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Herbert E. Meyer
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May 2, 2017
How to Defuse the Crisis with North KoreaThe looming crisis with North Korea provides a perfect illustration of what’s gone wrong with the way Washington works. Everyone is so eager to propose a policy, no one can be bothered to articulate an objective. So policymakers start arguing a...
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July 17, 2015
TAKEDOWN: From Communists to Progressives, How the Left has Sabotaged Family and MarriageAs Samuel Johnson famously wrote, we need to be reminded more than we need to be instructed. And it is precisely to remind us of the central role that marriage and family play in our civilization – and of the left’s never-ending eff...
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August 4, 2014
How to Solve the Putin ProblemEspecially when dealing with Russians, subtlety gets you nowhere; you must tell them, bluntly, what you want to happen. For example, when someone asked President Reagan to explain the objective of his Cold War strategy he replied: We win, they ...
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February 14, 2014
Reagan's Roadmap to VictoryReagan's Roadmap to Victory 11 Principles of a Reagan Conservative by Paul Kengor, Beaufort Books, 133 pages, $16.95 Do you miss President Reagan? Do you smile every time you see a film clip of our 40th president on some tel...
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October 30, 2013
Competence Comes FirstOur political differences have grown so profound, and become so nasty, that we've lost sight of the one thing that matters more than policy: competence. Even the wisest, most carefully conceived policy will end in failure if the officials who e...
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October 28, 2013
A Judgment on IntelligenceDespite everything you've gleaned from spy novels and movies, the most important raw material for a successful intelligence service isn't information; it's judgment. If you don't know what information is worth collecting, and if you cannot figu...
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October 26, 2013
Three Cheers for Chuck!Every so often an ordinary man does something extraordinary that delights the rest of us, and keeps us smiling as we go about our own mundane business. Let me tell you the story of Chuck Bailey's bike ride: Chuck is a semi-retired gentleman ...
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June 3, 2013
The Smoking Gun in Plain SightAs the Obama administration descends into a whirlpool of scandals, a race has begun among Congressional committees and news organizations to find the proverbial smoking gun -- the document that will link President Obama directly to the IRS's targetin...
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September 11, 2012
A Dose of Real-World Intel on IranI've been out of the intelligence business for many years now, so I've stayed out of the debate over Iran's nuclear program. I learned a long time ago that when people who don't have access to highly classified intelligence about an issue like ...
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July 25, 2012
The Commie's CommieThe Communist who's the subject of the stunning new biography by Paul Kengor is Frank Marshall Davis. He's the black poet, journalist, and activist whom the young Barack Obama hung out with as a teenager in Hawaii, then wrote a weird, disturbin...
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July 16, 2012
'Romney Picks Petraeus for Veep!'Actually, no. Gov. Romney hasn't named his choice for vice president. But were you electrified by that headline? Did it pull you out of your chair, pump up your heart rate and make you believe, for the first time, that Obama's on th...
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May 21, 2012
Elderly Montreal 'student' rioters protest tuition hikeTake a look at the two photos in this article about the out-of-control protests in Quebec over the rising cost of tuition. Looks to me like these, um, students have aged rapidly under the pressure of studying. Richard Baehr adds: If you spend t...
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February 23, 2012
A U-Turn Strategy for the GOPAs we head into some crucial GOP primaries -- Arizona and Michigan on February 28, then Super Tuesday one week later -- grassroots Republicans remain sharply divided over which presidential candidate to support. A lot of us would vote for None ...
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January 26, 2012
Why, Precisely, is America so Great?The one thing that President Obama and all the GOP contenders for his job agree about is that America is the greatest country in the world. They all use this line in every speech they make, and it always brings the crowd cheering to its feet....
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November 15, 2011
A Double-Dose of SpenglerHow Civilizations Die (And Why Islam is Dying, Too) David P. Goldman Regnery Publishing, $27.95 It's Not the End of the World (It's Just the End of You) David P. Goldman RVP Publishers, $22.95 Back in the 1990s, a publication no one had ever...
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September 6, 2011
An Economics Lesson Even a Liberal Can GraspThe more President Obama calls for a second stimulus spending spree to create those jobs the first spending spree failed to create, the more he sounds like the grocer in that old joke about the lady who wants her money back because the dietetic ice c...
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July 27, 2011
The Astonishing World to ComeMax Singer's "History of the Future" Lexington Books, 178 pages, $24.95, eBook: $9.99 I've just read one of the most brilliant, most important -- and most optimistic -- books about world politics that's been written in the last hundred years. Reade...
