In this two-page piece, Alonzo Hamby reviews Justin Hart‘s Empire of Ideas: The Origins of Public Diplomacy and the Transformation of U.S. Foreign Policy. What’s the big transformation? In short—the development of mass media and its subsequent employment by policymakers in foreign policy. Before radio—to say nothing of Twitter—international relations was the sport of kings. […]
Jeffrey Toobin, “Heavyweight: How Ruth B
Toobin’s profile of Ginsberg, not surprisingly, is admiring. No surprise there—Toobin is a liberal who likes her liberal jurisprudence. But Justice Ginsberg herself is hard not to admire. She is astonishingly accomplished, and she gets on well with her colleagues, even the sometimes caustic conservative Scalia. (They attend operas together.) Toobin’s piece is an interesting […]
Nick Paumgarten, “The Hangover,” The New
The subtitle for this lengthy, eye-popping, and forehead-slapping article is “the eurozone’s fourth-largest economy has become its biggest liability.” Paumgarten exposes and corruption that is rife in Spain, and also paints a picture of the horrible mess left after an orgy of borrowing and building: “New state-of-the-art airports near Valencia and Madrid are surrendering to […]
Ezra Klein, “Let’s Talk: The Move to Ref
As a preface, let me say that I take no position on the filibuster and whether it should be changed or left as is. So much ink has been spilled re: the filibuster of late. There are those in media who cast it as a horrible thing that gums up the operation of the Senate. […]
Patricia Marx, “Outsource Yourself,” The
The World Wide Web’s disruptions of life are manifold. Most simply, the web permits people to connect who might not have done so otherwise. A woman in Syria tweets and folks around the globe see it. In some cases, the Inter-Tubes are destroying jobs by cutting out the middleman—take publishing for example. Amazon, once a mere […]
Mark Bowden, “The Hunt for Geronimo,” Va
I enjoyed this article. Bowden writes well; this piece gallops along. While spinning an exciting yarn, Bowden introduces readers to the myriad players involved in the battle against Al Qaeda: the National Security Adviser, Director of National Intelligence, CIA, Department of Defense, State Department, etc. He also conveys a sense of the immense time-suck that […]