A man claiming to be Jaber al-Banna (also rendered Elbaneh), a Yemeni-American who is among the FBI's most wanted terrorism suspects, showed up in a Yemeni court Feb. 23—and was allowed to walk free, surprising the attendees. Al-Banna's appearance was at the court hearing the appeals case of 36 Yemenis sentenced convicted last year of planning attacks for al-Qaeda.

From New Scientist, Feb. 27:

Governments around the world are rushing to develop military robots capable of killing autonomously without considering the legal and moral implications, warns a leading roboticist. But another robotics expert argues that robotic soldiers could perhaps be made more ethical than human ones.

Jawed Ahmad, an Afghan journalist for Canada's CTV network held by the US military four months without charge, has been designated an unlawful enemy combatant, the Pentagon announced. Ahmad was allowed to make a statement before an enemy combatant review board, which determined there was credible information to detain him because he was dangerous to foreign troops and the Afghan government, said Maj. Chris Belcher. Ahmad is being held at the military compound in Bagram, 30 miles north of Kabul.

Our February issue featured the story "Oil Shock Redux: Is OPEC the Real Cartel —or the Transnationals?," by Vilosh Vinograd, which argued that the unprecedented $100 a barrel is due less to OPEC production levels than the correct perception that since the Iraq invasion a struggle has been underway for mastery over the planet's most critical oil reserves. Contrary to the conventional wisdom, the military grab for the Persian Gulf oil is raising prices—and may have been designed to do so. It is not about securing low oil prices for US consumers, but imperial control of oil as a tool of political power. Wrote Vinograd: "An effective anti-war position must entail deconstructing the propaganda of 'national security' on the oil question, and breaking with the illusion that elite concerns and consumer concerns coincide." Our February Exit Poll was: "Will oil hit $200 a barrel by year's end?" We received the following responses:

The New York Times reports in a front-page story Feb. 23 that the Justice Department has opened an internal ethics investigation into the notorious August 2002 Bybee Memo that gave the imprimatur of legality to the Administration's use of "waterboarding" and other forms of torture. Leave it to the far-left World Socialist Web Site (Feb. 21) to save from the Orwellian memory hole a new defense of torture's "legality" by Antonin Scalia:

We've noted that Zbigniew Brzezinski is one of the primary exponents of the policy-elite backlash against the neocons, and his emergence as an adviser for Barack Obama says much about the coalition that is coming together behind the Obamarama. The original ideological whiz-kid of the (yes, really) Trilateral Commission and Jimmy Carter's National Security Advisor, Zbiggy represents the "pragmatist" wing of the ruling elites. Rival Hillary Clinton has also got "pragmatists" in her camp, and Obama is also attempting to woo the neocons. But the basic division seems pretty clear. From "Behind Clinton and Obama" by Stephen Zunes in Foreign Policy in Focus, Feb. 4 (emphasis added):

We've noted ourselves that Ron Paul is the only Republican candidate that talks a good line on the Iraq war. But it is really disturbing to see anti-war folks line up behind him uncritically. Nico Pitney notes the phenomenon—without comment—on Huffington Post. Why, but why, is word not getting around of his sinister ultra-right connections? While too many "radicals" are taking his noxious bait, leave it to the liberals at The New Republic to call the rascal out. Their James Kirchick last month wrote a profile appropriately entitled "Angry White Man," in which he perused back issues of Paul's monthly newsletter, published under various names—Ron Paul's Freedom Report, Ron Paul Political Report, The Ron Paul Survival Report—since 1978, two years after he was first elected to Congress. Kirchick presents selections of ugly racist garbage that have appeared in its pages over the years. Excerpts:

The New York Times reports Feb. 9 that military prosecutors are in the final phases of preparing a "sweeping" case against suspected conspirators in the 9-11 plot. The charges, to be filed in the military commission system at Guantánamo Bay, are said to involve six detainees at the camp, including Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, known as "KSM." However, KSM was subject to waterboarding while in CIA custody, the agency's director Gen. Michael V. Hayden confirmed this week—throwing into question his supposed confession that "I was responsible for the 9-11 operation, from A to Z."