Spotlight
UNGA Pressure: An Insider’s Guide to Diplomacy’s Biggest Week
By: Sarah Gruen · 08/11/2026
As the former Director of Speechwriting for the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, UNGA was my Super Bowl (right down to the halftime
The Name is Mamdani.
By: West Wing Writers · 01/13/2026
Zohran Mamdani is a relentlessly disciplined messenger on affordability. So it’s all the more interesting when he gives a speech about something else. A week
What Abraham Lincoln Understood About the Founders
By: Jeff Shesol · 09/15/2025
Co-founder and Executive Director Jeff Shesol reviews a new book by Akhil Reed Amar that paints a sprawling portrait of 19th-century America in thrall to
In an Era of Deep Polarization, Unity Is Not Trump’s Mission
By: Jeff Shesol · 09/15/2025
Co-founder and Executive Director Jeff Shesol comments on the President’s failure to unify the country in moments of tragedy, in the New York Times.
A Murder Mystery Is Revisited in the #MeToo Era
By: Janet Potter · 02/21/2023
Janet Potter reviews Rebecca Makkai’s I Have Some Questions for You, a boarding school novel and a murder mystery, and the story of a woman reexamining
White House Aides Keep Trying to Torch the State of the Union Address. Presidents Keep Getting in the Way.
By: Jeff Shesol · 02/07/2023
In 1998, Jeff Shesol, a speechwriter in Bill Clinton’s White House, wrote an internal memo calling for a shorter, tighter speech that focused on one
Does the State of the Union Speech Matter Anymore? Here’s What an Expert Says
By: Jeff Shesol · 02/07/2023
Former Clinton speechwriter Jeff Shesol on how the effectiveness of the State of the Union addresses has changed over time — and why.
The State of the Union Shouldn’t Be Self-care for Presidents
By: Jeff Shesol · 02/07/2023
The State of the Union address is often described, charitably, as a tradition. What it has become, really, is a nostalgia act — an aging
The Secret to Wealth Is Giving Up Pointless Expenses (and Other Lessons from My Twenty-Eight-Dollar Book)
More Americans than ever are struggling to make ends meet. Is this because wages have remained stagnant while expenses creep up? Could it be that
Metropolitan Diary: Barney Greengrass
By: Sarah Gruen · 01/08/2023
Sarah Gruen quiets down on her first pilgrimage to a New York institution.
Dear Diary:
One Saturday this past
When Freedom Meant the Freedom to Oppress Others
By: Jeff Shesol · 12/12/2022
Jefferson Cowie’s powerful and sobering new history, Freedom’s Dominion, traces the close association between the rhetoric of liberty in an Alabama county and the politics
I’m the New York City Marathon, and We Need to Set Some Boundaries
By: West Wing Writers · 11/03/2022
We need to talk. I’ve really enjoyed getting to know you, but I’m worried you’re looking for something a little more serious than what I
If I Emailed My Parents Like Democrats Email Me
SUBJECT: I’m DESPERATE, Mom
Mom, did you see this?!?
FIRST: I got a $300 traffic ticket because I forgot about alternate
Vice President Harris’ Director of Speechwriting Rejoins West Wing Writers
By: Kate Childs Graham · 05/02/2022
Washington, D.C. — Today, West Wing Writers announced that Kate Childs Graham has rejoined the firm’s Washington, DC office as a Senior Advisor. Childs Graham returns to
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