Though he did not coin the phrase, the influential economist John Kenneth Galbraith popularized the notion of “conventional wisdom,” describing it more than a half-century ago as “the ideas which are esteemed at any time” for both their “acceptability” and “predictability.”i Such ideas, he might have added, become “conventional wisdom” when they gravitate from the …
Continue reading “Letter From Washington / Adventures in Engagement”
Every American president eventually faces a defining question – whether to assuage his supporters by telling them what they want to hear or challenge them by telling them what they need to hear. John Kennedy sought to educate the nation about civil rights, which won him no friends among his fellow Democrats in the South. …
In his latest blast at the United States, one that will receive far too little attention, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad accused the United States this week of trying to block the return of the “Hidden Imam” (or “Mahdi”), the messianic figure of Shia Islam who supposedly will bring Islamic justice to the world. Referring to …
“In America, anyone can become president,” Adlai Stevenson Jr., the two-time Democratic presidential nominee said, adding with his characteristic high-brow humor: “That’s one of the risks you take.” The quote comes to mind with news that Lou Dobbs, the controversial former CNN anchor, is exploring not just a U.S. Senate bid from New Jersey but …
Continue reading “Beware of Lou Dobbs and the politics of anger”
I read in the Washington Post over the weekend that former Bush press secretary Dana Perino organized an event at which successful women in Washington offered career advice to aspiring young females – in 10-minute intervals so the stars-to-be could roam from booth to booth and soak up as much advice as possible. The event …
They were just five words, but they swept through the Muslim world like a brush fire nearly four years ago, launching a scorching backlash that endures to this day. “Be quiet. It’s my turn,” the Syrian-born American, Wafa Sultan, said in February 2006 to a Muslim cleric she was debating on Al Jazeera. A woman …
In perhaps its most cited line, the national commission that investigated the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks blamed the nation’s “failure of imagination” in not recognizing the signs of mayhem to come. Today, as events before and after the Fort Hood massacre make clear, we suffer less from a failure of imagination than one of …