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The Obama administration is planning to send as many as 400 additional trainers to Iraq to train Iraqi forces against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, according to the New York Times . The decision comes after an embarrassing defeat of Iraqi forces at Ramadi last month to the terrorist group, prompting the administration to reconsider its training and equipping program for Iraqi forces. Sunni tribal fighters in Ramadi had complained of not receiving any training or equipment from the central government. After the defeat, Defense Secretary Ash Carter said he had asked a team of top military...

Jimmy Carter: Civil Rights Movement Unrealized, Americans Still Racist By Kathryn Schroeder Former President Jimmy Carter said in an interview with AARP that the civil rights movement did not fully succeed and that many Americans are still racist. “The recent publicity about mistreatment of black people in the judicial and police realm has been a reminder that the dreams of the civil rights movement have not been realized. Many Americans still have racist tendencies or feelings of superiority to people of color,” Carter said. Carter has repeatedly spoken out during President Barack Obama’s terms in office about how be believes...

Former President Jimmy Carter told AARP Inc. during a recent interview that many Americans hold “feelings of superiority” toward minorities. Mr. Carter spoke on a range of subjects with the magazine, including campaign spending and lobbyists, but he made a point to say that the U.S. still is lacking in terms of safeguarding civil rights. “The recent publicity about mistreatment of black people in the judicial and police realm has been a reminder that the dreams of the civil rights movement have not been realized. […] Many Americans still have racist tendencies or feelings of superiority to people of color,”...

Former Texas governor Rick Perry is gearing up for another presidential run and recently fired a shot across the bow of some of his competitors. In an interview with The Weekly Standard, Perry said that while he had “great respect” for senators Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, and Rand Paul, they were not ready to be president: I’ve had more than one individual say, “You know what, if you want to be the president of the United States, you ought to go back to your home state and be the governor and get that executive experience before you go lead this...

TEHRAN, Iran — The chief of an elite unit in Iran’s Revolutionary Guard has accused the U.S. of having “no will” to stop the Islamic State group after the fall of the Iraqi city of Ramadi, an Iranian newspaper reported Monday. The comments by Gen. Qassem Soleimani, the head of the Guard’s elite Quds unit, come just after U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter accused Iraqi forces of lacking the “will to fight” in an interview aired the day before. It wasn’t clear whether Soleimani’s remarks came as a direct response to Carter’s, though tensions remain high between the two countries...

After the price of oil quadrupled in 1973, Syria and other Arab states put pressure on Saudi Arabia to use its new wealth against Israel. Part of the Saudi government's response was to lead a campaign against support for Israel in the U.S. On their own, however, the Saudis lacked the connections and savvy to affect American-Israeli ties. To make up for this, the Saudi state recruited help. In "The American House of Saud" (Franklin Watts, 448 pages, $18.95), Steven Emerson, a journalist and former staff member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, chronicles anti-Israeli activities undertaken in recent years...

Once Obama is no longer president, I suspect he’ll be getting the same ‘warm welcome’ that Jimmy Carter is getting from the government of Israel right now. And it’s so satisfying: TIMES OF ISRAEL – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Reuven Rivlin have turned down invitations to meet with former US president Jimmy Carter during his upcoming visit to Israel over his “anti-Israel” views. Both the president and prime minister declined the invitations after consulting with the Foreign Ministry and the National Security Council, Haaretz reported Monday.

There were many horrendous moments for the American hostages held by Iranians for 444 days at the U.S. embassy in Tehran. One of the worst occurred when Iranian captors showed a hostage a photo of the school bus that took his son to and from school. If the hostage didn’t cooperate, his son’s fingers would be chopped off and sent, one a day, to his wife. On January 20, 1981, the day Ronald Reagan became president and Jimmy Carter departed, the crisis lifted and 52 Americans came home. And a few other good things happened. U.S. banks with investments in...

In 1979, the year before Republicans nominated Ronald Reagan as their presidential candidate, the Rev. Jerry Falwell and conservative activist Paul Weyrich founded the Moral Majority. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, recently announced his candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Va., founded by Falwell. Although Cruz made no reference to the Moral Majority in his remarks, his thinking is clearly in line with that of Falwell and Weyrich — that getting the largely politically inactive evangelical Christians politically engaged could change America. Cruz’s detractors call him “extreme,” but he may not be so close to the...

