Roundup: Media's Take

Jonathan Bernstein: Do Governors Make Better Presidents?

[Jonathan Bernstein is a political scientist who blogs about American politics, especially the presidency, Congress, parties, and elections.] In his complaint about Barack Obama's failures on executive appointments, Brad DeLong says:I think that the general rule in the future should be that nobody who has not served a full term as a state governor or managed a similarly large organization should be supported in any presidential run. FDR and DDE are certainly the c

William Underhill: Why is Tony Blair Beloved Abroad but Hated at Home?

[William Underhill is a Special Correspondent at Newsweek.] Good news for Tony Blair. The former prime minister recently learned that he’d won the 2010 National Constitution Center’s Liberty Medal (as well as a check for $100,0000), adding to a collection of U.S. gongs that includes the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Congressional Gold Medal. In the words of NCC president David Eisner, the award recognizes his “success in building understanding among nations and creating last

Jed Babbin: Debating Groucho's War

[Jed Babbin served as a Deputy Undersecretary of Defense under George H.W. Bush. He is the author of several bestselling books including Inside the Asylum and In the Words of Our Enemies.] So Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele said, "I went on a safari to Afghanistan, and one night I shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got into my pajamas I'll never know." Then Bill Kristol said Steele should be fired for cruelty to elephants and Ann Coulter said no,

Gwynne Dyer: U.S. bidding Iraq goodbye and good luck

[Gwynne Dyer is a London-based independent journalist whose articles are published in 45 countries.] As the American withdrawal gains speed, there are fewer American troops in Iraq than in Afghanistan for the first time since 2003. By the end of August there will be no U.S. combat troops left in Iraq, though some tens of thousands of support troops will remain until next year. And still there is no new Iraqi government, although it is now four months since the election on March 7.

Lee Bollinger: Journalism Needs Government Help

[Mr. Bollinger is president of Columbia University and author of "Uninhibited, Robust, and Wide-Open: A Free Press for a New Century" (Oxford, 2010).] We have entered a momentous period in the history of the American press. The invention of new communications technologies—especially the Internet—is transforming the human capacity to speak, perhaps as monumentally as the invention of the printing press in the 15th century. This is facilitating the largest and fastest expans

Stuart Taylor, Jr.: Supreme Immodesty: Why the Justices Play Politics

[The writer is a contributing editor to Newsweek and National Journal and a nonresident fellow at the Brookings Institution. He is also co-author of "Until Proven Innocent: Political Correctness and the Shameful Injustices of the Duke Lacrosse Rape Case."] ...Conservative (and some liberal) "originalists" are correct in saying that justices who seek to override the text and original meaning by invoking the "living Constitution" have nothing to guide the

Rachel Reid: The Taliban War on Women Continues

[Ms. Reid is the Afghanistan researcher for Human Rights Watch.] Beware Taliban revisionism. You're going to hear much more of it in the coming months as policy makers from Kabul to Washington seeking to reintegrate Taliban fighters try to explain why the enemy isn't so bad after all. Bombs that slaughter civilians, acid attacks that disfigure school girls, assassinations of women in public life—all of this will be swept under the carpet. In its place, a new narrative

Adam Kirsch: Why Don't We Take the Russian Spies Seriously?

[Adam Kirsch is a senior editor of The New Republic.] The...reason why we can’t take Russian espionage too seriously is that it has been shorn of exactly the element that made Soviet espionage so serious: ideology. Americans who became Soviet spies were not just betraying their country, they were endorsing an ideological critique of their country. In the most dramatic sense, they were “voting with their feet” for Communism; and as long as Communism had the power to win such dedicate

Nuala O'Loan: Northern Ireland ... A violence from the past

[Nuala O'Loan was first police ombudsman between 1999 and 2007.] The violence of the last few days in Northern Ireland has been in marked contrast to the earlier part of this year's marching season. The Drumcree march and many other marches passed off peacefully, or largely peacefully. Now, however, we have again seen people out on the streets rioting, we have seen police officers and members of the public injured, and we have seen shotguns, blast bombs, petrol bombs, bricks and oth

Robert H. Giles: Denied a Nieman, by the U.S.

