Tuesday's State of the Union Address should offer Americans compelling viewing. After the GOP's electoral disaster in November and the resounding thud that greeted the "surge" in Iraq, the 2007 SOTU can be said to officially mark the last throes of the Bush presidency. In anticipation of tomorrow night's presidential flight of fantasy, here are […]
Category: Nat'l Security
This week's startling revelations regarding Beijing's successful test of an anti-satellite weapon provided just the latest evidence of China's growing geo-strategic challenge to the United States. And as I first wrote almost three years ago, the Bush administration seems rudderless in the face of rapidly rising Chinese economic power, military might and diplomatic strength. For […]
In what may be a major reversal of course, the Bush administration may yet submit to the rule of law regarding its illegal NSA domestic spying program. The AP is reporting that Attorney General Gonzales notified Senate Judiciary Committee leaders Pat Leahy (D-VT) and Arlen Specter (R-PA) that the Justice Department will once again submit […]
In the Washington Post this New Year's Day, former counter-terrorism czar Richard Clarke has a compelling op-ed piece ("While You Were At War...") on the dangerous and rising opportunity costs of the Bush administration's Iraq fixation. In a nutshell, Clarke argues that while President Bush and the U.S. national security apparatus have been focused like […]
While President Bush has declared that he "won't be rushed" into unveiling his new strategy for Iraq, the outlines are already clear. The twin pillars of the coming Bush approach appear to be a "surge" in U.S. force levels combined with the sacking of the generals opposed to it. Call it "Surge and Purge." Rumors […]
With the nation engaged in a critical debate about the path forward in (or out of) Iraq during this holiday season, we should never lose sight of the men and women in the U.S. armed forces who serve in our name. We are immensely privileged to live in a nation where a selfless few fight […]
Since he first stepped into the Oval Office, much has been made about George W. Bush as America's CEO, our first MBA President. In the wake of the Iraq Study Group report, the nation has been eagerly awaiting President Bush's now-delayed new strategy with the baited breath surrounding a major new product announcement. But as […]
As he exits the Pentagon stage, outgoing Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld shows once again that for the Bush White House, nothing succeeds like failure. In an elaborate ceremony carried live on all the cable news networks, President Bush and Vice President Cheney feted the disgraced Defense Secretary with glowing words, military pomp and even […]
On Monday, Democrats began to pay the price for the ongoing feud between Californians Nancy Pelosi and Jane Harman. In one of the first tests of her leadership, Speaker Pelosi bypassed Harman in favor of Texan Silvestre Reyes to head the House Intelligence Committee. Sadly Reyes, like candidate George W. Bush before him, failed his […]
If a period of days can be said to mark the end of the era, this past week almost surely heralded the demise of the Bush Doctrine. On Wednesday, the Iraq Study Group dealt a death blow to the Bush foreign policy's three pillars of no safe havens, preemptive war and democracy expansion. But it […]