Dennis Ross Shoots Down War With Iran

Dennis Ross Shoots Down War With Iran

Robert Dreyfuss on February 15, 2012 - 10:21am ET

Back in 2007, during a similar outbreak of overheated rhetoric about war against Iran—at that time, Vice President Dick Cheney was pushing behind the scenes for a unilateral American strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities—a subversive report National Intelligence Estimate by the US intelligence community slammed the door on war by declaring that the spy agencies believed that Iran had halted its work on a nuclear bomb.
In 2012, Dennis Ross may have done the same thing. His op-ed in the New York Times today all but closes the door on the idea of war against Iran in 2012 by either the United States or Israel.... Read More

Tomgram: Peter Van Buren, In Washington, Fear the Silence, Not the Noise | TomDispatch

Peter Van Buren, In Washington, Fear the Silence, Not the Noise |

Posted by Peter Van Buren at 9:31am, February 9, 2012.
[Note for TomDispatch Readers: A last reminder for those of you in New York City: Jeremy Scahill and I will be onstage Friday, 6-8 pm, at New York University’s Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute discussing our American world (such as it is), his work, and my new book, The United States of Fear. Hope you’ll drop by. For further information and directions on getting there, click here. Tom]

One thing is obvious. No one ever joins the government in order to be a whistleblower or leaker. Whistleblowers are created, not born.

To offer an example...... Read More

Tomgram: Noam Chomsky, Imperial Hegemony and Its Discontents | TomDispatch

 Noam Chomsky, Imperial Hegemony and Its Discontents

[Note for TomDispatch Readers: Noam Chomsky’s latest TomDispatch post ends today, but TomDispatch, of course, goes on.  In the coming weeks, expect new posts from Andrew Bacevich, Rebecca Solnit, Michael Klare, Nick Turse, Karen J. Greenberg, and other TomDispatch regulars as well as surprising new authors.... Read More on TomDispatch

The Nature and Effects of Imperialism by Fazal Rahman, Ph.D. « Dandelion Salad

The Nature and Effects of Imperialism by Fazal Rahman, Ph.D. « Dandelion Salad

Posted on January 31, 2012 by dandelionsalad

by Fazal Rahman, Ph.D.
Guest Writer
Dandelion Salad
Originally published on imperialismandthethirdworld.wordpress.com
January 31, 2012
Multidimensional and complex nature and effects of imperialism on democracy, society, nature, and human nature

“At the same pace that mankind masters nature, man seems to become enslaved to other men or to his own infamy. Even the pure light of science seems unable to shine but on the dark background of ignorance. All our invention and progress seem to result in endowing material forces with intellectual life, and in stultifying human life into a material force.” Karl Marx. Selected Works, Vol. 1, p. 500. “That hideous pagan idol (imperialism), who would not drink the nectar but from the skulls of the slain.” Karl Marx. On Colonialism, Moscow Publication, 1968, p. 87.

Iran's Nuclear Program - Geopolitical Monitor

Iran's Nuclear Program - Geopolitical Monitor
A sense of enduring history and more recent experience of bitter conflict inform Iran's nuclear stance. To understand this could be a way to avoid war.

The United States navy currently has two aircraft-carrier battle-groups on station in the Persian Gulf and the Arabian Sea, led by the USS Abraham Lincoln and the USS Carl Vinson.

The NYPD's ugly history of racial profiling | Debbie Almontaser | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk

The NYPD's ugly history of racial profiling | Debbie Almontaser | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk

New Yorkers have long put up with discriminatory 'stop-and-frisk' searches. Now, the NYPD is demonising us as fanatical jihadists...
ust as, every day, I pray for the safety of my family members who serve in the New York Police Department, now I also have to pray for safety and security of my community from the very agency that is legally bound to protect them. Recently, it has been revealed that New York's police commissioner sat for a 90-minute interview during the making of The Third Jihad, a patently anti-Muslim film. Just as troubling, for months the commissioner and his staff played down both his involvement and the extent of the film's viewing by cadets in training....

Read more

Is Israel preparing to attack Iran? - The Washington Post

Is Israel preparing to attack Iran? - The Washington Post
By David Ignatius, Published: February 2
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta has a lot on his mind these days, from cutting the defense budget to managing the drawdown of U.S. forces in Afghanistan. But his biggest worry is the growing possibility that Israel will attack Iran over the next few months...

Read more

"Which Path to Persia?" 
was written in 2009 by the Brookings Institute as a blueprint for confronting Iran.

..........the occupation of Iran even more, to levels that realistically only could be met by a major, rapid expansion of the U.s. armed forces, for which the American people appear to have little interest.