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July 23, 2011
It's All About the SenatePresident Obama has done nothing to earn his Nobel peace prize, but after yesterday's performance at the White House podium no one should begrudge him an Oscar. His performance was mean-spirited, petulant, more politically vicious than anything...
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March 10, 2011
Three Cheers for Jack CashillWould you believe me if I told you that while in Milan last weekend, I'd been to La Scala for the world premiere of a new opera by George W. Bush? And would you ever again take me seriously if I published a review of Bush's new opera in which I...
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February 14, 2011
Egypt is an OpportunityThe lid has finally blown off the pressure cooker in Cairo. And as the Director of National Intelligence is apparently just now starting to notice, there are a few more pressure cookers on the stove that are beginning to make odd noises.Alas, i...
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January 23, 2011
A Stunning Upset in WashingtonThis weekend the Washington State GOP dumped its chairman and elected longtime radio host - and serious pro-life conservative -- Kirby Wilbur to lead the Party into the 2012 elections.Washington State is divided politically, as well as geographically...
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December 15, 2010
The Only Thing That Will Save Us Now Is Fear ItselfOn March 4, 1933, millions of Americans sat beside their radios listening to Franklin Delano Roosevelt delivering his first inaugural address, in which he famously declared that "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself." (Joe Bi...
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November 18, 2010
Lap Two for the Tea PartyPolitics is a relay race, not a sprint, which means that those of us who belong to the Tea Party or support its goals must start thinking about the kind of candidates we'll run in 2012.In this year's elections -- Lap One, so to speak -- the Tea Party...
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October 11, 2010
Dupes -- and TraitorsDupes: How America's Adversaries Have Manipulated Progressives for a Century by Paul Kengor, ISI Books, 2010One of the last mysteries of the Cold War is why so many seemingly intelligent Americans believed to the bitter end that the Soviet Union -- h...
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August 16, 2010
A Dim Bulb in the Oval Office?During his eight years in the White House, President George W. Bush was often described by liberals as being about halfway between an idiot and an imbecile. They told us he was so inarticulate -- so unable to express himself clearly -- that his...
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April 14, 2010
An Economics Lecture No Student Will Ever HearGood morning. Take your seats, turn off your cell phones, and keep them off for the duration of this lecture.Today's subject is jobs. As even the dimmest among you are aware, we're in a jobless recovery, which means that economic activity is picking ...
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March 23, 2010
The ACLU Goes AWOLWhen George W. Bush was president, the ACLU and its liberal allies were driven nearly berserk by the possibility that the FBI might know what library books Americans had borrowed. Under the terms of the health care legislation that Presid...
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February 18, 2010
The Re-Establishment of AmericaAmerica is on the verge of something unprecedented in history: the peaceful, constitutional replacement of our country's entire political establishment. This is what lies behind the decisions of so many elected officials, at every level, to step asid...
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January 13, 2010
Why Intelligence Keeps FailingIn the wake of our country's latest intelligence failure -- allowing a Nigerian terrorist to board Northwest Airlines Flight 253 from Amsterdam to Detroit when his own father had alerted us to the dangers posed by his son -- President Obama demands t...
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August 26, 2009
What the President's Attack on the CIA Really MeansThere is now just one group of people exempt from President Obama's worldwide ban on torture: the men and women of the CIA.By authorizing Attorney General Eric Holder to appoint a special prosecutor to determine whether a full criminal investigation ...
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July 28, 2009
Did the CIA 'Cook the Books' on Iran?Do you remember that 2007 U.S. National Intelligence Estimate which concluded -- to virtually everyone's astonishment -- that four years earlier Iran had suspended its nuclear weapons program?Publication of that NIE cut the ground out from under the ...
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May 20, 2009
RevolutionDuring the last 30 years we Americans have been so politically divided that some of us have called this left-right, liberal-conservative split a "culture war" or even a "second Civil War." These descriptions are no longer ac...
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April 4, 2009
Bruce Walker's The Swastika Against the CrossFor more than a year now, Bruce Walker has been publishing essays at American Thinker that read like Bach preludes -- tiny compositions that are so simple, and so perfect, that they could be composed only by a genius.If you (as I) were wondering...
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March 27, 2009
An Ambassador's Warning to the French PeopleMark Twain once cracked that mankind is halfway between the angels and the French, and those of us who've dealt with France's diplomats tend to share this sentiment. But there have always been a few diplomats at the Quai d'Orsay whose competenc...
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November 27, 2008
Repealing Roe v. Wade - in RussiaPeter the Great once described Russia as a country in which things that just don't happen, happen. It's true.Authorities in Novorossiysk, a city near the Black Sea, have declared this week to be a "week without abortion." Doctor...
