The White House has concluded that there is “very little doubt” that the Syrian regime has used chemical weapons against its own people. With President Obama reaching out to British Prime Minister David Cameron and French President François Hollande over the weekend, discussion has shifted to what should or can the United States and its allies do in response. Continue Reading
It has been a month since the Guardian and Washington Post newspapers began releasing articles based upon leaked information reputedly from a source inside the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA). I have waited to say much about the NSA leaks,… Continue Reading
Next week will bring the first bilateral summit between President Barack Obama and the newly installed Chinese President Xi Jinping. This meeting comes with new allegations of cyber espionage undertaken by the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) against not only U.S.… Continue Reading
The following excerpt comes from the report “Containment Through Cooperation: A Proposal for a Nuclear Energy Agreement With Iran,” by Rice University alumnus Sam Hile.
The United States has a strong commitment to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons, since the resulting destabilization of the Middle East would directly and adversely affect the national security and economic interests of both the U.S. and its allies in the region. Continue Reading
The following executive summary comes from the report “Democratization in the Arab World: Causes and Implications of the Ongoing Arab Uprisings and Future Prospects,” by Rice University alumnus Marc Sabbagh. The paper was originally submitted as an assignment for the course “U.S. Middle East Policy,” taught by Baker Institute founding director Edward P. Djerejian. Download the full report after the jump.
Many past studies of democratization and democracy consolidation have written off the Arab and Muslim world as a region with little potential for democratization. Samuel Huntington famously argues that Islam and “Western” standards of democracy are incompatible in his book “The Clash of Civilizations,” and, more recently, Jan Teorell’s 2010 work concludes that “having a predominantly Muslim population … is a factor that appears to impede democratization.” Continue Reading
I do not believe that Biden dominated the debate, for Congressman Paul Ryan performed well and traded jabs with the vice president. In fact, the post-debate CNN poll showed that 48 percent of Americans believed the congressman won, while 44 percent thought the vice president was victorious (the 4 percent difference is within the poll’s sampling error). But Biden did two things that I believe will leave him ahead in the long-run: he energized Democrats and shifted the narrative. Continue Reading
As the first presidential debate ended, I found myself asking, “how did everyone lose that debate?” While Republican Party nominee Mitt Romney may have done slightly better than President Barack Obama, nobody, including the American people, truly triumphed. Continue Reading