As I was reading about that Saudi prince who got nabbed in Lebanon for packing two tons of pep pills onto his private jet, I realized that it had been a while since I heard anything about Beirut's "You Stink" protests, over the Lebanese government's inability to even handle trash collection. Well, there's a reason … Continue reading Lebanon dealing with garbage in its streets and in its political system

Congratulations to confessed attempted murderer and alleged real doctor Ben Carson as he surges past ambulatory mouth Donald Trump to the top of the Crazytown Hall of Fame voting Republican primary field polling: Carson won the support of 26% of Republican primary voters, compared to 22% who are backing Trump, according to CBS News/New York … Continue reading Republicans change idiots mid-meltdown

Maybe this guy was conducting an experiment into what happens when you get a blue whale high on uppers, or something: A Saudi prince has been detained at Beirut airport in Lebanon after two tons of an amphetamine drug popular with Syrian rebels was found on a private jet. Prince Abdel Mohsen Bin Walid Bin … Continue reading He must have been planning a hell of a party

As we're learning more about what happened to that MSF hospital in Kunduz, MSF keeps losing more hospitals. Yesterday an MSF hospital in the northern Saada province was destroyed, most likely in an airstrike by the Saudi-led coalition that's been fighting the Houthi-led insurgency on behalf of Yemeni President Abd Rabbuh Mansour Hadi. The Saudi … Continue reading Another MSF hospital destroyed, this time in Yemen

Senator and soon-to-be presidential primary drop-out Rand Paul, who (full disclosure) has guest-blogged here in the past (we've also carried the full text of his speeches), has an ongoing problem, which is that he doesn't seem to grasp the difference between "telling the truth" and "lying." There was that whole thing where he decided to … Continue reading Rand Paul’s war on basic honesty

Defense Secretary Ash Carter told the Senate Armed Services Committee today that the US mission against ISIS has changed somewhat, along the lines of what he called "the three R's": Raqqa, Ramadi, and raids. In Syria, the US will focus its mission on backing a mostly-Kurdish offensive to dislodge ISIS from Raqqa, the groups "capital." … Continue reading This is boots on the ground

When US aircraft bombed a Doctors Without Borders hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan, on October 3, it was clear that something had gone terribly wrong, but it wasn't clear what that was. Did the US deliberately attack a medical facility? Was there some kind of inexcusable error in the heat of battle that led to that … Continue reading Did the US know that MSF facility in Kunduz was a hospital?

My newest piece at LobeLog is based on having watched a whole slew of panel discussions that have been happening around DC lately, assessing the first year or so of the anti-ISIS air campaign. The results have been mixed at best, with one analyst, Hassan Hassan from Chatham House (who has literally written the book … Continue reading Doing ISIS’s job for them

Over the weekend, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov floated a very generous offer to the Free Syrian Army: Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said his country is ready to support the Free Syrian Army (FSA) with air strikes and cooperate closely with the US in fighting the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) … Continue reading Russia’s generous offer

Marco Rubio thinks his job sucks: “I don’t know that ‘hate’ is the right word,” Rubio said in an interview. “I’m frustrated.” This year, as Rubio runs for president, he has cast the Senate — the very place that cemented him as a national politician — as a place he’s given up on, after less … Continue reading Maybe you should quit