“Our intelligence community does assess with varying degrees of confidence that the Syrian regime has used chemical weapons on a small scale in Syria, specifically the chemical agent sarin.”

I do assess with varying degrees of horror (some of the varying degrees rather high even) that a lot of people are going to die. And how dare they die from chemical weapons when they should be dying from hellfire missiles and cluster bombs and napalm and depleted uranium and white phosphorous. We have a responsibility to protect these people from dying of the wrong type of weapon and in too small numbers.

Let’s reflect back…

Amnesty International released its annual review of death sentences and executions around the world. The review found the five biggest executors in 2012 were China, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and the USA. It also found that the number of countries that abolished the death penalty rose to 97 and progress toward abolition of the death penalty was made in “all regions of the world.”

There are signs of significant rifts among Syrian militias trying to overthrow Assad.

On the eve of AIPAC’s annual Confab in DC, ex-AIPAC’er, MJ Rosenberg goes off

The words in President Obama’s “State of the Union” speech were often lofty, spinning through the air with the greatest of ease and emitting dog whistles as they flew.

Let’s decode the President’s smooth oratory in the realms of climate change, war and civil liberties.

An interesting wrinkle on Israel’s recent illegal incursion(s)

“The modern liberal state … often uses deception to gain its ends — not so much deception of the foreign enemy, but of its own citizens,who have been taught to trust their leaders.” – Howard Zinn

Hearings in Congress today pile on the political debate over the attack on the US consulate in Benghazi. The hearings come on the heels of the Pickering-Mullen report, which looked at the actions of the State Department and foreign service leading up to the attack, finding serious deficiencies in management and “grossly inadequate” security at the consulate. As a result four senior State Department officials resigned.

I imagine this will be perceived as the right wing collecting a scalp, but considering that liberal groups increasingly saw Susan Rice as no picnic either, this probably falls under the auspices of an acceptable loss.