Democratic Party now the leading US party of war

Last May a remarkable column by Stephen Kinzer appeared in The Boston Globe. It was headlined: “Republicans return to their roots as the anti-war party.”   More significantly, the subheading ran: “Since the Vietnam era, Americans have come to expect anti-war rhetoric from liberal Democrats. Cancel that.” The column began: “With Americans now engulfed in passion for […]

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How America’s democracy is ‘ripe to be exploited’

A Pew poll finds that while their democratic system is not perfect, most Americans prefer it to one-party authoritarianism. Photo: iStock

Voters in Sweden this month gave a leading role to a far-right party with neo-Nazi roots. Italy is also on the cusp of putting a party in power that has fascist origins. And of course, in the United States, one party has increasingly embraced election denialism and attempted to undermine the legitimacy of the electoral […]

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Understanding Libya’s relentless destabilization

Libya's then President Muammar Gaddafi (left) greets his then French counterpart Nicolas Sarkozy at Bab Azizia Palace in Tripoli, on July 25, 2007. Photo: Reuters / Pascal Rossignol

After leading a military coup in 1969, Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi cemented his rule for more than 40 years. A variety of different political ideologies – Pan-Arabism, Pan-Africanism, socialism, Islamic leftism, and others – characterized his leadership, which were further reinforced by a cult of personality. While living standards for Libyans increased under his rule, Gaddafi attracted resentment among some […]

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Who gains most from Nord Stream sabotage?

The US has long opposed NATO’s (especially Germany’s) dependence on Russian, formerly Soviet, natural gas. The United States, in fact, used export controls to block the original Yamal pipeline in the 1980s, believing the threat of a Russian cutoff would alter Europe’s political decisions. As recently as 2018, then-president Donald Trump warned the Europeans at the […]

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