Truth in advertising. Robert George is a friend of mine — but we became friends by a long string of intellectual, policy, and political jousting matches that have spanned many years.

At 2:00 p.m. today, I will be discussing the potential major breakthrough in the Six Party Talks with North Korea on the Al Franken Show with hosts Al Franken and Katherine Lanpher. Here are some points that need to be kept in mind.

Folks, watch out. A flurry of posts is coming shortly on TWN.

I heard a figure that I wish I had a hard time believing — but it probably is true. According to some economists that I heard last week, George W. Bush has had $3 trillion to the national debt in only four years.

I’m on my way to New York to blog the Clinton Global Initiative for TWN and TPMCafe. Thanks to JI for sending this photo — which I offer you in humor. More later.

I just co-authored and published this piece on Japan’s recent Lower House elections which many argue is about reform of Japan’s massive postal agency, or “reform” in general. Andrew Oros and I argue that it’s all about the theatre of boldness — but rather than just looking tough, Japan really does want to be tougher….

Via Talking Points Memo, this interesting article published by Knight-Ridder finds that Department of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff may have been confused about his role in specifying the priority of national emergencies.

For those of you in Washington, D.C. on the 21st of September, feel free to join us for the follow-on conference to our recent mega-forum on new thinking about terrorism.

I should have written “The Globe’s Fragile Networks” above.

From Thursday through Saturday, I will be up blogging up a storm in New York at the Clinton Global Initiative, for which I just received my press credentials.