Progressive Media Advocates
John Marciano: As I walked past a Santa Monica church on Easter Sunday, I wondered if the clergy inside had addressed the war’s anniversary. Had they at any time in the past ten years condemned it in clear and prophetic language? Where have they been during the long nightmare of war in Iraq – and Afghanistan?
Carolyn Eisenberg: While Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld make an appealing group of villains, embodying as they do the Deadly Sins of Sloth, Wrath and Pride, responsibility for the Iraq War is not limited to them.
John Peeler: Obama’s task—and that of his successors—will be to engage constructively with the changes the region will be undergoing, without repeating the errors of the imperialist past by seeking to dominate and control those changes.
Dick Price: I can now honor the service of the military men and women who have fought so long in Iraq—the great majority of whom who have acted honorably under fire—just as I hold fast to the notion that the Iraq invasion was undertaken for disreputable ends.
Joseph Palermo: Despite the redeployment of U.S. troops out of Iraq, during this dismal period of “austerity” the public isn’t likely to see any discernible difference in the government’s misplaced priorities.
Tom Hayden: Obama, the black candidate, the liberal candidate, the anti-war candidate, the candidate with not a moment of military experience, certainly saw a strategic opportunity to focus laser-like on bin Laden, from the 2008 primaries right through the first two years of his presidency.
Andy Love: So, despite their best efforts to rewrite history, will Bush, Cheney and Rice be viewed as villains or inept clowns? The answer can be found in another philosophical proposition: The Unity of Opposites. They can be villains and clowns.
Denis Campbell: As the Occupy Wall Street movement enters its fourth week, on Saturday the New York and Washington base camp plazas were so overfilled they resembled Tahrir Square, Cairo.
Stanley Kutler: To perpetuate the deceits of George W. Bush and Richard Cheney is only to delude ourselves. The attack on America did not legitimate the foreign policy debacles that have hobbled us for much of the past decade.
Sherwood Ross: Rupert Murdoch’s TNTW was only attempting to do in a small way what the governments of the U.S., U.K., Canada, Australia, and New Zealand are doing big time every day.
Sherwood Ross: The Conference, which speaks for 1,200 mayors, expresses the pain felt by city officials as urgent domestic needs have been long scuttled so that America’s imperial presidents can wage wars in the Middle East to control the region’s oil.
Gary Corseri and Eric Shine: Today, the most disturbing sign of this take-over of all of the civilian commons by the military, at least in the U.S., comes in the form of a new, or reinvigorated, Department of War.
Dick Price: I want someone who will stand on the corner and raise some hell. Lord knows, Washington has all the “go along to get along” it needs.
Ivan Eland: As in George W. Bush’s invasion of Iraq, analysis of the stated reasons for President Barack Obama’s attack on Libya lead to a lot of head-scratching.
John Peeler: No wonder the hyper-cautious Obama is moving as if he were in a minefield that’s been covered with grease. Anything he does (including nothing) will elicit ferocious criticism from both opponents and supporters.
Ivan Eland: Extending the U.S. nuclear shield to the much more unstable and violent region of the Middle East seems supremely foolhardy. The U.S. could more easily get dragged into an unplanned and unneeded future nuclear exchange there than in any other area of the world.
Sherwood Ross: The American people have been led into wars based on lies, fictions, and secrets and should be grateful to Assange and Manning for revealing the truth of this misconduct.
Tom Hayden: While it is significant that Canada will end its combat role in Afghanistan next year [unlike the U.S. commitment until 2014], it is disheartening that both the Conservative and Liberal parties have agreed to stay in a “training” role indefinitely
Ivan Eland: Although Bush can’t change his domestic catastrophes, such as the federal response to Hurricane Katrina or the horrendous financial crisis and the $700 billion Wall Street bailout, if Iraq and Afghanistan eventually reach some stability, he may be regarded as the man who threw out the despotic regimes of Saddam Hussein and the Taliban.
David Swanson: If our government is, uniquely among wealthy countries, denying people healthcare, shouldn’t we talk about that? How “sane” can it be to always seek out the middle ground and believe whatever propositions lie halfway between advocacy for peace and justice and advocacy for glorified racist ignorance and corporatism?
Andrew J. Bacevich: Once a serious journalist, the Washington Post’s Bob Woodward now makes a very fine living as chief gossip-monger of the governing class.
Ivan Eland: The Iraq War was not only disastrous, it was one of the worst strategic blunders in the history of U.S. foreign policy. President Obama should not renegotiate the status of forces agreement with any government in Iraq.
Tina Dupuy: The U.S. just spent a trillion dollars “liberating” Muslims in two countries and helping them democratically elect leaders. You’d think we’d all be super pro-Muslim judging by our national budget. But no, “Muslim” has a negative connotation because of terrorists on 9/11.
Ivan Eland: The sad truth is that if Iran wants a nuclear weapon, it will likely eventually get one. So the United States should quit wasting valuable political capital beseeching, threatening, and horse-trading with China, Russia, and other UN Security Council members to incrementally ratchet up likely futile multilateral economic sanctions against I
Randy Shaw: While conservatives love bashing “Hollywood liberals,” Sunday night’s Oscar telecast showed how little this description applies. From Kathryn Bigelow’s promoting George W. Bush’s argument that the U.S. invaded Iraq to protect Americans, to the disproportionate acclaim given to films exalting the military, to the exclusion of Michael Moore’sCapitalism, A Love Story from the documentary nominees, Hollywood now largely avoids any hint of progressive social analysis.
If the U.S. gives up fighting such ill-advised wars of choice and concomitant occupations, Rumsfeld’s concept of fewer ground forces and a heavier reliance on airpower can be viable. The concept is not the problem, but it’s not going to work if the United States continues such drawn-out imperial quagmires.
After the near comatose nod to escalation of US troops in Afghanistan, passage of H.R. 2346, the 97-billion Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2009, is in doubt in the House – not because of the strength of the anti-war movement, which morphed into the elect-Obama-movement, nor due to the high suicide rate amongst veterans, but because [...]
David Love: It is tricky business for a black man to long for the good old days, when those same Founders would have relegated you to someone’s backyard, and in chains no less.
Mary Beth Fiedler: The full range of the Los Angeles political spectrum supported the passage of Proposition C, and the overwhelming support for the measure was spread throughout the city.
RJ Eskow: A little unsolicited advice: Run! Run from the radical-right Republicans and demand sanity instead of madness. Run from anyone who tells you corporatist Democrats are the best you can hope for politically.
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Not American Enough? This Political Slur Has a Long History
Rosemarie Ostler: Obama’s critics have found a variety of ways to portray him as exotic and un-American. But this is nothing new. For two centuries politicians have been labeling their opponents as not quite American enough.