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Scandal fever hits the Obama administration hard
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May 16, 2013 12:57 AM
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At a time when Congress can’t pass a budget and the president can’t win approval of any important legislation, the public is indignant about the threat of an overreaching, all-powerful federal government that uses the Internal Revenue Service and the Justice Department to harass its...
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Not a breakthrough on Syria, but at least it’s a start
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May 13, 2013 01:48 AM
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It shouldn’t have been this hard, but U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry has finally gotten Russia to back the peace plan on Syria that it endorsed in principle last June. This isn’t a breakthrough but at least it’s a beginning. What the U.S. and Russia seem to have realized is...
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A key Syrian partner is frustrated by Obama’s caution
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May 03, 2013 12:44 AM
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Gen. Salim Idriss, the commander of rebel forces in Syria, complained late Tuesday that President Barack Obama’s desire “to wait and wait for more evidence” that the Syrian regime has used chemical weapons is encouraging their continued use – and that these attacks will...
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The Israelis can benefit from this period of quiet
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April 29, 2013 01:00 AM
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It’s a measure of the relatively quiet time for Israel these days that the sharpest argument at a big national security conference in the country was between an ultra-Orthodox rabbi who wanted “autonomy” for his fellow believers and secular Israelis in the audience who shouted...
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Exit Mervyn King, with his quirky intellectual passion
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April 25, 2013 01:15 AM
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John Maynard Keynes once said that words should be used aggressively, “for they are the assault of thoughts on the unthinking.” That’s a starting point for an appreciation of Mervyn King, who will retire soon as governor of the Bank of England and who has displayed the quirky...
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Faulty analysis leads to bad policy on Guantanamo
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April 22, 2013 01:22 AM
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For an example of how the U.S. government can work at cross-purposes in dealing with terrorism, take a look at the failed effort to release Afghan prisoners from Guantanamo. It shows how an incorrect analysis – that the Taliban and Al-Qaeda pose the same threat – can lead to a cascade of bad...
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Terrorism did not win any victories in Boston
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April 18, 2013 12:37 AM
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“Nothing broken but my heart,” was the subject line on an email from one of the Boston Marathon runners to his friends Monday night after the bombs had detonated near the finish line. And every American shared some of that trauma as a classic sporting ritual was turned into a scene of...
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Has North Korea crossed a line to mass suicide?
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April 15, 2013 12:31 AM
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One unlikely benefit of the North Korea crisis is that the world may be getting fed up with the country’s pugnacious young leader, Kim Jong Un. In his belligerent talk of war, Kim appears to have crossed a line, upsetting traditional allies such as China and Russia as well as the United...
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The road to Thatcher’s modern, middle-class Britain
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April 10, 2013 01:09 AM
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People talk about transformational politicians. But watching Margaret Thatcher take down the British class system was an education in how it’s really done. It required the radical vision and iron will of someone who genuinely abhorred the status quo. Thatcher demolished the two conservative...
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A weary America wants no part in a Middle Eastern war
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April 08, 2013 12:44 AM
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Talking with members of Congress at a gathering in Istanbul last week was an education in the public’s wariness of new foreign entanglements – especially in Syria. It was a reminder that the post-Iraq era is only beginning, and that it may limit America’s ability to exercise...
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Most of Syria’s rebels share strong roots in Islam
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April 04, 2013 12:52 AM
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As the battle for Damascus approaches, the array of Syrian opposition forces facing President Bashar Assad appears to share one common trait: Most of the major rebel groups have strong Islamist roots and backing from Muslim neighbors. The Free Syrian Army has developed a rough “order of...
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America sharpens the tip of its spear worldwide
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April 02, 2013 12:24 AM
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The emblem of the U.S. Special Operations Command pointedly illustrates its mission: It shows the tip of a spear. Now SOCOM is expanding this arsenal to create a global network that can project power even as America’s armies withdraw from the battlefields of the last decade. Adm. William McRaven,...
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Obama’s cold-blooded pragmatism
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March 29, 2013 12:45 AM
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Here’s the coldblooded calculation at work as President Barack Obama shapes his foreign policy agenda: If he took “full ownership” of the Syria problem through direct military intervention, that’s probably all he could accomplish during his second term – and even...
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Amid regional power plays in Syria, U.S. indecisiveness
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March 28, 2013 12:55 AM
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The moderate political and military command structure the United States has been trying to foster within the Syrian opposition appears to be fracturing, a victim of bitter Arab regional rivalries. The regional tension splitting the Syrian rebel movement is between Qatar and Turkey, on one side,...
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John McCain rails against Republican self-isolation
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March 25, 2013 01:09 AM
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Sen. John McCain’s “Straight Talk Express” has been in the repair shop for a while, but it sure was rolling last week during an interview. The main theme was that Republicans should end their self-isolation and “start working for the American people.” Journalists have...
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