January/February 2006

Paul Elie, "The Year of Two Popes"; William Langewiesche, "The Point of No Return"; Garrison Keillor, "Anthem"; Caitlin Flanagan on nice girls and oral sex; Clive Crook on greedy CEOs; P. J. O'Rouke on polling teens; and much more.

The Atlantic - January/February 2006

Also in this issue

77 North Washington Street

Letters to the editor

Calendar

What to watch for in the weeks ahead

Other articles in this issue

Lincoln for President

October 1860

How Books Become Immortal

September 1891

What College Graduates Owe America

August 1894

The Purpose of Poetry

February 1964

The Twelve Tribes of American Politics

Mapping America's Values

How our cultural attitudes stack up against ?those of other countries?

Poetry

The Anthem

If famous poets had written "The Star-Spangled Banner"

North and South

Selections from the notebooks of Elizabeth Bishop

Features

The Year of Two Popes

How Joseph Ratzinger stepped into the shoes of John Paul II—and what it means for the Catholic Church
Interviews: Paul Elie, the author of "The Year of Two Popes," talks about Ratzinger's rise and his own extraordinary experiences researching the story

The Point of No Return

First Pakistan's A.Q. Khan showed that any country could have made a nuclear bomb. Then he showed—not once but three times—why the nuclear trade will never be shut down
Interviews: William Langewiesche on nuclear proliferation—and why the U.S. is powerless to stop it.

The George W. Bush Presidential Library

An unauthorized preview, with never-before -seen drawings of the interior

Politics & Presidents

The first in a series of archival excerpts in honor of the magazine's 150th anniversary.

The Values Racket

by the Editors

Why the Culture War Is the Wrong War

It's time to challenge the metaphor—and the easy caricatures of left and right that sustain it

Tribal Relations

How Americans really sort out on cultural and religious issues—and what it means for our politics

Misfit America

Is our evolving national character a liability in our foreign relations?

Executive Privilege

The CEOs of too many public companies enjoy the power and rewards of ownership without the risks.

Two Cheers for Hypocrisy

As the Gallup Organization has discovered, the young are another country—and one day it's going to be ours

Agenda

The Perils of Primacy

When too much power means not enough security

Company, Left

There's something different about the latest crop of military veterans running for Congress

Man Versus Mine

Iraqi insurgents have perfected the use of lethal explosives, with profound implications for our military operations in Iraq

Whose Court Is It Really?

John Roberts is the new chief justice, but the Supreme Court isn't his to lead just yet

Primary Sources

The religion effect; a less violent world; one (very good) reason to resist early retirement

Books

The Not-So-Second City

Chicago Architecture and Design, by Jay Pridmore and George A. Larson; Chicago Architecture: Histories, Revisions, Alternatives, edited by Charles Waldheim and Katerina Rüedi Ray; Building Jerusalem: The Rise and Fall of the Victorian City

Are You There God? It's Me, Monica

How nice girls got so casual about oral sex

Mommies Dearest

Top literary reasons why it sucks to have chic parents

New fiction

The Accidental by Ali Smith

New Fiction

Arthur & George, by Julian Barnes

Downhill All the Way

An adroit new history of the British Empire in the post-Victorian era

A Close Read

Leaving Home, by Anita Brookner

Pursuits

Nova Scotia, Mon Amour

The province's quirks and inaccessibility are its very charms

The Singing Epidemic

All of a sudden everybody wants to be a jazz singer—and a few are actually good at it

Domestic Reserves

Americans no longer need to look abroad to satisfy their need for oil—Tuscan-style olive oil, that is

Who's Who

A selective index to this month's issue


Video

Miami: The Next Big Start-Up City?

How the city became a center for innovation

Video

Video

A Brief History of Romantic Comedies

From The Atlantic's Chris Orr

Video

Video

Life in 'the New Arctic'

A moving portrait of a fading landscape

Video

Video

The Rise of New York City

A fascinating look at Manhattan in the 1940s

Video

'I Thought It Was Really Funny, but No One Else Did'

A day with New Yorker cartoonist Joe Dator

Video

New Yorkers: The Winemaker

Make your own wine ... in New York City

Video

What Is Methane Hydrate?

"Flaming ice" is a vast natural energy source

Video

NASA's Time-Lapse of the Sun

Now with epic dubstep music

Video

A Video Letter From the Editor

Highlights from the May 2013 issue

Video

Shaken Not Tuned: Cocktail Experiments

Can a tuning fork improve a cocktail?

Video

Video

The Rise of Environmentalism

Tracking 50 years, from the Love Canal disaster to Greenpeace

Video

Is He Cheating? A 1950s Guide

'That little blonde secretary from the office?’

Video

New Yorkers: Vintage Vacuum-Tube Amps

Risking electric shock to restore old amplifiers

Video

The DIY Piano-Bicycle

Everybody needs a hobby

Writers

Up
Down
More back issues, Sept 1995 to present.

In Focus

2013 National Geographic Traveler Photo Contest