Significant progress is being made in the destruction of nuclear weapons and the securing of weapons-grade material, but barriers still remain in the drive to rid the world of these heinous weapons.

“The Nature of Political Leadership.” Think about what that means. Have you ever asked yourself what the fundamental nature of political leadership is? Prof. Ludwig is a psychiatrist, a student of human nature, not a political scientist.

The short-short-version is alpha male. Humans try to create postevolutionary times, but with bodies, limbic, and other systems that are stuck in evolutionary times.

You don’t need to ‘believe’ that conclusion. Because Prof. Ludwig did not just sit in his ivory tower at the University of Kentucky and think about it. What is so valuable about this book is that it is empirical. Evidence—imagine that!

It was not Ben Nelson who killed the nomination of Dawn Johnsen, nor was it Arlen Specter or Senate Republicans. No, the sole reason Dawn Johnsen is not leading the OLC is that Barack Obama and his coterie of advisors did not want Dawn Johnsen leading the OLC.

At the Southern Strategy Republican Leadership Conference in New Orleans, the Frothy Mixture offered up a favorite wingnut talking point.

Goldman Sachs says it didn’t bet against its customers in subprime mortgages. I guess it depends on what they mean by customer, and what they mean by market maker. It says it acted properly in its dealings with AIG. I guess it depends on what they mean by “properly”.

It’s hard to ignore the irony. The wannabe Republican heirs of George W. Bush gather in New Orleans, the city Bush’s callousness and ineptitude all but destroyed, to advance a movement best called the New Confederacy. At the Southern Republican Leadership Conference here, Texas Gov. Rick Perry invoked his love for the Tenth Amendment, the [...]

A controversy has simmered for some years over the role of the United States, and particularly of its then-Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, in the actions surrounding Operation Condor. Condor was an assassination and torture plan implemented by a number of South American countries, braintrusted by Pinochet’s Chile.

I want to point to this 2005 article, apparently attempting to scuttle Michael Chertoff’s nomination to be Secretary of Homeland Security by raising his role in approving torture (there are a couple of versions of this article, so if you’re having problems seeing what I’m looking at try this post). The article clearly states that Chertoff opposed the approval of a technique that involved the threat of immediate death.

When people accused Barack Obama of appeasing America’s enemies, I had no idea they were talking about Republicans.

Today in Talking Heads it’s nuclear treaties, Supreme Court nominees, and conservative conferences.