Personal Information, Government, and the Not-So-Private Sector

by Paul R. Pillar Though fully justified, the sudden attention paid to the exploitation, including for political purposes, of information on millions of Facebook users in ways that ought to make those users uncomfortable—and to how Facebook does not seem… Continue Reading

The Rule of Law in Jeopardy

by Paul R. Pillar After more than a year of excesses by a president whom not only centrists and progressives but also a thinking conservative such as George Will can aptly assess to be the worst U.S. president ever, outrage… Continue Reading

The President Plays with Matches, and the Whole World Burns

by Rebecca Gordon “I’ve just heard that my family home near Carpenteria is literally in flames at this moment,” a friend told me recently. She was particularly worried, she said, because “my mom has MS. She and my dad got… Continue Reading

America Alone

by Paul R. Pillar The congressionally mandated national security strategies have for the most part not merited the term “strategy”. They are public documents meant for public consumption rather than as guides to decision-making about individual foreign policy problems. They… Continue Reading

One Person, One Vote, One Time

by Paul R. Pillar An old fear about Islamist political parties entering government is that once in power, even if they’d gained their position through democratic means, they would subvert democracy for the sake of maintaining power. The U.S. government… Continue Reading