NEW ORLEANS--I've been rather consistently critical of the Obama Administration's largely MIA stance toward New Orleans, with the singular exception of the appointment of a... ...
NEW ORLEANS--In the wake of the Underpants Bomber, lobbyists for companies that make full-body scanners--including, notably, former DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff-have unhesitatingly pushed their products,... ...
In the welter of State of the Union news, this tidbit got to me: the administration is letting the Office of Gulf Coast Recovery quietly... ...
NEW ORLEANS--I'm preparing to begin shooting a feature-length documentary on the subject of why, in August 2005, 80% of the city of New Orleans experienced... ...
This relayed by my friend Lolis Elie, reporter for the New Orleans Times-Picayune, who describes Beverly Bell's work in Haiti as "selfless and inspiring": Friends:... ...
LONDON--The British have been doing something so deliciously un-American: looking backward. The Chilcot Inquiry into the origins of the Iraq War is back after its... ...
While the President and the punditocracy alike have no compunctions in talking about Guantanamo Bay, Obama's promise to close it, the missing of the deadline,... ...
Dick Cheney certainly isn't spending the first year of his retirement from the vice presidency growing a beard. Instead, he's playing a very clever game,... ...
Now that the reassurance machine has kicked into high gear, with statements from everyone from President Obama to Janet "The System Worked" Napolitano, we're being... ...
Something rather interesting is going on in Great Britain these wintry days--an official inquiry, broad-ranging in its declared scope, into the way that country got... ...
For a crystalline example of what's wrong with American journalism, and the American political conversation, at this exact moment, go no farther than Sunday's "60... ...
The man (and his wordsmiths) can write. President Obama's acceptance speech in Oslo was elegant, nuanced, and intelligent. Faced with accepting a peace prize while... ...
The spectacle of near-celebrities going on Larry King Live to ask for the return of their privacy has been one of the long-running jokes of... ...
As the Salahis begin their media tour with an admirable descent into self-described victimhood, we're being treated to an even more familiar spectacle, perhaps. White... ...
As the stage is being set for an“AfPak Surge”, it might be time to take a look at Surge 1.0, in the now-forgotten war... ...
This should be the year that made clear the distinction between the publicity-hungry, irremediably ego-needy actual denizens of show business (like myself) and the way... ...
Now we're getting somewhere, and it's only day three of Britain's inquiry into the origins of the Iraq war, a quaint little enterprise to strip... ...
The Guardian sums up the second day of the official Chilcott inquiry into the origins of the Iraq War. Hm, why can't we have one... ...
The Brits -- backward-looking sort, don't you think? -- have just opened an official inquiry into how that country got into the Iraq War. ...
Of course, Republicans defended George W. Bush and blamed state and local officials when independent investigations (here and here) pointed to the US Army Corps... ...
When Ruth Seymour announced earlier this week her retirement as general manager of Santa Monica's pioneering public-radio station, KCRW, it really did mark the end... ...
Okay, now it's official, or as official, at least, as the considered ruling of a Federal district judge can make it. The United States Army... ...
"It's scary," says Tom Jackson, a regional levee commissioner and engineer of the admission by the Army Corps of Engineers that a section of lakefront... ...
When the Fox network staged a special Veterans' Day version of its NFL pre-game show at Bagram AF Base last Sunday, two hours was apparently... ...
Following Matthew Hoh's resignation letter comes a missive from William Polk who, like Hoh, finds the only prudent course of action regarding Afghanistan to be a timely removal of troops. ...
One of the questions New Orleanians have heard most often from outsiders since the 2005 flood is, "why didn't you all have flood insurance?" The... ...
For anyone who wonders why New Orleanians worry about what the Corps of Engineers is doing in the "rebuilding" of the levee-floodwall system--now renamed the... ...
It was maybe March of this year that I first said to someone who asked what I thought of the then-new President that he was... ...
I'm preparing to make a documentary film on the causes of the flooding of New Orleans, and so I decided to attend one of the community outreach meetings the Corps of Engineers holds. ...
In case you haven't noticed, the"debate"about Afghanistan going on inside the White House (thanks for the transparency) has already been decided, and the... ...
Sam Stein's report that musicians are signing on to a Freedom of Information request for documents relating to the use of music as a torture... ...
Last post on this subject this week, I promise. The Times-Picayune's Mark Schliefstein reports on the visit of the White House Council on Environmental Quality's... ...
LONDON--Thanks to WWL-TV, I watched the Obama Town Hall in New Orleans live. Clearly the people in the room enjoyed being in his presence. But,... ...
LONDON--President Obama is visiting one school in New Orleans today. That's a symbolic nod in the direction of a major change wrought in the city... ...
President Obama spends four whole hours tomorrow in New Orleans, and then 16 hours in San Francisco. They must have experienced a hell of a federal disaster there. ...
As President Obama prepares for his four-hour visit to New Orleans tomorrow, he could do worse than to call Nancy Sutley, the director of his... ...
LONDON--The White House has released details of this Thursday's long-awaited (at least by New Orleanians) Presidential visit to the Crescent City. What he will be... ...
My, how times have changed. Remember way back in 2004, when John Kerry denounced the Bush administration for short-changing the Afghan war by diverting men,... ...
The good news: one day before the office was to expire, President Obama extended the life of the Gulf Coast Recovery "Czar" (don't tell Glenn... ...
Like a rock or pop act that makes its audience wait till the encore to hear the Big Hit, President Obama has made New Orleans... ...
I found Obama's Olympics lobbying to be the ultimate rebuke to the people of New Orleans regarding his torpor when it comes to remedying the aftermath of the failure of the federal levees four years ago. ...
Sen. Lindsey Graham was answering the president on Sunday's Meet the Press, and he had a good talking point. At least he must have thought so, because he kept using it. ...
Henry came on the national scene with a bang as part of "Laugh-In". Everyone of TV-viewing age at the time remembers "A Poem, by Henry... ...
Are the green shoots real, or are the government economy-minders taking premature credit to dampen populist anger? Let's hope they aren't simply seeing some dandelions in the lawn and calling it springtime. ...
This will be a lengthy post, because the events it describes have unfolded over the last six months. Hang with me, and I assure... ...
NEW ORLEANS--Viewed from this city, which lost its main hospital for the indigent and working poor (so-called Big Charity) in the aftermath of the flooding... ...
This weekend brought two different statements from representatives of two different governments about the notion of torture being used or condoned by their regimes. ...
Sometimes, journalism consists of "discovering" things that everybody knows--at least, everybody in the affected area--but that have slipped off the national radar screen. Such is... ...
Okay, I admit it, it may be my fault, I've watched Chris Matthews for three straight nights, and each evening he's sent the same question... ...
If you think of humans as the creatures most capable of learning from past mistakes, the ongoing saga of Hurricane Katrina and the flooding of... ...
