Even as French Jews are still in shock and mourning after the murder of Jewish schoolchildren in Toulouse, fear stalks the community. As the BBC has noted, the beating of another student at a Jewish school by anti-Semitic assailants is only the most notable example: Five bullet-holes were found in a window of the Yitzhak-Rabin music […]

President Obama’s recent decision to fast-track part of the contested Keystone pipeline has dominated headlines, but there’s a bigger story beyond the political points won or lost by that decision. The abundance of oil in North America is driving the development of several additional pipelines, says the WSJ: Two major energy companies are planning to build […]

After a week of Rep. Paul Ryan’s deficit-reducing budget plan dominating the political conversation, the Democrats have finally responded with a plan of their own. Whereas Ryan’s plan relies on changes to entitlement programs for the bulk of the reduction, the Democratic plan aims to lower the deficit through cuts to mandatory government programs and […]

The intrigue surrounding Bo Xilai shows no sign of abating in China. Bo himself has been sacked, but now his legacy as mayor of Chongqing is under attack.Always an ambitious man, Bo had hoped to claim a seat on the powerful Politburo Standing Committee by taking on the rampant corruption in his city. To this […]

[Update: this piece has been updated since its original publication.]  President Obama’s off-the-cuff remark to Russian President Dmitri Medvedev, picked up before a press conference by microphones that weren’t supposed to be on, was a brief candid glimpse into the mind of our president and the world of international politics. Here’s the exchange: Obama: On […]

[Updated] Fellow American Interest blogger Francis Fukuyama has an excellent review of Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson’s “Why Nations Fail” up on his blog. He has some important insights that should be read by every development specialist or NGO employee looking into the problems facing developing countries: Acemoglu and Robinson (henceforth AR; Simon Johnson of the […]

Many Australians are republicans, hoping to replace the Queen of England as their head of state someday with an elected or appointed Australian.  Maybe that will happen, but whether it is a republic or a monarchy Australia looks set to keep playing the Game of Thrones.These days America and Australia just can’t get enough of […]

WRM and Frank Fukuyama, together with Robert Kagan, were recently interviewed on The Agenda with Steve Paikin, a Canadian program. The title of the talk was Is America Still the Land of the Future? Here’s the YouTube clip: 

Remember that Mormon conspiracy to take over America that folks like Yale’s Harold Bloom and Salon’s Sally Denton keep warning us about? Well, according to a new survey of Utah lawmakers, it runs so deep that most Utah politicians have never even been lobbied by the LDS Church. BuzzFeed’s McKay Coppins has the insidious details: […]

Two simmering conflicts in Asia’s biggest countries have jumped back to the headlines recently. In India today, Naxalite forces ambushed a police convoy, killing fifteen policemen. And among China’s restive Tibetans, self immolations are on the rise. It’s a reminder that both these countries are dealing with serious internal unrest.In China’s Tibetan communities, something like thirty people […]