Robert Parry – The State Department’s Collective Madness

Over the past several decades, the U.S. State Department has deteriorated from a reasonably professional home for diplomacy and realism into a den of armchair warriors possessed of imperial delusions, a dangerous phenomenon underscored by the recent mass “dissent” in favor of blowing up more people in Syria. Some 51 State Department “diplomats” signed a memo distributed through the official “dissent channel,” …

Jonathan Marshall – Global Warming Adds to Mideast Hot Zone

While Washington decision-makers debate whether to launch U.S. military strikes against the government of President Bashar al-Assad, as if Syria suffers from a shortage of war and foreign intervention, the United States continues to ignore underlying issues that have helped trigger recent conflicts in the Middle East and threaten to create much bigger upheavals in decades to come. Taking the long view, …