On what we should learn from 11 years of war in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Anyone banking on a big-win breakthrough in Wednesday’s nuclear talks with Iran will likely find themselves in the same boat as investors who bet on an instant surge in the Facebook stock price last week. If there’s value to be found in nuclear negotiations with Iran, then — like an investment in Facebook — it’s likely to emerge over time. And in both cases, even the long-term outcome remains uncertain.
Barack Obama’s reelection may well depend on stimulus. Not the stimulus bill that passed Congress in 2009. Or the monetary injections administered by the Federal Reserve. This stimulus won’t even be debated in Washington. Obama’s reelection hinges on whether 17 Eurozone nations can band together to deal with a financial crisis threatening to tear apart Europe’s common currency [...]
The New York Times is reporting that Iran may be about to open its Parchin military facility to international inspections. This is a biggish deal, but not a complete breakthrough. Parchin is where Iran may have been conducting experiments on weaponizing its nuclear fuel; there has been speculation that the facility housed a chamber to test [...]
President Obama’s goal at the NATO summit this week is looking increasingly clear: wrap up U.S. troops’ combat role over the coming year, and get the allies to pay more money to enable the Afghan military to fill the gap. All signs are that NATO will agree to the first of those two goals Monday in Chicago.
Richard Wolf over at USA Today has a lengthy and comprehensive summary of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s legacy-to-date. I say to-date because Wolf leaves ample hints that her biggest role might yet be in the making. For example, he notes the numerous times Clinton is asked about a 2016 run — and her pat denials. His [...]
Any one remember sending their left overs to Africa? Not so long ago, that food aid consisted of massive amounts of random extra food that developed countries would send to the developing world in response to crises – mostly to rot on airport tarmacs for lack of distribution. On Friday, President Obama hopes to show [...]
Not since the oil shocks that first brought the world’s superpowers together in 1974–back then they called themselves the “Library Group” because they met in the White House library–has the G8 had so much substantive business on a summit agenda.
Everyone understands that Tea Party-era Republicans have moved right on domestic policies like taxes and entitlements. At the same time, there’s a sense that In the Tea Party era, there’s a sense that Republicans have mellowed on foreign policy—that the post-9/11 neocon-hawk moment has passed, and restraint has taken over among conservatives. The Tea Party has a [...]
The illustrious patriots over at the Commentary blog have, predictably, taken me to task for defending Peter Beinart’s fine book about the crisis in Israel. They have done so in a predictably specious way. So I’d like to make my position, and theirs, perfectly clear: the argument against West Bank settlements is not merely a demographic [...]
