The House of Representatives recently passed legislation that would expand the national background check system to require almost everyone selling firearms, including private collectors who supplement their incomes by selling firearms at gun shows, to perform background checks on the potential buyers. The bill has a section purporting to bar creation of a national firearms registry. However, the expanded background check system will require the government to compile lists of those buying and...

On Monday, in an all-but-unreported news item, the Pentagon announced that it would be paying $946 million to Lockheed Martin toward the installation of a missile defense system that was purchased — not by the United States government — but by Saudi Arabia. In other words, the Pentagon is paying nearly $1 billion to subsidize a purchase made by a foreign power. In its announcement, the Pentagon referred to the payment as an “undefinitized contract action” that would be used, in part, to...

Marco Rubio, the neocon senator from Florida, considers a suspicious power outage across Venezuela to be funny. He would no doubt feel different if his mother was on a ventilator in a Caracas hospital—then again. A few weeks ago the #MaduroRegime blamed iguanas for causing a large electric grid blackout. We have now received the first video of what caused tonight’s unprecedented nationwide blackout in #Venezuela: #SinLuz pic.twitter.com/TnYevG2GA0 — Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) March 8, 2019...

Some traditions say that having children is the same as attaining immortality. In the case of Meghan McCain, the apple certainly didn’t fall far from the warmongering psychopath. The View is an American morning talk show in which current events are discussed by a panel of women with radically diverse political beliefs ranging from Democratic Party neoconservatism all the way to Republican Party neoconservatism. Within this microscopic Overton window of public discourse, the subject of the...

Saying anything negative about Israel has long been the third rail of US politics and media. Israel is our nation’s most sacred cow. Any questioning of its behavior brings furious charges of anti-Semitism and professional oblivion. I keep in my bookcase a cautionary book, "They Dared Speak Out" written by US senators and congressmen who all lost their positions after rebuking Israel for its mistreatment of Palestinians or daring to suggest that Israel had far too much influence in the US....

Predictably during a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on Thursday, Republican chairman Marco Rubio condemned Venezuela's Maduro as a "clear danger" and a "threat to the national security of the US." To be expected the hearing was filled with plenty of threats and talk of flipping "military elites" and enforcing tougher sanctions. But perhaps unexpected was just how out in the open and brazen Rubio's own admissions of how far he's willing to go in promoting regime change in Caracas....

Gone are the days when US consumers looked to the nightly news and print media as a trusted source of information, and especially if they hold conservative views, according to a new poll by the Columbia Journalism Review. Things are going from bad to worse for the US legacy media as its trust credentials have reached an all-time new low, as if that were possible. It has even achieved a lower trust rating than lawyers and members of Congress. The introduction to the CJR poll provided the...

When it was first revealed in November that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is under secret charges by the Trump administration, I spent the next few days being told by Russiagaters that this was proof that I have been wrong about their demented cold war cult all along, because #MuellerTime is fast approaching. At long last, they vehemently assured me, Assange was going to prison for working with Russia to deprive Queen Hillary of her rightful throne.None of those people have come back to...

It was a mere two months ago the president of the United States declared he would leave Syria and bring home the troops. “Our boys, our young women, our men, they’re all coming back,” Trump said. “And they’re coming back now. We won. And that’s the way we want it. And that’s the way they want it.” After historic victories against ISIS, it’s time to bring our great young people home! pic.twitter.com/xoNjFzQFTp — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 19, 2018 We have defeated ISIS in...

In response to criticisms made by Congresswoman Ilhan Omar that US political leaders have too much allegiance to Israel and its lobbying groups, House Democrats have put forward an entire House resolution in accordance with demands made by AIPAC and the Anti-Defamation League. “The backlash [over Omar’s comments] continued on Monday, as the Anti-Defamation League wrote a letter to Pelosi calling for a House resolution to specifically reject what the organization calls Omar’s ‘latest slur,’”...

The OPCW (Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons) has presented its final report regarding an alleged chemical weapons attack on Douma, Syria on April 7, 2018. Despite attempts by the Western media to hail it as “proof” that the Syrian government used chemical weapons in Douma – the report says nothing of the sort. In fact, the report fails to link any of the alleged 43 deaths to apparent chlorine found at the scene of the alleged attack. Claims of the attack were made by...

In 12 months of shifting sands, one thing remains as its original foundations: the British state narrative on Salisbury stands as a castle in the air. One year from the dastardly fate of Sergei and Yulia Skripal, no one is a step forward on what happened to them, how, why, or of course where they are. One year ago, a nerve agent was allegedly sprayed onto their front doorknob. One year later, their house needs a new roof as a result. And why the roof? And why only the roof? I don't know what...

Gallup issued on February 28th its “2019 Rating World Leaders” report, subtitled “The US vs. Germany, China and Russia,” and said that “The world still frowned on US leadership more than the leadership of any other country asked about in 2018.” All four of the countries’ leaderships received approval-ratings from people worldwide in only the 30-39 percent range, and this low score for the US leadership (which was approved by merely 31 percent of people sampled worldwide during 2018)...

President Trump’s second summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un last week was criticized by both parties in Washington long before Air Force One even touched down in Hanoi. Washington’s political class seemed terrified that the nearly 70 year state of “war” with North Korea might actually end. In the end the only positive thing they could say about the meeting was that Trump apparently walked away with nothing to show for it.The location of the meeting – Hanoi, Vietnam – serves as a great...

President Donald Trump’s air trip to Vietnam cost taxpayers $5,695,000 just for the president’s flying Taj Mahal. Plus millions more for his retainers, the presidential limo, hotel rooms, meals, security details and only Ho Chi Minh knows what else. For what? A nice photo op and a cheery dinner for the two leaders in Hanoi. Just about everyone who follows Asian affairs knew in advance that North Korean dynastic strongman (aka king) had no interest or good reason for giving up his nuclear...