Some thoughts on the Austro-Hungarian empire’s legacy on the occasion of the passing of Otto von Habsburg.

This isn’t going to make Charlaine Harris very happy.  A new book on dogs says that dogs and wolves live in harmonious family groups.  Alpha males?  Struggles for dominance?  Forget about it, says author John Bradshaw.If the idea of happily social wolves gets out into popular culture, the fast growing horror/romance genre is going to […]

Words from a distraught left-winger on Obama’s apparent willingness to make large cuts in Medicare and Social Security: The truly historic importance of what is happen right now can’t be repeated enough. It is a Democratic President who is the driving force now behind cutting Medicare and Social Security. It is a Democratic President who […]

Secretary of State Hilary Clinton’s India trip is real news.  She is now openly asking India to join the US in shaping the future of Asia and the Pacific.“India’s leadership has the potential to positively shape the future of the Asia-Pacific,” the AP reported Clinton saying. “We think that America and India share a fundamentally […]

“The SAT doesn’t matter on your applications,” say colleges like Bowdoin and Wake Forest, and they don’t require students to send those scores in with their applications.This sounds very liberal and forward-looking, but it turns out that both these schools, plus others, buy those test results from the College Board. The highest scoring high school […]

How can America manage crime in the post-Blue era?New America Foundation fellow and blogger Reihan Salam draws attention to a report on a new and effective approach to urban crime reduction: non-profit organizations of local businesses focused on providing public goods to their neighborhoods.By hiring private security forces, these so-called Business Improvement Districts have lowered […]

“We have made it clear to the Pakistani government that confronting violent extremists of all sorts is in its interest.” So said Secretary of State Hilary Clinton today in…India.A few people in Pakistan might disagree.Sec. Clinton is in India this week both to strengthen the American relations with the (possibly) rising superpower and to encourage […]

Washington DC has been a majority Black city for 51 years, with Blacks accounting for 71 percent of the city’s population at their peak.  In recent years, Blacks have moved out as whites moved in; according to the New York Times sometime early this year the Black share tipped below fifty percent.Washington has had its […]

In response to readers’ requests, Via Meadia short posts now have comments enabled. Everyone is welcome to join the discussion but please observe the rules.For other insights, reactions, or recommendations, always feel free to email us at ViaMeadia@the-american-interest.com.If you look at the blog roll, you can see that it, too, has been updated.  The blog […]

It’s winter down under but environmental politics are hot.  Leaders of the state of West Australia are threatening to secede from the country after Prime Minister Julia Gillard released plans for a new carbon tax next year, according to The Atlantic. Even in environmentally-conscious Australia, where 81 percent of voters support action to combat global […]