What Washington Gets Wrong
January 4, 2017
Benjamin Ginsberg— At a Washington dinner party, I happened to mention to the woman seated to my right, an executive of Health and Human Services (HHS), the agency responsible for… READ MORE
Tag: American politics
Does Donald Trump Believe in American Civil Religion?
November 24, 2016
Walter McDougall— Americans are saying good riddance to the ugly 2016 campaign. Many believe that Donald Trump, having won, will cease the shock-jock talk and govern as the pragmatic businessman he… READ MORE
A Post-Election Reading List
November 17, 2016
The 2016 presidential campaign was one fraught with anger and mistrust across the political spectrum. In the days and weeks following the election, many may seek to open a dialogue… READ MORE
The Flawed Foundations of the Electoral College
November 16, 2016
George C. Edwards III— Political equality lies at the core of democratic theory. It is difficult to imagine a definition of democracy that does not include equality in voting as… READ MORE
Why the Trump Brand Worked
November 14, 2016
Steven B. Smith— In Woody Allen’s film Hannah and her Sisters, a dyspeptic artist played by Max von Sydow remembers watching a boring television show about Auschwitz with “puzzled intellectuals,”… READ MORE
Theories of Liberation
November 9, 2016
Michael Walzer— National liberation is an ambitious and also, from the beginning, an ambiguous project. The nation has to be liberated not only from external oppressors—in a way, that’s the… READ MORE
Debunking the Myth of the American Enlightenment
October 27, 2016
Caroline Winterer— In the dark years of World War II and the Cold War, Americans invented a national mythology that we hold dear to this day: the myth of the… READ MORE
Political Revelations and Investigations
October 24, 2016
Benjamin Ginsberg— Over the past year, America’s political waters have been roiled by a host of investigations and revelations aimed at influencing the outcome of the 2016 presidential election. Republicans… READ MORE
11 Little-Known Facts about the U.S. Presidency
September 1, 2016
Benjamin Ginsberg— 1. Presidential succession is governed by the Twentieth and Twenty-Fifth Amendments of the Constitution and by the Presidential Succession Act. Neither the amendments nor the act covers the… READ MORE
How the Republicans Lost in 2012
February 23, 2016
Thomas F. Schaller— The 2012 election results were tough medicine for Republicans to swallow. Many conservatives and Republicans believed that Barack Obama was a left-wing radical and a failed president…. READ MORE
Fashion or Function?