Talk to the Taliban

Jim Calio, 11.20.2009

Journalist, Producer

After years of propping up corrupt and ineffective governments in South Vietnam, the U.S. finally decided to enter into peace talks with the North Vietnamese. The same should happen with the Taliban in Afghanistan.

A Critically Endangered Mammal You've Never Heard of: the Saola

Mary-Charlotte Domandi, 11.18.2009

Mary-Charlotte Domandi is the host of the Santa Fe Radio Cafe on KSFR, Santa Fe Public Radio.

Discovered only in 1992 by wildlife biologists, saolas are antelope-like bovine creatures who live in the forests on the border of Laos and Vietnam. ...

A War Tax: A Strategic, Fiscal and Political Imperative

Paul Abrams, 11.06.2009

Physician, entrepreneur, biotechnology, law, economics, politics, professional iconoclast

Without a draft, and without a war tax, 99.9% of Americans do not have to sacrifice at all to continue the war. It is too easy for war to become, for 99.9% of us, more like a video game played out on television.

Our National Journey? Get Out A Map

Jeffrey Shaffer, 11.04.2009

While media attention in Iraq and Afghanistan focuses on car bombings and combat casualties, other disturbing events in the region are slipping through the news cycle almost unnoticed.

Keeping Afghanistan Safe from Democracy

Robert Scheer, 11.04.2009

Veteran Journalist and Editor of Truthdig.com

The most idiotic thing being said about America's involvement in Afghanistan is that the best way to protect the 68,000 U.S. troops there now is by putting an additional 40,000 in harm's way.

Dien Bien Phu, the Battle of Zhawar and the Battle of the Grand Canyon

Mark Axelrod, 10.30.2009

Professor of Comparative Literature, Chapman University

Let's pretend that a foreign country has decided to attack the United States mainland.

Is This Tom Friedman's "Walter Cronkite Moment" on Afghanistan?

Harvey Wasserman, 10.29.2009

Author of SOLARTOPIA! Our Green-Powered Earth

No one contends that Tom Friedman has the influence that Walter Cronkite did, but could Friedman's anti-Afghanistan editorial mark a similar war-time shift in thinking?

A Letter to the President

Ron Kovic, 10.28.2009

Author, Born On the Fourth of July

Many of us who served in Vietnam promised ourselves long ago that we would never again allow what happened to us in that war to ever happen again. We have an obligation to protest. To speak out.

"Lessons in Disaster": If Obama Caves to the Pentagon, He's No Jack Kennedy

Robert Naiman, 10.27.2009

Policy Director of Just Foreign Policy

You don't have to be a dove to understand what President Kennedy understood: putting U.S. troops on the ground somewhere doesn't automatically make you more powerful.

Explore War and Rethink Afghanistan

Joel Epstein, 10.20.2009

Corporate and philanthropic giving and strategic communications professional

Sun Valley Adaptive Sports (SVAS) is a nonprofit project funded by the Annenberg Foundation to support wounded warriors with their recovery and reintegration into society.

Wall Street Is More of a Threat to Obama's Domestic Agenda than Afghanistan

Joseph A. Palermo, 10.20.2009

Author/Associate Professor of History

Whatever Obama decides to do in Afghanistan is of little consequence compared to Wall Street's ongoing "plutonomy."

Afghanistan -- Winning Lessons from Vietnam

John Graham, 10.19.2009

President, Giraffe Heroes Project and author of Stick Your Neck Out -- a Street-Smart Guide to Creating Change in Your Community and Beyond

The collapse of US efforts in Vietnam was made inevitable by the pervasive corruption and incompetence of a succession of governments in South Vietnam -- and here lies the lesson for Afghanistan.

Vietnam, Agent Orange and Secretary Shinseki's Timely Decisions

Trish Kinney, 10.16.2009

Author of Silver Platter Girl and documentary filmmaker

Three new medical conditions may gain presumptive status as to their relationship to Agent Orange exposure. I am heartbroken that we haven't been there for vets when they needed us most.

Did Bush Screw Up Afghanistan Worse Than Iraq?

Cenk Uygur, 10.15.2009

Host of The Young Turks

Here's what you can't argue with - Bush did not try at all in Afghanistan. He didn't give a damn. 26,000 troops -- are you kidding me?

Full Throttle to Hyperlocal News in Czech Republic

Magda Abu-Fadil, 10.13.2009

Director of Journalism Training Program at the American University of Beirut

In the Czech Republic, "news cafés" are springing up, where people can relax, meet, down some brew, see their local paper being produced, mingle with editors and contribute copy.

One Self-Published Author Gives a Story of War a Soul

Carol Hoenig, 10.13.2009

Author of the multi-award-winning novel, "Without Grace."

Homefront, is a novel about someone waiting for a loved one to return home from war. What inspired you to write this particular story?

What Do We Do After We Send Our Loved Ones Off to War?

Carol Hoenig, 10.11.2009

Author of the multi-award-winning novel, "Without Grace."

Homefront is not a political book; rather, it shows how war paralyzes a loved one from going on living in the soldier's absence.

Health Is A Function Of Participation

Jim Selman, 10.16.2009

A recognized leader and authority in the field of organizational transformation and culture change.

My focus is on working to transform the culture of aging so that our later years in life are as meaningful and filled with possibility as when we were younger.

Afghanistan: Echoes of Vietnam

Foreign Policy Roundtable, 10.07.2009

Now that U.S. involvement in Iraq has finally begun to require fewer resources, Afghanistan is the new focus of anti-war sentiment, and increasingly Obama's critics are drawing on the analogy of Vietnam.

Afghanistan: The Original Quagmire

James Campion, 10.07.2009

Political Analyst for 'The Aquarian Weekly'

The United States must leave Afghanistan now. Not in eleven months or after careful discussion and continued study to determine an undisclosed time, but now.

New Rule Suggestion for Bill Maher: Afghan War Supporters Must Walk the Walk to Be Heard

Paul Abrams, 10.07.2009

Physician, entrepreneur, biotechnology, law, economics, politics, professional iconoclast

We should all be damned if we allow a group of cowards to cheerlead other peoples' children to their deaths or permanent injuries again without first putting themselves in the thick of battle.