The noose continues to tighten around Iran. As representatives from the P5+1 countries (the permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany) prepare to meet in Baghdad tomorrow to discuss Iran’s nuclear program, leaders from the G-8 summit took the unusual step of, well, doing something. The G-8 countries agreed to release oil from their strategic […]

The Rasmussen polling organization is out with a shock poll that the entire Washington establishment needs to study: 51 percent of voters surveyed said they wanted all US troops out of Europe, now. Only 29 percent favored keeping the troops where they are.US troops have been in Europe since World War Two. In the Cold […]

Boko Haram remains faceless and mysterious to Nigerians, but it does appear to have a strategy and organization, according to an interview with Ahmad Salkida, the Nigerian journalist widely considered to know the group more intimately than almost anyone. In 2005, Salkida began praying at Mohammed Yusuf’s mosque, where Boko Haram originally took shape, was arrested with […]

Few in Europe are happy to admit it, but Italy is looking disturbingly similar to Greece these days. Mass youth unemployment, an over-regulated bureaucratic economy and a shaky financial sector have crippled the fiscal health of both countries; both now face a future of austerity and stagnation. And the similarities became even more pronounced late […]

For much of the American public, Mitt Romney remains a cipher. As Via Meadia has noted previously, Romney has too often ceded control of his personal narrative to the press and his opponents, making him particularly vulnerable to countless attacks on his character and to damaging stories like the account of his prep school days. […]

Egypt has a problem with foreigners. More accurately, Egypt has a problem because there aren’t enough foreigners investing or traveling in Egypt anymore.After the revolution began last year, foreign investment dried up, fast. Tourists disappeared and haven’t really come back. The two groups—investors and travelers—are extremely important sources of money for the Egyptian government and […]

The following is an excerpt from Colin Powell’s book It Worked For Me: In Life and Leadership Although it has been many years since I gave my famous—or infamous—Iraq WMD speech to the UN and the world, I am asked about it or read about it almost every day. February 5, 2003, the day of […]

The news from Syria in recent days is more of the same—bad—except for when it is worse than bad. On Saturday a suicide bombing in Deir ez-Zour, apparently aimed at a regime target, killed 9 people and wounded more than eight dozen others. Coming after the suicide bombings in Damascus on May 10, these kinds […]

Here’s another reminder that the uprisings of the Arab Spring are a lot messier and more complicated than the optimists want you to believe: The Syrian opposition today issued a stinging riposte against its implacable foe…Israel. Reports YNet: Leader of the Syrian opposition bloc Burhan Ghalioun said Saturday that the Syrian regime signed an agreement […]

Greece’s exit from the Euro is looking more likely by the day, and increasing numbers of analysts now believe that that may be the best way forward—at least for the Greeks, if not the rest of Europe. Many countries stand to lose significant investments should Greece bail on the common currency.A new piece in French daily […]