News
“To Peking For Peace”
38 years ago this week, President Nixon stunned the world when he announced that he would visit Communist China. Today, President Obama was supposed to meet President Hu Jintao in Italy, but that meeting was canceled at the last moment – but no one is worried about...
Paglia’s Take On Palin’s Problems
Camille Paglia is back on Salon with one of her letter-answering columns. Always 100% quotable and at least 90% right regarding about 95% of what she says, she pins down the Palin problem --- and describes the solution. (In doing so, she reflects the wisdom expressed...
On Documents & Reassessment
Whenever new documents (or in the case of RN – tapes and documents are released), it is an opportunity to reassess a subject. Or at the very least, provide some nuance into the subject. Probably the best opportunity we have for this continuing process of discovering...
Robert McNamara’s Scoundrels’ Time
Robert Strange McNamara died yesterday at his home in Washington. He was 93. The former Harvard professor , Army vet, Legion of Merit recipient, and Ford Motors wunderkind served as America's eighth Secretary of Defense, from 1961-1968, under Presidents Kennedy and...
A Look Into The Cabinet
The death at age 93 of Robert S. McNamara, Secretary of Defense under Presidents Kennedy and Johnson, stirs up a whole host of memories for people of a certain age - as many (and as mixed) as are stirred up by the death of Michael Jackson where a younger generation is...
Been There Done That
From Confrontation to Negotiation: RN with Nikita Khrushchev in the famous Kitchen Debate in Moscow in 1959, and with Leonid Brezhnev (who had been part of Khrushchev's official entourage in the Kitchen) on the Truman Balcony at the White House in 1973. In a few...
Palin, Nixon, And The “Secret Plan”
At CQ Politics, Jonathan Allen contrasts Sarah Palin and Richard Nixon. "Palin doesn't have Nixon's interest in, or knowledge of, foreign affairs," he writes. "Imagine the reaction if Palin suggested she had a "secret plan" to win the war in Afghanistan." He is...
37’s 4ths
The Philippine Republic and the USA share July Fourth as their Independence Day. On 4 July 1956, Vice President and Mrs. Nixon joined President Ramon Magsaysay and First Lady Luz Magsaysay in Manila to celebrate the Philippines' 10th and America's 180th birthdays. ...
The Star Spangled Batter
Washington National Symphony violinist Glenn Donnellan wanted to make the orchestra's concerts for young people more engaging. So, naturally, he decided to make a violin out of a Louisville Slugger. As Anne Midgette reports in today's WaPo: Donnellan made his...