What we can learn from the 20 years between the 9/11 attacks and the January 6 coup attempt.
Bin Laden and Trump: Two Bookends to America’s Imperial Decline
read more
American Empire
Did 9/11 Change Everything?
The 9/11 attacks were a surprise. The response wasn’t.
A U.S. Soldier Died in Niger. What on Earth Are We Doing There?
When our soldiers kill and die in fruitless wars we don’t know about and can’t end, we’re not a democracy anymore — we’re an empire. And perhaps a fading one at that.
The Myth of Trump’s Alternative Worldview
Trump’s foreign policy isn’t an alternative to U.S. empire. It’s just a cruder rendition of it.
The Anti-War Position Bernie Sanders Can Represent
There’s a huge opening to critique the economic foundations of America’s wars — one that fits perfectly with the populist anger fueling the rise of Bernie Sanders.
The View from 2050
“Back in my youth, we imagined that lumbering dinosaurs like Russia and China and the European Union would endure regardless of the global convulsions taking place around them.”
What Comes After Empire?
Let’s say the U.S. actually curbed its military adventurism, reeled in the Pentagon budget, and closed its global network of bases. Then what?
Three Good Reasons To Liquidate Our Empire (And Ten Steps to Take to Do It)
This commentary was originally published by TomDispatch in 2009. In light of the draconian Bradley Manning verdict, we are republishing it now. However ambitious President Barack Obama's domestic plans, one unacknowledged issue has the potential to destroy any reform...
Retiring the American Empire
As people near retirement age, they enter the twilight years. Sometimes, they rebel against retirement. They want to keep working. They’re not interested in shuffling out of their office never to return. And if they’re in fact the owner of the workplace, conflicts...
The Fall of the American Empire (Writ Small)
It couldn’t be clearer now that, from the shirtless FBI agent to the “embedded” biographer and the “other other woman,” the “fall” of David Petraeus is playing out as farce of the first order. What’s less obvious is that Petraeus, America’s military golden boy and Caesar of celebrity, was always smoke and mirrors, always the farce, even if the denizens of Washington didn’t know it.