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September 27, 2008
Clowns in the CockpitAs you've probably noticed by now, the twenty-first century has gotten off to a rocky start. In 2001, on September 11, we were attacked. And now our country's financial system is collapsing. This makes for two "unimaginable...
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September 8, 2008
The Culture War's Decisive Battle has BegunIn every war there is one decisive battle. This battle doesn't end the war; a great deal of hard fighting lies ahead. But in retrospect it's the moment when one side's ultimate victory -- and the other side's ultimate defeat -- were seale...
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August 6, 2008
A Hard Look at Casualty NumbersSoldiering is a dangerous business -- even in peacetime -- and we mourn the death of any member of our armed forces no matter what its cause. A new report for members of Congress from the Congressional Research Service provides some astounding ...
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July 31, 2008
Political Prisms[Editor's Note: Women of Washington is a group of conservative women in Seattle whose members meet regularly to discuss issues, enjoy one another's company, and raise money for worthy causes such as the USO. This year WOW invited American Think...
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June 8, 2008
The EU Strikes AgainThe next time you're feeling discouraged, or infuriated, by the fecklessness of our country's bureaucrats, keep in mind that things are even worse in Europe.For instance, as France's President Sarkozy struggles to pull his country out of its nosedive...
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June 8, 2008
An Update on Iraq's Cell Phone TowersThe good news is that Iraq's cell phone towers are still standing. The bad news is that the towers now are being "protected" by a Shia militia that may have ties to Iran.As previously reported on AT, Iraq's mobile telephone network wa...
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May 14, 2008
The Bum Rap on BiofuelsOne of the striking features of modern politics is the speed at which a candidate, or a cause, can topple from the pedestal to the doghouse.Just a few years ago the emergence of biofuels was considered so important to our country's drive for energy i...
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April 29, 2008
An Urgent Memo to the SecDefOn May 13 about 70 percent of Iraq's mobile telephone network will cease to operate. This will be a serious blow to the Iraqi economy. Moreover, a shutdown of Iraq's mobile phone network - upon which our own people in Baghdad rely to comm...
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April 11, 2008
While senators fiddleEverything about this week's Senate hearings was disgraceful. Senator Carl Levin, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, started the hearing by reading his conclusions. Shouldn't he have listened to the testimony before reaching his co...
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April 7, 2008
Heston's hidden movie masterpieceCharlton Heston deserves all the accolades he's getting as one of Hollywood's greatest actors. But as yet I've seen no mention of the stunning performance he delivered as Thomas More in a televised version of A Man for All Seasons that he not o...
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March 6, 2008
The Trouble with RussiaEach year a group of KGB Commissars would get together for a weekend of bear hunting. A helicopter would fly them to a clearing deep in the forest, leave them with their guns and camping gear, then pick them up two days later.Now the hunting we...
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December 30, 2007
Ronald Reagan's Top HandThe Judge: William P. Clark, Ronald Reagan's Top HandBy Paul Kengor and Patricia Clark DoernerIgnatius Press, 378 pp, $20.95Very few people get to be President, but each time we elect a president about 3,000 men and women get the privilege of serving...
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December 5, 2007
The Key Question about the NIE's Key JudgmentIn the Intelligence business, you get paid for just one thing: to be right.So here's the key question about the Key Judgment of the National Intelligence Council's new National Intelligence Estimate on Iran's nuclear intentions and capabilities: Is t...
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October 12, 2007
Pulling for the EnemyWhen all else fails -- look at the evidence. That's what Vasko Kohlmayer, an American Thinker contributor, has done in Human Events. More precisely, he's put together a list of all the Democrats' statements and actions about the war....
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July 10, 2007
The War About the WarThe 9-11 attacks did more than start a war; they started a war about the war. No sooner had the World Trade towers collapsed and the Pentagon burst into flames than two perceptions of the threat began competing for the public's support:Percepti...
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June 23, 2007
The entertainment industry's guy at the CIAIf this is true -- and it must be, because it's on the CIA's official website -- the "Impeach Bush" crowd may have a new recruit. The Central Intelligence Agency has chosen Paul Barry, a veteran officer, as its new liaison to the entertainm...
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March 4, 2007
Intelligence and Iran's NukesThere's no question but that our country's intelligence service isn't performing very well. And in her latest essay on Iran's nuclear weapons program, American Thinker contributor Rachel Neuwirth raises some important questions. But the real is...
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February 26, 2007
Islamism is the new totalitarianismOne of the most striking features of our age -- and one of the most disturbing -- is that we argue before we understand. And of all the subjects over which we argue, none is more important to our survival than the war.Whatever your views of how...
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February 5, 2007
Canada and immigrationIt looks like this is spreading. And in multi-culti Canada of all places. Good....
