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The current economic crisis is likely to make Washington D.C. as the center of business, attention and power. Other views and information on Washington D.C., as well as on industrial policy, are presented.

The worldwide financial crisis highlights the vacuum in global political leadership. The United States served as an international rule-maker and leader of the economic and geopolitical order after the Second World War but has failed to take the lead in finding solutions for the financial crisis and for climate change. Views on the U.S.'s role in global politics and markets are presented.

The United States is a frontier-oriented nation, constantly searching for new frontiers to conquer. Several social, political and scientific frontiers crossed by the U.S. over time are discussed, suggesting that the inert Mars mission will most definitely be speeded up in face of competition.

Public opinion polls are analyzed to reveal the American public's decreasing support to the Iraq War after the 9/11 Commission concluded that there was no credible link between Iraq and Al Qaeda responsible for the attack. The people expect the disengagement of Washington from the military conflict in Iraq, capturing or eliminating Osama bin Laden and other terrorists out to harm America but it seems that Washington is not willing to accept the views of the people in this regard.

Alternatives to American global dominance are discussed in a situation where in the United States loses its position of world supremacy in the era after the Iraq war. It is believed that America is well positioned to maintain its dominance because of the talent and determination shown by immigrants from all over the world who take the oath of the US citizenship.

Vladimir Putin is not reshaping Russia, as thought by Washington, as much as he is embracing the revival of the Old Russia, which is a confident, stronger Russia, and a cause for worry to the West. The process by which Russia is reorienting itself under Putin is organic, and 'Putin's Russia' is not his construction or possession, but his knack of aligning himself to the revival of Russian identity, but with features of the West.

The system of deterrence following the mutually assured destruction or the MAD principle is almost as old as Atomic Age and has proved effective so far in Russia and China. But deterrence as a concept is not invalidated because non-state actors in some cases, may be outside its boundaries while in the case of Iran's mullahs, the question of whether deterrence could work might come down to whether America's leaders resolve to make it so.

The world's leading generators and practitioners of secular-value rights are the people of Holland. The Netherlands was the first country to legalize same-sex marriage, euthanasia, prostitution and soft drugs and it is debated if Americans would inevitably take their value clues from the Dutch.

When Ronald Brownstein of the Los Angeles Times explains what animates him as a political reporter, it is clear why a colleague calls him 'The Great Analyzer.' 'My dominant interest [...]

For a funny, grabby, irreverent, deconstruction of a politician, 'The Boy in the Bubble,' Michael Lewis's New Republic cover story on Dan Quayle of a few years back, was hard [...]