WASHINGTON — Google the name “Tallulah Bankhead” and you will be regaled (or mortified if your mores tend to the Victorian) with tales of the actor’s libertine appetites, her breakout performance in the Hitchcock classic Lifeboat, or her half-camp, half-vamp villainess in the 1960s Batman television series.
NEW YORK — Saudi Arabia’s king-in-waiting, Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman or “MBS,” has long been suspected of pushing to forge a historic alliance between the Gulf Arab monarchy and apartheid Israel as a part of his reform agenda.
This article is Part II of a series exploring the past of soon-to-be National Security Adviser John Bolton and what his appointment will mean for U.S. foreign policy, with a focus on the Middle East, Latin America, and the Koreas. Part I examined Bolton’s past advocacy for Israel, often at the U.S.’ expense.
This article is Part I of a series exploring the past of soon-to-be National Security Adviser John Bolton and what his recent appointment will mean for U.S. foreign policy, with a focus on the Middle East, Latin America, and the Koreas. Part I explores Bolton’s history of putting the interests of the Israeli government ahead of those of the U.S., as well as what his appointment means for Israel’s current preparations for a “three front” war and American involvement in that war.
INDIANAPOLIS – On a recent weekday afternoon in March, the Goodwill store on this city’s east side was buzzing with nearly two dozen shoppers – young and old, black and white, Latino and Asian — rummaging excitedly through the rows of blue jeans, piles of shoes, and shelves of luggage, books, and picture frames in a hunt for the best bargains to be had.
MEXICO CITY — Thirty-one-year-old photojournalist Ruben Espinosa was murdered the first time in July of 2015, when he and four women were fatally shot, execution style, with a 9-millimeter handgun, inside an apartment in a middle-class neighborhood of Mexico City. Three of the women were likely in the wrong place at the wrong time; the real targets were almost certainly the human-rights activist Nadia Vera, 31, and Espinosa, both of who were implacable foes of the corrupt governor of the state of Veracruz, Javier Duarte.
NEW YORK — Published 25 years ago this fall, Mark Danner’s 22,000-word article for the New Yorker magazine recreated, in painstakingly vivid detail, the 1981 massacre of nearly 800 villagers by a Salvadoran Army brigade hunting for communist guerrilla fighters:
TEMA, GHANA (Analysis) — The Argentine naval vessel Libertad embarked on its maiden voyage in 1961 and remains, to this day, a maritime and mechanical marvel. At 340 feet, it is one of the longest, heaviest, and yet fastest ships afloat — holding, at one time or another, several world speed records. With its classical windjammer design and clipper bow, it is the ninth naval vessel in Argentina to bear the name “Libertad” and is adorned with a wood-carved figurehead clothed in long, flowing robes to represent the idea of liberty.
AFRIN, SYRIA (Analysis) — In less than two months since Erdoğan’s Operation Olive Branch kicked off, the Kurdish “Rojava Project,” which aims for a unified Kurdish-controlled area in northeast Syria, has been delivered a strong blow. Kurdish militias have shown their inability to unite in the face of Turkish aggression.
BOGOTA, COLOMBIA — With Colombia’s March 11 legislative elections ending in a near tie between right- and left-wing coalitions, the future of an already precarious peace process most likely hinges on the May 27 presidential vote.
When far-right uribista Ivan Duque of Centro Democratico (Democratic Center) squares off against left-leaning former Bogota mayor Gustavo Petro, it will determine the trajectory of the close U.S. ally, and whether or not the most recent attempt at peace might continue.
