted...
Via Glenn Greenwald, Daneil Denvir writes about former Governor Ed Rendell trying to explain why he shouldn't be indicted for providing "material support" to the Iranian cult terrorist group MEK: One 10-minute speech earned Rendell $20,000, and he frequently flew to...
Adam Serwer in Mother Jones has a nice sum-up of the highlights from the recent declassification of selected documents from the raid on Osama bin Laden's compound in Pakistan a year ago. The al-Qaeda leader's internal documents and correspondences include asking for...
In Politico, Daphne Eviator of Human Rights First, contests the Obama administration's legal justification for a borderless, undeclared drone war in multiple countries, which is that the AUMF grants them the authority to take lethal action against al-Qaeda and its...
