American accused of spying still imprisoned as Russians decline prisoner swap

Paul Whelan, a U.S. Marine veteran, continues to be under arrest by the Russian government, charged with espionage. The Russians have refused to entertain the prospect of a prisoner swap. Emerging details surrounding this case have muddled the picture. Whelan has a remarkable four citizenships: British, Canadian, Irish, and U.S. This wasn’t his first visit to […]

Navy SEAL court-martial underway: What’s at stake?

The court-martial of Special Operations Chief Edward Gallagher began on Friday. All in all, Chief Gallagher is charged with four different violations of the Uniformed Code of Military Justice (UCMJ). More specifically, the SEAL is accused of murdering a captured teenage ISIS fighter by stabbing him in the neck and body, shooting at unarmed civilians, […]

Exploding government debt is a national security issue

One hundred and five percent of GDP: This is the value of the total debt owed by the United States. Put differently, the value of the debt burden owed by the United States government is five percent larger than the total value of all production and consumption in the U.S. economy during the course of […]

Opinion: Why are military recruitment numbers down? Broken promises

A recent influx of headlines about the U.S. Army failing to hit its recruiting goals last year and the U.S. Air Force facing a longstanding pilot shortage prompted a resurgence in concerns about how to effectively draw young Americans to the clarion call of service. You’ll find proposed solutions (“give them more money!”) to assigned […]

Read outgoing Defense Secretary James Mattis’ farewell to the troops

Late Monday night, as Americans were preparing to ring in the new year, Defense Secretary James Mattis was having a very different sort of evening. After decades of service, the former Marine general relinquished authority over the Pentagon to his former deputy secretary and current acting defense secretary, Patrick Shanahan. According to the Department of […]

Military families hurting economically, even before partial government shutdown

The holidays are over, but the pinch continues for military families. The Coast Guard’s 42,000 active members and some civilians have drawn their last paycheck until the partial government shutdown ends. They were to be paid on Monday, December 31, and their next payment is due on January 15. No income, no outgo. A simple […]

Unpaid government employees given sample letters that suggest trading services to landlords for missed rent

As the partial government shutdown continues, some 380,000 federal employees have been furloughed, with another 420,000 expected to continue working without pay. Now, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) has released sample letters for those federal workers to send to creditors, mortgage companies, and landlords explaining why they are unable to meet their financial obligations. […]

Breaking: American arrested in Russia for espionage

On Monday, December 31st, Russian security services arrested an American man in Moscow on charges of espionage. Paul Whelan, who, according to his family, was visiting the Russian capital in order to attend a wedding, was arrested by the FSB—Russia’s domestic security service—for “carrying out an act of espionage.” A U.S. Marine veteran, Whelan had […]

Like it or not, Trump got it right on Syria

In 2013 MSNBC host Rachel Maddow authored a book titled “Drift: The Unmooring of American Military Power.”  The book explores America’s steady march towards perpetual war, one that has echoes of George Orwell’s famous novel 1984 in which propagandized citizens recite that, “we are war with Eurasia, we have always been at war with Eurasia.”  […]