Several years ago, Farid Ghadry​--a Syrian exile activist--published a piece in the Middle East Quarterly looking at what political trends lay beneath the surface of Syria's Baathist dictatorship. He identified the discussions groups that arose during the short-lived "Damascus Spring" and hypothesized that they represented the proto-political parties which might develop.

President Obama's speech on Afghanistan has left supporters and opponents alike wondering if he has a strategy there at all -- or is just trying to split the difference between fighting and abandoning an unpopular war.

Merely monitoring Iran's foray into Latin America is the very least the United States must now do to frustrate Teheran's plans to threaten U.S. security and interests close to home.

Free speech absolutists express general constitutional values shared by most of us, but they're useless in figuring out how to treat offensive speech in the real world.

The Japanese military is emerging from decades of pacifism. But do the country's political leaders have the vision and the will to make the country strong again?

Vincente Fox's provocative words may ensure that Mexico's 2012 presidential campaign will include a healthy debate on whether its citizens are committed to building a modern, law-abiding society or prefer to tolerate drug corruption that stunts its economic and political growth.

Rather than await the decision on the Affordable Care Act, President Obama decided to attack preemptively with error-filled claims about the place of judicial review in our constitutional system. Judicial review springs from the duty of a court, when deciding a case before it, to enforce the Constitution over a conflicting act of Congress.

President Obama's pledge to start pulling troops from Afghanistan in July was imprudent. It will be downright dangerous if the conditions on the ground he pays attention to are political ones at home.