As the race for the next Mayor of Los Angeles begins to heat up, a vital issue of public policy has gone unaddressed -- the uninspiring name of our hometown airport, currently known as LAX.

The Los Angeles Board of Airport Commissioners has been sending residents a fancy brochure titled...

It's a disappointing year when Justin Bieber has a Christmas album called Under The Mistletoe and Lady Gaga has not yet done hers. What's a music loving family to do? The best I can suggest is Tony Bennett's, The Classic Christmas Album. Bennett deserves a shout-out for showing up at...

Two cheers for Occupy!

Abrazos from California to all those willing to take action and make a statement against the economic status quo and politics as usual. Your spirit and activism are cheering to those of us from the 60s generation who have not given up on...

"How should we think about Obama?"

My friend and former State Senator, Sheila Kuehl likes to get right to the serious stuff.

I recently had a catch-up lunch with Sheila, a fourteen-year veteran of the California legislature (she left because of term limits), author of over 170 bills, including paid...

Does Obama have a coherent foreign policy -- and does it matter?

Tufts professor Daniel Drezner discusses these questions in the current issue of Foreign Affairs and answers in the affirmative. Drezner, who is well known for his witty treatise on Zombie theories of...

President Obama needs more economic and political soul, if he is to get his groove back.

It's early December, and it's already cold out there. The political atmosphere in Washington, DC is decidedly chilly for progressives, and the compromises coming from the lame duck session of Congress won't be...

The profile of Barack Obama by Peter Baker in the New York Times Sunday magazine ("The Education of A President") has a "woe is me" tone. Obama and his White House team seem a little too sorry for themselves and lack genuine self-analysis of the president's political...

Happy Days are not coming any time soon to America -- and not to most of the world.

This summer has convinced me that it is realistic -- not pessimistic or fatalistic -- to believe that we have reached the twilight of the oil-industrial age. A global reckoning is coming...

In his new biography The Bridge: The Life and Rise of Barack Obama, author David Remnick describes how a young Barry Obama discovered the value of a liberal arts education.

During his two years at Occidental College in Los Angeles, one of the nation's leading liberals arts colleges, Obama learned...

A few weeks ago in New Delhi it felt like I had walked on to the set of A Great Big Indian Wedding, become a cast member, and had the film become reality.

My wife Sue and I were members of an Indian wedding -- dancing,...

A popular Washington, DC joke: What has Barack Obama accomplished his first year in office?

Answer: He won the Nobel Peace Prize.

It's not really very funny or fair to Obama, or to the Nobel committee who picked him as this year's winner. I think that the Norwegians...

There is almost nothing about the state of the world that doesn't seem a little rosier with good holiday music playing in the house. As I write, Bob Dylan's contribution to yuletide cheer -- his new album, Christmas In The Heart, is on and makes me smile. Next week at...

Fed chairman Ben Bernake, along with other Obama economic team officials, tells us that economic growth is returning, and that it is "very likely" the recession has ended. With ten percent unemployment in many parts of the country, this might seem like less than great news. Certainly, in conventional...

My wife loves President Obama -- at least, that's how she puts it, and she won't have a bad word said about him in the house. I like the guy, but I have a hard time falling in love with any politician. I'm a metrics man. Show me results...

Official Washington seems shocked that torture has been the rule above the law during the Bush administration. Reaction to the release of the Justice Department memos on the subject seems almost naive--and certainly with no sense of history (in this case, very recent history).

I remember...

President Obama has had a difficult time finding a new Secretary of Commerce. He shouldn't worry about it any longer. There is a simple solution--just abolish the post.

The Commerce Department, as presently constituted, is a hodge podge of agencies with no central purpose. It's not...

The Obama administration needs a stronger narrative. If the president is to succeed in the recovery from economic recession, repair the multi-faceted damage of the Bush years, and create sustainable economic growth for the future, he has to have a compelling story line. Most Americans don't easily understand economics--but...

The White House needs a new basketball court and it's not in the stimulus package.

I was in New York City recently and bumped into Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. I congratulated her on the stimulus package, but refrained from lobbying her about a glaring omission in...

It's hard not to be excited by the change from Bush to Obama. The 60s activist in me couldn't help but smile at the sight of Bruce Springsteen backed by an African-American choir opening the Inaugural Concert on the Mall -- and later, Springsteen brought Pete Seeger on to lead...

What do you get a President-elect for the holidays who will soon have the weight of the world on his shoulders? Advice books, energy food, sports gear? It's a predicament.

After January 20, Barack Obama will be in official gift land. He will have to declare almost all...