5 Posts found for Author: James Fallows

Being president is impossible. […] To “succeed” in the job, a person needs a broader range of skills than any real human being has ever possessed. Public eloquence. Private persuasive power. IQ. EQ. Stamina. Luck. A generous imagination, but also cold-bloodedness. A thousand traits more. The question is not whether any president will “fail.” It is in which particular way, and how the world will … [ Read more ]

Author: James Fallows | Source: The Atlantic | Subjects: America, International, Politics & Public Policy

This to me is the most consistent marker of real intelligence. The more acute someone’s ability to perceive and assess, the more likely that person is to recognize his or her limits. These include the unevenness of any one person’s talents; the specific areas of weakness—social awkwardness, musical tin ear, being stronger with numbers than with words, or vice versa; and the incomparable vastness of … [ Read more ]

Author: James Fallows | Source: The Atlantic | Subjects: Education | Scholarship, Intelligence | Knowledge

Strictly idealistic undertakings eventually become too costly—in money, lives, and other assets. Wholly expedient and self-interested strategies eventually offend America’s self-image as a nobler exception among nations. Thus the story of American engagement with the world is the continual effort to find the right combination of idealism and practicality, and to readjust that balance almost as soon as it is set.

Author: James Fallows | Subjects: Foreign Policy, International

In my cover story in the December issue of the magazine, on how the United States should prepare for the possibility of a more truculent and repressive China, I mention the concept of the “Thucydides Trap.” The article describes the implications:

This concept was popularized by the Harvard political scientist [and my one-time professor as an undergraduate] Graham Allison. Its premise is that through the 2,500

… [ Read more ]

Author: James Fallows | Source: The Atlantic (December 17, 2016) | Subjects: Articles & Links, Excerpts, Politics & Public Policy, Trump

Is America going to hell? After a year of economic calamity that many fear has sent us into irreversible decline, the author finds reassurance in the peculiarly American cycle of crisis and renewal, and in the continuing strength of the forces that have made the country great: our university system, our receptiveness to immigration, our culture of innovation. In most significant ways, the U.S. remains … [ Read more ]

Author: James Fallows | Source: The Atlantic (January2010) | Subjects: America, Articles & Links