Who says there's no anti-war movement in the United States? In the past two months, the anti-war movement has taken on one of the most powerful lobbying groups in the United States in an important fight. And so far, the anti-war movement is winning.

Here's the story: On May 22,...

Senator John McCain's latest gaffe on Social Security is somewhat breathtaking, and ought to be a campaign issue. It indicates that he is not any better informed on major domestic policy issues than he is on foreign policy (which is supposedly his "strength").

Readers whose memory extends beyond the...

Can our state and local governments afford to subsidize businesses that conduct their sales only on the internet, rather than through physical retail stores? And if we could, is there a good reason to do so?

These are the two most obvious questions when addressing the issue of whether internet...

Washington's foreign policy establishment - and much of the U.S. media -- was taken by surprise this week when President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, stated that the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) should lay down their arms and unconditionally release all of their hostages. The FARC is a guerrilla...

Since the U.S. economy showed positive growth for the last quarter, some commentators in the business press are saying that we are not necessarily going to have a recession, or that if there is one it will be mild. This is a bit like the proverbial story of the man...

'The IMF is back," declared the International Monetary Fund's managing director, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, at its annual spring meeting earlier this month in Washington. And not a moment too soon either. To hear the organization's economists tell it (as they mingled in five-star hotels, long black limos and posh restaurants with...

Of all the nonsense that we hear regularly about Venezuela, the idea that the country is a "security threat" is probably the most ridiculous. For six years now, since the Bush administration supported a failed coup attempt against the democratically elected government of President Hugo Chavez, Washington has been sporadically...

Eighty-one percent of Americans now agree that "things have pretty seriously gotten off on the wrong track," the most since this question has been asked and a remarkable preponderance of pessimism by any comparison.

And this recession is only beginning; real home prices have dropped only about 13 percent, (since...

Some big pharmaceutical companies are up in arms about developing countries importing less expensive generic versions of drugs for which these companies hold a patent monopoly. But the procedure is perfectly legal, even under the World Trade Organization's pro-pharmaceutical-monopoly rules. The only question is whether these huge corporations -- who...

"A free press is supposed to function as our democracy's immune system against . . . gross errors of fact and understanding," wrote Al Gore in his book, The Assault on Reason. But it doesn't - as Gore explains -- and that is what makes the mass media one of...

The major media plays a much bigger role in the formation of our national politics than most people realize. The media helps define and choose the issues, and acts as gatekeeper in setting the limits for political discussion and sometimes even candidacies for public office.

The most media-savvy candidates...

This week's news that the U.S. Embassy in Bolivia has repeatedly asked Peace Corps volunteers and then a Fulbright Scholar to spy on people there is much more serious than it has so far been treated. In fact, together with other activities funded there by the U.S. Agency for...

As the economy shifts into reverse gear and the Congress and President work out the details of a proposed fiscal stimulus, some are asking whether it will be enough to keep the economy out of a recession. The answer is very likely no.

The timing, length, and depth of a...

Barack Obama had a few choice words for Bill and Hillary Clinton after the South Carolina primary, about people who would "say anything and do anything to win an election."

Imagine if the U.S media had reported his remarks without ever reporting what the candidate was responding to. (He was...

It was 1971 when Richard Nixon, a conservative, uttered the famous phrase "We are all Keynesians Now. " But there was a backlash soon to follow, with Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher changing the world as perhaps no two other people did in the 20th century. Ronald Reagan's "supply-side economics"...

It has had the makings of a telenovela - a Latin American soap opera: hostages held for years deep in the Colombian jungle, anxious anticipation and tearful reunions, and most spectacular of all, the boy: Emmanuel. Born three and a half years ago in captivity, of a liaison between a...

If we read the newspapers and watch TV in the United States, we are told that President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela is a "dictator," "authoritarian," "a threat to democracy" in his own country and the region, and "anti-U.S." But leaders who try to empower poor people are generally vilified in...

The now infamous "suitcase scandal" has deeply alienated the new Argentine government and is likely to further sully Washington's reputation in Latin America.

On December 20 the U.S. government indicted four Venezuelans and one Uruguayan for allegedly acting as foreign agents without notifying the U.S. government. The charges stem from...

A January 2 article in Editor and Publisher gives the impression that the Inter-American Press Association (IAPA) is defending freedom of expression in Venezuela.

But a careful review of the facts indicates that the IAPA is not defending press freedom, but rather taking sides in a partisan struggle, in a...

In the baseball-and-sex classic Bull Durham Susan Sarandon accidentally calls out the wrong name in the heat of passion and makes a remarkably quick recovery. She asks her partner which he would rather have, her having sex with him and saying the other guy's name, or vice versa? In the...