The Habbush Affair

In December 2003, a letter from Iraqi Director of National Intelligence Tahir Jalil Habbush al-Tikriti to Saddam Hussein dated in 2001 was "discovered" by the provisional regime in Baghdad. The letter "proved" that Iraq had WMD and had trained Muhammad Atta. 

Here (and here) is the initial Telegraph reporting on the discovery of the letter.

Ron Suskind's new book claims (based on interviews with CIA sources) that Habbush informed the CIA in 2001 that Iraq had no WMD the White House ordered the CIA to forge the letter to justify the war ex post facto. 

Amy Goodman and WaPo on Habbush  Affair.

Obama in Denver: Spectacle or Spectacular?

Religious Studies Professor Ira Chernus on the spectacle in Denver. For Chernus the speech fell short of expectations. He believes that Obama toned it down so as to reassure rather than inspire. 

Alexander Cockburn expected less, but thought it was a "strong speech." The critiques of neo-liberal, trickle-down/ pissed-on, economic policy hit the mark, as did his basic theme that "McCain doesn't get it."  

He was less impressed by the foreign policy pronouncements, and the decision to keep President Carter quiet.

Naomi Klein on Obama

The Shock Doctrine author Naomi Klein is interviewed on the task of holding Obama accountable to progressive demands such as ending US involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan, and reversing the growing income inequality in the US  (10 min. video). 

Are anti-war, pro-social justice votes taken for granted?

Obama and... Biden?

Alexander Cockburn on Biden and the state of the race. Cockburn offers his take on how it is that Obama has managed to lose the initiative on virtually every issue. And in politics, as in war, initiative is everything. Once you force your opponent on the defensive, you control the tempo of the contest. When Obama was riding high from his world tour McCain managed to launch an attack from a defensive position and so regain the initiative. The Obama campaign has demonstrated no such capacity.

USF Professor of Politics and Middle East Studies (and formerly a big Obama booster) Stephen Zunes comments on the Biden selection. Zunes sees the selection of a pro-war senator (and a highly influential one at that- the war authorization and its democratic support would not have been possible without Biden) as a betrayal of the anti-war sentiment that got Obama the nomination.

"AIPAC: We like Biden"

Radical economists on Obanomics

Monthly Review editor Michael D. Yates, and Johnathan M. Feldman on the campaign and the state of the economy.

An interview with Michael Hudson on the Chicago School of economics.

Indigenous Voices and the Spectacle

Palestinian-Israeli Azmi Bishara comments on the US election.

Leonard Peltier's open letter to Barack Obama. 

American Class Structure

Liberal economist Paul Krugman comments on American class structure here. Its interesting to note that when Obama was on Meet the Press a few weeks ago and was asked who is economic advisers would be he said: Robert "let's deregulate Wall Street" Rubin, and Lawrence "women can't do math" Summers. But he did not mention Paul Krugman, Joe Stiglitz, or Robert Reich (all very mainstream, left-of-center economists). 

I fear that when the Right-Wing propaganda machine really gets going after Labor Day, Obama may regret having chided his "friends on the Left" for not listening to what he has been saying all along, and assuming that he would take adopt stronger positions on the the issues thatthey care about (War and the military industrial complex, social justice and the economy, ecology). I fear that Huffington and others will be proven correct, that it is a flawed electoral strategy to alienate Barack's base in an effort to peel off independents and moderate republicans. When it comes time to pull the lever for a black man, many "Obama Republicans" may find that they are more "Republican" than "Obama"; and many "Reagan Democrats" may find that they are more "Reagan" than "Democrat."  Obama: those people will not show up for you when the chips are down, best to know who your friends are (sort of an elementary point in any "power analysis"). Rather than trying to win over anti-abortion enthusiasts at Saddleback perhaps he should be mobilizing on the South Side of Chicago - speaking to the concerns of that constituency (which are broader than 'not feeding your kids "Pop-eye's" for breakfast' (I'm still waiting for him to come out against the "egg McMuffin meal"). 

I don't think its too late, I think the new campaign commercial that speaks to anxieties over meeting one's mortgage payments (while McCain tries to figure out how many homes his Sugar Mamma wife owns) is a good start. Of course I'd like to see him address the concerns of renters as well as home-owners, but its a good start anyway... He needs to go after McCain hard on his supply side, trickle down/ "pissed on," neo-liberal economic policies which only exacerbate the difficulties of the middle, working, and under classes. Of course this would require a little housecleaning within the Obama camp. I don't suppose that Robert Rubin or Jason Furman are big fans of economic redistribution schemes.

Obama needs to expand the size of the electoral pie. Winning a larger slice of existing voters is not an option. He needs to bring new voters into the system (probably at least 5-10 million) and he can only do this by appealing to their economic concerns.

Col. Bacevich: In Defense of Realism

Boston University Professor of History and International Relations Andrew Bacevich previews his new book The Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism (part I and II). 

Bacevich is interviewed on Bill Moyers Journal and Democracy Now!

Obama and oil drilling

Obama says he'd expand oil drilling in the US, and gets heckled by activists in the crowd for committing insufficeint attention to issues affecting African American communities. 

The Nation's Open Letter to Barrack.