Government & Politics

Journalist Mike Chinoy, author of Meltdown: The Inside Story of the North Korean Nuclear Crisis, discusses North Korea's development of nuclear weapons and America's attempts to stop their program.

Why is it that government has expanded under an administration that claims to be against big government? Social critic Thomas Frank poses this question in his new book, The Wrecking Crew.

United States security has long been a primary issue for the conservative movement. But is an aggressive foreign policy actually counterproductive? Author J. Peter Scoblic says yes.

To win this coming election, presidential candidate John McCain must prove that he is as strong on the economy as he is on military and foreign affairs. His senior economic adviser, Douglas Holtz-Eakin, discusses McCain's approach to economic policy.

Parsing the presidential candidates' tax plans is necessary to understanding their general takes on the economy. Economist Len Burman has been doing just that. He is a senior fellow at the Urban Institute, which has just released a report comparing the candidates' proposed tax policies.

Jason Furman has been given the task of formulating Barack Obama's economic policy. He's the presidential hopeful's top economic adviser, and he will talk about where Obama stands on the most pressing economic issues.

Lt. Col. John Nagl wrote the textbook on counterinsurgency — literally. Nagl was part of the team that drafted a U.S. Army field manual on counterinsurgency. Having completed his tour in Iraq, Nagl talks about how military theory was put into practice in the region.

For soldier Brian Turner, words have the impact of bullets. His poems provide a first- person account of war; The New York Times praised their "attention to both the terrors and the beauty he found among Iraq's ruins."

The Republican Party has often been stereotyped as the party of wealthy, old white men. Conservative writers Ross Douthat and Reihan Salam think that can change. Their new book, Grand New Party, offers a vision for expanding the Republican base.

According to investigative journalist Jane Mayer, the war on terrorism may have done as much political and social damage to the United States as terrorism itself. Mayer writes for The New Yorker, and she recently published The Dark Side.

Barack Obama has been portrayed as an outsider candidate — an idealist not mired in the political game. But Ryan Lizza says that a look at Obama's political history in Chicago might offer a different view of the candidate. Lizza is the Washington correspondent for The New Yorker, and has been tracking the Obama campaign.

Fresh Air's TV critic has a look at the new HBO miniseries, created by The Wire's David Simon and Ed Burns. Generation Kill focuses on a unit of Marines during the first 40 days of the Iraq war.

Narcotics busts and daring rescues are just ordinary parts of John Rebus' work. Critic John Powers talks about the fictional British detective, protagonist of Ian Rankin's novels and an eponymous TV show.

Before Tony Montana, there was Meyer Lansky. True-crime writer T.J. English recounts the history of a mob-ruled Havana before the 1959 revolution.

With plenty of nods to The Great Gatsby Joseph O'Neill's Netherland explores dreams and ambition in post-Sept. 11 New York City. Maureen Corrigan calls the novel "marvelous."

Journalist James Glanz is Baghdad bureau chief for The New York Times; he's just reported on a government study criticizing the Bush administration for broadly overstating certain gains in Iraq.

The '60s sitcom was often a one-joke affair; the film's starry-eyed geek has room for nuance. You can make a case for both Maxes, but critic David Edelstein misses the tube's lovable boob. Anne Hathaway's Agent 99, now ... that's another matter.

In his new book, Torture Team, international lawyer Philippe Sands argues that the Bush administration's interrogation policy constitutes a war crime.

Actor Liev Schreiber had what he thought was a good idea: He'd reach out to a Baghdad film student, offering him an internship on a shoot. But as Nina Davenport's documentary proves, good intentions don't always end in good outcomes. Critic-at-large John Powers has a review.

Nathan Hodge and Sharon Weinberger are nontraditional tourists who explore missile silos, test sites, and bomb shelters. The two just published A Nuclear Family Vacation: Travels in the World of Atomic Weaponry, a chronicle of their travels to nuclear landmarks across ten states and fives countries.