The Dallas police decision to use a robot-delivered bomb to kill the cornered shooter blamed for murdering five police officers raises troubling legal, technological and public-safety questions, writes Marjorie Cohn.
Robot-Delivered Death in Dallas
Campaign 2016, Foreign Policy, Human Rights, Lost History, Obama Administration, Politics, The Bush-43 Administration
Afghanistan: President Obama’s Vietnam
Exclusive: President Obama is keeping U.S. troops in Afghanistan fighting an unwinnable war for fear of the political consequences if he faces reality and admits defeat, an echo of Vietnam, writes Jonathan Marshall.
Foreign Policy, Human Rights, Intelligence, Lost History, Obama Administration, Politics, Secrecy, The Bush-43 Administration
Welcome to Vietnam, Mr. President
From the Archive: With still no end in sight for the Afghan War, President Obama can’t say he wasn’t warned. Barely two months into his presidency in 2009, ex-CIA analyst Ray McGovern welcomed Obama to his own Vietnam quagmire.
Hillary-Kaine: Back to the Center
Hillary Clinton’s VP choice, Tim Kaine, is well liked Inside the Beltway, partly because he bends to pressure from Wall Street, DLC-style “centrists” and the austerity-pushing mainstream media, explains ex-bank regulator William K. Black.
Behind Turkey’s Post-Coup Crisis
The political crisis in Turkey, after a failed coup and mass arrests, sees President Erdogan consolidating his power and blaming his troubles on a Turkish exile living in Pennsylvania, as ex-CIA official Graham E. Fuller explains.
Constitution, Foreign Policy, Human Rights, Intelligence, Obama Administration, The Bush-43 Administration
Study Says Drones Generate More Terrorism
Using lethal drones to kill “bad guys” on the other side of the planet is offensive to many people on moral grounds, but a new study finds it is also ineffective in reducing terrorism, observes ex-CIA analyst Paul R. Pillar.
Trump’s Midnight in America
Ivanka Trump portrayed her father as a can-do executive with a big heart, but then Donald Trump opened his mouth, spewing forth what sounded like a call for a police state, as Bill Moyers and Michael Winship marveled.
Will NYT Retract Latest Anti-Russian ‘Fraud’?
Exclusive: In covering the new Cold War, The New York Times has lost its journalistic bearings, serving as a crude propaganda outlet publishing outlandish anti-Russian claims that may cross the line into fraud, reports Robert Parry.
Erdogan Suspects US Sympathy for Coup
Reports that Russian President Putin may have tipped off Turkish President Erdogan about last week’s coup attempt – while the U.S. apparently stayed silent – suggest a possible reordering of regional relationships, says John Chuckman.
US-Backed Syrian ‘Moderates’ Behead 12-Year-Old
Exclusive: The grisly beheading of a 12-year-old boy by U.S.-backed Syrian rebels spotlights Washington’s creepy excuses for arming “moderate” jihadists who are barely distinguishable from Al Qaeda and ISIS, reports Daniel Lazare.
Failed Turkish Coup’s Big-Power Impact
Turkey’s failed “coup” has shaken up the region’s geopolitics, splintering the powerful Turkish military, forcing President Erdogan to focus on internal “enemies,” and undermining the Syrian rebels next door, says ex-British diplomat Alastair Crooke.
Stomping the Embers of Turkey’s Democracy
Whatever motivated Turkey’s failed coup, President Erdogan is exploiting the outcome to round up his political enemies and consolidate his dictatorial style rule, a challenge to the U.S. and E.U., as Alon Ben-Meir describes.
Campaign 2016, Foreign Policy, Human Rights, Intelligence, Obama Administration, Politics, Right Wing
VP Choice Pence Reaffirms Israel Devotion
Donald Trump may alarm Washington’s foreign policy establishment with his “America First” rhetoric but Mike Pence, Trump’s VP choice, reaffirms a commitment to the traditional “Israel First” doctrine, as Sam Husseini shows.
Why Public Needs Go Begging
For decades, Americans have been sold on rugged individualism and told to disdain collectivism and community, a philosophy that has starved many public institutions and fattened up the few at the top, as Lawrence Davidson explains.
GOP Crazy Talk Comes to Cleveland
The Republican National Convention has been an orgy of crazy talk – mixed in with some plagiarism by Donald Trump’s wife and a vast kangaroo court convicting Hillary Clinton – a truly remarkable spectacle, as Michael Winship describes.
Turkey’s Nukes: A Sum of All Fears
Exclusive: The post-coup chaos in Turkey is a reminder about the risk of leaving nuclear weapons in unstable regions where they serve no clear strategic purpose but present a clear and present danger, explains Jonathan Marshall.
‘Fraud’ Alleged in NYT’s MH-17 Report
Exclusive: An amateur report alleging Russian doctoring of satellite photos on the Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 case – a finding embraced by The New York Times – is denounced by a forensic expert as an “outright fraud,” reports Robert Parry.
In Case You Missed…
Some of our special stories in June examined Hillary Clinton’s problems with emails and Libya, the world’s march to a new Cold War with Russia, the push for a wider hot war in Syria, and the meaning of Brexit.
America’s Failure to Protect Voting
America may call itself democracy’s gold standard, but it fails to guarantee the right to vote and permits the dominance of political money, a shameful anomaly that requires a constitutional amendment, writes William John Cox.
Israel’s Wolf-Crying about Iran’s Bomb
Despite Israeli and neocon-led doomsday talk, the year-old Iranian nuclear agreement has achieved its principal goal of stopping Iran from getting the Bomb and has even quieted alarums from Israel, writes Trita Parsi.