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Walter Russell Mead
Big Data Won’t Solve the Student Loan Crisis In the past, when students at Georgia State weren’t able to pay their tuition bill, they were barred from class, which often led to their ... The Steady Decline of US Popularity in Egypt One of the hoped-for legacies of Barack Obama’s presidency was a reconciliation between the US and the Islamic world. This vision has suffered a series of ... ACA Supporters Bask in the Glow of an Obamacare Victory California has released its first official numbers about the monthly premiums state residents will face under Obamacare, and they’re lower than anyone expected. The consulting ... Game of Thrones: Pacific Island Edition Andrew Pickford wrote an interesting piece on Australia’s changing neighborhood for today’s Diplomat. Nations like the Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea, and East Timor are small, sparsely ... Cyprus Cozying up to Russia? The Kremlin can hardly believe its luck these days. With the US dithering over Syria and the EU hopelessly lost, wandering in the ruins of ... GWOT: Not Ending on Schedule President Obama wants to be rid of the Global War on Terror, but the Global War on Terror isn’t quite finished with him. For evidence, ...
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Syria How to Make the "Red Line" Mean Something Chuck Freilich Syria's use of chemical weapons violates fundamental international norms and sets dangerous precedents. To ignore it, or to try to smooth it over through futile diplomatic efforts, is unacceptable.
 
Armed Forces Decline at Sea is a Political Choice Seth Cropsey Sequestration and other budget cuts will further reduce the U.S. Navy's fleets, combat preparedness and global presence. This slow retreat toward home waters is antithetical to national policy and may eventually prove dangerous.
 
Russia A Response to the Critics Thomas E. Graham How a strategic dialogue with Russia could cut through the stereotypical thinking on all sides, and other closing thoughts on The American Interest's debate on U.S. policy on Russia.
 
The North Caucasus A Patchwork Puzzle Sergey Markedonov Boston focused our minds on the security challenges posed by the situation in the North Caucasus. Too bad people still use events from over twenty years ago to understand a region that's far too complicated for simple generalizations.
 
Libya Benghazigate: Missing the Point Adam Garfinkle The real lesson we should draw from the murder of a U.S. Ambassador and several other Americans in Benghazi last year is that the Libya war was a completely predictable and avoidable mistake. Why aren’t Republicans making this argument? Why can’t they connect these obvious dots? Because they are in the main cheap hawks.
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Ahead of the Curve
Editors' Choices from Previous Issues
July/August 2009 The Essential Italian Michael McDonald Giulio Andreotti, who served as Prime Minister of Italy seven times, is dead at 94. The inscrutable Andreotti must bedevil any would-be obituary writer, but one young filmmaker came close to capturing the essence of the man in a 2008 film, Il Divo. With flamboyant, almost surrealistic style, the film is also a searing portrait of Italian politics.
 
March/April 2008 Bombs Away Zachary S. Davis In his State of the Union Address, President Obama pledged to "continue leading the global effort to secure nuclear materials that could fall into the wrong hands." Stopping proliferation has become vastly more difficult over the years, but strategic interdiction is perhaps the most powerful—and underutilized—tool at his disposal.
Featured Reviews
Books, Film, Music & Other Cultural Artifacts
Books The Apple Pie of Booze Hannah Dean Bourbon is the spirit America makes better than anyone—its distinctive flavor comes from our native corn, water and oak barrels. It's patriotism in a glass. But its rise as the all-American spirit was by no means assured. A motley assortment of distillers, hucksters, politicians and partisan drunks paved the way to the hard stuff we enjoy today.
Books The Boy From Bombay Brian Stewart Salman Rushdie's memoir Joseph Anton recounts the aftermath of Satanic Verses and the fatwa that targeted him for death. Years of isolation and anxiety brought a deep appreciation of western freedoms, and of the forces that threaten it from within.
Film Dancer in the Dark Matt Cohen Kathryn Bigelow's Zero Dark Thirty takes us into the shadows of the decade-long manhunt for Osama bin Laden. The film is less about the enemy and more about America's stubborn determination to drag him into the light.
Books The Achilles Heel within the Boot Paul DeRosa Bill Emmott’s Good Italy, Bad Italy spins an anecdotal narrative of Italy’s recent history from the early 1990s Mani Pulite scandals to the ongoing euro crisis, successfully carrying readers up to the decision the country faces about its future. Wisely, Emmott avoids predicting which path Italy will choose.
Television Why Republicans Should Watch More TV Peter Augustine Lawler With their party in disarray, Republican politicians and strategists should put down the poll results and data sets and turn on the television for a change. What they find may provide a better picture of social reality—and the electorate they've so long failed to win over.