An Open Letter to Obama (Bring Home the Troops)
Kevin Zeese, a leading proponent of the conservative/liberal/libertarian antiwar coalition, is soliciting signers for this excellent letter. If you want to add your name, as I did, send an email to...
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Backlash Builds Against TSA
In the aftermath of my own encounter with the TSA Thugs, I submitted complaints to “my” representatives: Barbara Lee, Dianne Feinstein, and Barbara Boxer. To paraphrase a favorite poet, I didn’t get...
View ArticleI Pocket Knife: A Tale of Petty Tyranny and the TSA
By the time you read this, I’m probably little more than a glob of metal, like so many millions of my brothers and sisters. And I did nothing wrong. For a while, I blamed my owner—didn’t he know that...
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Remembering Gore Vidal
In the aftermath of 9/11, we found ourselves almost bereft of friends and allies, as so many we had thought were fellow-travelers—sharing our dedication to core principles of the sanctity of every...
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The Names Behind the Collateral Damage
Drones Watch has compiled a list of the names of children killed in America’s drone bombings of Pakistan and Yemen. Should a major terrorist attack hit the United States, this is as likely a reason as...
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Prince of Peace
As we enter Christians’ Holy Week, which culminates with Easter, the day of Jesus’ resurrection and the beginning of God’s new creation, it’s an apt time to reflect on Christ’s lasting teachings. Prior...
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The Veterans’ Administration Has Been a Disaster Since Its Inception
In her modern, exceptional biography of President Calvin Coolidge, Amity Shlaes (Coolidge, HarperCollins, 2013) documents the very blemished history of today’s U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA),...
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Fallujah Fallout: Who Pays the Price?
November of this year will mark the ten-year anniversary of the Second Battle of Fallujah. Fallujah, a city west of Baghdad with a population of over 300,000, is known to have observed some of the most...
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Paid Patriotism: The Artist Formerly Known as “Propaganda”
Last week, Senators Jeff Flake (R-AZ) and John McCain (R-AZ) released a report revealing the Department of Defense paid professional sports teams to host “patriotic events.” Anyone who has ever...
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New Video on History of Police Militarization
Several years ago, my coauthor Chris Coyne and I wrote a paper titled, “The Militarization of U.S. Domestic Policing.” Although we’ve since written on a variety of other topics, I frequently field...
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Apple Encryption and the Erosion of Privacy
In the wake of the terror attack in San Bernardino late last year, the FBI and other government agents set out to uncover as much information about the attackers as possible. After searching the...
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9/11’s Legacies: Fewer Civil Liberties and Bigger Banks
September 11, 2016, marks the fifteenth anniversary of a calamity that shook America to its core. I remember vividly to this day being riveted by the constant video replays of the two Boeing 767s...
View ArticleTrump’s Wars After Mattis
Despite President Trump’s generally bad policy and potentially authoritarian behaviors outside democratic norms, it took his order withdrawing U.S. forces from Syria and his plan to halve the number of...
View ArticleManufacturing Militarism: US Government Propaganda in the War on Terror
The stands at Super Bowl LV were filled with cardboard cutouts. The half-time show by the Canadian singer known as “The Weeknd” had some of us wondering where he spent that extra $7 million. A man...
View ArticleThe Sunk Cost Fallacy in the War on Terror
“Do you want their deaths to mean nothing?!” I’ve heard this argument a lot when discussing ending the perpetual war on terror. In fact, I was asked this precise question while on a recent panel...
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Three Movies that Explore Complexity of the War on Terror
America’s chaotic exit from Afghanistan put the world spotlight back on global terrorism. The poorly executed departure has inspired radical Islamic terrorist groups to launch new attacks on Western...
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9/11, Independent Institute and 20 Years of the “War on Terror”
Literally on 9/11/01 and throughout the 20 culture-destroying years since, the Independent Institute has stood hard and fast for the difficult but essential principles that undergird liberty, human...
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