George Packer
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Oliver Munday We Are Living in a Failed State
The coronavirus didn’t break America. It revealed what was already broken.
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Ernesto Artillo A Novelist’s Ambition to Define America
Robert Stone set out to capture the national condition in fiction, a goal that’s more relevant than ever.
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Photo rendering by Patrick White The President Is Winning His War on American Institutions
How Trump is destroying the civil service and bending the government to his will
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Jonathan Ernst / Reuters The Enemies of Writing
A writer who’s afraid to tell people what they don’t want to hear has chosen the wrong trade.
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Ashkan Shabani / Redux Killing Soleimani Was Worse Than a Crime
It was a blunder.
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Associated Press The Ulcer of Walter Flowers
In 1974, one congressman lay awake at night, agonizing over impeachment.
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Bettmann / Getty The Mafia Style in American Politics
Roy Cohn connects the McCarthy era to the age of Trump across more than half a century.
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Samantha Sais / Reuters The Michael Bennet Problem
What does it say about American politics that the Colorado senator hasn’t managed to stand out in the presidential race?
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Paul Spella When the Culture War Comes for the Kids
Caught between a brutal meritocracy and a radical new progressivism, a parent tries to do right by his children while navigating New York City’s schools.
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Jim Palmer / AP The Truth Teller
Leslie Gelb never stopped asking himself what practical steps a foreign crisis or puzzle might require.
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Bryan Woolston / Reuters The Left Needs a Language Potent Enough to Counter Trump
The president’s rhetoric is dangerously populist in nature, and the left doesn’t know how to fight it.
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Brian Frank / Reuters Buttigieg Looks to Truman, Not Obama, on Foreign Policy
The Democratic candidate is trying to reorient his party’s approach, tying international affairs back to the concerns of ordinary voters.
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Oliver Munday Doublethink Is Stronger Than Orwell Imagined
What 1984 means today
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Bernard Bisson / Sygma / Getty; Luca Bruno; ... The End of the American Century
What the life of Richard Holbrooke tells us about the decay of Pax Americana
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Keystone / Getty Is America Undergoing a Political Realignment?
A new Democratic coalition could be coming to power—but don’t count on it.
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Joshua Roberts / Reuters The Throwback Democrat
Sherrod Brown could help his party win back white working-class voters—but he’s out of sync with the mercilessness of American politics.
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Bryan Woolston / AP The Covington Story Was a Collective American Nightmare
It showed where America is, and where it’s going.
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Frank Augstein / AP What Julian Assange and Donald Trump Have in Common
They share enemies—and they use similarly nihilistic tactics toward similarly antidemocratic ends.
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Gary Cameron / Reuters The Suicide of a Great Democracy
A shutdown looks like the beginning of the end that Lincoln always knew was possible.
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Rodi Said / Reuters No Peace for Them and No Honor for Us
Trump’s withdrawal from Syria is most notable for its needless cruelty.
