How old do you think this woman is? Or this one (hint: it’s the same woman, around the same time)? Or how about this one? All three are pictures of Russian ballerina Maya Plisetskaya. She’s eighty years old in the … Continue reading →
I don’t know about you, but when I read this piece in the Times Online about Imad Mughniyeh’s (their spelling) assassination, I couldn’t help but feel it had just a smidgen of sympathy in it. Sympathy, that is, for the … Continue reading →
In a recent Atlantic article by Robert Kaplan entitled “Rereading Vietnam,” the author discusses a number of books that have been given little press and short shrift by reviewers. These are histories and memoirs written by men who served in … Continue reading →
Yesterday I flew on Jet Blue from Boston to Los Angeles. For me this involves not enough sleep the night before as I pack and suddenly realize in the wee hours of the morning that I can’t take half of … Continue reading →
Remember the Spanish-American War? You probably learned about it in your history classes–which was a long time ago, perhaps. If you were anything like me, you only remember a few key phrases: “yellow journalism.” “Remember the Maine.” The American people … Continue reading →
Yes, it’s official: now you can bring your beyond-the-checkpoint-purchased beverages on board the plane. What’s more, you can bring little bottles of hair gel and face cream and all that good stuff, as long as they’re small enough to fit … Continue reading →
France gives Iran quite the tonguelashing: Foreign Affairs Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy describes Iran’s refusal to halt its uranium enrichment program as “unsatisfactory”. “Unsatisfactory” is such a tepid way to describe what Iran is actually doing, which is to defy and … Continue reading →
Yesterday I wrote that the word “unimaginable” makes no sense in terms of the thwarted terror attacks. After 9/11, they were not only imaginable, but eminently so. But it turns out it’s even worse than that. Not only were they … Continue reading →
Richard Landes, of the blog Augean Stables and the website Second Draft, has recently returned from a trip to France and filed this eminently readable report on which way the wind is blowing in France today (and you don’t need … Continue reading →
The controversy over yesterday’s David Irving conviction, and the more general question of whether Holocaust denial should be a criminal offense, seem on the surface to be no-brainers, easily resolvable by saying that the principle of free speech dictates that … Continue reading →
An article appeared in this Sunday’s NY Times advising us that our relations with our neighbors may need to change if the much-feared bird flu pandemic ever arrives. This is what will be necessary if we want to protect ourselves … Continue reading →
Having studied the stories of so many political “changers” (most recently, Kanan Makiya), it strikes me how similar the paths to such change often seem to be. Oh, the details vary, of course–different countries of birth, different turning points. But … Continue reading →