Barack Obama

The war in Afghanistan was nasty and brutish, marked by the same imperial arrogance that doomed U.S. involvement in Vietnam.

Gay marriage was a victory, we’re told—but a victory for what?

Celebrations of multiculturalism obscure the country’s settler colonial history—and the role that immigrants play in perpetuating it.

Spencer Ackerman’s new book argues that the forever wars created the conditions for Trump’s rise.

America did exactly what the Kerner Commission on the urban riots of the mid-1960s advised against, and fifty years later reaped the consequences it predicted.

How the 33rd president finagled his way to a post–White House fortune — and created a damaging precedent.

Looking back on the George Floyd rebellion.

The recent ProPublica exposé shows we need to attack the wealth and power of the rich — and that means massively increasing taxes on them.

After 20 years of foreign policy failures following the attacks on the World Trade Center, America is finally rethinking its place in the world.

John Glenn's fan mail shows many girls dreamed of the stars.

Pulitzer-winning historian Annette Gordon-Reed reflects on the battle for the past and the fragile state of American democracy.

Too much has been lost already. The glue that holds humanity’s knowledge together is coming undone.

The famed economist’s theories were embraced by Beltway power brokers in both parties. Finally, a Democratic president is turning the page on a legacy of ruin.

From 1956–1978, Republicans backed D.C. representation, but now oppose it, reflecting a broader GOP shift against voting rights and toward partisan control.

As a political reporter, I've seen four Republican revolutions — Reagan’s, Gingrich’s, the Tea Party’s and Trump’s — each of which took the party farther right.

For too long, we've ignored our real history. We must face where truth can take us.

How conservative politicians and pundits became fixated on an academic approach.

In a book and documentary series, Henry Louis Gates Jr. offers a wide-ranging tour of Black religion in America.

Globalism is out. Nationalism is in. Progressives who think they can jump aboard are dangerously naive.

A new history of the Cuban missile crisis emphasizes how close the world came to destruction—and how severe a threat the weapons still pose.