Over the past two days, the fawning American media has provided rave reviews of John McCain's visit to France. While the New York Times lauded "McCain's soothing tones," Time gushed about "McCain's Paris romance" and the transformation of Franco-American relations made possible by his warm embrace of French President Nicolas Sarkozy. But lost in these […]

As I documented just two day ago, John McCain has been wrong from the start about virtually every aspect of the Iraq war. From Ahmed Chalabi and Saddam's WMD to the prospects of Americans troops being greeting as liberators and the certainty of a "rapid" U.S. victory in "three weeks," John McCain had it wrong […]

Over the past week, Democrat Hillary Clinton has proclaimed her potential Republican rival John McCain to be the gold standard of wartime presidents. But lost in Clinton's fierce barrage against Barack Obama's national security experience is the inescapable conclusion about John McCain's own suitability as Commander-in-Chief. McCain's mistake-filled record, questionable judgment, calamitous misreading of history, […]

In a stunning announcement Friday, the Pentagon skipped over Boeing and awarded a massive $40 billion contract for a new fleet of refueling tankers to a Northrop Grumman and European Aeronautics Defense and Space (EADS). While Air Force officials claimed the choice of the KC-45 tankers jointly developed by Grumman and Airbus' parent company was […]

Exactly two years ago, I dissected the Bush administration's dubious legal justification for its illicit program of NSA domestic surveillance. Then, I argued that the President's twin claims that his constitutional authority as Commander-in-Chief and the 2001 Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF) allowed Bush to operate outside the legal mandate of FISA […]

Watching the CNN Democratic debate last night, I wondered if Barack Obama had reprised George W. Bush's infamous "not ready for duty, sir" accusation about the American military's preparedness. As it turns out, what sounded like Obama hyperbole about the state of overstretched U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan is by and large accurate. And […]

That cheering sound you may have heard this morning was conservatives' applauding the news that New York Times reporter James Risen has been subpoenaed in an effort to force him to reveal his confidential sources. But while Republican rage may be temporarily muted over the inquiry into Risen's 2006 book, many on the right won't […]

In an unprecedented and blistering "undorsement" on Saturday, the Concord Monitor implored New Hampshire voters not to support GOP White House hopeful Mitt Romney under any circumstances. Labeling Romney "a disquieting figure" who "most surely must be stopped," the Monitor profiled the serial flip-flopper whose pronouncements on national security and civil liberties issues "are often […]

President Bush's amen corner in the conservative commentariat is apoplectic over the new National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iran. After all, the report's conclusion that Tehran suspended its nuclear weapons program inn 2003 knocked the legs out from their "World War III" rhetoric. And as you'd expect, the same people who helped bring you the […]

As Condoleezza Rice prepares to host the Middle East summit in Annapolis this week, her State Department has issued an updated historical timeline of American efforts to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The timeline is a fascinating document both for what it reveals and what it leaves out. The rise of Hamas and its election victories […]