Featured Articles — November 18, 2008

November 18, 2008 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Featured Articles 

Interesting Takes from Home and Abroad:

Fighting the Financial Crisis, One Challenge at a Time By Henry Paulson
WE are going through a financial crisis more severe and unpredictable than any in our lifetimes. We have seen the failures, or the equivalent of failures, of Bear Stearns, IndyMac, Lehman Brothers, Washington Mutual, Wachovia, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the American International Group. Each of these failures would be tremendously consequential in its own right. But we faced them in succession, as our financial system seized up and severely damaged the economy.

The Formerly Middle Class By David Brooks
At the beginning of every recession, there are people who see the downturn as an occasion for moral revival: Americans will learn to live without material extravagances. They’ll simplify their lives. They’ll rediscover what really matters: home, friends and family.

In Detroit, Failure’s a Done Deal By George Will
“Nothing,” said a General Motors spokesman last week, “has changed relative to the GM board’s support for the GM management team during this historically difficult economic period for the U.S. auto industry.” Nothing? Not even the evaporation of almost all shareholder value?

The Seven Deadly Deficits By Joseph E. Stiglitz
What the Bush years really cost us, and how President Obama can get the economy back on track.

‘No Excuses’ for Liberals By Bret Stephens
“I make no excuses, I only wear them.” Remember that? It was the pitch made by Donna Rice for a pair of tight-fitting stonewashed jeans some 20 years ago. Too bad the brand is long gone, since we’re at yet another No Excuses moment in American politics.

Which GOP Will Obama Face? By E. J. Dionne
There is a second transition under way over which President-elect Barack Obama has no control — the transition of conservatives to minority status. How they do this will have a powerful impact on the new presidency.

Missile Defense: Bullying Barack By Peter Brookes
Stakes rising on Prez-Elect’s First Test.

Never Wobbly By Vincent Carroll
Statism’s enemy: principled, charismatic and infuriatingly sure of herself.

Crash and Burn by Joshua Kurlantzick
How the global economic crisis could bring down the Chinese government.

Is Obama a Middle East ‘splitter’? By Gideon Rachman
Historians are sometimes divided into lumpers and splitters. The splitters like to chop problems up into lots of small bits. The lumpers like to link them altogether.

A borrowing binge By David Cameron
Brown clearly doesn’t read his own speeches. Unfunded tax cuts would be reckless and wrong.

Enlightened realism in Ukraine By Gwynne Dyer
The brawl in the Ukrainian Parliament on Nov. 11 was an undignified ending to the country’s two-month political crisis, but something important has changed. In the immediate aftermath of the Orange Revolution of 2004, the more extreme Ukrainian nationalists fantasized that the country could break all its links with Russia and become an entirely Western state, but realism is starting to prevail.

Can We Really Negotiate With the Taliban? By Fred Kaplan
We must reach out to willing factions. But first they must believe we can win.

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