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The Link between Iran and Venezuela: A Crisis in the Making?
The issues I will discuss with all of you are the blossoming relationship between what might seem unlikely bedfellows…. the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, whether we...
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On the Ground in Kandahar
You could say that we began going wobbly over Afghanistan in March, when the much-heralded new strategy embodied the best nation-building aspirations, but did not quite add up to a renewed declaration...
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Too Many Cooks
Today’s headline in the Washington Post tells us that our Ambassador in Kabul, Karl W. Eikenberry, opposes the sending of more U.S. and allied troops to Afghanistan, putting him at odds with the...
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Why I like the Afghan timetable
I am probably the only person in the United States who actually likes the fact that President Obama set an 18 month timetable for the beginning of a drawdown of US forces in Afghanistan in his speech...
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90 Notes on Obama’s Speech
I found President Obama’s speech on Afghanistan policy remarkable. The speech itself, looked at as an object of art, is brilliant. Some of the formulations in it, not just rhetorical but also...
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Tensions Flare in Copenhagen
Tensions flared Friday at the UN climate change conference in Copenhagen as China’s Vice Foreign Minister He Yafei, using unusually blunt language, described U.S. Chief Negotiator Todd Stern as...
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Some Literary Notes
Just a few selected comments on this weekend’s newspaper reading, as it were. First, in the New York Times “Week in Review” section under the headline “Our Decade of Deluded Thinking,” an unsigned...
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Special Event: President Obama One Year On
Update: The event, co-hosted with the New America Foundation, has already concluded. Thank you to everyone who attended, asked questions and participated. Below is a video recording of the event for...
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Alexander M. Haig, Jr.
It is appropriate, I think, to pause and reflect when a death finally brackets a part of one’s life. I briefly worked for Alexander Haig back in 1979-80, just before he became Secretary of State. I was...
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Arms Control Returns as Farce
On Thursday, March 25, the newspapers announced on their front pages a U.S.-Russian nuclear arms agreement. A slow news day, maybe, I thought. This sort of thing would have deserved front page coverage...
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Filling in the Blanks
The Washington Post reported this week that a number of Arizona politicians, both Republican and Democratic, are deeply concerned over their state’s developing reputation for intolerance and bigotry....
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Dueling Anthems
The last time Spain faced the Netherlands in a really big match they were wearing cuirasses and carrying swords. Nobody will be killed at Sunday’s World Cup match, but the Dutch will sing the same...
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The Frustrations of Infrastructure
We have in The American Interest an ongoing project called “Nation-Building in America” and infrastructure renewal is a subject I have been trying to get covered now for some time, so far to no avail....
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Saving American Society from Structural Disaster
As the midterm elections approach, the political topic on everyone’s tongue is jobs. The discussion in the popular press, such as it is, takes several forms. Lately, the most common question one hears...
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Fighting Islam in Afghanistan
“The GWOT is dead, long live the COFKATGWOT,” Walter Russell Mead likes to joke. It’s spot-on damning, really—a hamfisted rebranding could not change the essence of two wars well underway as President...
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You want a statin with that?
A study by a group led by one Dr. Darrell Francis of Britain’s National Heart and Lung Institute recently made headlines with its recommendation that fast-food joints hand out cholesterol-lowering...
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How to think about the Mosque
The ongoing debate about the so-called “Ground Zero mosque” is a test for the real foundations of our country, and the maturity of our political debate. This issue has the danger of sliding further...
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The Ethical versus The Possible
On his excellent blog for our magazine, Peter Berger has clearly laid out the impassioned moral argument for why we ought to think twice about pulling out of Afghanistan. He starts by highlighting a...
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The Face of the Taliban
Via DangerRoom, some remarkable and gripping footage of the Taliban in Kunar province of Afghanistan that’s worth your time to watch. It’s easy to dismiss this kind of stuff as a particularly...
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54 Notes on Obama’s Iraq Speech
On December 3, 2009, two days after President Obama’s speech on the Afghan War at West Point, my annotations to that speech appeared in AI Cont’d. Altogether I wrote 90 notes to the President’s text,...
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