What’s So Terrible About Trade Deficits Anyway?
Populist rhetoric and the hidden costs of economic illiteracy.
Robert Johnson
· 7 min read
Politics
A collection of 523 posts
Victims of Realism
Alexander Vindman’s bracing new book argues that Ukraine has been made to suffer the consequences of Western naivety and restraint.
Brian Stewart
· 6 min read
The Nonsense of the “Tariff Men”
President Trump’s protectionist policies are erratic, ill-defined, and incoherent.
Phillip W. Magness
· 15 min read
Justice or a Democratic Scandal?
A French criminal court ruling forbidding Marine Le Pen from contesting the 2027 presidential election could throw the country into turmoil.
John Lloyd
· 6 min read
The Strange Western Surrender
When dealing with the Chinese Communist Party, why does the West find it so difficult to learn the exhausting lessons of bitter experience?
Aaron Sarin
· 10 min read
A Hollow Kind of Patriotism
The economic and geopolitical consequences of America First nationalism are going to be disastrous—not least for Americans themselves.
Matt Johnson
· 17 min read
Border Wars and the Return of Fear
The new European commitment to defence and Russia’s unshakeable wish to control Ukraine have revived an awareness that war is something with which comfortable and relatively wealthy states may still have to live.
John Lloyd
· 10 min read
Derangement Discourse
Accusations of Trump Derangement Syndrome and Trump himself are both products of the social-media age.
George Case
· 8 min read
Red Spies and Lies
Clay Risen’s new book about the American “Red Scare” emphasises the injustices of anti-communism but minimises the true extent and danger of communist infiltration.
Ronald Radosh
· 23 min read
Fatuous Moral Humility
The pope is not a source of ethical wisdom.
Brian Stewart
· 5 min read
Lessons for Western Militaries from the Gaza War
Israel’s experience in Gaza provides a sobering preview of what high-intensity urban warfare can entail, and how modern militaries must evolve to achieve decisive and ethical victories in any future conflict.
Andrew Fox
· 22 min read
The MAGA War on Ukraine
Why does so much of the US Right hate a country valiantly resisting a war of aggression?
Cathy Young
· 13 min read
The Political Foundations of the DOGE Scam
The Trump/Musk administration’s approach to cutting costs makes good political sense in the short-run. But from a longer-run governing perspective, it is a recipe for disaster.
R. Shep Melnick
· 7 min read
The World Trump Is Building
The strong will do what they can and the weak will suffer what they must.
Matt Johnson
· 12 min read
Making the World Safe for Autocracy
Forced to choose between the values upheld by the National Endowment for Democracy and fealty to Donald Trump, Republicans have opted for the latter.
Ronald Radosh
· 15 min read