Just over 40 years ago, the United States signed an “Agreement on Ending the War and Restoring Peace in Vietnam.” It did neither. President Richard Nixon called it “peace with honor.” But it wasn’t. All the agreement did was end direct U.S. involvement in the war, but certainly not the war itself, nor the conflict […]

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The authors of Going to Tehran: Why the United States Must Come to Terms with the Islamic Republic of Iran, Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett, support the Islamic Republic of Iran, a fundamentalist totalitarian regime. Their book (reviewed by Chase Madar in “Obama in Tehran,” March 2013) is full of hypocrisy and blatant misrepresentation. […]

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The most annoying adage of American diplomacy is surely “Only Nixon could go to China,” as it credits the 37th president with solving a problem that he did more than anyone to create during his tricky career of redbaiting, fearmongering and saber-rattling. U.S. diplomatic recognition of the People’s Republic of China should have been a […]

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Outrage over the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre may or may not spur any meaningful gun control laws, but you can bet your Crayolas that it will lead to more seven-year-olds getting handcuffed and hauled away to local police precincts. You read that right. Americans may disagree deeply about how easy it should be for […]

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Reviewed: The Age of Austerity: How Scarcity Will Remake American Politics by Thomas Byrne Edsall (Anchor Books, 272 pp., $15.95). The New Year’s Day bill that Congress finally passed to avert the “fiscal cliff” prevented a rise in income taxes for most American families, and put off drastic cuts in the federal budget for two months. […]

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