Section: The Atlantic (USA)
Why Some People Think a Typo Cost Clinton the Election
On March 19, an IT employee at the Hillary Clinton campaign gave John Podesta, the campaign chairman, some computer-security advice. “John needs to change his password immediately,” he wrote in an email, “and ensure that two-factor authentication is turned on his account.”The helpdesk staffer was responding to a Google alert with a bright red...
The United States of Exxon
The biographical particulars of ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson, who was nominated to serve as Donald Trump’s secretary of state on Tuesday, seem crafted from a Mad Libs sheet of Michael Moore’s grimmest nightmares. A “tall, strapping Texan” with “a twang to show for it” and “silver coiffure,” Tillerson is an Eagle...
Could Europe Learn to Stop Worrying and Love Trump?
Had Europeans been allowed to vote in the American presidential election on November 8, they would have handed Hillary Clinton a landslide victory, according to Gallup International, with margins as high as 50 points in Britain and 70 points in Germany and Scandinavia. (Trump would have won only in Russia.) Now, the angst-ridden of the Old...
Trump’s Choice of Tillerson Defies Senate Skeptics
For a moment, it looked like Donald Trump might have lost heart. On Saturday, well-sourced reporters were indicating that the president-elect’s appointment of Rex Tillerson as secretary of state was imminent. But then things went quiet. Trump tweeted noncommittal praise but made no announcement. Meanwhile, some leading Republicans began...
Rex Tillerson’s World: In His Own Words
Rex Tillerson, whom President-elect Donald Trump nominated Tuesday to be the secretary of state, has a long history of dealmaking as the chairman and CEO of Exxon Mobil, the world’s largest oil company. It’s a skill that would be useful in his new role, but it’s also an attribute that might cause problems for him during his...
Global Conflicts to Watch in 2017
Over the last several years, concern about a particular threat to the United States has been steadily rising in a survey of American foreign-policy experts and government officials by the Council on Foreign Relations. On an annual basis, hundreds of respondents estimate the likelihood and impact on U.S. interests of 30 possible conflicts in the...
The Senate Will Investigate Russian Election Interference
The Senate will investigate claims that Russia interfered in the election on behalf of Donald Trump—whether the president-elect likes it or not.Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Monday gave his backing to bipartisan inquiries after the CIA reportedly concluded that not only did Russia meddle in the campaign, it did so with the goal of...
Five Questions About Russia’s Election Hacking
The evidence to support the CIA’s conclusion that Russia intervened in the 2016 election to help Donald Trump remains mostly secret. But the outline of the case is no mystery. Both Democratic and Republican Party servers were reportedly hacked by foreign agents, yet the Moscow-friendly folks at Wikileaks somehow only obtained the contents...
Who Killed Alexander Perepilichny?
On November 10, 2012, Alexander Perepilichny was feeling a little under the weather. He decided to try to shake it off by taking a few laps around the gated community southwest of London where Russian émigrés like him lived in multimillion-dollar mansions alongside members of the English elite. Perepilichny jogged through a neighborhood of homes...
Ranked: Other Foreign-Policy Traditions Trump Could Upend
Donald Trump blindsided the world when he took a call from Taiwan’s president last weekend. It almost certainly won’t be his last bolt from the blue. Particularly for foreign policy matters, the U.S. president has tremendous power to uphold or overthrow traditions—such as the one where you don’t speak directly to the president...
