| 25 Jan 2010 |
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The Progressive Imperative, More Than Ever
Last week, with the Tea Bagger triumph in Massachusetts and the corporate triumph in the U.S. Supreme Court, an apt soundtrack would have been the Creedence Clearwater Revival song “Bad Moon Rising”:
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| 27 Dec 2009 |
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Vast Change Is Essential
AN AILING ECONOMY and a warming climate have caused many people to become more skeptical of business as usual in such matters as food, energy, housing, water and the environment. The virtues of self-reliance are compelling - and in Marin County, more than ever, the hunt is on for local solutions.
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| 22 Dec 2009 |
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Flares in the Political Dark
The winter solstice of 2009 arrived as a grim metaphor for the current politics of healthcare, war and a lot more. “In a dark time,” wrote the poet Theodore Roethke, “the eye begins to see.”
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| 10 Dec 2009 |
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Mr. President, War Is Not Peace
As President Obama neared the close of his Nobel address, he called for “the continued expansion of our moral imagination.” Yet his speech was tightly circumscribed by the policies that his oratory labored to justify.
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| 30 Nov 2009 |
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The Hollow Politics of Escalation
An underlying conceit of the new spin about benchmarks and timetables for Afghanistan is the notion that pivotal events there can be choreographed from Washington. So, a day ahead of the president's Tuesday night speech, the New York Times quotes an unnamed top administration official saying: "He wants to give a clear sense of both the time frame for action and how the war will eventually wind down."
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| 16 Nov 2009 |
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Biggest State Party to Obama: Get Out of Afghanistan
There's a significant new straw in the political wind for President Obama to consider. The California Democratic Party has just sent him a formal and clear message: Stop making war in Afghanistan.
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| 12 Nov 2009 |
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The War Stampede
Disputes are raging within the Obama administration over how to continue the U.S. war effort in Afghanistan. A new leak tells us that Washington’s ambassador in Kabul, former four-star general Karl Eikenberry, has cautioned against adding more troops while President Hamid Karzai keeps disappointing American policymakers. This is the extent of the current debate within the warfare state.
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| 6 Nov 2009 |
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One Year Later: Unrest within the Obama Base
On election night a year ago, celebrations across the North Bay included dancing in the streets. The voters had spoken — loudly — for Barack Obama, who won 74 percent of ballots in Sonoma County and 78 percent in Marin. Spirits were sky high, and so were expectations.
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| 5 Nov 2009 |
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The Next Phase of Healthcare Apartheid
In Washington, “healthcare reform” has degenerated into a sick joke. At this point, only spinners who’ve succumbed to their own vertigo could use the word “robust” to describe the public option in the healthcare bill that the House Democratic leadership has sent to the floor.
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| 5 Nov 2009 |
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The Next Phase of Healthcare Apartheid
In Washington, “healthcare reform” has degenerated into a sick joke. At this point, only spinners who’ve succumbed to their own vertigo could use the word “robust” to describe the public option in the healthcare bill that the House Democratic leadership has sent to the floor.
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| 21 Oct 2009 |
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Uncle Sam in Afghanistan: Good Help Is Hard to Find
Almost eight years after choosing Hamid Karzai to head the Afghan government, Uncle Sam would like to give him a pink slip. But it’s not easy. And the grim fiasco of Afghanistan’s last election is shadowing the next.
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| 1 Oct 2009 |
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Starting Another Year of War in Afghanistan
October 2009 has begun with the New York Times reporting that “the president, vice president and an array of cabinet secretaries, intelligence chiefs, generals, diplomats and advisers gathered in a windowless basement room of the White House for three hours on Wednesday to chart a new course in Afghanistan.”
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| 23 Sep 2009 |
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Afghanistan Needs Your Help
It takes a long time to fly from Kabul to Washington--but the real distances between the two capitals have little to do with miles.
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| 8 Sep 2009 |
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Men with Guns, in Kabul and Washington
For those who believe in making war, Kabul is a notable work product. After 30 years, the results are in: a devastated city.
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| 1 Sep 2009 |
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The View from Afghanistan
I'm about 7,400 miles from home, but that's the least of the distances between the pleasures of Marin and the agonies of war here in Kabul.
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| 1 Sep 2009 |
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A Little Girl in Kabul
Yesterday, I met a little girl named Guljumma. She's seven years old, and she lives in Kabul at a place called Helmand Refugee Camp District 5.
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| 26 Aug 2009 |
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The Afghanistan Gap: Press vs. Public
This month, a lot of media stories have compared President Johnson's war in Vietnam and President Obama's war in Afghanistan. The comparisons are often valid, but a key parallel rarely gets mentioned: the media's insistent support for the war even after most of the public has turned against it.
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| 23 Aug 2009 |
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Spinning Health Care: A Bad Case of Vertigo
"I want to cover everybody," President Obama said at his news conference Wednesday night. "Now, the truth is that unless you have a - what's called a single-payer system, in which everybody's automatically covered, then you're probably not going to reach every single individual ..."
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| 5 Aug 2009 |
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The Incredible Shrinking Health Care Reform
Like soap in a rainstorm, "health care reform" is wasting away. As this week began, a leading follower of conventional wisdom, journalist Cokie Roberts, told NPR listeners, "This is evolving legislation. And the administration is now talking about a glide path towards universal coverage, rather than immediate universal coverage.” ...
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| 2 Feb 2009 |
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Why Are We Still at War?
The United States began its war in Afghanistan 88 months ago. "The war on terror" has no sunset clause. As a perpetual emotion machine, it offers to avenge what can never heal and to fix grief that is irreparable.
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