Historians Admit To Inventing Ancient Greeks (The Onion)

Here is one of the funnier stories from The Onion that I came across this year (though it appeared back in 2010), offered as a contribution...

Freedom of expression & freedom of conscience in Mauritania – Mauritania's first death sentence for "apostasy"

Even if a country tolerates minority religions, it can't claim to have religious freedom unless it is possible for individuals to decide...

Religious toleration in Iran – Mohsen Amir-Aslani executed for heresy, Soheil Arabi condemned to death for "insulting the Prophet" on Facebook

Heresy, blasphemy, and apostasy (from Islam, not from other religions) are all crimes in Iran, potentially subject to the death penalty, an...

The Erdogan-Gulen civil war within Turkish political Islam (Dani Rodrik & Claire Berlinski)

Since Turkey's AK Party, led by former Prime Minister and now President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, began winning national elections in 2002, ...

Is Saudi Arabia deliberately helping crash world oil markets in order to hurt Iran?

It's not totally implausible. Plummeting oil prices are generating economic and political effects around the world. I don't think an...

Elizabeth Warren takes the fight to the Money Power

Great speeches that combine solid substance, clear explanation, rhetorical power, and political passion have become rare in American politic...

Is capitalism really "the human condition"?

The item below was part of an e-mail exchange I had in November 2009 with Norman Geras (whom we lost with his very sad and untimely death i...

China's man in Hong Kong explains the problem with democracy – It's a threat to capitalism

As reported by AFP : Hong Kong's Beijing-backed leader Leung Chun-ying told media that if the government met pro-democracy protesters...

The US is now airlifting supplies to Kobani's defenders

(Kobani is the small yellow dot in the middle of the Syrian-Turkish border, at the top of the map.) I have seen some accusations that Turkey...

The meaning of Kobani (Henri Barkey)

(Kobani is the small yellow dot in the middle of the Syrian-Turkish border, at the top of the map.) Kobani is hanging on. Earlier this week ...

Why would Britain's National Union of Students refuse to condemn ISIS?

According to the veteran Middle East correspondent Patrick Cockburn , the month-long struggle by Kurdish militia fighters to defend the nort...