Senator McCain’s Mythic Reagan
Would the Gipper really be disappointed in the absence of hawkish tendencies in this Republican field?
On the Newsstand:Iraq
On WikiLeaks: Transparency for Transparency’s Sake
When we sacrifice our national security for the sake of transparency, we have crossed the line
Memorial Day Reading
This afternoon, I came across George Orwell’s “Revenge is Sour” in a collection of his essays. Originally published in the Tribune in November 1945, it speaks to the emptiness of revenge and — more topically for today — to the disconnect between civilians and soldiers in war. Below is the final paragraph: The Belgian averted his face as we went ... Read More
The Relative Value of Valor
The New York Times Magazine has a fantastic article about the puzzle of the paucity of valor awards–those medals given for high acts of courage. Only six Medals of Honor have been awarded in Iraq or Afghanistan: a fraction of previous wars either absolute or percentage terms. In the Pentagon’s defense, the article quotes one spokeswoman: Addressing the drastic drop ... Read More
Generational Inadequacy
I just finished watching Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks’ The Pacific, an HBO miniseries following a group of marines in WWII. And it was truly epic. Melodramatic and overwrought maybe, but the war in the Pacific was no jungle romp. As The Pacific vividly shows, it was unimaginably gruesome, traumatic, and relentless. The marines battled the unyielding and suicidal Japanese on malaria-infested, ... Read More
Absolutely Not Fabulous
Goldman Sachs has been making headlines (again) after charges were filed by the SEC alleging that the company sold a financial product whose components were decided on in part by Paulson & Co., a company who made bets in a hedge fund that the product would see losses, without disclosing this to investors and thereby creating a conflict of interest. ... Read More
Spring Interviews are Online!
Our three latest interviews are available here. Teaching the Teachers: Teach for America’s founder talks about education in America. Wendy Kopp is the founder and president of Teach for America, the national non-profit teaching corps. She also serves as CEO of Teach for All, an organization that works to introduce Teach for America’s methods around the world. By Meredith Baker. ... Read More
The Enthusiasm Gap
I think Glenn Greenwald is quite right about this. The Democratic Party has spent the last few years more or less conspicuously failing to deliver on every single one of its campaign promises. I count cap-and-trade, Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, the end of the Iraq War, a restoration of civil liberties, the closing of Guantanamo Bay, the end of domestic ... Read More
Why Andrew Sullivan is a Hack, Part I
No, I don’t think he’s an anti-semite (see Jonathan Chait on that). But he has been reckless enough with the truth, and obsessed enough with Israel, that much of the recent criticism is spot-on. Take Sullivan’s latest post on CPAC for example. He begins by heralding Ron Paul’s surprise victory in the CPAC straw poll, and ends up with yet another diatribe against Israel and the ”neocon” quest ... Read More
Lesson’s From Today’s “Morning Joe”
You can learn a lot by watching TV, it turns out! Here’s what I learned by watching this morning’s “Morning Joe.” First, it’s okay to be a druggie, boozing, womanizing liberal so long as you support covertly aiding the enemies of our enemies (mistaking them for our friends). This we learned from Joe Scarborough’s valedictory declaration that the recently deceased ... Read More
