THE ENEMY OF MY ENEMY HAS TO BE MY FRIEND

Washington is poised to bomb ISIS positions in northern Syria. Given the fact that ISIS is a deadly enemy of the Assad government, why doesn’t the U.S. simply request permission from Damascus to bomb ISIS? U.S. public opinion was opposed to any kind of intervention in Iraq. ISIS’s horrific killing of two U.S. journalists has something to do with the recent shift in public opinion. But it’s also testimony to the effectiveness of the monolithic U.S. media that, following in the footsteps of William Henry Hearst (whose papers blamed Spain for the sinking of the Maine without any evidence whatsoever), is an expert at beating the war drums.