[Robert H. Giles, former editor and publisher of the Detroit News, is curator of the Nieman Foundation.] Colombian journalist Hollman Morris has long worked in challenging conditions, producing probing television reports that document his country's long and complex civil war. He has built contacts with the left-wing guerilla group known as the FARC and told stories of the conflict's victims. He has revealed abuses by the country's intelligence service and enraged government official

Katrina vanden Heuvel: November's Unpalatable Choice

[Katrina vanden Heuvel is editor and publisher of the Nation and writes a weekly column for The Post.] On the eve of the 1940 election, then-President Franklin Roosevelt took to the stump to call out his Republican adversaries for their obstructionism. "The Republican campaign orators and leaders are all now yelling 'me too' on help to Britain. But this fall they had their chance to vote to give aid to Britain and other democracies -- and they turned it down," Roosevelt de

Nick Turse: Death on Your Doorstep

[Nick Turse is the associate editor of TomDispatch.com.  An award-winning journalist, his work has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, the Nation, and regularly at TomDispatch. He is the author of

Gregory Scoblete: Rewriting the History on Afghanistan

[Gregory Scoblete is an editor at RealClearWorld.] Republican National Committee Chairmen Michael Steele made headlines earlier this month when he declared that Afghanistan was "Obama's war." Speaking to candidates at a party fundraiser in Connecticut, Steele said of the war in Afghanistan: "This is not something the United States had actively prosecuted or wanted to engage in." The implication of Steele's remarks was obvious: The naive liberals in t

Gabriel J. Chin and Kevin R. Johnson: High Court Ruling Underpins Arizona Immigration Law

[Gabriel J. Chin is a professor at the University of Arizona Rogers College of Law. Kevin R. Johnson is dean and a professor of public interest law and Chicana/o studies at the University of California Davis School of Law. ] In its challenge to Arizona's controversial immigration law last week, the Justice Department argues that the state law conflicts with federal law, intruding on federal power and ability to regulate immigration. For many Americans, however, the lawsuit is needed

Richard Cohen: Michael Steele was Right about Afghanistan

[Richard Cohen is a columnist with the Washington Post.] "Facts are the enemy of truth," Don Quixote tweeted so very long ago -- and as if to prove his point, the Democratic Party in all its tawdry glory unloosed a barrage of facts in the direction of the slyly brilliant Michael Steele, chairman of the Republican National Committee who is almost certain to someday take his place in the conservative cable TV firmament. For saying that the war in Afghanistan is "a war o

Andrei Soldatov: Nostalgia for Soviet Spies

[Andrei Soldatov and Irina Borogan are security analysts with Agentura.ru. This comment appeared in EJ.ru.] The Russian spy scandal has focused attention on whether the use of “illegals,” undercover agents with no diplomatic immunity, makes any sense in the 21st century. Comparisons to Soviet-era illegals who were quite successful during the Cold War are not valid. The Cold War was a war of ideologies, and the moral corruption of the enemy was the chief objective. But t

Goran Fejic: Midnight in Belgrade, Dusk in Brussels

[Goran Fejic is senior adviser in the strategy and policy unit at the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (International IDEA)] Almost two decades ago, the violent disintegration of the former Yugoslavia was about to begin and the then European Community was testing its emerging “soft power” by projecting onto the virulent nationalisms of the Balkans its own claimed values and principles. Many of today’s “Yugonostalgics” are all too keen to bl

Anna M. Clark: Obama's Bigger Problem with the Gulf Oil Spill -- You

[Anna M. Clark is the author of "Green, American Style." She blogs on Ecoleadership for Greenbiz.com.] American citizens don't agree on much, but on this point we are united: liberty. As with other broad ideological concepts, many Americans struggle to articulate a precise definition of liberty. Yet this doesn't prevent us from holding firm to the belief that liberty is a fundamental right, and that if required, we would die for it. For our forefa

Jacob Heilbrunn: The New START treaty deserves to be ratified

[Jacob Heilbrunn is a senior editor at the National Interest.] Here we go again. President Obama signed a nuclear arms control agreement — the New START treaty — with Russian counterpart Dmitry Medvedev in Prague in April to much fanfare. Senate hearings on the treaty are taking place. But in a reprise of Cold War debates, hard-liners are seeking to block Senate ratification of the treaty, where it needs a two-thirds majority, by depicting the deal as a dangerous sellou

David J. Kramer: U.S. Acted Too Hastily in Spy Swap

[David J. Kramer is senior trans-Atlantic fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States in Washington. During the administration of George W. Bush, he served as deputy assistant secretary of state for Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. He writes here in a personal capacity.] Most analysts in the United States are praising U.S. President Barack Obama and the way his administration handled the spy swap. Many in Russia, by comparison, are blasting the Foreign Intelligence Service f