Detain 'em and Deport 'em
Been reading a lot lately from Daily Kos folks who support a major increase in the use of immigration detention and a "get tough" policy on "illegals". People of good conscience can differ on the...
View ArticleAlito on Asylum
Alito's position on reproductive rights is the BIG issue that will energize both the Democratic and Wingnut base. But how does he stand on other human rights issues? Republicans like Alito are known...
View ArticlePostcard from Iraq
Let me write about an Iraq that exists as more than a reflection of our anger and outrage at the Bush Administration; an Iraq that existed before the invasion, and will continue after the last US...
View ArticleIraq Postcard II
A few days ago I wrote about the borderlands between Kurdistan and the rest of Iraq. Today I'd like to write about Iraq's Shia' majority. Shia' politics is the politics of raw emotion: despair,...
View ArticleImmigration Detention: American Gulag
This diary is as much about rule of law as it is about immigration. The Bush Administration and their allies in Congress have taken it upon themselves to remove judicial oversight abroad in...
View ArticleLieberman and Brownback - We Need You (today)
OK, can we find two more unpopular senators here on Daily Kos than Joe Lieberman and Sam Brownback? Is redemption possible, even for just a little while, and even on one issue? Contrary to their...
View ArticleWar Crimes come home to roost in IL-11th
Imagine for a moment what the Republican Party would do to Sherrod Brown if: (1) His father in law was an indicted war criminal; (2) His wife was the political advisor to an indicted war criminal; and,...
View ArticleIraq Journal - the Border
I'm fortunate to have the opportunity to work in Iraq, and occasionally post diaries on Daily Kos. These diaries are an effort to provide more context to the current conflict, from a little closer and...
View ArticleA gentle critique: Iraq mortality report
Let me preface this diary by saying the recent Johns Hopkins study on mortality in Iraq may well be accurate, and that I'm not debating the larger questions of US complicity in the war or culpability...
View ArticleIraq Diary - Civil Society
This is the latest in a series of periodic diaries from Iraq. I haven’t written one for a few months, but this last week has been unusually depressing and frightening and the week’s events deserve...
View ArticleSaddam's Execution - Conversation with his Appeals Court Judge
An Iraqi appeals court upheld Saddam’s death sentence, and the AP reports that he has been handed over to the Iraqi government for execution within the next 24 hours. The inexorable slide toward...
View ArticleWhite House picks pastry chef w/“light touch”
This diary won’t be up to my usual standards, but there’s something so grossly offensive about reading the words "White House" and "light touch" in the same sentence, that I feel compelled to comment....
View ArticleOut Now!
Compare and contrast:Bush Administration incompetence doomed New Orleans. We created this mess by building levies on the Mississippi, destroying the wetlands, cutting canals through the delta, and...
View ArticleTurks invade? Realtime news from Kurdistan
OK, this will be a short diary. There are several diaries up right now about the Turkish invasion of Iraqi Kurdistan, so I feel compelled to post some quick information because we actually work there,...
View ArticleDream Act Defeated in Senate
The Senate just voted on the DREAM Act. The vote was on a procedural motion, so 60 votes were needed to proceed to vote on the DREAM Act itself. It was not really all that close. 54 voted in favor,...
View ArticleGWB: Defining Down Torture for 40 Years
Wow. Fourty years ago today, George W. Bush first found his name in print in the New York Times. At the time, Bush was a senior at Yale and former president of the Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity....
View ArticleGitmo defense attorneys endorse Obama
I'll make this a very brief diary and add some caveats right at the beginning. First, I hope this diary doesn't turn into an opportunity for more fighting in the primary wars, because all three...
View ArticleHow long has this been going on? Fraud at the NRCC
Just a short diary about some new developments in an interesting story. As was mentioned last week in the NYT, the National Republican Congressional Committee called in the FBI to investigate...
View ArticleDawn Chorus - Iraqi Kurdistan Edition
Last week, Lineatus asked me to write a guest Dawn Chorus diary on location in Iraq. I wrote the following last weekend in Suleymaniya, a city in the Kurdistan region, and am posting it this...
View Article"The Annointed One" - viral video, Obama and Abortion
Unfortunately, I share the same last name as a certain former Republican Congressman. It's not a common name, and for the last few weeks I have been receiving e-mails from a member of his family, who...
View ArticleUrgent appeal - Gay men escaping Iraq
I got a call today that I would rather not have received. M called and told me that his partner was dead. The Sadr militia caught him, super-glued his anus shut and then beat him to death. M is...
View ArticleEaster Sermon for the Birds
I’ll admit I’m an odd person to be writing an Easter sermon. Some of us prefer our epiphanies grounded in the external world, even feathered and something we can hold in our hands. Some of us...
