At around 9:30 Monday morning, White House reporters got this comically bland update to the president's schedule: "11:10AM THE PRESIDENT makes a personnel announcement." This was followed by official leaks that Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel is resigning. By the time President ...read more

The White House and congressional Republicans have inadvertently teamed up to make for one hell of a confusing week about what the government's policy is and what it should be vis-à-vis ISIS. The trouble began Tuesday morning when Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Martin ...read more

On Tuesday morning, Secretary of State Chuck Hagel appeared before a Senate Armed Services committee hearing on the U.S. strategy against ISIS, but the real star of the show was anti-war activist group Code Pink. The group enjoyed widespread popularity on the Left during the ...read more

The House Armed Services Committee is holding what will likely be the first of many #Boweghazi hearings about the prisoner swap that resulted in the return of Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl from five years of Taliban captivity. On Wednesday morning, Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel took ...read more

Agree with his policies or not, it's nearly impossible for anyone with a semi-functional brain to deny that in almost any interaction with his counterparts in Congress, Barack Obama is generally the most adult one in the room. If you pare that down to just the Republicans in ...read more

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel meets with Afghan President Hamid Karzai in Kabul, Afghanistan, on March 10, 2013. (Defense Department photo by Erin A. Kirk-Cuomo) By Gareth Porter Two weeks after Afghan President Hamid Karzai demanded the withdrawal of all U.S. Special ...read more

For a while now I've contemplated this: A specific weekly column that catalogs for posterity the latest examples of the Republican party and conservative movement in general's descent into absolute, painfully stupid chaos. Last week, an entire piece could've been written on ...read more

The Daily Banter Headline Grab (from the Huff Post): Senate Republicans successfully foiled attempts to confirm Chuck Hagel for the post of defense secretary on Thursday, by denying him the 60 votes needed for the nomination to proceed. Democrats ultimately came up short of ...read more

Former Assistant Secretary of State Elliott Abrams, who also was a leading neocon inside President George W. Bush’s National Security Council. By Paul R. Pillar Chuck Hagel’s chances to become Secretary of Defense seem to be on the rise, with the biggest reason being the ...read more

The Daily Banter Headline Grab. From Yahoo! News: Several Republican senators voiced their concerns on Sunday about President Obama's expected nomination of former Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel for defense secretary over past statements the former Nebraska lawmaker made about ...read more

Sen. Chuck Hagel during a 2008 visit to Iraq. (Photo credit: Lance Cpl. Casey Jones) By Robert Parry: The year 2012 has been a rough one for Washington’s arrogant neocons. Their political influence has waned since they threw in their lot with presidential loser Mitt Romney ...read more