Columns, pieces and posts
So far so good. The war has begun, and the world hasn’t ended (alarmists, pessimists and prophets on left and right please note). Saddam Hussein may be hurt or dead. And so, on to Baghdad. An old song from the American civil rights is on my mind and seems on point. It’s about how far […]
The Bush administration, famously inclined toward clarity and bluntness in foreign affairs, did something Friday that seemed almost . . . subtle. Or even obscuring. On the brink of war, with everyone in the world rushing to the radio and TV to see if the invasion had happened or the White House blinked or the […]
It’s a beat-up little suburban single-story house in a Third World place far away. Faded blue paint on the outside, broken bicycle on a cracked cement walkway, rusty fence. You wouldn’t think twice if you drove by. It wasn’t interestingly decrepit or antique, just modern, cheap and fallen down. It’s after midnight. A man—thin, bearded, […]
Recently Andrew Cuomo asked me to contribute to a book of essays on the future of the Democratic Party. I thought I would send it to Andrew through OpinionJournal.com. That way he will be able to see your responses pro and con and perhaps include a few of them in the book, too. Dear Andrew, […]
Two of our former presidents, Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter, have been talking a lot about their views and feelings on Iraq. It would be nice if they took to speaking less and thinking more. They could start with an event in the latter years of Dwight David Eisenhower, a former president who knew how […]
What is emerging right now is the real “new world order.” Twelve years ago when the Soviet Union fell, the first President Bush declared it had arrived, but it is this President Bush on whom it has come to call. Old alliances fall, new ones rise. The 21st century takes its shape. The “old West” […]
At this point Iraq is, for each of us, a gut call. We probably have as much information and hard data as we’re going to get. There are different ways to interpret the evidence, to understand the peril. No one can prove containment will work in the future, for instance, and no one can prove […]
What did you think of President Bush’s Columbia speech? It hit the spot, did what needed to be done. The bible references were pure Bush. Only question was why it wasn’t given in the Oval Office. I think I am correct in observing that modern presidents shy away from the Oval for addresses. But why? […]
“The Columbia is lost. There are no survivors.” Blunt words spoken softly by President Bush this afternoon. He spoke of how easy it is for all of us to “overlook the dangers of travel by rocket. . . . These astronauts knew the dangers, and they faced them willingly.” He spoke of why “mankind is […]
You always hope a State of the Union address will be a sleek and handsome ocean liner cutting through the sea. Often they start that way and then turn, inevitably, into a greasy old barge riding low in the water, weighed down by policy cargo. It blows its horn proudly but the sound is more […]