"Campaign 2012: Twelve Independent Ideas for Improving American Public Policy" is an indispensable guide to the questions facing White House hopefuls in 2012, as well as the challenges awaiting the winner. It presents authoritative analyses of a dozen key policy issues currently testing the nation:

-domestic economic growth

-America's role in the world

-the budget deficit

-China relations

-health care

-Afghanistan and Pakistan

-federalism

-Iran

-reforming government institutions

-the Middle East

-climate change

-terrorism

This is truly Brookings at its best --independent expert analysis, presented in an accessible manner and offering viable solutions.

Just in time for the first Supreme Court confirmation of the Obama administration, one of America's most insightful legal commentators updates the critically acclaimed Confirmation Wars: Preserving Independent Courts in Angry Times to place the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor in the context of the changing nature of judicial nominations by recent presidents. Our system has gone from one in which people like Sotomayor or recent highly qualified nominees like John Roberts and Samuel Alito are shoe-ins for confirmation to a system in which they are shoe-ins for confirmation confrontations. While rejecting parodies offered by both the Right and Left of the decline of the process by which the United States Senate confirms-or rejects-the president's nominees to the federal judiciary, Wittes explains why and how this change took place. He argues that the trade has been a bad one-offering only the crudest check on executive appointments to the judiciary and putting nominees in the most untenable and unfair situations. Published in cooperation with the Hoover Institution

In Confirmation Wars, Benjamin Wittes rejects the parodies offered by both the Right and Left of the decline of the process by which the United States Senate confirms_or rejects_the presidentOs nominees to the federal judiciary. He draws on original reporting and new historical research to provide a more accurate understanding of the current climate. He argues that the transformations the process has undergone should not be understood principally in partisan terms but as an institutional response on the part of the legislative branch to the growth of judicial power in the past five decades. While some change may have been inevitable, the increasing aggressiveness of the SenateOs conception of its function poses significant challenges for maintaining independent courts over the long term. The problem, Wittes argues, lies both in the extortionate quality of modern confirmations, in which senators make their votes contingent on reassurance by the nominees about substantive areas of concern, and in the possibility that the breakdown of the confirmation process represents a far larger effort by the Senate to rein in judicial power. Wittes offers several strategies for managing the political conflict surrounding nominations, strategies that seek to protect the independence of the courts and the prerogative of the president to choose judges while maximizing the utility to democratic government of a Senate that takes its advice and consent role seriously. Most importantly, Wittes argues for ending the relatively new practice of having nominees testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Published in cooperation with the Hoover Institution.

From drone warfare in the Middle East to digital spying, today's governments have harnessed the power of cutting-edge technology to awesome effect. But what happens when ordinary people have the same tools at their fingertips? Advances in cybertechnology, biotechnology and robotics mean that more people than ever before have access to potentially dangerous technologies - from drones to computer networks and biological agents - which could be used to attack states and private citizens alike. In The Future of Violence, security experts Benjamin Wittes and Gabriella Blum detail the myriad possibilities and enormous risks present in the modern world, and argue that if our national governments can no longer adequately protect us from harm, they will lose their legitimacy. They explain how governments, companies and citizens must rethink their efforts to protect our lives and liberty. As a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and co-director of the Harvard Law School-Brookings Project on Law and Security, Benjamin Wittes is arguably the Unites States' leading expert on security and law. Gabriella Blum is the Rita E. Hauser Professor of Human Rights and Humanitarian Law at Harvard University.

What would the Father of the Constitution think of contemporary developments in American politics and public policy? Constitutional scholars have long debated whether the American political system, which was so influenced by the thinking of James Madison, has in fact grown outmoded. But if Madison himself could peer at the present, what would he think of the state of key political institutions that he helped originate and the government policies that they produce? In What Would Madison Do?, ten prominent scholars explore the contemporary performance of Madison's constitutional legacy and how much would have surprised him. John DiIulio Jr (University of Pennsylvania) observes the failure of today's policymakers to address adequately the nation's long-range financial liabilities and considers the need for constitutional reforms. William Galston (Brookings Institution) examines significant departures from the framers' intentions: most notably, the implications of the rise of political parties and the ascent of ""direct versus representative democracy."" Pietro Nivola (Brookings Institution) makes the case that our old political system, now so often said to be dysfunctional, actually acquitted itself comparatively well in contending with the recent Great Recession. R. Shep Melnick (Boston College) challenges the common presumption that the U.S. government is gridlocked and surveys the robust record of policy accomplishments in the past couple of decades. Jonathan Rauch (Brookings Institution) argues that America's political process continues to encourage useful compromise, much as Madison intended. Jack Rakove (Stanford University) ponders what Madison would think of the contemporary United States Senate and the chamber's rules or practices that often facilitate obstruction. Martha Derthick (University of Virginia) contemplates how startled Madison would be by the federal government's extensive involvement nowadays in ""local and particular"" concerns of states and localities. Eugene Hickok, a former deputy secretary of education, discusses Madison's devotion to education in the young nation and invites us to wonder how he might view the educational system's current condition. Lynn Uzzell (Montpelier's Center for the Constitution) reflects on how Madison might have regarded the judicial role in resolving constitutional disputes such as those stirred by laws like the Affordable Care Act. Benjamin Wittes (Brookings Institution) and Ritika Singh (Lawfare) look at the age-old tension between national security interests and safeguarding civil liberties - from Madison's own perspective and from that of the present day.