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February 4, 2007
"Personnel is Policy"Back in the Reagan Administration, we had a saying that always drew sneers from the press and from the Washington establishment: "Personnel is policy." What we meant, of course, is that to execute the President's policies it was neces...
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January 31, 2007
The heroes of Herouxville (updated)Kudos to the mayor and six city counselors of Herouxville, a small community northeast of Montreal. Fed up with the demands of immigrants that the city change its values to accommodate them -- can you guess the religion of these demanding immig...
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January 15, 2007
Ronald Reagan: The CrusaderThe Crusader:Ronald Reagan and the Fall of Communismby Paul KengorRegan/HarperCollins, 412 pp, $29.95The complicated business of understanding how Ronald Reagan led the Free World to victory in the Cold War has just become much easier. Run to y...
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January 6, 2007
Transplanting Al-Aqsa: responseDan Gordon's astonishing proposal -- that Israel turn over Al-Aqsa, on the Temple Mount, to Saudi Arabia -- reminds me of all those Cold War liberals who twisted themselves into pretzels trying to find some formula for nuclear-arms control that the S...
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January 3, 2007
Fidel's Flunkies Keep FlailingIt's probably too early to award the 2007 prize for Dumbest Commentary, but this column by a former chief of staff of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee surely will be among the finalists.In his call for a change in US policy toward Cuba, Pat M. ...
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December 27, 2006
How to Think About the WarWhether we are winning or losing in Iraq is open to debate, but it's clear that our national conversation about the war has begun to fail. Today our elected leaders, our most influential commentators, and even ordinary Americans chatting among themse...
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December 2, 2006
"Forced" -- my Foot!I read Richard Cravatts' essay on the book publishing industry with special interest. I'm an author and -- more to the point -- I also own one of those 70,000 book publishing companies whose declining standards he's bemoaning.There's no questio...
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November 30, 2006
Guess whose side the Dems are on?Watching the Democrats adopt one policy after another that undermines American security, a lot of Americans are starting -- belatedly -- to ask, "Whose side are these guys on?"Now we have the answer. In a brilliant column published by...
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November 25, 2006
Q&A on global warmingThis is the best-ever overview of the issue. It's from AEI's new magazine, The American, and the first issue is terrific. Herbert E. Meyer...
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October 8, 2006
The Star Wars EnigmaThe Star Wars Enigma:Behind the Scenes of the Cold War Race for Missile Defense By Nigel Hey Potomac Books, 288 pages, $27.95 If you want to read a terrific, utterly riveting book about the goings on at the top levels of our government — loade...
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October 1, 2006
The Big Secret of that Leaked NIEDuring this past week, politicians and commentators from across the political spectrum have been weighing in on the now—declassified 'Key Judgments' of that leaked National Intelligence Estimate about the Iraq war and its impact on terrorism. A...
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September 26, 2006
That Leaked N.I.E. on Iraq is a FlopThis weekend someone in Washington leaked to The New York Times the key judgment of a recently—completed — and highly classified —— National Intelligence Estimate: 'The Iraq war has made the overall terrorism problem worse.'...
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August 1, 2006
To Hell with HezbollahI worked for President Reagan at the CIA, and during those years I made quite a number of overseas trips. While having dinner one evening with some of our local CIA people, I fell into a conversation with a young woman who had recently complete...
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June 7, 2006
I Had a DreamI've read that as you get older, your dreams become less exciting. Not mine. Earlier this evening, after another of my wife's spectacular suppers, I was sitting in my La—Z—Boy —— with my feet up and my hand wrapped...
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April 18, 2006
The Generals are RevoltingSix retired generals have now called for the resignation of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld on the grounds that... well, just what has the Secretary done, or not done, that justifies his removal from the Pentagon in the middle of a war? Read throug...
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April 3, 2006
Why Americans Hate This 'Immigration' DebateOne of the most striking features of the immigration debate now raging in Washington is that none of the Democratic or Republican proposals seem to hold any appeal for ordinary Americans —— which is why this debate is generating so much f...
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February 20, 2006
What if Dick Cheney Hadn't Stiffed the Press?For more than a week now, the press has been beating up on Vice President Dick Cheney for his handling — or, rather, for his mis—handling — of how the accidental shooting of his friend while on a hunting trip in Texas was disclosed....
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February 7, 2006
Take Out the Mullahs – TonightTo think clearly about the looming crisis with Iran, close your eyes and imagine that you're standing outside your children's school. It's 2:55pm, and you're chatting amiably with other parents while waiting for the 3pm bell to ring. Suddenly y...
