Author: Charles Goyette

[audio:http://dissentradio.com/charles/aw2007-09-26clemons.mp3]

Steve Clemons, author of the Washington Note blog and senior fellow at the New America Foundation, discusses his belief that President Bush is not yet completely on board with Vice-President Cheney’s plan for war with Iran, some phone calls he received from “very senior administration officials” that confirmed his recent article along those lines, the continuing fight between the neocons and everyone else, the continuing danger of a Cheney end-run and a war begun “accidentally” and then made large, the role that Robert Gates is playing in checking Cheney’s power, the recent demonization of Iran’s president and the need for people to influence the Congress to stand up to the presidency on issues of war.

MP3 here. (19:09)

Steven Clemons directs the American Strategy Program at the New America Foundation, which aims to promote a new American internationalism that combines a tough-minded realism about America’s interests in the world with a pragmatic idealism about the kind of world order best suited to America’s democratic way of life. He is also a Senior Fellow at New America, and previously served as Executive Vice President.

Publisher of the popular political blog The Washington Note, Mr. Clemons is a long-term policy practitioner and entrepreneur in Washington, D.C. He has served as Executive Vice President of the Economic Strategy Institute, Senior Policy Advisor on Economic and International Affairs to Senator Jeff Bingaman (D-NM) and was the first Executive Director of the Nixon Center.

[audio:http://dissentradio.com/charles/aw2007-09-26draper.mp3]

Robert Draper, national correspondent for GQ magazine and author of Dead Certain: The Presidency of George W. Bush, discusses the access he was allowed to the White House while writing his book, the firing of Donald Rumsfeld, the president’s relationship with his father, certainty about everything he does and fear of ghosts.

MP3 here. (16:34)

Robert Draper has been a national correspondent for GQ magazine for the past decade, and prior to that was senior editor at Texas Monthly. He lives in Washington, D.C. He is author of a novel, Hadrian’s Walls (Knopf), and the biography Rolling Stone Magazine: The Uncensored History.

[audio:http://dissentradio.com/charles/aw20070927garethporter.mp3]

Historian and investigative reporter Gareth Porter discusses the McCain-Lieberman resolution which recently passed the U.S. Senate, the falsehoods upon which it is based, the Democrats loyalty to the War Party the possibility of open warfare against Iran, the 2003 peace offer [.pdf], the consequences of its rejection for the war against al Qaeda, Biden’s plan to split Iraq in three.

MP3 here. (30:25)

Dr. Gareth Porter is an investigative historian and journalist on U.S. national security policy who has been independent since a brief period of university teaching in the 1980s. Dr. Porter is the author of four books, the latest of which is Perils of Dominance: Imbalance of Power and the Road to War in Vietnam (University of California Press, 2005). He has written regularly for Inter Press Service on U.S. policy toward Iraq and Iran since 2005.

Dr. Porter was both a Vietnam specialist and an anti-war activist during the Vietnam War and was Co-Director of Indochina Resource Center in Washington. Dr. Porter taught international studies at City College of New York and American University. He was the first Academic Director for Peace and Conflict Resolution in the Washington Semester program at American University.

[audio:http://dissentradio.com/charles/092107michaelledeen.mp3]

Michael Ledeen, “Freedom Scholar” at AEI explains why America ought to help the people of Iran overthrow our government, falsely claims he was opposed to the war in Iraq, argues that Bush will not attack Iran, denies any connection to the Niger uranium forgeries, and falsely denies advocating war against Iraq again.

MP3 here. (24:27)

Michael Ledeen writes at the National Review Online and advocates regime change from the American Enterprise Institute.

[audio:http://dissentradio.com/charles/090507matttaibbi.mp3]

Matt Taibbi of Rolling Stone magazine discusses the unbelievable extent of the Republicans’ corruption in Iraq and the complete and total lack of accountability.

MP3 here. (14:39)

Matt Taibbi is a roving national reporter and columnist for Rolling Stone. He’s the author of Smells Like Dead Elephants: Dispatches from a Rotting Empire, a collection of his writings about the 2004 election. He lives in New York City.

[audio:http://dissentradio.com/charles/aw20070918aneeshramen.mp3]

Aneesh Raman, CNN’s Middle East correspondent, from Baghdad, discusses Blackwater’s and other mercenaries’ impunity in Iraq and the farce of Iraqi and for that matter American sovereignty over their behavior and the possibility of war with Iran and why it’s a bad idea.

MP3 here. (14:00)

Aneesh Raman is CNN’s Middle East correspondent, based in the network’s Cairo Bureau, a position he has held since November 2006. Prior to moving to Cairo, Raman was based in Baghdad as a correspondent from June 2005. While there, Raman extensively covered the on-going conflict in the region, including the political process, the trial, verdict and sentencing of Saddam Hussein. He was also embedded with US forces and reported on the impact on the Iraqi people of the nation’s on-going struggle.