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The distinguished scholar and best-selling author Chalmers Johnson has died. He passed away in California on Saturday afternoon at the age of 79. During the Cold War, he served as a consultant to the Central Intelligence Agency and was a supporter of the Vietnam War, however, later became a leading critic of U.S. militarism and imperialism. He wrote the book, Blowback: The Costs and Consequences of American Empire in 2000, which became a bestseller after the 9/11 attacks. He went on to complete what would become a trilogy about American empire. Today we re-air part of our last interview with Chalmers Johnson from 2007. [Includes rush transcript]

WASHINGTON - The Army general who led the investigation into prisoner abuse at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison accused the Bush administration Wednesday of committing "war crimes" and called for those responsible to be held to account.

House passes bill authorizing worldwide war as momentum builds against it. Defense bill also contains several other troubling provisions.

Numerous people have argued that one potential benefit from the death of Osama bin Laden is that it will enable the U.S. Government to diminish its war commitments in that part of the world and finally arrest the steady erosion of civil liberties perpetrated in the name of the war on Terror (as though any of that is the government's goal).  By contrast, I've argued from the start that the bin Laden killing is likely to change nothing of any significance, except that -- if anything -- the resulting nationalistic pride, the vicarious sensations of power and strength, the substantial political benefits for the President, and the renewed faith in military force would be more likely to intensify rather than arrest these trends.  But that was definitely a minority opinion.

All of those views -- Democratic Party orthodoxy a mere three years ago -- have become relegated to the fringe under the Obama presidency by virtue of the President's adoption of what were once purely GOP/right-wing positions.  But it's worth recalling that they were indeed the backbone of the Democrats' once-vigorous opposition (at least in rhetoric) to the Bush/Cheney worldview of using war and battlefield theories to fight Terrorism and to erode core Constitutional and civil liberties.

Buried in the depths of the National Defense Authorization Act for FY2011 (H.R. 5136) is the latest salvo in the war on lawyers. In particular, section 1037 of the Act [page 403 of the PDF], titled "Inspector General Investigation of the Conduct and Practices of Lawyers Representing Individuals Detained at Naval Station, Guantanamo Bay, Cuba," instructs the Department of Defense IG to "conduct an investigation of the conduct and practices of lawyers" who represent clients at Guantánamo and report back to the House and Senate Armed Services Committees within 90 days.

It's one thing that the United States will soon be taking orders from China (or already is). But what about when we're becoming less forward-thinking than England? That's the only possible reading of the fact that there, the former top drug official Bob Ainsworth has addressed the House of Commons and argued for the legalization of all drugs. Not just pot-all of them. His reasoning is simple, and has nothing to do with the ideology of Timothy Leary: "We need to take effective measures to rob the dealers of their markets and the only way that we can do that is by supplying addicts through the medical profession, through prescription. We cannot afford to be shy about being prepared to do that." He continues: "We spend billions of pounds without preventing the wide availability of drugs. It is time to replace our failed war on drugs with a strict system of legal regulation, to make the world a safer, healthier place, especially for our children. We must take the trade away from organised criminals and hand it to the control of doctors and pharmacists."

"The main problem with the drug war is the concept that there are good drugs and bad drugs," when what's actually good or bad "is the relationship between the person and the drug, and the context in which the drug is taken."

Pakistan's success against the home-grown terrorism is recognized worldwide. So convincing is the effect of military engagement with terrorists of various hues and colors, but on the convergence of a unanimous decision to be made to visit each dignitary of the state of Pakistan has a point in the Swat Valley to visit and about first-hand the now known as the Swat success model. Compare that with the collapse of the U.S. war against terrorism in Afghanistan, despite extensive military and economic resources and the importance of the so-called ally Pakistan even more. Encouraged by the success in Malakand Pakistan Army has chosen to expand to dismantle the operation in South Waziristan on the structure of command and control and training camps for terrorists.