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January 3, 2006
Common Sense About the NSA 'Scandal'The choreography of Washington 'scandals' has become as precise — and as predictable — as a performance by the Radio City Music Hall Rockettes. And the latest so—called scandal — this one over disclosures that the NSA ha...
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December 13, 2005
Leave the Nukes, Take Out the MullahsTo think clearly about how best to remove the looming threat of a nuclear—armed Iran, just keep in mind the National Rifle Association's much maligned — but perfectly sensible — old slogan: Guns don't kill people. People kill ...
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November 28, 2005
Why it Isn't Over, Over ThereLike every other business, the business of war has changed. Centuries ago, a war ended when one army defeated another on the battlefield. But in the modern world of total war , a war isn't over when one army defeats the other. A war is over whe...
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November 23, 2005
A Second Letter to Opponents of the War in IraqWhen I first wrote to you, last January, the level of opposition to the war in Iraq was too low to affect the war's outcome. President Bush had just been re—elected, and he had the public support he needed to stay the course. But for...
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November 4, 2005
Two Questions for George TenetFinally, the spotlight has started to swing away from Lewis Libby and his allegedly perjurous grand—jury testimony toward where that spotlight should have focused all along: on the CIA's incompetent, weird — and possibly treasonous ...
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November 1, 2005
One Question for Chuck SchumerThe one phrase that Democrats in the US Senate and elsewhere in that party's leadership use more than any other to smear the men and women President Bush has nominated for key positions in our government is: 'right—wing extremist.' They d...
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August 24, 2005
The War is now a three-way splitFrom the moment President Bush set his war policy after the 9—11 attacks, our country has been divided into two factions. The first faction supports the President because it believes he's doing the right thing, while the second faction op...
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August 8, 2005
How to Read an NIEIt looks as though quite a kerfuffle is brewing over the new National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) about Iran, which leaked earlier this week and which apparently projects that Iran won't have nuclear weapons for another 10 years. Putting aside for a ...
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August 2, 2005
An Open Memo to the Homeland Security SecretaryA few weeks ago, when you announced your long—awaited reorganization of the Department of Homeland Security — including creation of a new Intelligence Division — the general reaction was a great big yawn. But the deadly terror...
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June 27, 2005
An Open Letter to the PresidentDear Mr. President, I've no idea what your advisers are telling you, but based on my own experience in Washington I suspect they are talking more bluntly among themselves than they are to you. So I'm writing to deliver an unpleasant message you...
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May 25, 2005
A talent for intelligenceIf your objective were to place a beacon atop a mountain, would you: A: Get a beacon and place it atop the mountain, or B: Get a beacon, suspend it in mid—air near the mountain using poles, wires and helicopters, then shove the mountain unde...
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April 27, 2005
The Real Bolton 'Scandal'If the Senate Democrats who are trying to stop John Bolton's appointment as our UN Ambassador weren't doing so much damage to our country, their shenanigans would be hilarious. We have just completed more than three years of non—stop investigat...
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March 21, 2005
Hold principles sacred (in principle)Right now two issues are roiling the country that involve the question of 'principle' — whether 'in principle' the U.S. Congress has the right to intervene in hopes of saving Terri Schiavo's life, and whether the CIA 'in principle' should tortu...
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March 18, 2005
A revolutionary changeEach political revolution is unique, but in all revolutions the decisive moment comes when the crowd surges and the dictator turns to his military leaders and gives the order to shoot. If the order is obeyed and the army shoots into the crowd, ...
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January 27, 2005
Russia's revolution has begun[Editor's note: Herbert E. Meyer was awarded National Intelligence Distinguished Service Medal, the intelligence community's highest honor, for his service at the CIA during the Reagan Administration, where he managed the production of National Intel...
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January 4, 2005
An open letter to opponents of the War in IraqI am not writing to quarrel with your judgment about the war in Iraq. Rather, I am writing to protest your attitude toward the war. And the point I want to make is this: sometimes, you have to choose between proving yourself to have been ...
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November 11, 2004
An open letter to EuropeHi. Are you nuts? Forgive me for being so blunt, but your reaction to our reelection of President Bush has been so outrageous that I'm wondering if you have quite literally lost your minds. One of Britain's largest newspapers ran a headli...
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November 1, 2004
One big questionSometimes an entire political campaign can be encapsulated in one big question. The trick is to figure out what this question is, and to ask it so clearly, and so often, that no voter in the country can pretend that he or she didn't hear it....
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October 20, 2004
The Lessons of 9-11Not even President Bush's biggest fans claim that he's articulate, and the President himself cheerfully pokes fun at his inability to use the English language very well. But when it comes to the War on Terrorism, this isn't a laughing matter....