Category: Human Rights

Reining in the Drones

Key aspects of George W. Bush’s post-9/11 “war on terror” are finally winding down: U.S. troops have left Iraq and are leaving Afghanistan, but the troubling issue of lethal drones remains and it is time for Congress to set new…

Obama Deflects Neocon Pressure on Syria

Exclusive: Despite the angry tone, the Syrian peace talks have made some slight progress, at least in that President Obama and the opposition have backed away from making President Assad’s removal a precondition for negotiations, but the neocons still want U.S.…

The Dangers of Stereotyping

Ignorance in the form of stereotyping people from other parts of the world can have unpredictable consequences, sometimes leading to mass suffering that a more enlightened view might have avoided, as Lawrence Davidson reflects.

Tea Party and Thomas Jefferson

Special Report: Black History Month celebrates talented African-Americans, but it also should be a time to reflect on distorted white history that has ignored damage inflicted by racist ideologues, like how Thomas Jefferson’s hypocrisies helped give us the Civil War and the…

Hectoring Obama Over Syria

The U.S. punditocracy is pushing President Obama to intervene in the Syrian civil war and judging his diplomatic efforts a “failure” because little progress has been made. But the underlying assumption that U.S. military action can fix everything is dangerous, says ex-CIA…

Amazon, the CIA and Assassinations

The entangling threads connecting technology, media and the surveillance state have snarled so completely that it’s next to impossible to untie them, exemplified by Amazon, the Washington Post, and the CIA’s pending assassination of a suspected American terrorist, as Norman Solomon explains.

Learning the Wrong Mideast Lessons

Feb. 11 marks two important anniversaries in the Middle East: the ouster of the Shah of Iran in 1979 and the overthrow of Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak in 2011. But the question remains whether the U.S. has learned the right…

The High Cost of a ‘War on Terror’

Despite the declining threat that international terrorism poses to the U.S. homeland, the U.S. government continues to pour countless billions of dollars into counter-terrorism while impinging on constitutional liberties and misleading the public, as the Independent Institute’s Ivan Eland notes.

Is Hillary Clinton a Neocon-Lite?

Exclusive: As a U.S. senator and Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton often followed a neocon-style foreign policy, backing the Iraq War, teaming up with Defense Secretary Robert Gates on an Afghan War “surge,” and staking out an even more hawkish stance than Gates on…

A Half Century of the Beatles

The Beatles — introduced to Americans a half century ago — became a marker for Baby Boomers as they emerged from the shock of JFK’s death, faced the Vietnam War, grieved over the murder of prophets, including John Lennon, and confronted life’s endless complexities, as Michael…