Peter Van Buren

October 4, 2016

Once again a story that Trump did nothing illegal is somehow front page news. His crime this time? Continuing to legally rent out office space to a bank already in a building he bought 18 years ago. So the big news is that Donald Trump’s real estate organization rented space to an Iranian bank later […]

Peter Van Buren

October 4, 2016

When Islamic State beheads someone it is terrorism. When an Iraqi housewife beheads an ISIS fighter and cooks his skull, it is freedom. That is the CNN doctrine. CNN reports the story of 39-year-old Wahida Mohamed aka Um Hanadi, an Iraqi woman who supposedly leads a tribal militia force of around 70 men south of […]

Daniel McAdams

October 3, 2016

Thanks to a non-profit investigative journalism organization we now know that the Pentagon paid British PR firm more than half a billion dollars over five years to create false propaganda designed to push the US story line on the Iraq war. How much of it was aimed at the Iraqis and how much came back […]

Jason Ditz

October 3, 2016

While most of the focus on the presidential campaign remains on the weight of a former Miss Universe and unsubstantiated claims of a Russian plot to get Donald Trump elected, a story with at least a tenuous grounding in reality emerged today. Trump Rented Space to Outlawed Iranian Bank Linked to Terrorism That’s a headline […]

Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity

October 2, 2016

ALERT MEMORANDUM FOR: The PresidentFROM: Veteran Intelligence Professionals for SanitySUBJECT: PREVENTING STILL WORSE IN SYRIA We write to alert you, as we did President George W. Bush, six weeks before the attack on Iraq, that the consequences of limiting your circle of advisers to a small, relatively inexperienced coterie with a dubious record for wisdom […]

Eric Schuler

September 30, 2016

Last week, President Obama vetoed the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act (JASTA), which would allow the 9/11 victims to sue the Saudi government for its apparent involvement. Many leaders in Congress claimed they had the votes needed to overcome the veto (2/3 in both houses), but it almost seemed too good to be true. […]

Bob Waldrop

September 30, 2016

In the Catholic Church, October is "pro-life month" – an organized focus on the Church’s teaching that life should be respected from the moment of conception to the time of natural death. Yet, "time of natural death" notwithstanding, the issue of war doesn’t even get a sentence. The letter of the Archbishop of New York […]

Daniel McAdams

September 29, 2016

The mainstream media portrays the fight for Aleppo as one between Syrian President Assad and the people, painting Assad as someone killing his citizens for the fun of it. In other words, as they did with Iraq and Libya, etc. the mainstream media again happily takes up the role of mouthpiece of the US government. […]

William Astore

September 29, 2016

Today brings yet another announcement of more U.S. troops to Iraq. This time 600 are being sent as logistics support, advisers, and enablers (that term, “enabler,” is fuzzy indeed: enabler of what? More failure?). That brings the number of US troops in Iraq to more than 5200, but of course this figure seriously under-represents the […]

Daniel McAdams

September 28, 2016

In an interview with a prominent German newspaper, the commander of al-Qaeda’s Nusra Front in Aleppo, Syria claims that the US government and its allies are providing it with weapons and training. It may seem preposterous, but the US did the same thing with the mujahideen in Afghanistan after the 1979 Soviet invasion. And we […]