“Given the risks of military action, the United States must make a final, good-faith attempt to negotiate a halt to Tehran’s nuclear program early in the Trump administration ,” went the teaser text for an article by Richard Nephew in a social media post from Foreign Affairs on the first full day of the current presidential term in January. As it happens, the U.S. did exactly that before engaging in military action that has, as of this writing, proven almost laughably risk-free. But what is notable about it now is one particular word: that smug “must,” a word that inserts a tone of authority into all sorts of journalistic writing that possesses neither the power nor, apparently, the knowledge to be issuing imperatives almost as though written in the tone of God.

Confession: I have a

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