Elect the Guy Who Can Prevent This

Fannie and Freddie, health-care reform, and Wasilla, Alaska, are just meaningless election “commentary” to Jeffrey Goldberg, who writes in the New York Times that nuclear terrorism is the only issue that matters. Proliferation experts say the chance of a terrorist group detonating an atomic bomb in the US could be as high as 50%. And neither candidate seems wholly prepared.

Barack Obama takes the issue seriously, and he’s far from the “squashy caricature drawn by his opponents.” But Goldberg fears he’ll be afraid to take preemptive action, scared off by George Bush’s Iraq adventure. John McCain doesn’t have that problem, but he has several others: He’s not cautious enough, and worse, seems unclear on who we’re actually fighting. America must demand these men debate the issue, Goldberg says, “because nothing else matters.” (More terrorism stories.)