I was a college student on 9/11. The ensuing “War on Terror,” anchored by the bombing and U.S. occupation of Afghanistan, has been with us ever since—virtually my entire adult life. President Biden was right to end the war in Afghanistan and follow through on a deal that his predecessor Donald Trump had negotiated with the Taliban. As Biden explained, “After 20 years, I’ve[Read More...]
Legislation banning abortions as early as six weeks into pregnancy took effect in Texas at midnight after the US Supreme Court did not act on an emergency appeal by Texas abortion providers Tuesday. Senate Bill 8, ushered through the Republican-dominated state legislature and signed into law by Governor Greg Abbott, prohibits abortions whenever an ultrasound can detect a “fetal heartbeat,”[Read More...]
The Jewish Chronicle, a weekly newspaper that was saved from liquidation last year by a consortium led by a former senior adviser to Theresa May, has been exposed as having a quite astonishing record of journalistic failings. Over the past three years, the Independent Press Standards Organisation (IPSO), the misnamed and feeble “press regulator” created by the billionaire-owned corporate media,[Read More...]
When the US State Department announced that it would host a virtual ministerial meeting on August 30 with “key partners on Afghanistan,” there was an element of surprise in the list of participants. Apart from the US’ NATO and EU allies, there was a solitary non-western partner country — Qatar. What qualified this peninsular Arab country to be invited to join such a privileged circle of America’s[Read More...]
by Thomas Klikauer and Meg Young It has often been said that predictions are hard to make – particularly when they concern the future. We have seen it many times in recent years and this may just as well apply to the upcoming federal election in Germany scheduled for 26th September 2021. Unlike the USA’s first past the post system[Read More...]
For twenty years, two dominant narratives have shaped our view of the illegal US invasion and occupation of Afghanistan, and neither one of these narratives would readily accept the use of such terms as ‘illegal’, ‘invasion’ and ‘occupation.’ The framing of the US ‘military intervention’ in Afghanistan, starting on October 7, 2001, as the official start of what was dubbed[Read More...]
With the final U.S. soldiers leaving Afghanistan earlier this week after nearly 20 years of occupation and war, a new analysis released Wednesday shows the United States will ultimately spend upwards of $8 trillion and that nearly one million people have lost their lives so far in the so-called “global war on terror” that was launched after the attacks of September[Read More...]
US President Joe Biden delivered a speech Tuesday afternoon declaring an end to the 20-year US war in Afghanistan. Coming the day after a C-17 military transport plane flew the last US troops out of Kabul and in the midst of celebrations in the streets of Afghanistan of the end of US occupation, Biden’s speech included statements never before heard[Read More...]
No more profoundly disturbing statement was needed. In the dying days of the official US departure from Kabul, a US drone etched its butcher’s legacy with a strike supposedly intended for the blood-lusty terrorist group ISIS-K, an abbreviation of Islamic State in Khorasan Province. Its members had taken responsibility for blasts outside Harmid Karzai International Airport that had cost the[Read More...]
by Thomas Klikauer and Meg Young At the end of August 2021, Germany’s right-wing Axel Springer bought the US political magazine Politico for about $1bn (€850m) – the most expensive acquisition in the history of Germany’s right-wing Springer Group. Until the Springer takeover, Politico used to belong to the Capitol News Company of media owner Robert Allbritton. Allbritton founded Politico[Read More...]
