Aung San Suu Kyi has shown great strength as Burma’s opposition leader. During her years of house arrest, she became a symbol of freedom and democracy. Yet these qualities will not necessarily bode well for a potential presidency, given the demands of governing a divided country.
Focusing on the executive actions you can take without Congress is a great idea, Mr. President.
For many Democrat voters, John McCain represents the least bad Republican presidential candidate on the ballot. Democrats not wanting the Bible in the White House are disinclined toward southern Baptist Mike Huckabee, and those not wanting a doubled-in-size Guantanamo or an immigrant-free America find Mitt Romney completely unlikable. McCain seems to be the most willing to build bipartisan coalitions, the most willing to give detainees legal representation, and the most willing to tackle global warming  all of which makes many Democrat voters fonder of McCain than any other Republican candidate.
The strong showings by Senator Barack Obama of Illinois in the early contests for the Democratic presidential nomination don’t just mark a repudiation of the Bush administration’s Iraq policy and “war on terrorism.” They also indicate a rejection of the Democratic Party establishment, much of which supported the invasion of Iraq and other tragic elements of the administration’s foreign policy.
When Condoleezza Rice traveled to Liberia to celebrate the inauguration of Africa’s first woman president Monday, it was an inspiring sign that women of African descent are reaching new levels of political leadership and recognition. Yet Liberia’s new president, Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, will need more than photo-ops with the America’s first female African-American secretary of State to lift her country out of the ruins of two decades of war. Dr. Rice and other US officials who traveled to the inauguration must bring a serious commitment to help jump-start Liberia’s economic recovery.