National Insecurity
The Cost of American Militarism
"Melvin A. Goodman explains why CIA Director John Brennan should resign immediately"
Mar 13, 2014
Melvin A. Goodman, author of National Insecurity: The Cost of American Millitarism, comes to light in CounterPunch.
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Melvin A. Goodman, CounterPunch
"How US Policy is Deepening the Crisis With Russia"
Mar 10, 2014
Melvin A. Goodman, author of National Insecurity, wrote an op-ed on "A new cold war" for CounterPunch.
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Melvin A. Goodman, CounterPunch
"Radio interview on KWMR- 90.5 FM Point Reyes Station and 89.9 FM in Bolinas"
Feb 12, 2014
Melvin Goodman's interview on his book "National Insecurity: the Cost of American Militarism"
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The Local Organon
"The San Francisco Chronicle picked National Insecurity as one of the best books of 2013!"
Dec 20, 2013
National Insecurity, written by Mel Goodman, is among the best books of 2013.
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San Francisco Chronicle
"Lecture in Maryland"
Dec 3, 2013
Mel Goodman discusses National Insecurity.
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Mel Goodman, YouTube
"Mel Goodman discusses military spending in Counterpunch"
Jul 8, 2013
Mel Goodman, author of National Insecurity, wrote an op-ed on military spending for Counterpunch.
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Melvin A. Goodman, Counterpunch
"Mel Goodman interviewed by Meria Heller"
Jul 2, 2013
Melvin A. Goodman discusses his book National Insecurity, military spending, and his opinions on the NSA and Edward Snowden and Bradley Manning with Meria Heller on "Talk Radio with Meria Heller."
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Meria Heller, Talk Radio with Meria Heller
"Oped by Mel Goodman in Counterpunch"
Jun 25, 2013
"And now we have an Obama administration that has encouraged the creation of its own informant network among millions of federal employees and contractors to watch for "high-risk persons or behaviors" among co-workers. . . . "
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Melvin A. Goodman,Counterpunch
"Oped by Mel Goodman in The Baltimore Sun"
Jun 23, 2013
"A major problem in the United States is not that there are too many whistle-blowers. Rather, there are too few. . . . "
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Melvin A. Goodman, The Baltimore Sun
"The Real Benghazi Scandal"
May 15, 2013
"When congressional Republicans complete manipulating the Benghazi tragedy, it will be time for the virtually silent Senate intelligence committee to take up three major issues that have been largely ignored. The committee must investigate the fact that the U.S. presence in Benghazi was an intelligence platform and only nominally a consulate . . . "
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Melvin Goodman, Huffington Post
Huffington Post
"With a focus on the most recent such 'adventures' in Iraq and Afghanistan, Goodman summarizes much of what any impartial informed view of these wars, especially the Iraq disaster, must conclude--they have been a 'monumental blunder,' as former New York Times editor Bill Keller, a former supporter, had to conclude from the evidence a decade into the war."
Mel Goodman discusses National Insecurity on San Francisco's KALW
Apr 30, 2013
In 2011, the US defense budget was the highest it has been since World War II, higher than during the peak of the Korean War and Vietnam War -- in constant dollars. Goodman argues that in spite of this monumental spending, we are not safer as a country, and we suffer economically for it. So what would it take to re-calibrate our military spending and put the focus back on priorities at home?
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Max Jacobs, KALW
"Interview on WMNF Tampa, FL"
Apr 10, 2013
Mel Goodman discusses how the military budget can be reduced.
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Robert Lorei, WMNF
"Mel Goodman's 2nd interview on KSFR's 'The Journey Home'"
Apr 9, 2013
With push coming to shove in the defense budget, Goodman takes a critical look at the weapons systems and the Pentagon policies that consume so much of our tax dollars; and the history of how we came to be the most militarized nation on Earth.
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Diego Mulligan, KSFR's "Journey Home"
"Interview on WNHN's The Attitude"
Mar 21, 2013
Interview on Concord, NH's "The Attitude" with Arnie Arneson.
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Arnie Arson, "The Attitude"
"Interview on WJFF's Connections with Dick Riesling"
Mar 25, 2013
Interview on Jeffersonville, NY's (The Catskills) WJFF's "Connections with Dick Riesling."
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Dick Riesling, WJFF's "Connections with Dick Reisling"
"Interview on KSFR's Journey Home"
Mar 14, 2013
Interview on Santa Fe New Mexico's KSFR "Journey Home."
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Diego Mulligan, KSFR's "Journey Home"
"Interview on Sirius XM's Rightsidewire"
Mar 14, 2013
Armstrong Williams interviews Mel Goodman.
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Armstrong Williams, Sirius XM
"Interview on KPFK's The Progressive Forum"
Mar 7, 2013
KPFK's Wally James at "The Progressive Forum" (Houston, TX) interviewed Mel Goodman about National Insecurity.
