The Return of Total War
Understanding—and Preparing for—a New Era of Comprehensive Conflict
By Mara Karlin
Wars Are Not Accidents
Managing Risk in the Face of Escalation
Politics: Foreign Affairs Magazine – November 2024
Category Archives: Foreign Affairs
World Affairs: Trend Magazine – Fall 2024
Trend Magazine (October 17, 2024) – How to Restore Trust in Elections, Media Mistrust Has Been Growing for Decades, Can Science and Health Care Gain What’s Missing?; How Better Policies Can Help Build Trust
Americans’ Mistrust of Institutions
Trust in our nation’s institutions has never been lower. And experts tend to blame our politically polarized society, which certainly contributes to the deep unease that is being felt by a majority of…
Data Behind Americans’ Waning Trust in Institutions
If mistrust were a disease, the United States would be facing an epidemic. Over the last half-century, trust in American institutions has steadily declined, and this mistrust has rapidly increased in…
The Founding Debate on Trust in America
As our nation grapples with growing mistrust of all institutions, including the federal government, it’s important to remember that this is not a new debate, but one that has been embedded in the American…
5 Ways to Rebuild Trust in Government
Only 1 in 5 Americans trust the federal government—so how do we restore public confidence? For more than two decades, the Partnership for Public Service has worked across presidential administrations to…
Nobody Roots for Goliath: Why Americans Trust Small Business
We root for David, the underdog facing impossible odds, who stands in contrast to Goliath, the big bully. So maybe it’s not surprising that Americans root for small business in contrast to big business.
Archive
Commentary Magazine – October 2024 Preview
Why Won’t We Let Ukraine Win?
…the U.S. has been too slow in arming its ally, too restrictive in setting conditions on the use of weapons, and generally too fearful of Vladimir Putin’s threats. The result is that Ukraine, for all its unfathomable courage and boundless ingenuity, has been permitted to fight, but not win, the war. If this keeps up, Ukraine could actually lose.
Mark Zuckerberg Is Just So Very Sorry, You Guys
When I step back a bit, I can see that Zuckerberg isn’t just haplessly begging our forgiveness. He’s trying to save his business. Meta Platforms, the company he controls, contains some of the world’s most widely used and profitable digital brands, including Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. Meta appears to be thriving, with its stock price more than quadrupling since a rocky 2022. But Zuckerberg knows that his company’s brands are built on foundations of sand. Just as a sandbar will move with tides, the user base of any social platform can drift away in a surprisingly short time.
The Harris Shuffle
This is Harris’s challenge: She’s the incumbent vice president running for higher office in a change election. She’s an undefined candidate whose positions and job performance are vulnerable to attack. She wants to be seen as a disruptor while remaining loyal to President Biden. And she wants to move away from the far-left views she held as a senator while she continues to proclaim that her values have stayed the same.
Strategy Behind Ukraine’s Invasion Of Russia (WSJ)
Chapters: 0:00 Where the war stands 0:34 Ukraine tactics in Kursk 1:53 Russia’s response 2:53 What’s next?
If Pokrovsk falls, it will be the largest population center taken by the Russian military since Bakhmut in May 2023. WSJ explains the latest developments on how the Kursk invasions steps up the stakes for both Ukraine and Russia.
Politics: Foreign Affairs Magazine – Sep/Oct 2024
The Perils of Isolationism
The World Still Needs America—and America Still Needs the World by Condoleezza Rice
America Isn’t Ready for the Wars of the Future
And They’re Already Here by Mark A. Milley and Eric Schmidt
What Was the Biden Doctrine?
Politics: Foreign Affairs Magazine – July/Aug 2024
A Foreign Policy for the World as It Is
Biden and the Search for a New American Strategy
“America is back.” In the early days of his presidency, Joe Biden repeated those words as a starting point for his foreign policy. The phrase offered a bumper-sticker slogan to pivot away from Donald Trump’s chaotic leadership. It also suggested that the United States could reclaim its self-conception as a virtuous hegemon, that it could make the rules-based international order great again. Yet even though a return to competent normalcy was in order, the Biden administration’s mindset of restoration has occasionally struggled against the currents of our disordered times. An updated conception of U.S. leadership—one tailored
The Return of Peace Through Strength
Making the Case for Trump’s Foreign Policy
Si vis pacem, para bellum is a Latin phrase that emerged in the fourth century that means “If you want peace, prepare for war.” The concept’s origin dates back even further, to the second-century Roman emperor Hadrian, to whom is attributed the axiom, “Peace through strength—or, failing that, peace through threat.”
America Is Losing the Arab World
And China Is Reaping the Benefits
Politics: Foreign Affairs Magazine – May/June 2024
China’s Alternative Order
And What America Should Learn From It
By now, Chinese President Xi Jinping’s ambition to remake the world is undeniable. He wants to dissolve Washington’s network of alliances and purge what he dismisses as “Western” values from international bodies. He wants to knock the U.S. dollar off its pedestal and eliminate Washington’s chokehold over critical technology. In his new multipolar order, global institutions and norms will be underpinned by Chinese notions of common security and economic development, Chinese values of state-determined political rights, and Chinese technology. China will no longer have to fight for leadership. Its centrality will be guaranteed.
No Substitute for Victory
America’s Competition With China Must Be Won, Not Managed
New Yorker Films: “The Smallest Power”-A Woman In Iran Finds Her Might
His father, Ali, was born a Shiite Muslim from Iran. They met in the library at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, married in 1978, and eventually settled in Russellville, Arkansas. “I grew up in the Ozarks, so I didn’t have a deep connection to my Iranian heritage,” Sarjahani told me. His family had Christmas trees and celebrated Easter but also marked Nowruz, the Persian New Year.
Military Analysis: USA Vs China Aircraft Carriers
Video Timeline: 00:00 – Intro 00:26 – Carriers 02:06 – Technology 04:31 – Importance 05:28 – Background 06:03 – Future Plans 07:14 – Threats 08:15 – Balance Of Power 09:14 – Credits
Commentary Magazine – April 2024 Opinion Preview
The Elite War on the American Middle Class—and How to End It
Being middle class in America used to mean something—something socially transformative, something even revolutionary. The American middle class represented a form of national social order never before seen on this earth—cultural domination not by the very rich and very educated, or the political domination either by tyrants or the mob, but by a mass of people, relatively well-to-do, who felt themselves fortunate in their circumstances. That was what made the American middle class different from the French or English bourgeoisie. Its members believed, and the country believed, that they were the nation’s backbone, its true governing class, and its moral compass.
The Four Questions of 2024
President Joe Biden and former president Donald Trump squared off four years ago and are on track for the first major-party rematch since 1892. Biden and Trump are the oldest presidential candidates in history, and each man has an established political brand. Biden first won federal office in 1972, and it’s been over a decade since the GOP nominated someone other than Donald Trump. The 2024 election is like all the SIRIUS XM oldies stations—Classic Vinyl, Classic Rewind, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Radio—rolled into one.
The Hateful Candace Owens
If you had never heard of Candace Owens until recently, you aren’t alone. Less than a decade ago, she was an unknown college dropout working as a marketing professional in New York, writing pieces for her company’s website about the “bat-s—t crazy antics of the Republican Tea Party.” Then, suddenly, she claimed to have experienced a political conversion. She told the libertarian political commentator Dave Rubin in 2017, “I became a conservative overnight. . . . I realized that liberals were actually the racists. Liberals were actually the trolls.”
Boomers Daily 