The Sensitive Soldier
Gail Sheehy is an American writer and lecturer, most notable for her books on life and the life cycle. She is also a contributor to Vanity Fair, and can be found at gailsheehy.com
Can U.S. troops be rewired to be impervious to trauma? In the wake of Fort Hood, Brigadier General Rhonda Cornum launched a groundbreaking program to eliminate PTSD.
Just Another Politician
Monica Crowley is a radio and television political commentator based in New York. Since 2002, she's had her own nationally syndicated radio show, The Monica Crowley Show and is a regular commentator on The John Batchelor Show. She is a panelist for The McLaughlin Group, and she blogs at MonicaMemo.
Once perceived as transformative, Obama now looks more and more like a regular politician, ensnared by petty squabbles, obsessed with politics instead of leadership, and often paralyzed by decision-making.
The Dumb War
Garry Wills is professor of history emeritus at Northwestern University. His books include Inventing America: Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence and the Pulitzer Prize-winning Lincoln at Gettysburg: The Words That Remade America. His book Nixon Agonistes earned him a coveted place on Nixon’s list of political opponents.
In his campaign for the presidency, Obama said he was not against war, just against dumb wars. Yet he is waging and expanding the dumbest kind of war-and creating his very own Vietnam.
The Best of Brit Lit
Peter Stothard is editor of the Times Literary Supplement. He was editor of The Times of London from 1992-2002. He is the author of Thirty Days, a Downing Street diary of his time with British Prime Minister Tony Blair during the Iraq war and On the Spartacus Road: A Spectacular Journey Through Ancient Italy will be published in January.
A look at great reads from the editor of the Times Literary Supplement. This week: Maggie Thatcher's concerns over German reunification and diplomatic etiquette for the digital age
America's Dark Side
Chris Lehmann is co-editor of Book Forum and a columnist for TheAwl.com.
Mark Danner's new book, Stripping Bare the Body, is damning in its assessment of American foreign policy failures in Haiti, Bosnia, and now Iraq, says Chris Lehmann.
Cheney Blood Lust
Lee Siegel has written about culture and politics and is the author of three books: Falling Upwards: Essays in Defense of the Imagination; Not Remotely Controlled: Notes on Television; and, most recently, Against the Machine: Being Human in the Age of the Electronic Mob. In 2002, he received a National Magazine Award for reviews and criticism.
Cheney's "dithering" salvo was just the latest attack on Obama from the former vice president and his daughters. Lee Siegel on a family crusade worthy of Ancient Greece.
This Week's Hot Reads
The Daily Beast is dedicated to news and commentary, culture, and entertainment. We carefully curate the web’s most essential stories and bring you original must-reads from our talented contributors.
This week: A new novel about Manhattan prep-schoolers by one of their own, a Tudor tragedy reconsidered, the essential primer to Central Asia, a shocking exposé of food waste, and the latest Harry Bosch detective thrill.
What War Costs the Right
Conor Friedersdorf, a Daily Beast columnist, also writes for The American Scene and The Atlantic Online's ideas blog.
Conservatives are all for shrinking government spending-except when it comes to the Pentagon. Conor Friedersdorf on why more skepticism about military funding is a matter of national security.
Lloyd Grove is editor at large for The Daily Beast. He is also a frequent contributor to New York magazine and was a contributing editor for Condé Nast Portfolio. He wrote a gossip column for the New York Daily News from 2003 to 2006. Prior to that, he wrote the Reliable Source column for the Washington Post, where he spent 23 years covering politics, the media, and other subjects.
Martin Jacques is the cofounder of the UK think tank Demos, writes a regular column for The Guardian, and is a visiting research fellow at the London School of Economics Asia Research Centre. His new book, When China Rules the World, is available now.
Christopher Buckley's books include Supreme Courtship, The White House Mess, Thank You for Smoking, Little Green Men, and Florence of Arabia. He was chief speechwriter for Vice President George H.W. Bush, and is editor-at-large of ForbesLife magazine. His new book is Losing Mum and Pup, a memoir. Buckley's Daily Beast column is the winner of an Online Journalism Award in the category of Online Commentary.
The Daily Beast is dedicated to news and commentary, culture, and entertainment. We carefully curate the web’s most essential stories and bring you original must-reads from our talented contributors.
Peter Beinart, senior political writer for The Daily Beast, is a professor of journalism and political science at City University of New York and a senior fellow at the New America Foundation.
Jeffrey Koterba is an acclaimed syndicated political cartoonist. Since joining the Omaha World-Herald in 1989, he has been a finalist for Editorial Cartoonist of the Year from the National Cartoonists Society and has placed second in the National Headliner Awards. His work is distributed through King Features Syndicate to 400 newspapers nationwide, and has appeared in such publications as the New York Times, the Chicago Tribune, and the Washington Post, among others.
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