What a week! Suicidal airplanes, exploding buildings, our Mideast policy revealed to be as venal and addled as we feared. We have not seen such a synthesis of incompetence and malfeasance since…well, ever. Even Jimmy Carter looks competent and wise by comparison. At least back then it was still clear which end zone we were trying to protect.Now that the Arab Spring is nothing more than a vague dream fragment the Middle East appears on the brink of implosion. The thin memory of that verdant vernal equinox is about to be eclipsed by nuclear winter. And haven’t we all had...

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) — Former President Jimmy Carter has met with Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Muqrin during a visit to the kingdom. The official Saudi Press Agency says the two met in a palace in the Saudi capital of Riyadh on Wednesday. The report says they discussed a number of topics but gave no details.

Gerardo Hernandez, a spy for Communist Cuba and the man responsible for the murder of four humanitarian workers (three of whom were American citizens) over international waters, was freed from prison last year by the Obama administration, due in part to the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). This was revealed at a February 6, 2015, celebration of Hernandez’s release, along with two of his fellow Cuban agents (collectively known as the “Cuban 5.. At the beginning of the event, an IPS official thanked all who who took part in the 17-year campaign and singled out a number of organizations that...

The White House on Monday backed Defense Secretary Ashton Carter's remark that transgender people should not be precluded from military service because of their sexual identity. “The president agrees with the sentiment that all Americans who are qualified to serve, should be able to serve,” White House press secretary Josh Earnest said during a press briefing. “For that reason, we here at the White House welcome the comments from the Secretary of Defense,” he added. On Sunday, Carter said he was “very open minded” about the idea of transgender people serving in the military. “I don't think anything but their...

The new secretary of defense, Ashton Carter, said Saturday the U.S. may slow down the withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan. Carter made the announcement during his first trip to Afghanistan as defense secretary. On the flight there, Carter also discussed an impending battle against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, in Iraq - the battle for Mosul. A senior Obama administration official told CBS News that neither Carter nor the White House knew about that briefing, where a military official also said the assault would include between 20,000 and 25,000 Iraqi troops backed by U.S. air...

Navy Rear Admiral John Kirby, the press secretary of the Pentagon and they guy you always see explaining American military action on television, announced his sudden resignation today, one day after the new Secretary of Defense was sworn into office.

Full Senate confirmation vote to come as early as tomorrow.

DETROIT, Mich. (INTELLIHUB.COM) — The former 39th President of the United States, Jimmy Carter, appeared at a recent annual conference held by the Islamic Society of North America recently as thousands of onlookers listened to what he had to say. While Carter, an authority figure, spoke on a number if issues, he maintained that the key to securing peace in the mid-East stems from the “principles of Allah”, as reported by others. Onlookers were amazed by Carter’s “insight” when he requested for Muslim leaders at the convention to sign a “Declaration for Peaceful Communities” to end “suffering”. Video Source: WXYZ-TV...

Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) criticized President Obama for swapping three Cuban spies for imprisoned American Alan Gross on Wednesday's "America's Newsroom" on the Fox News Channel, calling President Obama the "worst negotiator" since Jimmy Carter.

Former President Jimmy Carter responded Friday to being referred to as one of the worst presidents in U.S. history by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., quipping that it’s a “compliment” to be considered a terrible president by a “warmonger” like McCain. [SNIP] “I was lucky enough to go through my four years, we never shot a bullet or dropped a bomb or fired a missile,” Carter said.

American journalist and freelance photographer James Foley campaigned for Barack Obama. But when he was captured and held by ISIS, Obama was not there for him. The Sunday Times reported in August that President Obama delayed a rescue mission for James Foley and the other prisoners for 30 days. Obama spent that time “fretting over his image”, playing golf and worrying his administration would be “Carterized” if the mission failed. James Foley campaigned for the wrong candidate. The New York Times reported: As the number of people in the 20-square-meter cell in Raqqa grew smaller, it was hard to stay...