Freyburg

So, just when you thought Bush couldn’t screw things up any further, the push for biofuels has pushed the world into a food crisis. That’s just great.

Peter Bergen, who wrote the excellent Holy War, Inc., has penned a mammoth investigative report for the Independent that points to the possible decline of Al Queda as a force in the Middle East. Interestingly, it’s not American military pressure but Muslim religious leaders who are turning the tide away from extremism. Al Queda’s predilection for slaughtering plenty of innocent Muslims along with whoever else they have on their hit list isn’t going down too well, and opinion i turning against jihadism. It’s interesting that after pulling off the most spectacular terrorist attack in history and subsequently evading the American military for the better part of a decade, the one thing Bin Laden and Co. didn’t account for is human decency.

involving the C-word, so cover the ears of the young ‘uns and laugh. (NSFW)

CIA director Michael Hayden recently announced that Al Queda is on the ropes, a spent force, and that the group has failed to gain traction in Iraq. Well, not so fast. A recent editorial in the Guardian points out that mass uprisings may not be what Bin Laden has in mind when he calls for jihadist revolution, and more importantly, terrorists don’t even need mass support to achieve their goals. All they need is the loyalty of a hard-core group of supporters, and they can continue their operations indefinitely. Will the leaders of those die-hards be Al Queda? Maybe not, as recent intelligence has indicated some disillusionment with Bin Laden and Zawahiri. At any rate, the last time the United States took their eye off the ball, they ended up suffering the most devastating attack in the US history, invading Afghanistan and Iraq, and basically ruining their standing in the world. For their own sake, a little more vigilance and a lot less swagger might be a good idea.

Roger Stone learned the dark art of political hatchet-jobbery from Richard Nixon and Roy Cohn, two of America’s finest villains. He’s continued with their “win at any costs” philosophy, most recently applying his vile talents to both the 2000 recount and the 2004 smear job on John Kerry. And he’s an unrepentant horndog, though interestingly his habit of frequenting Miami swinger’s clubs actually led to the downfall of former New York governor and whoremonger Elliot Spitzer. An article in the current New Yorker lays out his perfidious ways in detail, and if you want to get his personal take on the world, check out his blog. I would hope that somehow this toad is kept out of the current election, but somehow I can’t shake the feeling that Obama has been in his sights from the word go.

Fareed Zakaria, Newsweek’s resident smart foreign policy guy. has a corker of an article about what the world will be like once developing economies like India, China and Russia all develop to the point where they equal or surpass the United States. This will be a turning point in history, Zakaria says, and he’s right. It’s inevitable that the US won’t be on the top forever, and Zakaria remains hopeful that the transition will be somewhat peaceful. It’s all excerpted from his new book, “The Post-American World,” due out in May.

“Nixonland,” a new book by Rick Perlstein, looks like an interesting tome about how Nixon was both a reflection of and answer to the state of America in the late Sixties. It also points out that Nixon did succeed in calming an incredibly tumultuous time in the US, when the country was tearing itself apart from within. Compare that to today, when we have an arguably worse president but a relatively stable social and political atmosphere.

Not that I ever trusted Billy anyway, especially amongst the womenfolk, but it’s interesting to see how the conquering hero of the Democrats has sunk a few pegs due to the (shock! horror!) tendency of the Clintons to play dirty in order to get re-elected.

Vanity Fair isn’t just George Clooney covers and Oscar parties, it’s also some pretty damn fine journalism, including this article detailing the legal wranglings and outright villainy of the Bush administration as they moved to change the old rules regarding interrogation, ignored the Geneva conventions and legalized torture.

The always excellent Frontline has pulled out the stops for the fifth anniversary of the War in Iraq with a huge documentary entitled “Bush’s War,” detailing the build-up from 9/11 onwards, the initial invasion and the continued bloodshed in Iraq today. It’s long, but worth the watch. Unfortunately, PBS hasn’t quite gotten the glory that is embedding video just yet, so you’ll have to head to their page to check it out.