President Obama sees himself as a pragmatist holding GOP ideologues at bay in debt-limit talks. Not even close.

Until the terrorist attacks of 9/11, the American view of radical Islam and its many discontents was shaped more by the Middle East than South Asia. The U.S. has long been at odds with the raging Ayatollah in Iran, the murderous truck bomber in Lebanon and the masked Palestinian "freedom...

The best thing the Obama Administration did for Asia did not happen in Asia. Sure it was important that the president announced the movement of troops to Australia.  Equally so was the announcement of the Trans Pacific Partnership which could lead to greater trade liberalization and is a powerful way to tie allies together.

President Obama and his team came into office insisting that they were on top of things and above mere ideological considerations. They were wrong.

In the past couple of weeks, people who care about American politics and about Congress have lost two important figures: Harry McPherson and James Q. Wilson.

An independent or third-party candidate, whether an ideological one such as George Wallace or a non-ideologue such as John Anderson or Ross Perot, would fall short. But consider three ways a third candidate can affect the outcome of a presidential contest.

If there is one success story since 9/11, it has been the efforts to combat terror finance. If military action is sometimes akin to conducting surgery with an axe, efforts to dry up sources of funding are like wielding a scalpel.

Obama’s decision to block the building of the Keystone pipeline on the grounds that the Congress — in a bipartisan vote — didn’t give the bureaucrats enough time to study the issue is akin to Leslie Groves accepting that he couldn’t have his silver because he failed to ask for it in troy ounces.