Sometimes events overtake us. When we at the WQ first learned
about this article last spring, we were eager to bring it to our
readers. It seemed to us that James Billington's argument that the
Soviet Union was in the midst not of a revolution but of what he
calls a "fever break" was vitally important. We were not alone. In
late May, Billington, the Librarian of Congress and a leading histo-
rian of Russian culture, was invited to present his paper at the
residence of the U.S....