Antiwar.com Blog

Last week’s “Balkan Express” was the 278th installment I wrote for Antiwar.com over the past seven years. I’m proud of them all, and don’t regret anything I’ve written. But as I said myself, on several occasions, this is not 1999 any more.

Not that anything has changed dramatically between last week and today: Bosnia is still a moribund artificial construct mired in ethnic hatreds and corruption; part of Serbia is still under imperial occupation, and Washington insists on making it an “independent” state. Old conflicts simmer in other places still, and new ones may spring forth at any time. Unfortunately for the inhabitants of this corner of Europe, their lives won’t be boring for a long while yet, and I will still write about that a lot.

There are, however, other issues and events I’d like to address, taking place beyond the Balkans – and therefore not being within the declared scope of “Balkan Express”: the recent death of Russia’s first president, for example, or the upcoming elections in France, or the proposed EU legislation to ban certain forms of speech. It isn’t as if I haven’t touched on some aspects of EU and American politics – that would be impossible, as conflict in the Balkans has touched upon both since its inception.

Beginning this week, I will continue covering the Balkans, but will also comment on events in Europe – both “old” and “new” – in what should be much the same column, with a different name. “Balkan Express” is now retired. Please welcome its successor, “Moments of Transition.”

[audio:http://dissentradio.com/radio/07_04_30_floyd.mp3]

Chris Floyd, author of Empire Burlesque: High Crimes and Low Comedy in the Bush Imperium, explains America’s proxy war in Somalia and some of the liars in the mass media who aid and abet this mass murder.

MP3 here. (48:42)

Chris Floyd is an award-winning American journalist, and author of the book, Empire Burlesque: High Crimes and Low Comedy in the Bush Regime. For more than 11 years he wrote the featured political column, Global Eye, for The Moscow Times and the St. Petersburg Times in Russia. He also served as UK correspondent for Truthout.org, and was an editorial writer for three years for The Bergen Record. His work appears regularly CounterPunch, The Baltimore Chronicle and in translation in the Italian paper, Il Manifesto, and has also been published in such venues as The Nation, the Christian Science Monitor, Columbia Journalism Review, The Ecologist and many others. His articles are also featured regularly on such websites as Information Clearing House, Buzzflash, Bushwatch, LewRockwell.com, Antiwar.com, and many others. His work has been cited in The New York Times, USA Today, the Guardian, the Independent and other major newspapers.

Floyd co-founded the blog Empire Burlesque with webmaster Richard Kastelein, who created the site using open-source software. Floyd is also chief editor of Atlantic Free Press, which was founded and designed by Kastelein. Floyd has been a writer and editor for more than 25 years, working in the United States, Great Britain and Russia for various newspapers, magazines, the U.S. government and Oxford University.

In the final installment of today’s National Review trilogy, I present Thomas Sowell in Paul Harvey mode:

When I see the worsening degeneracy in our politicians, our media, our educators, and our intelligentsia, I can’t help wondering if the day may yet come when the only thing that can save this country is a military coup.

(Thanks to Scott Horton for the link.)

Another classic from Bruce Bartlett, from April 2003: “War in Iraq Is a Bargain: A new study says the conflict is an economic blessing — for us and them.”

For those unclear on the title reference, click here.

I understand a lack of enthusiasm for the top-tier GOP presidential candidates – really, I do – but isn’t it a little early yet for the neocons* to endorse Hillary?

Not that they’re logically wrong to do so…

*UPDATE: A reader writes in to say that Bruce Bartlett, author of the National Review piece linked above, is not a neocon. I was ascribing the term more to the publication than the author, but fair enough. My apologies to Bartlett, who appears to be merely a hawk of the old school. To wit:

Given the views of the Democratic base and the enormous unpopularity of the Iraq War, it is a real act of courage for her to steadfastly refuse to say her vote for the war was wrong. Of course, like all Democrats and most Americans, she opposes the war today and favors a rapid pullout. [I’m not sure that she opposes the war or favors a rapid pullout, even rhetorically, but I haven’t been over her campaign literature with a fine-tooth comb. -Ed.]

That is why the easy thing for Sen. Clinton to do would be to just throw in the towel, admit her vote was wrong, and move on. And that’s why it is an act of courage for her to refuse to do so. If conservatives weren’t so blinded by their hatred for her, this would be obvious.

Antiwar.com regular and Foreign Follies author Doug Bandow dismisses our government’s ridiculous narrative about why the Terroristsâ„¢ are at war with the United States.

MP3 here. (39:06)

Doug Bandow is a Washington-based political writer and policy analyst and a member of the Coalition for a Realistic Foreign Policy. He served as a special assistant to President Ronald Reagan and as a senior policy analyst in the 1980 Reagan for President campaign.

He has been widely published in leading newspapers and periodicals and has appeared on numerous radio and television shows. He has written and edited several books, including Foreign Follies: America’s New Global Empire (Xulon Press), The Korean Conundrum: America’s Troubled Relations with North and South Korea (Palgrave/Macmillan, coauthor), Tripwire: Korea and U.S. Foreign Policy in a Changed World (Cato), Perpetuating Poverty: The World Bank, the IMF, and the Developing World (Cato, coeditor), and Military Manpower and Human Resources (National Defense University). His latest book is Foreign Follies (Dimension Press).