Jackson Williams: Must See TV: My Trip to Al-Qaeda on HBO

On Tuesday, September 7, HBO airs the documentary My Trip to Al-Qaeda by Alex Gibney and Lawrence Wright. It should not be missed. Wright’s most recent book, The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11, won the ’07 Pulitzer for General Non-Fiction. It’s the best book yet about the complexities surrounding that tragedy, and [...]

Laura Flanders: The F Word: Accepting Defeat in Iraq

Everyone is spinning the Iraq mission’s so-called end but no one seems willing quite to accept defeat. Republicans are complaining that the president didn’t mention George W. Bush often enough in his speech announcing the end of combat operations. In fact, he did, quite a bit, and in an over-generous way, most sane people agree. [...]

Andy Thayer: The "End" of the Iraq War?

In his speech to the nation Tuesday night, President Obama essentially claimed to be ending the U.S. war in Iraq, and preparing to wind up U.S. domination in Afghanistan and by implication, elsewhere. Nothing could be further from the truth. Taking a look at Iraq alone, the violence that the United States illegally initiated seven [...]

Jake Diliberto: Enough Is Enough: War Chatter From the Oval Office

On August 31, 2010, President Obama declared the “end of our combat mission in Iraq.” President Obama said, “Like all Americans, I am awed by [U.S. troops'] sacrifice, and by the sacrifices of their families.” What were those “sacrifices”? As I reflect on my time as a Marine in Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom, I [...]

Don Kraus: The Lesson of Iraq

President Obama, speaking from the Oval Office, told the nation (and the world) that it is time to “turn the page” now that U.S. combat operations have officially ended in Iraq. And while he talked about what we learned from the last “page,” the President missed an important part of the Iraq war’s lesson. If [...]