Politics & Current Affairs

The Boston Globe finds a dangerous irony in Israel’s decision to keep Noam Chomsky from speaking at a Palestinian University in the West Bank.

The country’s six largest banks have hired more than 240 former government officials to lobby Congress as it debates regulating the financial industry. That’s according to a new report (pdf) […]

Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-AR) is in trouble. She is struggling to survive a primary challenge from Lt. Gov. Bill Halter. Now it looks like she may be headed to a […]

Daniel Wilkinson and Nik Steinberg write that the U.S. embargo of Cuba must end, but that it is naive to think that the Caribbean country’s government will suddenly reform as a result.

Detroit intends to take advantage of warm weather and new federal funding to demolish some 3,000 buildings by the end of September in order to “right size” the city.

“The government’s current policy to leave a great deal of its liabilities off-balance sheet makes the U.S.’s current debt levels look a lot more favorable than they really are,” writes Daniel Indiviglio.

“The world remains inexplicably indifferent and uncurious” about the deadly nature of Communism, writes Claire Berlinski. “For evidence of this indifference, consider the unread Soviet archives.”

“Instead of creating a joint military, Europe must now be worried about keeping its common currency. Europe could end where it began: in Greece,” writes writes Christoph Schwennicke.

William Saletan argues that we shouldn’t ask Elena Kagan is she’s gay, and she needn’t volunteer an answer. Forced disclosure isn’t just a threat to the nomination, he writes, it’s a threat to freedom.

Walter Rodgers suggests the vocalized concerns of tea partiers about big government mask a fear among aging, white Americans of their own diminishing political power.

Emily Bazelon thinks that the youth and judicial inexperience of Elena Kagan, President Obama’s selection to replace Justice Stevens on the Supreme Court, make her a good choice for the job.

Until the Pakistani military truly takes on a more holistic view of the country’s national interests, the country will continue to be a hotbed of terrorism, writes Fareed Zakaria.

For Obama to turn Gulf oil spill crisis into an opportunity, John Heilemann thinks he may have to embrace the expansion of nuclear energy.

Although federal law prohibits discrimination in the workplace on the basis of race, national origin, age, sex, and disability, there are no federal laws protecting people from discrimination on the […]

It looks like the mainstream media has finally decided to quit ignoring the rancid stench of race based hatred that fuels a lot of the anger behind the Tea Party […]

The “special relationship” between the U.S. and the U.K. is likely to change because Britain has less than ever to offer America as David Cameron seeks to be a domestic policy Prime Minister.

The devil is in the details. In the modern world, that’s more true than ever. No one can realistically hope to keep track of or understand all the legal and […]

“You are not allowed to proceed further. Turn back and head the way you came.” These words were spoken to me by a policeman standing on the approaches to the […]

Incarceration rates quintupled over the last third of the 20th century, and conventional wisdom is that it must have something to do with a corresponding rise in crime. Robert Perkinson, […]

“If the United States is to have a sustainable toehold in Asia, Washington has to start paying serious attention to some countries in the region that are not China or India,” writes Ernest Bower.

Former U.N. ambassador John Bolton writes that “It is hard to conclude anything except that the Obama administration is resigned to Iran possessing nuclear weapons.”

The preservation of “fundamental rights” by a nation’s judiciary is an old habit of tempering democracy with aristocracy, writes James Grant of the U of Cambridge.

Maybe the Tea Party isn’t the real threat to the Democrats after all. The greatest threat to the Democratic majorities in Congress just may be old people. Margaret Talev points […]

In an interview with The Nation, historian Tony Judt says consciously choosing to build a social democratic state is an expression of our freedom, not a limit on it.

Matt Yglesias makes a good point. The Tea Party activists talk a lot about the government taking away their freedom, whether by taxing them, byforcing them to buy health insurance, […]

On Monday, Republicans voted to prevent financial reform legislation from moving to the Senate floor for debate. The Democrats’ motion to bring about cloture—which would end the Republicans filibuster of […]

I was tooling around the internet for awhile yesterday, looking for a transcript of the Congressional hearings that featured Goldman Sachs executives and traders as the star witnesses, before I […]

Former President Jimmy Carter writes that Sudan’s recent elections, despite the condemnation of many critics, “will permit this war-torn nation to move toward a permanent peace.”

With yet another journalist attacked and killed in Honduras this past week, the country has become one of the most dangerous for reporters in 2010. As previously mentioned on this […]

Here then is the hidden truth that none of the established political parties will tell the electorate in this, the penultimate week in what is fast proving to be one […]