ON JOHN MCCAIN AND TOM BROKAW'S SHAMEFUL VERSIONS OF THE VIETNAM WAR

Note: As John McCain's makes his Vietnam war experience central to his campaign, the true facts about the war are more relevant than ever. This is the original version of a review of Tom Brokaw's shameful book Boom!...

Below please find links to some 22 minutes of personal videos about Nixon and Kissinger's war-making from 1969-72, a period that holds important lessons for the growing dangers in Iraq and the Mideast today. Understanding the historic shift in the balance of power toward the jihadists resulting from Bush's...

Should war-critics go on the offensive and stress the obvious but largely unmentionable truth of the Iraqi war: that our leaders are callously betraying U.S. soldiers dying in a war that cannot be won? Does John Kerry's 1971 Senate testimony, excerpted below, apply today to leaders of both parties...

The wonderful news that Dr. Muhammad Yunus has won the Nobel Peace Prize sent me back to reread a still-relevant article I wrote after interviewing him ten years ago (please see below). Dr. Yunus is not only a real hero, but a wonderful human being - kind, modest, friendly, good-humored,...

Note: Fred Branfman spent over 4 years on the ground in Indochina as a volunteer and journalist between 1967 and 1973, and was co-director of the Indochina Resource Center in Washington, D.C., which U.S. Ambassador Graham Martin blamed for the loss of Indochina.

This is the second of a...

WHEN 'STAYING THE COURSE': MEANS DEFEAT: 1. IRAQ

Note: Fred Branfman spent over 4 years on the ground in Indochina as a volunteer and journalist between 1967 and 1973, and was co-director of the Indochina Resource Center in Washington, D.C., which U.S. Ambassador Graham Martin blamed for the loss of...

"Gestapo interrogation methods included: repeated near drownings of a prisoner in a bathtub."
The History Place

"The CIA officers say 9-11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed lasted the longest under waterboarding, two and a half minutes, before beginning to talk, with debatable results."
 -- Brian Ross, ABC World News...

Now that the hoopla on the Cheney shooting has begun to die down it is time to focus on the most serious issue it symbolizes: Mr. Cheney's weakening the U.S. and strengthening our enemies over the past 5 years. Just as he bungled his hunting, he has bungled every major...

PRESIDENT BUSH IS ENDANGERING OUR LIVES: 14. LOSING THE WAR ON TERROR BY MISUSING EXECUTIVE POWER

"We are losing."
-- The Next Attack, by former NSC officials Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon

"Over the years there had been an erosion of presidential power and authority. I believe that...

"In a time of crisis, it is important to remember the President who, while waging our bloodiest, most divisive war, was able to do what recent Presidents have failed to do: he inspired `the better angels of our nature'." (Emphasis added)
-- "Lincoln", by Gary Wills, Life Magazine, Feb....

"Saeed Semnanian, the chancellor of one of Tehran's most conservative universities (said) the achievement that matters is that Iran is independent. As far as he is concerned, it might be yesterday, and not in 1953, that Kermit Roosevelt and the C.I.A. organized the coup that overthrew Mohammed Mossadegh, the prime...

"(Captured reporter Jill) Carroll actually spoke Arabic and still was unable to avoid the wash of fury and hatred that now confronts Westerners. We are not wanted." (Emphasis added)
-- Alissa Rubin, L.A. Times, 1/26/05

"But while I am certain bin Laden is losing, I still don't feel that...

"The Hun is always either at your throat or at your feet."

-- Winston Churchill

Congratulations to Arianna for daring to expose Tim Russert, whose Meet the Press has for so long dishonored American journalism. Russert is guilty of all the sins she has exposed: slimy cronyism, back-stabbing, nepotism, favor-trading...

"The U.S. will, if necessary, act preemptively, and will require bases within and beyond Western Europe and Northeast Asia, the ability to ensure U.S. access to distant theaters, and critical U.S. infrastructure and assets in outer space. Our forces will dissuade potential adversaries from pursuing a military build-up in hopes...

"Iraq will serve as a model for freedom in the broader Middle East ... In 2006, on the political side, we will help Iraqis build a lasting free society. On the security side, we will strengthen Iraqi security forces so (they) can lead in the fight. And on the economic...

"We're establishing clear lesson plans in professional ethics for all nine Iraqi police academies." -- President Bush, speech on "A National Strategy for Victory", January 10, 2006

"Badr fighters have joined the security services, like the police and commando units under the control of the interior minister ... Hundreds of...

"The United States is fighting the Global War on Terrorism with a mindset shaped by the Cold War. Unfortunately, the wars the United States must fight today in Afghanistan and Iraq are not of this variety." --LTC M. Wade Markel, Military Review (Nov-Dec, 2004):

"Eliot Cohen cites the two dominant...

"The abuse of prisoners harms, not helps, our war effort. Abuse of prisoners often produces bad intelligence (and) endangers our own troops who might someday be held captive. Prisoner abuses expose us to ... charges that democracies are no more inherently idealistic and moral than other regimes. The mistreatment of...

"Former Secretary of State Dean Rusk said `I personally underestimated the tenacity of the North Vietnamese.' The estimated 700,000 casualties by the North Vietnamese, he said, was the equivalent of 10 million American casualties ...
-- "Rusk Says He Misjudged Hanoi's Will To Wage War", The Washington Post,...

"It seems that the safety of the American people is not very high on Washington's priority list."
-- former Republican Governor Thomas Kean, Chairman of the 9/11 Commission, AP, December 5, 2005

"Every reasonable expert believes the terrorists will strike again. Many believe their goal is...