Ray Kelly’s approach to policing has made New York safer than it’s ever been. It’s also fueled bitterness among the city’s cops, who are crying foul at the statistics-obsessed, micromanaging culture. Could the biggest threat to the department right now be the cratered morale of its rank and file? By Chris Smith
On the Cover: Ray Kelly. Photograph by Christopher Anderson/Magnum Photo/New York Magazine.

Features

“It Won’t Hurt You. It’s Vapor.”

Bill Maher is a dope-smoking, God-hating, stripper-loving Hollywood liberal—exactly the kind of upstanding citizen that Democrats were praying would donate $1 million to Obama’s super-PAC. By Joe Hagan

Born This Way

Is political ideology a choice, or is it hardwired into us? New research posits it’s our DNA that determines our vote—and that the country’s partisan divide may have less to do with geography and class than it does with how many friends we had in high school and whether or not we like motorcycles. By Sasha Issenberg