Books on political affairs and current events come regularly and many pack a partisan punch. This is especially true in the intense political season of a presidential campaign. Publishers have been releasing title after title into the political torrent.

Books on political affairs and current events come regularly and many pack a partisan punch. This is especially true in the intense political season of a presidential campaign. Publishers have been releasing title after title into the political torrent.

Fergus M. Bordewich has written what is best described as a biography of Washington, D.C. In Washington: The Making of the American Capital (Amistad Books/HarperCollins), Bordewich traces the history of America’s Capital City, telling that story with a compelling narrative and fascinating (and surprising) details.

The decade of the 1970s is now a generation behind us, but the cultural and political movements of that pivotal decade set the stage for so much of what we face in our current times.  In terms of national politics, two great developments stand out.  On the Left, the nomination of Sen. George McGovern became the pivotal event of the decade, even as the rise of a reinvigorated conservatism became the great event on the Right.

The history of African-American theology raises one key question — What happened? Thabiti M. Anyabwile, now senior pastor of the First Baptist Church, Grand Cayman Islands, answers this question in The Decline of African American Theology: From Biblical Faith to Cultural Captivity [InterVarsity Press]. Anyabwile traces a road from biblical orthodoxy to theological liberalism in the mainstream of African-American theology.

Sen. Barack Obama has quickly emerged as a major political force in America, and if predictions and polling projections hold, he will emerge the big winner of today’s New Hampshire primary. This means that many Americans are trying to understand this man and the meaning of his candidacy. Few persons can match Shelby Steele in terms of cultural analysis. A research fellow at the Hoover Institution, Steele is one of the nation’s most insightful analysts on a host of issues, including race. His earlier book, The Content of our Character: A New Vision of Race in America is one of the most significant works on race to emerge in this generation. That book was brave, insightful, and deservedly influential.

The threat of nuclear weapons in North Korean is deeply troubling. The very idea that the Hermit Kingdom could be armed with nuclear weapons is enough to send the rest of the world into a state of international anxiety. The political and military dimensions of the Korean quandary are complex and unclear.