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Wally James, KPFK
"Interview on KGNU's The Economy"
Mar 7, 2013
KGNU's "The Economy" (Boulder, CO) interviewed Mel Goodman about National Insecurity.
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KGNU's "The Economy"
"Interview with Mel Goodman on Truthout"
Mar 6, 2013
Truthout talked with Melvin Goodman about the military and intelligence network machine that maintains America's empire.
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Mark Karlin, "Truthout"
Firedoglake Book Salon with Mel Goodman
Mar 30, 2013
The FDL Book Salon invited Mel Goodman to discuss his new book National Insecurity. Goodman took part in a 2 hour on-line salon, discussing why he wrote the book, and his career in the CIA, and answered many other questions submitted from participants around the world.
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Steve Horn, Firedoglake
DCist previews Mel Goodman's new book and event at Busboys and Poets
Mar 20, 2013
What exactly is national security? If it entails the safety and well-being of Americans and American land, could national security mean a protected environment with clean water and air? Could it mean that sick people can afford timely treatment? Or that personal income will be protected from unfair taxation or pressures that facilitate irresponsible spending? These concepts may not be considered "national security" in the usual sense, but as Melvin Goodman writes in National Insecurity: The Cost of American Militarism, those issues currently present more imminent threats than any from overseas. Yet, he says, they sit on the back burner as defense spending has gone up and the economy has suffered.
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Nicole Dubowitz, DCist
"Mel Goodman's '9 Ways to Reduce Defense Spending' on the Huffington Post"
Mar 5, 2013
Mel Goodman says, "By reducing our military budget, we will better position the U.S. globally, and enhance prosperity and security at home." Here he offers nine specific ways to cut defense spending.
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Mel Goodman, Huffington Post
"Excerpt from 'National Insecurity' featured on Truthout.org"
Mar 5, 2013
Read the introduction to National Insecurity as featured on Truthout.org
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Mel Goodman, Truthout.org
"Mel Goodman interviewed on MSNBC's 'The Cycle'"
Feb 28, 2013
Mel Goodman discusses why cutting the military budget will make us safer on MSNBC's "The Cycle".
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The Cycle, MSNBC
"Mel Goodman interviewed on The Gary Null Show"
Feb 25, 2013
A conversation on our political disconnect with the Pentagon and the resulting crisis in national security with $3 trillion to private contractors, with ex-CIA analyst Professor Melvin Goodman.
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Gary Null, The Gary Null Show
"Mel Goodman interviewed on Background Briefing with Ian Masters"
Feb 25, 2013
A look into the extraordinary rise of defense spending during the last decade, increases not seen since the Korean War, and whether this can be slowed or reversed. Mel Goodman discusses whether the Republicans have changed their minds on defense cuts and if cuts could be targeted against useless weapons systems like the most expensive defense contract in history, the F-35 aircraft that is now grounded.
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Ian Masters, Background Briefing, KFPA Berkeley
"Mel Goodman interviewed on The Inside Track, Tucscon, AZ"
Feb 24, 2013
Mel Goodman discusses the sequester and defense spending.
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Inside Track
Consortium News
"Beyond his prescriptions for finally curbing the money that feeds the military-industrial complex, Goodman also recommends a national recognition that the United States must finally see itself realistically as part of the community of nations, not as a self-directed policeman."
"Brennan's Bumbling Case for Terror War"
Feb 9, 2013
CIA Director-designate John Brennan stumbled through less-than-challenging questions at his Senate confirmation hearing, struggling to square the circle of his past ties to abuses in the "war on terror" with his future promises to be a force for openness and reform, as ex-CIA analyst Melvin A. Goodman notes.
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Mel Goodman, Consortium News.com
"He Was The Agency": Ex-CIA Analyst Questions Brennan Claim He Couldn't Stop Waterboarding, Torture
Feb 8, 2013
CIA nominee John Brennan was repeatedly questioned about torture at his CIA confirmation hearing, including the use of waterboarding and enhanced interrogation techniques. He refused to say waterboarding was a form of torture, but said he has come to oppose the technique. Under George W. Bush, Brennan served as deputy executive director of the CIA and director of the Terrorist Threat Integration Center. "Remember, he was the cheerleader for some of these onerous policies, particularly renditions and extraordinary renditions. So, for John Brennan today to say he read the Senate committee intelligence report on torture and he learned things he never knew before and that he was shocked with what he learned, this is a case of incredible willful ignorance," says Melvin Goodman, former CIA and State Department analyst.
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Democracy Now
"Mel Goodman interviewed on WORT's A Public Affair"
Feb 8, 2013
Mel Goodman discusses his new book National Insecurity: The Cost of American Militarism.
