This is a very skeptical assessment of Obama strategy from top New York Times security reporter David Sanger. A taste: He surged forces into Afghanistan only to quickly reverse himself, speeding the withdrawal with the declaration that “it is time to focus on nation-building here at home.” He briefly joined the fight to halt a […]

You know a new technology has really arrived when the government starts regulating it. That’s why it’s big news that the FDA is going to start regulating some smartphone and tablet health apps. More: Agency officials said their goal is to oversee apps that function like medical devices, performing ultrasounds, for example, and that could potentially pose […]

New York City has just become ground zero in the national debate over charter schools, with a massive protest scheduled for next month. On October 8th, a number of charter school teachers and their students will take the day off and head to the Brooklyn Bridge, where they will protest what they see as mayoral […]

Obamacare is more unpopular than ever, and the law’s future has become increasingly uncertain. In the midst of the ongoing controversy, Politico has a fascinating retrospective on the ACA, from its almost accidental origins to its role in defining  Obama’s presidency: Soon-to-be-candidate Obama, then an Illinois senator, was thinking about turning down an invitation to […]

In the face of insolvency, many US pension funds are counting on a Hail Mary option: the high-risk/high-reward strategy of alternative investment. On average, a public pension plan now has about 11 percent of its money in alternative investments, including hedge funds, real estate, and venture capital. The Guardian offers some insight on what’s driving […]

Last week, one of the world’s biggest, most expensive, and technically fraught oil fields produced its first barrel of oil. Kashagan, as the field is called, is located in Kazakhstan, in the North Caspian Sea, and was developed by a consortium of energy giants that shared the massive risk of pouring in $50 billion and […]

If blue policies worked in practice the way their defenders say they do in theory, then San Jose, the self-proclaimed capital of Silicon Valley, one of America’s most dynamic and regions, should be the Kingdom of Heaven on Earth. It should be a place where the overwhelming “excess” of riches from a relatively large, elite […]

A new study on wage levels brought renewed attention to income inequality last week, but there’s another inequality that we should be focused on, according to our TAI colleague Adam Garfinkle. Pivoting off of yesterday’s NYT article on the Affordable Care Act, he notes that our health care system is becoming increasingly unequal:  We are slowly (or […]

For the second year in a row, more illegal immigrants were caught entering the country than the year before, mostly along the US-Mexico border. The numbers are nowhere near their pre-recession peak, but they are unmistakably trending upward. This has heightened the battle between Republicans and Democrats over whether immigration reform should focus first on […]

AI Executive Committee member Joe Joffe tells you what you need to know in the Wall Street Journal: The deeper meaning of this strange election, triumphal as it was for the once and future chancellor, is of a watershed in postwar German history. For the first time since 1949, the liberals—the Free Democratic Party—will not be […]