Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, following a meeting in London May 2 of the Quartet for Middle East Peace, also will visit Israel and the West Bank to shore up ongoing Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. During her trip, she also is meeting with allies to discuss financial aid for the Palestinian Authority. (© AP Images)

The Middle East Elusive Peace

THINK AGAIN: ISRAEL. Gershom Gorenberg, Foreign Policy, May-June 2008, var. pages. "Six decades after its founding, the Jewish state is neither as vulnerable as its supporters claim nor as callous and calculating as its critics imagine. But if it is to continue defying all expectations, Israel must first confront its own mythology." READ MORE.

THE LONG DANCE: SEARCHING FOR ARAB-ISRAELI PEACE. Aaron David Miller. The Wilson Quarterly, Spring 2008, pp. 38-44. "The first principle in finding a way to peace between Arabs and Israelis is that, because theirs is an existential conflict in which the stakes are physical and political survival, the core decisions belong to the parties, not to us. What this means in practical terms is that Arabs and Israelis rarely act in response to the entreaties and pressures of distant powers. They consider taking big risks only when local or regional calculations-prospects of real pain or gain-cause them to do so. If they're smart, tough, and committed, American mediators can take advantage of shifts in the region's tectonic plates, but they can't make those plates move." READ MORE

CLEARING THE AIR IN THE MIDDLE EAST. Bassma Kodmani, Current History, May 2008, pp. 201-206. "After a campaign during which candidates promise whatever they think will help them rise a few more rungs up the ladder toward the White House, the time will come for a lucid appraisal of the state of us relations with the countries of the Middle East and what can realistically be done to improve them. It will not take long for a new president to conclude that a different approach is needed to the critical issues of the region. The challenge will be to devise a new approach on the basis of the right lessons." READ MORE.

WHY PLANS FOR A TWO-STATE SOLUTION IN THE MIDDLE EAST HAVE FAILED. Morton A Kaplan, International Journal on World Peace, March 2008, pp. 43-57. "Early United Nations plans for a two-state solution in the Middle East to the present have come up against immovable obstacles. Now that the cold war is over there have been renewed hopes for peace. Kaplan argues that the theory, supported by professors Mearsheimer and Walt, that the Jewish lobby in the United States is the main obstacle to a peace settlement is wrong and sidetracks people from the real issues of security and infrastructure of a peaceful Palestinian state." READ MORE.

2008 Election

PRESIDENT McCAIN? YES, IT COULD HAPPEN.  Andrew Stephen. New Statesman, April 21, 2008, pp. 32-34. The choice facing the nation for its 44th president, therefore, is between an elderly and possibly still very ill man with a notoriously unpredictable temper, a Go-year-old woman disliked by many, who brings with her the baggage of 33 years of marriage to Bill Clinton, and a 46year-old biracial yuppie who would enter the White House with even less political experience than George W Bush had when he became president in 2001. READ MORE

THE FIRST 21ST-CENTURY CAMPAIGN.  Brownstein, Ronald.  National Journal, April 19, 2008, n.p.  Brownstein examines the many reasons why he believes that the Democratic battle for the presidential nomination will be remembered as “the first true 21st-century campaign.” He believes that the pairing of intense anti-Bush emotions on the part of Democrats combined with major advances in information technology are responsible for creating this new style of campaigning. READ MORE

TELL ME HOW THIS ENDS?  Karen Tumulty. Time, May 5, 2008, pp. 26-28.  Not since the nasty 1984 primary race between party-establishment favorite Walter Mondale and the insurgent Gary Hart has the nomination come down to the super delegates, who also include governors, Senators and party officials. READ MORE

Values

SMART GROWTH: STATES PROMOTE TRANSIT-ORIENTED DEVELOPMENT.  Campbell, Zachary. State News, March 2008, pp. 22-24.  With the high costs of gasoline, and increasing awareness of the importance of protecting the environment, states have began to support transit-oriented development -- compact communities centered around mass-transit systems where residents can conduct their daily affairs without needing cars. Six states -– California, Florida, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey and Pennsylvania, as well as Washington DC -- have transit-oriented development policies.  Each state has a somewhat different approach to encouraging transit-oriented development, but with a common goal of encouraging environmentally friendly construction, bringing people closer to their jobs, and decreasing car usage. READ MORE

THE CULTURE OF SUCCESS: INSIDE AN INEQUALITY RIDDLE.  Lindsey, Brink. New Republic, March 12, 2008, pp. 30-31. The main reason high percentages of African-Americans and Hispanics don’t go to college is not because they can’t afford it or can’t do the work, but because the cultural backgrounds from which they come discourage it, says Lindsey, vice president for research at the Cato Institute. Lindsey writes: “It’s a bedrock fact of social psychology: Humans have a powerful and universal tendency to form self-policing social groups. READ MORE