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A Public Affair, WORT Wisconsin
Pt 2 of 2, "The Iraq War Ten Years Later: Blurring the Blame for the Iraq War"
Feb 7, 2012
The myth that bad intelligence led to the Iraq War won't die, but the evidence is clear that President George W. Bush decided to invade after 9/11, though Iraq had nothing to do with the attack, and intel was assembled to sell the invasion to a scared U.S. public, as ex-CIA analyst Melvin A. Goodman explains.
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Mel Goodman, Consortium News.com
Interview on KPFA Berkeley's "Up Front"
Feb 7, 2013
Discussing the nomination of John Brennan to head the CIA, what questions the Senate Intelligence Committee should ask him during his confirmation hearings, and what kind of leadership Goodman thinks the CIA needs. Interview begins around 9 minute mark.
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Up Front, KPFA Berkeley
Interview on KPFK, Los Angeles
Feb 7, 2013
Mel Goodman discusses his new book National Insecurity: The Cost of American Militarism.
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Ian Masters, Background Briefing, KPFK
Pt 1 of 2, "The Iraq War Ten Years Later: How the Iraq War was Sold"
Feb 5, 2013
As George Bush and his national security team marched the U.S. off to war in Iraq, they were aided by key news outlets, especially the neocon-dominated Washington Post. Now a decade later, the Post still won't take a hard, honest look at what was done, writes ex-CIA analyst Melvin A. Goodman.
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Mel Goodman, Consortium News.com
"Goodman Marano Spaulding Surreal News 391"
Feb 1, 2013
Mel Goodman discusses his new book, National Insecurity: The Cost of American Militarism, and the nomination of Chuck Hagel to Secretary of Defense. Interview begins at 17 minute mark.
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The Surreal News Show, WSLR Florida
"Interview with Peter B. Collins"
Jan 29, 2013
Mel Goodman discusses his new book, offers an historical analysis of Obama's first term, presents a critique of the film "Zero Dark 30," considers Chuck Hagel's nomination as Secretary of Defense, and offers ways to cut military spending.
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Peter B. Collins, The Peter Collins Show
"The Force: How Much Military is Enough"
Jan 28, 2013
"'We have hundreds of military bases all over the world,' Melvin A. Goodman observes in National Insecurity: The Cost of American Militarism (City Lights). 'Few countries have any.' Goodman, a former Army cryptographer and a longtime C.I.A. analyst who taught at the National War College for eighteen years, is one of a growing number of critics of U.S. military spending, policy, and culture who are veterans of earlier wars."
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Jill Lepore, The New Yorker
San Francisco Chronicle
"Goodman's value added is his focus on the role of the militarization of intelligence. . . . crucial to establishing that mortal threats to America perennially loom--out there--demanding bloated military budgets and frequent wars. . . . With a convincing accumulation of examples, Goodman reveals how our political leadership's occasional impulse to arms-control accords or defense budget cuts have come to be thwarted by an ever more powerful Pentagon."
East Bay Express
"Goodman, currently director of the National Security Project at the Center for International Policy and an adjunct professor of government at Johns Hopkins University, has firsthand experience with war planners and intelligence strategists, and critiques the military economy from President Eisenhower through President Obama."
Interview on KPFA Berkeley's "Letters and Politics"
Jan 24, 2013
Mitch Jeserich of KPFA Berkeley's "Letters and Politics" interviews Mel Goodman. Interview begins at 26 minute marker.
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Mitch Jeserich, Letters and Politics, KPFA Berkeley
"Mel Goodman on the Commonwealth Club Podcast"
Jan 22, 2013
Mel Goodman spoke about his new book at the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco on January 22, 2013.
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Commonwealth Club Podcast
"Book Discussion on National Insecurity"
Jan 22, 2013
Melvin Goodman talked about his book, National Insecurity: The Cost of American Militarism, in which he argues that our current level of spending on defense is excessive and is making us less secure. Goodman spoke at the Commonwealth Club of California in San Francisco in January 2013.
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CSPAN Book TV
"News about New England books and authors"
Jan 12, 2013
The "Boston Globe's" Jan Gardner highlights Mel Goodman's "National Insecurity" in her latest column.
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Jan Gardner, Boston Globe
"Mel Goodman on KPFA: Letters and Politics"
Jan 7, 2013
Mel Goodman, a former CIA agent who rallied support against John Brennan for his previous nomination to head the CIA, discusses his new nomination on KPFA, Berkeley (begins @ 28 min.)
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KPFA: Letters and Politics
"Restore Reliability and Accountability"
Dec 3, 2012
Mel Goodman weighs in on the future of the CIA's leadership: "A respected civilian leader could correct flawed analytical and operational processes and name an inspector general who is a junkyard dog."
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Melvin Goodman, The New York Times, Room for Debate
"The CIA director's flaws"
Nov 23, 2012
"Mel Goodman responds to the editorial 'David Petraeus' Affair Has Damaged the Nation' by explaining that in choosing national security advisers, Obama has 'ignored the need for an independent civilian voice to counter the influence and worst-case analysis of military intelligence.'"