Turkey and Syria, a century ago, one state and one nation. And for many years have passed since World War Two, but for some reason between the two states, and thus alienated the nation. Today, the relationship is moving in a different atmosphere. Traitor who betrayed the descendants of the Arabs! This is expressed by the sentence was being pumped by the value o

NOTE: It is important to separate hunting down terrorists who attack our country and deserve justice (which Ron Paul is 100% for), and not confuse justice with occupying entire countries for a decade under the guise of the "War on Terror" or "Spreading Democracy". Terrorists are individuals and small groups, so why are we picking fights with entire nations? BILLIONS for Defense, NOT A PENNY for Empire. This speech is called "Imagine" and it was given by Ron Paul on March 11, 2009. The original text of the talk is below: Imagine for a moment that somewhere in the middle of Texas there was a large foreign military base, say Chinese or Russian. Imagine that thousands of armed foreign troops were constantly patrolling American streets in military vehicles. Imagine they were here under the auspices of "keeping us safe" or "promoting democracy" or "protecting their strategic interests." Imagine that they operated outside of US law, and that the Constitution did not apply to them. Imagine that every now and then they made mistakes or acted on bad information and accidentally killed or terrorized innocent Americans, including women and children, most of the time with little to no repercussions or consequences. Imagine that they set up checkpoints on our soil and routinely searched and ransacked entire neighborhoods of homes. Imagine if Americans were fearful of these foreign troops, and overwhelmingly thought America would be better off without their presence. Imagine if some Americans were so angry about them being in Texas that they actually joined together to fight them off, in defense of our soil and sovereignty, because leadership in government refused or were unable to do so. Imagine that those Americans were labeled terrorists or insurgents for their defensive actions, and routinely killed, or captured and tortured by the foreign troops on our land. Imagine that the occupiers' attitude was that if they just killed enough Americans, the resistance would stop, but inst

"AMY GOODMAN: Bill Hartung, before you go, I wanted to ask you about the largest weapons deal in history, and that was just worked out between the United States and Saudi Arabia. Explain the significance of this. WILLIAM HARTUNG: Well, first of all, at $60 billion, it's, you know, a huge gift to the weapons industry. They're going to sell, you know, over 70 Boeing F-15s. They're going to sell Apache helicopters. They're going to refurbish the Saudi air force. There's not a deal that's ever come close to this. And this is at a time when the Saudis are helping put down democracy in Bahrain, when they've been involved around their borders in places like Yemen, when of course they're one of the most undemocratic regimes in the world. So, if you talk about Arab democracy, Arab Spring, this is the worst possible symbol the United States could be sending to the region, in terms of, you know, where they stand on the issue of democracy".

What amazes me most whenever I write about this topic is recalling how terribly upset so many Democrats pretended to be when Bush claimed the power merely to detain or even just eavesdrop on American citizens without due process.  Remember all that?  Yet now, here's Obama claiming the power not to detain or eavesdrop on citizens without due process, but to kill them; marvel at how the hardest-core White House loyalists now celebrate this and uncritically accept the same justifying rationale used by Bush/Cheney (this is war! the President says he was a Terrorist!) without even a moment of acknowledgment of the profound inconsistency or the deeply troubling implications of having a President - even Barack Obama - vested with the power to target U.S. citizens for murder with no due process. Also, during the Bush years, civil libertarians who tried to convince conservatives to oppose that administration's radical excesses would often ask things like this: would you be comfortable having Hillary Clinton wield the power to spy on your calls or imprison you with no judicial reivew or oversight?  So for you good progressives out there justifying this, I would ask this:  how would the power to assassinate U.S. citizens without due process look to you in the hands of, say, Rick Perry or Michele Bachmann?

A large majority of the American people consistently support the following agenda: Tax the rich and corporations End the wars, bring the troops home, cut military spending Protect the social safety net, strengthen Social Security and improved Medicare for all End corporate welfare for oil companies and other big business interests Transition to a clean energy economy, reverse environmental degradation Protect worker rights including collective bargaining, create jobs and raise wages Get money out of politics

The March, 2011, Harper's Index expressed the point this way: "Number of American civilians who died worldwide in terrorist attacks last year: 8 - Minimum number who died after being struck by lightning: 29."  That's the threat in the name of which a vast domestic Security State is constructed, wars and other attacks are and continue to be launched, and trillions of dollars are transferred to the private security and defense contracting industry at exactly the time that Americans - even as they face massive wealth inequality - are told that they must sacrifice basic economic security because of budgetary constraints. 

The psychology of vengeance explains much about the state of the world and suggests the war on terror can never succeed, says Metin Basoglu