A New Beginning for Georgia
With the surprise election of billionaire Bidzina Ivanashvili, Georgian Dream presents an alternative to standard second-world power transitions.
On the Newsstand:NATO
The True Governments of Somalia
Somaliland may be the most stable and smoothest functioning democracy that officially does not exist.
(Sting’s) Intro to US-Russian Relations
Socially, relations between the U.S. and Russia have come an incredibly long way over the past two decades. Political relations, however, still have a long way to go.
Op-Ed: Libya and Future Foreign Interventions
The calculus behind US approaches to foreign interventions.
Assessing Libya: What To Do Now?
Now that we're involved in Libya, let's put aside narrow domestic political considerations and act like we know how to win.
Retroactive Diary of Qureshi Forum
Makhdoom Shah Mahmood Qureshi, foreign minister of Pakistan, at the Institute of Politics
The Dangers of Direct Democracy
In Federalist No. 63, James Madison wrote that the defining principle of American democracy, as compared to Athenian democracy, “lies in the total exclusion of the people in their collective capacity.” But since Madison wrote those words, several direct-democratic institutions have been introduced into American politics. California became the first state to adopt a ballot-initiative process in 1911, enabling citizens ... Read More
House Democrats Vote to Raise Taxes
Just before its Memorial Day recess, the House passed a bill that, according to The New York Times, would raise the taxes that investment managers pay on carried interest, just at the moment new long-term investment is most needed. General executive partners of long-term investment partnerships, including investments in real estate, venture capital, private equity, and other investments, are paid ... Read More
Rand Paul a Racist? I Think Not.
Sam Barr’s most recent post makes the rather shocking claim that Rand Paul, the Republican nominee for the U.S. Senate seat in Kentucky being vacated by the retiring Jim Bunning, is a racist, or at least that he is not a non-racist. Sam deduces this from the fact that Mr. Paul is not a “consistent libertarian,” that he “picks and ... Read More
Weighing In: Manliness, A Bad Word for a Good Thing
In his essay “What Makes A Life Significant,” William James gives voice to the “manly virtues” that Wagley, in her “Defense of Manliness,” seems to want to defend. I say “seems” because, like Sam, I’m not exactly sure what her article is advocating for. If it’s anything like what James wanted when he called for a life of “precipitousness, so ... Read More
Absolutely Not Fabulous
Goldman Sachs has been making headlines (again) after charges were filed by the SEC alleging that the company sold a financial product whose components were decided on in part by Paulson & Co., a company who made bets in a hedge fund that the product would see losses, without disclosing this to investors and thereby creating a conflict of interest. ... Read More
Disgrace. Charlie Crist’s Ungainly Political Manueverings
Disgrace is the only word apt to describe Governor Charlie Crist these days. After being passed up as John McCain’s VP choice, perhaps the apex of his political success, Crist decided to abandon running for reelection for the governorship of Florida, a position he would likely have won easily. Instead, Crist continued a lifelong power-grab, running for the US Senate ... Read More
Justice Stevens Lets Go — Better Hang On!
My Harvard Independent column for this week addresses the retirement of John Paul Stevens and the issue of picking his successor. Read the original here. If they made posters of Supreme Court Justices, I’d put John Paul Stevens on my bedroom wall. The man is a progressive hero — first and foremost, for his longevity. In 2006, the liberal radio ... Read More
Final Clubs and Gender Relations
In today’s Harvard Crimson, Daniel Herz-Roiphe has written an unusually articulate, well-argued entry in the perennial “Why Final Clubs Are Still Really Bad” essay contest. I’m glad he focused on gender discrimination and inequality, rather than also trying to tackle racial, hetero-normative, and class-based elitism. Those other forms of discrimination are equally important, but I think they’re pretty low-hanging fruit. ... Read More
Those Tea Party Crashers
Alex Copulsky’s reporting on the Tea Party is hilarious. If you haven’t seen his post yet, go check it out. But his sightings of ”trolls” — people unsympathetic to the Tea Party movement who are there just to make it look bad – corroborate the reports we’ve been hearing about left-wing activist groups mobilizing to crash the Tea Party events and frame them as ... Read More
