Lots of people angry about the Pride Committee's decision to fire Bradley Manning as a grand marshal. But the most savage, all-out assault comes from Steven W. Thrasher, a former Village Voice writer who has nothing good to say at all about Pride or the people who run it -- or for the more mainstream parts of the LGBT movement:Read more »

I like Robert Reich; he's one of the smartest economic thinkers in the country and can explain everything that's wrong with the economy in two minutes. And I really want to believe that he's correct in his latest essay, and that President Obama really is poised to under the Reagan Revolution (or at least, the Reagan Republican Coalition).Read more »

What fresh hell is this. Last weekend, a US Army staff sergeant who has suffered past traumatic head injury walked off his military base and allegedly shot 16 Afghani men, women, and children.

Sadly, that Wall Street Journal article about the matter that I linked to in the first sentence of this post goes on to state that not only does Hilary Clinton think the incident has no bearing on our country's "steadfast dedication to protecting the Afghan people," the Afghan people don't seem to be all that surprised by the US serial killer in their midst. A tribal elder from the Helmand province was quoted as saying "even if he was a madman, what about all the other times when they've killed our innocent women and children? How do you explain those?" Iraq Veterans Against the War has one answer -- the group released a statement that says the military's policy of redeploying mentally unfit troops in the field is to blame. The suspect soldier was on his fourth tour of duty.

The incident only underlines the fact that Afghanistan is no longer on anyone's mind anymore. What is going on out there? Read on for an upcoming Bay Area event that hopes to provide some answers. Read more »

A substantial majority of Americans support ending the war in Afghanistan, decreasing the military budget, and redirecting that money to domestic needs, a position held even more strongly in liberal San Francisco. Read more »

My poor dog will be hiding under the table when I get home, hyperventilating. I'm trying to make phone calls -- and I feel like I'm in a war zone. I know, I know -- it's fleet week and we support the troops and an expensive, dangerous, ostentatious display of military might should make us all feel better.

But I'm not feeling it.Read more »