The Indian Spring
By Fareed Zakaria NEW DELHI Americans dismayed by politics in Washington might find something familiar in what’s happening in India. Here, frustration with government has turned into rage. Last month’s gruesome gang rape and murder of a 23-year-old woman brought tens of thousands onto the streets. And while the protests have subsided, the anger is … Read more
The Year We Reckon With Iran
By Fareed Zakaria Opponents of Chuck Hagel’s nomination to be the U.S.’s next Secretary of Defense claim he is outside the mainstream in his views on Israel. Hagel’s actual policy positions don’t reflect that. On many issues, he sounds a lot like Israeli President Shimon Peres, who lamented in an interview published Jan. 9 by … Read more
The New Crisis of Democracy
By Fareed Zakaria In November, the American electorate, deeply unhappy with Washington and its political gridlock, voted to maintain precisely the same distribution of power — returning President Barack Obama for a second term and restoring a Democratic Senate and a Republican House of Representatives. With at least the electoral uncertainty out of the way, … Read more
What’s missing from the cliff debate: Growth
By Fareed Zakaria The deal to avoid the “fiscal cliff” is a small victory for sanity, but what it says about the future is bleak. Washington will lurch from crisis to crisis, kicking problems forward and placing Band-Aids on those that it does address. There are likely to be no large-scale policy initiatives — on … Read more
On Foreign Policy, Why Barack Is Like Ike
By Fareed Zakaria One of the least controversial judgments about barack Obama’s first term is that he has been a good foreign policy President. Certainly that’s what the American public believes. It has given him high marks on overseas affairs for much of his presidency, especially after the successful operation to kill Osama bin Laden. … Read more
The solution to gun violence is clear
By Fareed Zakaria Announcing Wednesday that he would send proposals on reducing gun violence in America to Congress, President Obama mentioned a number of sensible gun-control measures. But he also paid homage to the Washington conventional wisdom about the many and varied causes of this calamity — from mental health issues to school safety. His … Read more
The Baby Boom and Financial Doom
To rightsize spending, entitlement programs must be reformed By Fareed Zakaria The American left has trained its sights on a new enemy: Pete Peterson. The banker and private-equity billionaire is, at first glance, an obvious target—rich and Republican. He stands accused of being the evil genius behind all the forces urging Washington to do something … Read more
End the war on terror and save billions
By Fareed Zakaria As we debate whether the two parties can ever come together and get things done, here’s something President Obama could probably do by himself that would be a signal accomplishment of his presidency: End the war on terror. Or, more realistically, start planning and preparing the country for phasing it out. For … Read more
Where the Past Is Not Prologue
Turmoil is a constant in the Middle East, but the region is strengthening By Fareed Zakaria Yasser Arafat’s body has been exhumed for investigation, bringing back memories of the unpredictable Palestinian leader and the Middle East in which he operated. That news broke just as a conventional wisdom began to take hold that the Middle … Read more
Israel dominates the new Middle East
By Fareed Zakaria As missiles and rockets exploded in Israel and Gaza, television news was dominated by the tragic violence, and we were warned that the battle between Israel and the Palestinians might spread because we are in a new and much more dangerousMiddle East. Islamists are in power, democracies will listen to their people. In fact, as the relatively … Read more
