The Newt Gingrich campaign amused the pols and pundits, but what it says about future primary contests isn't the least bit funny.

Two new books show us that racism is alive and all too well—not just in America, but in segregated cities around the world.

The venerable publishing house Scribner recently published a new edition of Ernest Hemingway’s classic novel A Farewell to Arms, complete with all the many endings the author rejected. “I rewrote the ending of Farewell to Arms, the last page of it, 39 times before I was satisfied”, he told The Paris Review. Given a little […]

Charles Darwin published his culture-shaking Origin of Species in 1859. It immediately provoked a passionate controversy. This is hardly surprising. The Darwinian culture shock can be compared to an earlier one: the Copernican one. Copernicus made people see the earth as one of several planets circling the sun, rather than as the center of the […]

For policymakers, the main appeal of unmanned combat aerial vehicles (UCAVs) is that by keeping pilots and ground crews far from harm’s way, they dramatically reduce the political risks and costs of conducting military operations. That explains why the Obama administration is relying on drones to play the lead role in what used to be […]

The evolving crisis over Iran’s nuclear program has led the governments of the United States, Israel and other regional states to draw “red lines” that have shifted with time. Unfortunately, these red lines may be self-defeating in that their constant shifting gravely corrodes the credibility of those who set them—that is, credibility not only in […]

Yesterday there were warnings that the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) was about to default on its prepaid pension obligations. And today, sure enough, the USPS announced that it could not meet today’s obligations, and also that it would not meet those pending six months hence. For loyal and long time readers of The American Interest, […]

A while ago on this blog I commented on a judgment by a Texas court which ruled that so-called “imprecatory prayer” (that is, prayer that asks God to inflict harm) is protected speech under the first amendment of the US constitution.  The court asserted that there was no evidence that the prayer had actually harmed […]

Mitt Romney’s midsummer foray into foreign policy has left Democrats giddy with schadenfreude. More than his stumbling performance abroad, however, it’s the substance of Romney’s views that ought to really give voters pause.  Or, more precisely, lack of substance. With less than 100 days to go, Romney has yet to develop a coherent outlook on […]

The world is a couple of steps closer to a new Middle East war this morning. Even as the bloodshed in Syria gets worse and government gunships and artillery pound rebel controlled neighborhoods in the country’s largest city, Turkey is moving closer to striking Syria, and Iran is threatening to respond.Turkey has sent troops and […]