Ex Super Power? Can This Be True?

Asia Times Online published an article on May 10, 2008 entitled “An oil-addicted ex-superpower.” The American author, Michael T. Klare, Five Colleges professor of Peace and World Security Studies, makes a chillingly convincing case for the fact that the United States’ massive borrowing to pay for its oil habit has already cost them their superpower [...]

Randy Newman’s Best Defense of America

I invite you to listen to this great Randy Newman song again: Just a few Words in Defense of Our Country. Newman’s satire is so easy going, so fast and loose, so intelligent and so insidious that when you think he’s talking about other people–stupid, vain, greedy, hypocritical other people–little by little you begin to [...]

The Gringo Series

Let’s call it de-gringo-ization, that penchant the United Statesians have for placing universal labels on things that are uniquely gringo. The first thing that comes to mind, of course, is the World Series, the annual end-of-season baseball playoff in the United States. Insofar as there are no teams from other baseball-playing countries represented–neither Japan nor, [...]

Is It a Bird? Is It a Plane? No, It’s the Machine Again

Faster than a speeding pork barrel, more powerful than executive privilege, able to leap tall ballot boxes in a single bound. There in the sky, is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it’s Superdelegate! Now that the contest for the Democratic nomination is intensifying we see the term “superdelegate” popping up more and [...]

U.S. Resorts to Pistachio Diplomacy–Take Cover!

I intended to introduce you Robert Fisk this morning, but this journalist who has given us the finest, most reliable Middle East coverage for decades will have to wait till next time. Breaking news demands our attention. According to Madrid’s El Mundo newspaper this morning, Sal Emergui, their correspondent in Jerusalem, filed the following report [...]