Skip Navigation
James Fallows

James Fallows - James Fallows is a national correspondent for The Atlantic and has written for the magazine since the late 1970s. He has reported extensively from outside the United States, and once worked as President Carter's chief speechwriter. His latest book, China Airborne, will be published in May.
More

James Fallows is based in Washington as a national correspondent for The Atlantic. He has worked for the magazine for nearly 30 years and in that time has also lived in Seattle, Berkeley, Austin, Tokyo, Kuala Lumpur, Shanghai, and Beijing. He was raised in Redlands, California, received his undergraduate degree in American history and literature from Harvard, and received a graduate degree in economics from Oxford as a Rhodes scholar. In addition to working for The Atlantic, he has spent two years as chief White House speechwriter for Jimmy Carter, two years as the editor of US News & World Report, and six months as a program designer at Microsoft. He is an instrument-rated private pilot. He is also now the chair in U.S. media at the US Studies Centre at the University of Sydney, in Australia.

Fallows has been a finalist for the National Magazine Award five times and has won once; he has also won the American Book Award for nonfiction and a N.Y. Emmy award for the documentary series Doing Business in China. He was the founding chairman of the New America Foundation. His two most recent books, Blind Into Baghdad (2006) and Postcards From Tomorrow Square (2009), are based on his writings for The Atlantic; he is at work on another book about China. He is married to Deborah Fallows, author of the recent book Dreaming in Chinese. They have two married sons.

Fallows welcomes and frequently quotes from reader mail sent via the "Email" button below. Unless you specify otherwise, we consider any incoming mail available for possible quotation -- but not with the sender's real name unless you explicitly state that it may be used. If you are wondering why Fallows does not use a "Comments" field below his posts, please see previous explanations here and here.
« Previous Fallows | Next Fallows » Email Email Print Print

More on Chertoff's folly

By James Fallows

Jul 15 2007, 11:34 PM ET

The more I think about it, the more I marvel (as in previous item) at Sec. Chertoff's "gut feeling" comment. It's very much in the spirit of the wonderful "Demotivational" posters offered by Despair.com:



Think if Sec. Chertoff had been on hand at other big moments in history:



Valley Forge, 1778, Michael Chertoff (standing in for George Washington): I dunno, it's just a gut feeling, but I think the most powerful army on earth is going to crush us like bugs.


Hanoi, 1967, Michael Chertoff (standing in for Ho Chi Minh): See Valley Forge, above.


Albuquerque, NM, 1975, Michael Chertoff (standing in for Bill Gates): It's just a gut feeling, but I'm going to look like an idiot for dropping out of college and coming to cheap digs in the desert to start this company.


Superbowl XLI, 2007, Indianapolis Colts huddle, Michael Chertoff (standing in for Peyton Manning): Listen up, guys. It's just a gut feeling, but I don't think we're ever going to shake this "loser" curse.


And so on.


To do homage to the "serious" motivational posters for a moment: Attitude can't guarantee victory, but bad attitude can guarantee defeat.

Presented by

More at The Atlantic

Adulthood, Delayed: What Has the Recession Done to Millennials? Adulthood, Delayed: What's the Recession Done to Millennials?
What Matters in President Obama's 2013 Budget What Matters in President Obama's 2013 Budget
Will the Developing World Be Mobile First or Mobile Forever? The Developing World and Mobile Tech
Reading About Reading: How Tech is Making Us More Aware of the Ways We Read How Tech Is Making Us More Aware of the Ways We Read
The GOP Primary Is Badly Wounding Mitt Romney Why a Long Primary Fight Will Hurt Mitt Romney
Special Report
Submit Your Photos of America at Work AP Submit Your Photos of America at Work
Send us your images of friends, family, and neighbors on the job. We'll publish the best. Read more ›

Just In

Correspondents

View All Correspondents

The Biggest Story in Photos

Valentine's Day 2012

Feb 14, 2012

Subscribe Now

SAVE 59%! 10 issues JUST $2.45 PER COPY

Facebook

Newsletters

Sign up to receive our free newsletters

(sample)

(sample)

(sample)

(sample)

James Fallows
from the Magazine

Obama, Explained

As Barack Obama contends for a second term in office, two conflicting narratives of his presidency…

Barack Obama

Facing huge risks and holding inconclusive intel, the president makes a gutsy call to take out bin…

Hacked!

As email, documents, and almost every aspect of our professional and personal lives moves onto the…