By Lee H Hamilton Here we go again. The United States crashed through the nation’s debt ceiling on Jan. 19, according to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen. For now, the government is relying on accounting tweaks and shifting money from one pot to another to pay the bills. But that only works for so long. Soon,… Read more »
By Lee H Hamilton At the start of 2022, I wrote that defending democracy was the defining challenge for the United States. I noted that we Americans have faith that democracy is the best and most just system; that we believe in government “of the people, for the people and by the people.” Defending democracy… Read more »
By Lee H. Hamilton Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has created foreign policy challenges for the United States. That’s even more true across the Atlantic, where the war has driven up inflation, worsened energy shortages, made refugees of millions of Ukrainians and unsettled the nations of Eastern Europe. There is a tremendous need for European leadership… Read more »
By Lee H. Hamilton Dec. 7 is Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day, commemorating Japan’s surprise attack in 1941 on a U.S. naval base in Hawaii. It’s also a time to step back and appreciate the remarkable transformation of the U.S.-Japan relationship: how we went from being sworn enemies to vital allies over a few decades. For… Read more »
By Lee H. Hamilton We heard a lot in the recent U.S. election campaigns about inflation. We heard a lot about crime. We heard about the erosion of rights and threats to our democracy. What we didn’t hear much about was foreign policy. Most candidates didn’t have a lot to say about America’s role in… Read more »
By Lee H. Hamilton Watching Brazil’s presidential election from the United States has been like looking into a funhouse mirror. The image looks a lot like us, for better or for worse. According to official results, challenger Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva ousted the incumbent, Jair Bolsonaro, and will take office Jan. 1. But the… Read more »
By Lee H. Hamilton It’s good to be the king, as a popular song has it in China these days. It’s good to be Xi Jinping. Xi was just chosen to lead the nation for a third consecutive five-year term. That’s not entirely unprecedented: Mao Zedong led the People’s Republic of China from 1949 to… Read more »
By Lee H. Hamilton The United States was born in a rejection of being ruled by the King of England and a celebration of the rights of individuals. The Declaration of Independence states boldly that “all men are created equal,” suggesting that hereditary monarchs are no better than anyone else. It may seem a little… Read more »
By Lee H. Hamilton It sometimes seems that Americans are hopelessly divided by politics, but I believe it will take politics to make our country work. More specifically, it will take political skills. We need elected officials with the political skills to bring together diverse factions and address America’s challenges. What are political skills? They… Read more »
By Lee H. Hamilton September 14, 2022 Not many people can say that they changed the course of history. Mikhail Gorbachev, who died last month at age 91, is one of those few people. He had a profound impact on world affairs. It may not have been the impact he intended, but he changed the… Read more »
