The Cautious American President

At the end of his first term, President Obama’s public foreign policy in the Middle East has reflected his presidency as a whole: cautious, measured, haunted by its own high-blown rhetoric, and in many ways a deep disappointment to the young idealists who flocked to vote for him. In private, he has presided over a huge covert expansion of American spying and paramilitary operations against Al-Qaeda and its affiliates in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Yemen—and this is to say nothing of the hardl...

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Above the Law

Libya is gearing up for country-wide polls to elect a General National Congress on 7 July in what is promised to be the nation’s first free vote since 1969. Around 2,500 candidates are competing for 200 seats in the transitional parliament, tasked with appointing a prime minister and a cabinet, as well as electing an additional 60-member constituent assembly, split evenly among the Tripolitania, Cyrenaica and Fezzan regions. Voter turnout is expected to reach 2.2 million—that’s 80 ...

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