"An early-morning U.S. raid on Kabul's northern outskirts Sunday killed at least 13 civilians, including eight members of one family, witnesses said, a day after another apparent stray U.S. air strike hit two villages in territory occupied by the main opposition coalition, the Northern Alliance." [more]

"Stung by the stubborn resilience of the Taliban, senior American and British officials are bracing themselves for a military campaign in Afghanistan that promises to be more prolonged and difficult than they had hoped as recently as early October." [more]

"This is an administration that will let its special interests ¡ª particularly its high-rolling campaign contributors and its noisiest theocrats of the right ¡ª have veto power over public safety, public health and economic prudence in war, it turns out, no less than in peacetime." [more]

"War skeptics such as Richard Gere, Susan Sontag, Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Oakland), Bill Maher and the Berkeley City Council should be congratulated, not vilified, for daring to demur, ever so slightly, from government propaganda. Right or wrong, they have acted as free people in a free society who understand that if our course is correct, it can survive criticism. And if it is not, it is all the more important that we gather the courage to state that criticism clearly and in a timely fashion." [more]

"In 1979, Bushís first business, Arbusto Energy, obtained financing from James Bath, a Houstonian and close family friend. One of many investors, Bath gave Bush $50,000 for a 5 percent stake in Arbusto. At the time, Bath was the sole U.S. business representative for Salem bin Laden, head of the wealthy Saudi Arabian family and a brother (one of 17) to Osama bin Laden. It has long been suspected, but never proven, that the Arbusto money came directly from Salem bin Laden. In a statement issued shortly after the September 11 attacks, the White House vehemently denied the connection, insisting that Bath invested his own money, not Salem bin Ladenís, in Arbusto." [more]

"Hardt and Negri argue that a new global economic regime is emerging, which they call simply 'Empire.' It is a new form of imperial power defined partly by what it is not. It is not a nation-state. It is not an aligned superpower bloc. It is an empire, in the classic sense, but has no seat like the Roman Empire. It is a distributed network, like the Internet, created by international agreements binding nations big and small into relationships that none of them fully control." [more]