Brookings Today, 12/15/14

A roundup of some of the content published today at Brookings.

• The economics and politics of long-term budget projections. Henry Aaron, in one of three new working papers for the Hutchins Center on Fiscal and Monetary Policy, reviews four sets of federal budget projections. In the other papers, Alan Auerbach looks at fiscal uncertainty and how to deal with it; and David Kamin looks at designing legislation that responds to fiscal uncertainty.
• Afghanistan’s end game plan. Bruce Riedel says President Obama needs to revisit the decision to end the U.S. troop presence by 2017.
• The Nixon Sightings (part I). Steve Hess, author of The Professor and the President: Daniel Patrick Moynihan in the Nixon White House, recalls a key moment in his time working with Richard M. Nixon. In this story: the 1952 Republican Convention.
• How big is digital education in the U.S.? Josh Bleiberg and Darrell West offer an end-of-year review of the state of online learning in the U.S.
• Top five places retaining foreign students. Neil Ruiz ranks the top five metro areas that retain the most foreign students under the optional practical training (OPT) program that was recently expanded and extended by President Obama’s executive order.
• Egypt and speaking truth to power. H.A. Hellyer says Egypt’s recent refusal of entry for analyst Michele Dunne, an American Middle East scholar who has been publicly critical of Egyptian authorities, “speaks volumes and goes far beyond her own personal ability to travel to Egypt.”