View ArticleAfghanistan Onion - comedy and tragedy in Afghan press
I thought I'd share a few news stories in the Afghanistan Observer and the Daily Afghanistan Outlook newspapers - stories that alternately make one laugh or cry. This diary is not a detailed...
View ArticleNews update - multiple large blasts in Baghdad
Just got an email from a friend who sent me a BBC link - seems there have been about 10 coordinated explosions in Baghdad, many of which appear to be car bombs in primarily Shia' areas of Baghdad....
View ArticleEyes on Iraq - Demonstrations Today
I wanted to write about some events today in Iraq related to the series of popular uprisings that are spreading throughout the Arab world. I manage some programs in Iraq and am currently in the Iraqi...
View ArticleLibya to release NYT reporter Anthony Shadid
OK, this will be a short diary, but this is very good news. Libya has acknowledged capturing Pulitzer-prize winning NYT reporter Anthony Shadid and three of his colleagues and will release them. They...
View ArticleBreaking - Iran implicated in plot to assassinate Saudi ambassador in US
I'm watching this on Al Jazirah outside the US but didn't see it posted yet on Daily Kos. Al Jazirah is reporting that the FBI has arrested an Iranian-American and indicted a leading Iranian...
View ArticleTripoli Celebrates!
Brit suggested I write a diary to expand upon his, so I'll do so. If you haven't read his yet it's here: http://www.dailykos.com/... Some brief background. I work for a US-based non-profit...
View ArticleLibya - After the Revolution
This diary is a follow-up to one I published here last week, here: http://www.dailykos.com/... Some readers suggested that I continue providing updates on the situation in Libya, and add a little...
View ArticleAdvocacy Alert: Senate Com on Intelligence Torture Report
Dear Friends,Do you have a few minutes for a little quick and painless advocacy? Do you live in California or Maine? Tomorrow, the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI) faces an...
View ArticleSyria in context (not a rant)
I've felt that the diaries on Syria over the last few days have been more about the US than Syria and that there's been a gap in analysis. Meteor Blades encouraged me to write a diary on the Syrian...
View ArticleMeanwhile in Iraq (Updated - US planes attack IS)
[UPDATE: Just received reports from the NGO coordinating committee and some of our partners in Erbil that the US has begun airstrikes against IS forces between Mosul and Erbil. WP reports that US...
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Dawn Chorus: Sweden
Mute swan - Cygnus olorI was in Stockholm for work, and had a chance to spend a few days in this beautiful city. We absorb images of Scandinavia from stories and books in childhood; Stockholm...
View ArticleWe milk the goat even if it's male
The so-called Islamic State calls out to be mocked... and plenty of comics in the Middle East are happy to rise to the challenge. Some say that they are so brutal, so awful, and cause so much tragedy,...
View ArticleBlack cops charged for police brutality
So what happens when black police use excessive force? As the nation focuses on two instances in which white cops committed acts of violence against black citizens, perhaps it is worth looking at what...
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Images of Muhammad in Islam
In the wake of the Charlie Hebdo killings in Paris, I thought it would be a good idea to provide background information on the prohibition of depicting the human form in Islam, including the Prophet...
View ArticleBill Clinton encouraged Trump
My sweetie just sent me a Washington Post article that discloses that Bill Clinton talked with Donald Trump about running on the GOP ticket. I haven't seen it diaried here, so I thought I'd send this...
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Major Kurdish offensive begins against Islamic State
A major battle to retake the strategic town of Sinjar started overnight, with approximately 7,000 Kurdish troops surrounding the town and cutting the main road between Mosul and the “Islamic State”...
View ArticleIbrahim for Citizen Urgent Action Please!!!
I’m writing to ask for your help.Those of you who have been to SE Michigan may have come across bumper stickers that say “Ibrahim for Citizen”. These bumper stickers are part of a campaign that has...
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A Fake Progressive and A Confederate Scumbag Kill Immigration Reform
I’m going to confess right up front that this is an exercise in propaganda — I am writing this diary to make a point and not to attack Bernie Sanders. I like both Sanders and Clinton, and I will vote...
View ArticleOpen letter to Bob Inglis on the day after Donald Trump accepts the GOP...
On the day after Donald Trump received the GOP nomination, I think it is important to remember that some Republicans see through the narcissism and the pathology, and perhaps also mourn the passage of...
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BREAKING: Trump still clueless on ISIS as Mosul Offensive starts
I am writing this diary from Iraq, and wanted to give a first person account of the imminent operation against the Islamic State of Iraq and Ash-Sham (ISIS) in Mosul. ISIS suffered a major symbolic...
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