I have only been watching the Bernie Madoff affair from a distance — because despite the scale of the fraud, what has befallen the American and global economies and gut-punched real people’s lives make the Madoff scheme sadly, almost unbelievably trivial.
Barack Obama’s decision to give his first sit down, formal presidential interview with Al-Arabiya is really inspired. He is “Mr. Engagement.” And this is a darned impressive move. He is opening the door to new possibilities.
Defense Secretary Gates will be on the hill this morning testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee on the “hard choices” ahead for the Department of Defense (DOD) spending on big weapon systems.
I saw this pic this morning in a friend’s Facebook photos. This game is housed for future generations to glance at over at The National Museum of American History. Intriguing and spooky at the same time.
Patchwork Nation is a fascinating, ongoing monitor of 11 different community types in the United States. As I understand it from one of the blog proprietors, Dante Chinni, Patchwork Nation which is based at the Christian Science Monitor has established a broad set of criteria sensitive to all sorts of economic and life shifts.
My colleague and friend Robert Wright, who is now launching The Progressive Realist, kind of comes off in person as a hybrid of Anthony Perkins and Garrison Keillor — but focused in a folksy but serious way on America’s as of late unenlightened and reckless foreign policy course.
New looks to government websites do not necessarily portend better foreign policy. But that said, the State Department’s just revealed new website looks great. It looks more high energy and seems to telegraph “engagement.” I like it.
Jim Lobe has just confirmed that outgoing Special Assistant to President George W. Bush and Senior Director for Near East and North African Affairs and Deputy National Security Adviser for Global Democracy Strategy Elliott Abrams will be joining the Council on Foreign Relations team in February.
(photo credit: Jon Taplin’s Blog) In the book, America and the World: Conversations on the Future of American Foreign Policy, which is an April-May 2008 rolling conversation between former national security advisers Zbigniew Brzezinski and Brent Scowcroft with Washington Post national security columnist David Ignatius, Brzezinski says this: I think it was too bad that…