Can the public make its will felt through Congress and start the difficult process of bringing closure to the Iraq War? Although the voters spoke last November, the administration has seen no need to listen. But the prospect of another defeat in 2008 may motivate enough Republicans in Congress to break with the administration on […]
Paul Starr
Paul Starr is co-founder and co-editor of The American Prospect, and professor of sociology and public affairs at Princeton University. A winner of the Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction and the Bancroft Prize in American history, he is the author of eight books, including American Contradiction: Revolution and Revenge from the 1950s to Now (Yale University Press, October 2025).
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Bad Plan, Necessary Step
It’s dead on arrival in Congress. It penalizes workers and families with good health benefits. It won’t significantly reduce the number of uninsured. And it will do little, if anything, to slow down rising health care costs. So should we just bury Bush’s proposal, unveiled in last night’s State of the Union address, to convert […]
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MONSTER SUCCESS.
MONSTER SUCCESS. Now that O.J. Simpson is publishing his quasi-confession If I Did It, I’m looking for a forthcoming memoir by former Rep. Mark Foley that ought to be called My Back Pages. It’s no longer true that patriotism is the last refuge of scoundrels. The last refuge now is the best-seller list. –Paul Starr
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Pyongyang Boomerang
Republican government during the past six years has been a study in dissipation. No, I’m not referring to the Mark Foley scandal. I mean the dissipation of American power and influence in the world — the latest consequence of which is North Korea’s explosion of a nuclear weapon. Rather than deterring Pyongyang from going nuclear, […]
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Bush’s Pyongyang Boomerang
Republican government during the past six years has been a study in dissipation. No, I’m not referring to the Mark Foley scandal. I mean the dissipation of American power and influence in the world — the latest consequence of which is North Korea’s explosion of a nuclear weapon. Rather than deterring Pyongyang from going nuclear, […]
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A Rendezvous with Failure
Many liberals in recent years have been smitten with political envy. The conservative movement and Republican Party have seemed so much shrewder in their use of language, tougher in their tactics, and better organized than their progressive and Democratic counterparts. Perhaps so. But let us put to rest one supposed source of advantage for conservatives: […]
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Next Stop Iran?
During the early Cold War, while right-wingers called for the rollback of Soviet communism, the strategists of containment argued that the United States ought to be patient, confident that internal forces would weaken communism from within and that the “gravitational” force of a revived Western Europe would eventually draw Moscow’s satellites out of its orbit. […]
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Bush vs. Constitution
Repeatedly through our history, the liberties guaranteed by the Constitution have been threatened in war by an overreacting government and then reaffirmed in peace by calmer leadership. The Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798, Lincoln’s suspension of habeas corpus, the suppression of free speech during and after World War I, the internment of Japanese Americans […]
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Starting Over
In his State of the Union address in January, George W. Bush is widely expected to try to relaunch his presidency. That he needs a new start is a reflection of just how badly his second term has gone, even in the eyes of conservatives. His domestic initiatives regarding Social Security and tax reform are […]
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Starting Over
In his state of the union address in January, George W. Bush is widely expected to try to relaunch his presidency. That he needs a new start is a reflection of just how badly his second term has gone, even in the eyes of conservatives. His domestic initiatives regarding Social Security and tax reform are […]