In a controversial new book on America’s debates over national security, Matthew Yglesias, associate editor of The Atlantic Monthly, presents a critical analysis of progressives’ failure to produce a coherent alternative to the conservative approach to foreign policy. Conventional examinations of progressives’ political difficulties in dealing with the national security issue focus on a perceived lack of "toughness." Heads in the Sand proposes a different theory: that progressives have had difficulty taking full advantage of the Bush administration’s failures because they’ve largely avoided arguing on the strategic level.
Rand Beers, President of the National Security Network and Kurt Campbell, Chief Executive Officer of the Center for a New American Security and co-author of Hard Power: The New Politics of National Security, will offer a critical analysis of the book’s argument from their perspectives as the leaders of two institutions working to engage in America’s national security and defense policy debates.
