John Brennan

What Rand Paul got right

2013-03-14 00:00:00

I hope I'm not too late to the fight. Last week, freshman Sen. Rand Paul, a Kentucky Republican, held an old-fashioned filibuster against the nomination of John Brennan to head the CIA. Mr. Paul's stated reason for taking to the floor and talking for...

Drone warfare becomes America's face to the world

2013-02-12 03:00:00

It is certainly not be what he hoped or intended, but one of President Barack Obama's biggest legacies in foreign affairs may prove to be the proliferation of drones as tools of war, assassination and terror. Mr. Obama is not the first to use drones...

Obama the decider

2013-02-11 09:12:00

A rare phenomenon occurred on Capitol Hill the other day when two ranking officials of the Obama administration testified that they had differed with the president they still served over providing arms to the rebels in Syria seeking to oust dictator...

U.S. hiding behind tortured definitions

2013-02-17 04:00:00

If it is true, as the writer Samuel Johnson once said, that "patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel," then the dictionary must be the first. Consider how readily our leaders, in justifying what cannot be justified, parse definitions down to...

Real questions for Hagel and Brennan

2013-01-07 11:10:00

Whether Chuck Hagel and John Brennan are the ideal men to lead the Pentagon and CIA remains to be seen. We need the exercise of a through vetting in Senate confirmation hearings, and certainly an examination of the nominees' past statements and actions is...

Maryland's Congressional delegation, John Brennan and executive-branch drones

2013-02-07 10:00:00

As Senate Intelligence Committee members file into room 216 of the Hart office building in Washington for a CIA confirmation hearing this afternoon, they will be under a spotlight much brighter than they anticipated last week. That was before a Monday...

1911 bank robbery attempt put Laurel in the spotlight

2013-01-31 03:00:00

Laurel's Main Street in 1911 was a dirt road with vacant lots between businesses and houses, and the pace of traffic was slow. People on foot far outnumbered sputtering automobiles and pungent horse wagons, and walkers had to step lively to avoid piles of...

Rand Paul's filibuster worked

2013-03-07 13:12:00

Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul got a lot of attention Wednesday for mounting an honest-to-God filibuster of President Barack Obama's nominee for CIA director, John Brennan. The nation's political class marveled at his real-life Mr. Smith act, the funny stuff his...

Laurel Pop Festival was warm-up act for Woodstock in July 1969

2012-12-29 10:55:00

The second half of the 1960s ushered in the era of music festivals — culminating with the granddaddy of them all, Woodstock, in August 1969. Other festivals that enjoyed huge attendance that year included pop festivals in Atlanta and Texas, 140,...

Laurel Speedway's wooden track hosted auto racing in the 1920s

2012-11-27 06:20:00

Long before there was a Patuxent Greens Golf Course or Stewart Towers high rise building, a mammoth oval race track occupied that area of land off Route 197, near Route 198. Horse racing at Laurel Park racetrack had been ongoing since 1911, but in 1924 an...

Is Israel fixing the intelligence to justify an attack on Iran?

2012-07-30 11:28:00

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney's strong pro-Israel statements over the weekend, including his endorsement of Jerusalem as Israel's capital (a reversal of long-standing U.S. policy), increases the pressure on President Barack Obama to...

Bin Laden anniversary a reminder of Obama's foreign successes

2012-05-01 14:25:00

We are a nation that loves anniversaries — of births, weddings, deaths and everything else under the sun. We're now celebrating the first anniversary of the killing of Osama bin Laden and arguing whether President Barack Obama, who gave the order,...

A U.S. Predator unmanned drone, shown here on June 13, 2010, is armed with a missile while sitting on the tarmac of Kandahar military airport. U.S. Sen.

2013-03-15 16:59:00

CIA Director John Brennan testifies during a hearing before the Senate (Select) Intelligence Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C.

2013-03-12 00:00:00

John Brennan testifies before the Senate (Select) Intelligence Committee hearing on his nomination to be CIA director Feb. 7 in Washington, D.C.

2013-03-08 11:59:00