From drone warfare in the Middle East to digital spying by the National Security Agency, the U.S. government has harnessed the power of cutting-edge technology to awesome effect. But what happens when ordinary people have the same tools at their fingertips? Advances in cybertechnology, biotechnology, and robotics mean that more people than ever before have access to potentially dangerous technologies,from drones to computer networks and biological agents,which could be used to attack states and private citizens alike.In The Future of Violence , law and security experts Benjamin Wittes and Gabriella Blum detail the myriad possibilities, challenges, and enormous risks present in the modern world, and argue that if our national governments can no longer adequately protect us from harm, they will lose their legitimacy. Consequently, governments, companies, and citizens must rethink their security efforts to protect lives and liberty. In this brave new world where many little brothers are as menacing as any Big Brother, safeguarding our liberty and privacy may require strong domestic and international surveillance and regulatory controls. Maintaining security in this world where anyone can attack anyone requires a global perspective, with more multinational forces and greater action to protect (and protect against) weaker states who do not yet have the capability to police their own people. Drawing on political thinkers from Thomas Hobbes to the Founders and beyond, Wittes and Blum show that, despite recent protestations to the contrary, security and liberty are mutually supportive, and that we must embrace one to ensure the other. The Future of Violence is at once an introduction to our emerging world,one in which students can print guns with 3-D printers and scientists' manipulations of viruses can be recreated and unleashed by ordinary people,and an authoritative blueprint for how government must adapt in order to survive and protect us.

An authoritative assessment of the new laws of war and a sensible and sophisticated roadmap for the future of liberty in the Age of Terror
America is losing a crucial front in the ongoing war on terror. It is losing not to Al Qaeda, but to its own failure to construct a set of laws that will protect the American people during this global conflict. As debate continues to rage over the legality and ethics of war, Benjamin Wittes enters the fray with a sober-minded exploration of law in wartime that is definitive, accessible, and nonpartisan. Outlining how this country came to its current impasse over human rights and counterterrorism, "Law and the Long War" paves the way toward fairer, more accountable rules for a conflict without end.

"At the beginning of the twenty-first century, breathtaking changes in technology are posing stark challenges to our constitutional values. From free speech to privacy, from liberty and personal autonomy to the right against self-incrimination, basic constitutional principles are under stress from technological advances unimaginable even a few decades ago, let alone during the founding era. In this provocative collection, America's leading scholars of technology, law, and ethics imagine how to translate and preserve constitutional and legal values at a time of dizzying technological change. Constitution 3.0 explores some of the most urgent constitutional questions of the near future. Will privacy become obsolete, for example, in a world where ubiquitous surveillance is becoming the norm? Imagine that Facebook and Google post live feeds from public and private surveillance cameras, allowing 24/7 tracking of any citizen in the world. How can we protect free speech now that Facebook and Google have more power than any king, president, or Supreme Court justice to decide who can speak and who can be heard? How will advanced brain-scan technology affect the constitutional right against self-incrimination? And on a more elemental level, should people have the right to manipulate their genes and design their own babies? Should we be allowed to patent new forms of life that seem virtually human? The constitutional challenges posed by technological progress are wide-ranging, with potential impacts on nearly every aspect of life in America and around the world. The authors include Jamie Boyle, Duke Law School; Eric Cohen and Robert George, Princeton University; Jack Goldsmith, Harvard Law School; Orin Kerr, George Washington University Law School; Lawrence Lessig, Harvard Law School; Stephen Morse, University of Pennsylvania Law School; John Robertson, University of Texas Law School; Christopher Slobogin, Vanderbilt Law School; O. Carter Snead, Notre Dame Law School; Jeffrey Rosen, George Washington University Law School; Benjamin Wittes, Brookings Institution; Tim Wu, Columbia Law School; and Jonathan Zittrain, Harvard Law School. "