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Melvin Goodman, The Washington Post, Opinion page
New York Journal of Books
"Melvin A. Goodman is a damn fine author, and National Insecurity is a damning assessment of U.S. defense spending and covert operations."
"Petraeus Testifies on Benghazi Attack"
Nov 16, 2012
Mel Goodman discusses David Petraeus's testimony on Benghazi attack in this radio interview.
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MPR News
Kirkus Reviews
"A 25-year CIA veteran examines how recent presidents have handled the military and defense spending.
As he left office in 1961, President Dwight Eisenhower gave a farewell address in which he warned against the influence of the 'military-industrial complex,' theorizing that overinvestment in defense could compromise other domestic issues. Goodman (Failure of Intelligence: The Decline and Fall of the CIA, 2008, etc.) claims that in the 50 years since that speech, Eisenhower's warning has gone unheeded, especially by the four most recent presidents: George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Barack Obama. The author takes each president to task for his particular failings in foreign policy or his dealings with the military. While the chapter on the second Bush administration and its manipulation of post-9/11 intelligence reports feels slightly rehashed, the chapters on George H.W. Bush (covering the invasion of Panama and Desert Storm and Desert Shield) and Bill Clinton (which addresses 'don't ask; don't tell,' as well as military incursions into Haiti, the Balkans, Somalia and Rwanda) are engrossing and thoughtful. After examining these four presidents, Goodman includes a chapter on the national missile-defense program, calling it 'the most expensive and least effective weapons system in the U.S. arsenal.' This program was introduced during the Ronald Reagan administration (which spent more than $60 billion to develop it), leaving readers to speculate why Reagan was not included as a president guilty of runaway military spending. Goodman waits until nearly the last page before offering 'some good news in the overall picture.' He offers a few words of praise for President Obama, who 'does understand that the United States is far less exceptional than his opponents believe,' before ending with an ominous reminder: 'The age of the superpower is over.' Engaging reading for those interested in foreign policy and military spending."
Publishers Weekly
"In this impassioned exposé of the astronomical costs of America's defense policy, former CIA analyst Goodman (Failure of Intelligence: The Decline and Fall of the CIA) demonstrates how post–cold war neoconservatives, energized by the recent dissolution of the U.S.S.R. and the United States' unrivaled position as the world’s premier superpower, promoted a pugnacious militarism that has led to a string of foreign policy debacles and unprecedented levels of military spending. Kicked into high gear by Reagan, expenditures slowed during the 1990s under Bush and Clinton, but skyrocketed after the 9/11 attacks and during the second Bush’s 'ultra-expensive and un-winnable wars.' Obama, having inherited 'a national security state that violate[s] civil rights at home and human rights abroad,' promised reforms, but has been reluctant (or unable) to actively reduce military expenditures. The military-industrial complex, presciently denounced decades earlier by Eisenhower, rumbles on. The obligatory how-to-fix-it chapter contains much bipartisan, cost-cutting rhetoric, but it’s clear that the majority of both parties in Congress consider the defense budget sacrosanct, or at least immutable. Few will finish this precisely argued polemic without the uneasy feeling that military spending is out of control."
"The Why Behind the Benghazi Attack"
Nov 6, 2012
Goodman gives the back story on the Benghazi attack explaining it was not the political cover-up that the Right has pushed, but rather how the U.S. consulate had grown into a CIA base, making it an inviting target for militants. The primary security failure was in not anticipating the danger.
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Melvin Goodman, Counterpunch
"Romney's Shape-Shifting Foreign Policy"
Oct 24, 2012
Mitt Romney's three debate performances in October 2012 have exposed his political cynicism, with the Republican candidate abandoning long-term positions in order to adopt more moderate ideas for the run-up to the election.
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Melvin Goodman, Truthout
"Time for major cuts in defense spending"
Sep 30, 2012
In this op-ed for The Baltimore Sun, Mel Goodman, a former CIA-analyst and author of the forthcoming National Insecurity: The Cost of American Militarism, explains why now is the time for cuts in defense spending.
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Melvin Goodman, The Baltimore Sun
"9/11 Could have been prevented"
Apr 14, 2012
Mel Goodman speaks before the World Affairs Council of New Hampshire on how 9/11 could have been prevented.
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Melvin Goodman, YouTube
"The 9/11 Commission Report One Year Later - Part 20"
Feb 22, 2008
Ex-CIA analyst Mel Goodman critiques the intelligence reforms put forward by the 9/11 Commission.
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Melvin Goodman, YouTube
"Interview with former CIA & State Dept. Analyst Mel Goodman"
May 20, 2007
A radio interview in which Mel Goodman discusses his CIA career.
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Talking Stick TV, YouTube
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