THE SECRET IS THE SYSTEM.  Bruce Seely. The Wilson Quarterly, Spring 2008, pp. 47-58. For more than 25 years, reports and studies have repeatedly warned about shortcomings in the nation's networks of bridges, roads, airports, docks, and rail lines; deficiencies in its public-transit networks; and potential failures in the water supply, sewerage, gas, and electric power utilities. For decades after the inception of the federal highway program in 1916, highway engineers at the state and federal levels enjoyed a remarkable degree of public confidence, and that trust translated into unparalleled political autonomy. READ MORE

THE PARTY OF RACE.  Jeffrey Lord. The American Spectator, April 2008, pp. 43-46.  Of the three post-Civil War Democrats elected president before Harry Truman began changing the party's position on race -- Grover Cleveland, Woodrow Wilson, and Franklin Roosevelt -- all came to power on the strength of an unholy alliance with rabid Southern racists, the party's racial hang-ups on vivid display in the coincidentally named White House.  READ MORE

Africa for the next President

THE US AND AFRICA: PRISONERS OF A PARADIGM? Greg Mills, Current History, May 2008, pp. 225-230. "Africa needs more investment and economic growth. It needs less theater and, certainly, no more pity. The question of how best to assist fragile states trying to promote development while managing volatile expectations; the rise of China’s involvement on the continent; and Africans’ persistent fears of Western domination: All these are parts of the political and policy jigsaw puzzle that next year will confront America’s newly inaugurated president." READ MORE.

THE TROUBLE WITH CONGO. Séverine Autesserre, Foreign Affairs, May-June, pp. 94-110. "Although the war in Congo officially ended in 2003, two million people have died since. One of the reasons is that the international community's peacekeeping efforts there have not focused on the local grievances in eastern Congo, especially those over land, that are fueling much of the broader tensions. Until they do, the nation's security and that of the wider Great Lakes region will remain uncertain." READ MORE.

WHEN CHINA MET AFRICA. Serge Michel, Foreign Policy, May-June 2008, var. pages. "It seemed a perfect match: A growing country looking for markets and influence meets a continent with plenty of resources but few investors. Now that China has moved in, though, its African partners are beginning to resent their aggressive new patron. What happens when the world’s most ambitious developing power meets the poverty, corruption, and fragility of Africa? China is just beginning to find out." READ MORE.

WHAT HAS THE UNITED STATES BEEN DOING? Dinorah Azpuru, Steven E. Finkel, et al. Journal of Democracy, April 2008, pp. 150-157."Democracy assistance has been a growing priority for the United States since the end of the Cold War. The record shows that its focus goes well beyond elections and other procedural dimensions of democracy." READ MORE.

Turkey

Turkey and the Threat of Kurdish Nationalism. Philip Giraldi. Mediterranean Quarterly, Winter 2008, pp. 33-41 Turkey and the United States share a strategic vision of an Iraq that is one nation with a strong and functioning central government. For the United States, that would mean an Arab-dominated regime able to deal with internal security problems like al Qaeda between the Two Rivers before they become international threats and also strong and self-confident enough to serve as a bulwark against Iranian expansion. For Turkey, it would mean a Baghdad government capable of eliminating the Marxist terrorist group the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has bases and safe havens in the north of the country. A strong central government would also ipso facto render irrelevant any Kurdish aspirations for independent statehood. READ MORE

Headscarves Are Secular Turkey's Waterloo. Haluk Sahin. New Perspectives Quarterly, April 30, 2008. Foreign observers are perplexed by the ferocity of the headscarf debate raging in Turkey. They can't understand why a piece of fabric covering a female university student's head should engender so much sound and fury in a country negotiating for full membership with the European Union. From the outside, wearing headscarves might appear as a minor dress code problem that could easily be solved by university administrations. Instead, political parties are engaged in fierce parliamentary fighting over it while high courts await their turn to speak. READ MORE

Middle Easternization of Turkey's Foreign Policy: Does Turkey Dissociate from the West? Oğuzlu, Tarik. Turkish Studies, Mar2008, pp. 3-20. This essay argues that Turkey’s foreign policy has been Middle Easternized. This has mainly been informed by the growing negative impact of political developments in the Middle East—particularly Iraq—on Turkey’s feeling of security at home and abroad. Rather than culminating in a breakup with the West, this Middle Easternization process has resulted in the adoption of a more pragmatic/rational than an emotional/romantic approach towards the European Union and the United States. READ MORE