Columns, pieces and posts
Great essays tell big truths. A deeply reported piece in next month’s Atlantic magazine does precisely that, and in a way devastating to the Obama administration’s thinking on ISIS. “What ISIS Really Wants,” by contributing editor Graeme Wood, is going to change the debate. (It ought to become a book.) Mr. Wood describes a dynamic, […]
I was at dinner at the home of a friend, a journalist, when the phone rang. I heard her say, “Oh no, no,” and saw her face: Something terrible had happened, not to her personally but in the world. She got off and told us that Bob Simon, the CBS News correspondent, had died. I […]
Everything’s frozen. When you ask, “What is the appropriate U.S. response to ISIS?” half the people in Washington answer: “ George W. Bush broke Iraq and ISIS was born in the rubble. There would be no ISIS if it weren’t for him.” The other half answer: “When Barack Obama withdrew from Iraq, ISIS was born […]
Something is going on here. On Tuesday retired Gen. James Mattis, former head of U.S. Central Command (2010-13) told the Senate Armed Services Committee of his unhappiness at the current conduct of U.S. foreign policy. He said the U.S. is not “adapting to changed circumstances” in the Mideast and must “come out now from our […]
Whatever your views on Benjamin Netanyahu, the Likud Party, and the upcoming Israeli elections, put them aside for a moment and appreciate this as sheer political art. It is one of the best political ads I have ever seen—funny, warm, surprising and clever. It seems aimed at what I’d think is one of Netanyahu’s prime […]
It’s odd in Washington now. There’s a lot of claiming of authority and no taking of responsibility. The president gave his State of the Union address, and of course the TV ratings were bad—Nielsen put viewership at 31.7 million, the lowest since Bill Clinton ’s last State of the Union, in 2000, when America had […]
I saw “American Sniper” last night. It is not a great movie but it is a powerful one. It had the power to leave a packed Manhattan movie house silent—really, completely silent—as they stared at the closing credits and tried to absorb the meaning of what they’d seen. They filed out silently, too. It’s not […]
This is a good day, with the snow starting to come down heavy in storm-braced New York, to look at the only memorable image to come from the State of the Union address. That image came from the response, by Joni Ernst, Iowa’s new U.S. senator. She spoke, at the top of the speech, of […]
Hershey, Pa. A conversation with a Republican governor who is a possible presidential aspirant: I told him I’d been thinking about something and wanted his response. You can argue that a governor is a better presidential nominee than a senator because governors, unlike lawmakers, have to do something and can be judged by their performance, […]
The new issue of Charlie Hebdo is out. In Paris it sold out almost immediately and the print run has been upped to a reported five million. On the cover is a cartoon of Muhammad, a tear on his cheek. Tens of millions of people will see it. It is almost enough but not quite. […]