To hear some media portray it, there is a building case against Chuck Hagel as Secretary of Defense. But, like the Susan Rice fiasco before, this is based on spurious assumptions and the comments of just a small handful of activists and a few...

Writing about the sad incidents involving the resignation of David Petraeus as Director of the Central Intelligence Agency is not easy. Many people's lives are involved and one can only hope that all find the private peace that they need. There is, however, a broader set of questions that Americans...

The past several years, I have engaged intensively in research and writing on post-Celtic Tiger Ireland. One thing I frequently hear in Dublin is -- "well, at least we're not Greece." So, after three trips to Ireland in the last half year, I jumped at a chance to...

Mitt Romney has made ballistic missile defense in Europe a centerpiece of his presidential campaign's assertion of President Barack Obama's weakness on national security. North Korea's recent missile test and Iran's nuclear program combine with President Obama's "hot mic" comments to Russian President Dmitry Medvedev about post-election "

As Europe is warned of pending recession by analysts and credit raters and as its leaders seem unable to halt the spread -- what happens to the initial assumptions behind the bailout of peripheral economies like Ireland? A basic reality appears to have not yet hit the Irish government or...

Having just returned from several weeks in Ireland, I am struck to find a spate of articles showing that second quarter growth in the Irish economy proves that deep austerity programs are good for a country in deep recession. On 23 September, the Wall Street Journal asked "Is...

In the midst of traumatic upheaval, it can be hard to take stock of opportunities and positive trends in the hands of the Irish people. Yet as the rest of the world looks with shock at what went wrong in Ireland and as Irish anger grows, it is time to...