Public scandals are America's favorite parlor sport. Learning about the flaws and misdeeds of the rich and famous seems to satisfy our egalitarian yearnings.

Presidents by six years have been there long enough for the media and the country to see their flaws.

Despite its flaws, the American electoral system has produced Lincoln, the two Roosevelts, and Harry Truman.

What makes war interesting for Americans is that we don't fight war on our soil, we don't have direct experience of it, so there's an openness about the meanings we give to it.

Allegations that President Clinton pardoned Marc Rich partly in return for donations to his presidential library have raised questions about the value of such institutions and the federal appropriations that support them.

There was a president who was much less healthy than the public image of him conveyed. If [the public] knew about it in 1960, I doubt that he would have been elected.