Even as Islamic State fighters battle Iraqi forces in western Iraq near a base where hundreds of American troops are currently stationed, the government in Baghdad is facing a new crisis. On Friday, Sunni tribal leader Sheik Qasim al-Janabi, his son and six bodyguards were killed by unidentified Shiite militiamen in Baghdad. In the aftermath […]

Recent polling from Israel suggests that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud party and its coalition allies may eke out a narrow victory in the March 17 elections. Here in the United States, Republicans are certainly hoping so. After all, they didn't just invite Netanyahu to use Congress as an unprecedented platform for a foreign leader […]

When Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delivers his address to Congress, his objectives will be two-fold. While President Obama is trying to avoid a U.S. war with Iran, Bibi wants to start one. (As his Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon put it last year, "The one who should lead the campaign against Iran is the U.S.") […]

Less than one month ago, Republican Senator and possible 2016 presidential candidate Lindsey Graham (R-SC) traveled to Jerusalem to deliver a simple message to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu: "the Congress will follow your lead." Follow Bibi's lead, that is, on policy towards Iran. And now, just as the U.S. and its international partners enter […]

Republicans are predictably foaming at the mouth over the news that the Obama administration secured the release of American soldier Bowe Bergdahl exchange for five Taliban prisoners held at Guantanamo Bay. Even more predictable, the right-wing rage is unfounded. As Lt. Col. Robert Bateman explained, throughout its history the United States has engaged in prisoner […]

In December 2004, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld lectured American troops worried about vital equipment shortages plaguing U.S. combat forces in Iraq. "You go to war with the army you have," Rumsfeld pontificated, "not the army you might want or wish to have at a later time." That was a particularly galling statement for Rumsfeld of […]

The sun still rises in the east and the force of gravity still applies. And when they want to sound tough on Iran, would-be Republican presidential candidates still cite Ronald Reagan as their role model. So following in the footsteps of Sarah Palin and Mitt Romney, Texas Senator Ted Cruz tweeted a picture of Ronald […]

Even as American and international negotiators were finalizing the interim agreement with Iran over its nuclear program, both houses of Congress were moving to tie President Obama's hands in the future. While a bipartisan bill mandating harsh new sanctions nears a veto-proof majority in the Senate, House Republicans announced they would take up the legislation […]

As 2013 draws to close, the negotiations over the Iranian nuclear program have entered a delicate stage. But in 2014, the tensions will escalate dramatically as a bipartisan group of Senators brings a new Iran sanctions bill to the floor for a vote. As many others have warned, that promise of new measures against Tehran […]

Despite their decades-long record of shaking hands with tyrants whose nations posed an existential threat to the United States, when President Obama shook the hand of one who did not Republicans nevertheless took to the fainting couch. The image of Obama's brief handshake with Cuba's Raul Castro prior to his address at the memorial service […]