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, was published in early 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. His latest book, China Airborne, was published in early May. 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

Last word on heroes of the Bush administration

By James Fallows

Sep 19 2007, 8:59 AM ET

I'm declaring the voting closed on people whose reputations are better and place-in-history improved by virtue of service under GW Bush.

Overall winner: Christopher Hill, State Department careerist now in charge of North Korean negotiations. Better known than he was six years ago, and in a good way!

Dark-horse category winner: Sandy Randt, Yale classmate of GW Bush who has been ambassador to China since the beginning of the Administration; lawyer and Mandarin-speaker, unknown to 300 million Americans but respected by 1.3 billion Chinese.

Interesting honorable mentions in their own special categories: Robert Gates (backing down from Donald Rumsfeld); Robert Zoellick (backing down from Paul Wolfowitz); conceivably David Petraeus, depending how the next 18 months goes. Possibly Patrick Fitzgerald, with the ambiguous legacy of his prosecutions? (Bad for the Bush administration; also bad for the press.) Also depending on the next 18 months, Henry Paulson?

Honorary winners (technically disqualified since they're not part of the administration but instead feed off it): Jon Stewart; Stephen Colbert; staff of The Onion.

Presented by

More at The Atlantic

Gawker Gives Comments Some Love, and Now We Know Why Gawker Gives Comments Some Love, and Now We Know Why
Watch and Buy: Kickstarter Is the Hipster Home Shopping Network Kickstarter Is the Hipster Home Shopping Network
Picture of the Day: The Bright, Burning Sun Picture of the Day: The Burning Sun
Buying a Piece of America: Why Chinese Shoppers Love U.S. Brands Why Chinese Shoppers Love American Brands
Love in the Time of Syrian Revolution Love in the Time of Revolution

Correspondents

View All Correspondents

The Biggest Story in Photos

The American West, 150 Years Ago

May 24, 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)

(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…