Bad Moon Rising – A New Cabinet will Mark Neocon Ascendancy

Bad Moon Rising – A New Cabinet will Mark Neocon Ascendancy

Back during the admittedly brief shock and awe period that immediately followed on the Trump electoral victory, it appeared that there might be an actual realignment of American foreign policy. The neoconservatives virtually unanimously had opposed Donald Trump in the most vile terms, both in the GOP primaries and during the actual electoral campaign, making…

Tillerson Reported to Step Down: Major White House Reshuffle to Affect US Foreign Policy

Tillerson Reported to Step Down: Major White House Reshuffle to Affect US Foreign Policy

Rex Tillerson is reported to be on his way out against the backdrop of his increasingly frayed relationship with President Donald Trump. Mike Pompeo, a former Republican congressman who now leads the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), is to take his place. Tom Cotton, a hawkish Arkansas Senator, is to head the CIA. The timing of Tillerson’s departure remains…

Cherry-Picking Toward War with Iran

Cherry-Picking Toward War with Iran

Although nobody knows exactly where Donald Trump intends to go with his campaign of seeking confrontation with Iran, his administration already has provided disconcerting parallels with the techniques an earlier U.S. administration used in selling its launching of a war against Iraq. Among these techniques is the cherry-picking of intelligence not to inform policy-making or to…

Meet Mike Pompeo, the Far-Right Christian Zealot Who Will Lead Trump’s CIA

Meet Mike Pompeo, the Far-Right Christian Zealot Who Will Lead Trump’s CIA

Rep. Mike Pompeo is a Rapture-believing evangelical who sees “radical Islam” at work in small-town America. One of the many side stories that has been lost in the chaos of the Trump transition is the fact that far-right Islamophobe Frank Gaffney has been serving as a foreign policy adviser. Considering President-elect Donald Trump’s views about Muslims, this isn’t too…

Installing a Torture Fan at CIA

Installing a Torture Fan at CIA

President-elect Donald Trump’s selection of Kansas Congressman Mike Pompeo, an open aficionado of torture practices used in the “war on terror,” to be CIA director shows that Trump was serious when he said he would support “waterboarding and much worse.” Earlier, there had been a sliver of hope that that, while on the campaign trail,…