Section: The American Interest (USA)
The Impeachment Conundrum
The growing accumulation of evidence that President Trump pressured Ukraine to investigate the son of his possible 2020 election opponent has placed Democrats—and more broadly, democrats—in a quandary. The allegations involve deeply serious presidential wrongdoing in multiple respects. First, it appears that the President sought valuable...
The Rallying Cry We Need
Editor’s Note: This is the first in a series of three essays, commissioned and cross-posted by the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute, examining the legacy of Reagan’s Westminster Speech and its relevance for democracy promotion today. Coming Wednesday: a contribution by Daniel Twining. Coming Friday: a contribution...
A Blinkered Case for Nationalism
The Case for Nationalism: How It Made Us Powerful, United, and Free Rich Lowry Broadside Books, 2019, 288 pp., $26.99 If we are fortunate, one way or another, through impeachment or the ballot box, the Trump era will soon draw to an end. What will fill the enormous void left by the departure of the mega-miscreant Donald Trump? Unsurprisingly, a...
Ukrainegate and Political Decay
Watching the Ukraine scandal unfold from Singapore, I feel like the hapless dental patient in an early George Carlin routine who, muzzled in the chair by his busily probing and poking dentist standing over him armed with sharp metal implements and wads of cotton, strains but fails to respond to the dentist’s insistent defense of Richard...
Azerbaijan: Reform Behind a Static Façade
A wave of political dynamism is passing through Central Asia and the Caucasus. Under new leadership since 2016, Uzbekistan has embarked on a major effort to reform and modernize. Armenia’s former President’s attempt to cling to power launched a Velvet Revolution in 2018 and ushered in a new administration explicitly committed to...
How the Press Can Avoid Playing Trump’s Game
In the face of President Trump’s Biden-Ukraine smear, the Biden camp has declared a low intensity war on the press, determined to head off the false equivalency and other mind games that helped derail Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential bid.When a reporter asked Joe Biden late last month how many times the former Vice President had...
As the World Marches for Freedom, Where is Trump?
Look beyond the chaos in Washington, and you can spot some good news in a number of settings across the globe: people in the streets, on social media, or at the ballot boxes are demanding freedom and insisting that corrupt and tyrannical governments step aside. This encouraging phenomenon, alas, has largely been overshadowed by the twists and...
A Time of Crisis
We are not prone to alarmism. Yet for a variety of reasons, we see the crisis begun over Ukraine and most recently accelerated by the decision to abruptly leave Syria as part of a larger and disturbing pattern. We view the extreme impulsivity and flaws of judgment repeatedly evidenced by our President as an increasingly grave concern. We share...
Sovereignty Is No Solution
Since his arrival in office, President Trump has been making essentially the same speech to the United Nations General Assembly every year. “If you want democracy, hold on to your sovereignty,” he urged the world’s leaders this September. “The future does not belong to globalists. The future belongs to patriots. The future belongs to...
No Trust In Self, No Money For Defense
In the world of security and defense, Germany presents an enigma. How can a country that has been re-unified and fully sovereign for almost 30 years, a country possessing a fully globalized economy (the fourth-largest in the world), a country with a few heavy history lessons under its belt, be so completely absent strategically? Why is it that...
