Articles with headlines in gray are unavailable online.
Letters to the Editor
COMMENT The Stakes in 2004 The coming presidential election may be the most important in generations
by Michael Barone
BRIEF LIVES The Natural Why is Barack Obama generating more excitement among Democrats than John Kerry?
by Ryan Lizza
POLITICS Dixie Chicks A new kind of Democrat is emerging in the South—and she's no shrinking violet
by Alexandra Starr
THE ODDS Who Will be the Next President? The market speaks
by Nathan Littlefield
PHENOMENON Nader Republicans
by Nathan Littlefield
FOREIGN AFFAIRS Ayatollah Democracy Arrogant, dogmatic, and anti-American, Iraq's Shiite clerics are the last people enlightened Westerners want to see in power. Let's hope they prevail
by Reuel Marc Gerecht
THE LIST Private Military Contractors A buyer's guide
by Matthew Quirk
VERBATIM Rumsfeld’s Rules Revisited
by Ross Douthat
CONVERSATION Adult-Male-Elephant Diplomacy Colin Powell talks about Iraq, the Cold War, his place in the Administration, and chilling "the ambitions of the evil"
by P. J. O'Rourke
INTERVIEWS A Conversation With Colin Powell Colin Powell and P. J. O'Rourke discuss foreign policy, Volvos, Elvis, and more. The full transcript of an interview from the September 2004 AtlanticPrimary Sources The U.S. prison system as a terrorist university; why the suburbs make you fat; the "happiness-maximizing" number of sex partners
by P. J. O'Rourke [Web only]
NATION IN NUMBERS The God Vote
by Ross Douthat
Inside Al-Qaeda’s Hard Drive
Budget squabbles, baby pictures, office rivalries—and the path to 9/11
by Alan Cullison
The Hollywood Campaign
Want big money to get elected to national office? If you're a Democrat, you need to head for the hills—Beverly Hills.
by Eric Alterman
In Search of a Pope
Media commentators love to speculate about the power politics of the next conclave. They keep forgetting about the most important factor of all
by Paul Elie
More Nixon Tapes
Fresh talk about the Irish, the Africans, the Ivy League, and Chairman "Mayo." A selection from recently released recordings in the National Archives.
by James Warren
FICTION Florence of Arabia
How one woman (plus a disgraced Green Beret, a shameless PR lackey, and the wife of a sheikh) brought the Middle East to the brink of female emancipation. A short story
by Christopher Buckley
INTERVIEWS Veiled OptimismPOETRY Peaceable Kingdom
Christopher Buckley, the author of Florence of Arabia, talks about women's lib, exploding camels, and the making of the modern Middle East
by Benjamin Healy [Web only]
[with audio]
by Henry Taylor
NEW & NOTEWORTHY Wolves, Actors, Jihadis
Vicious, by Jon Coleman; Who the Hell's in It, by Peter Bogdanovich; Imperial Hubris, by Anonymous; Heloise & Abelard, by James Burge
by Benjamin Schwarz
Policy Wank
Bill Clinton's sodden memoir goes into all the wrong detail
by Tom Carson
Mother of All Mothers
The leadership secrets of Kim Jong Il
by B. R. Myers
READING LIST Mirror, Mirror
Astonishing memoirs by (and about) deeply repellent people
by Terry Castle
The Immortal
A new biography reaches the heart of the labyrinth—the intense and wondrous life of Jorge Luis Borges
by Christopher Hitchens
INNOCENT BYSTANDER Witless Protection
Coping with the sixteenth minute
by Cullen Murphy
50 YEARS AGO IN THE ATLANTIC “When Russia Is Ready”
In the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, the question of whether protecting U.S. national security warranted a preventive war was fiercely debated. The question was not new. In the September 1954 Atlantic, Thomas K. Finletter, who had recently served as the Secretary of the Air Force, broached it in a very different context.
FOOD Principled Pork
"Sustainable farming" is now open to debate and commercial exploitation. But sustainable pork certainly tastes the way pork should
by Corby Kummer
THE PUZZLER Chain Links
by Emily Cox and Henry Rathvon
Word Court
by Barbara Wallraff
POST MORTEM The Lord’s Music and the Devil’s Words
by Mark Steyn
Proper-Name Index
by Benjamin Healy