A Southerner with a liberal viewpoint, Lyons comments on politics and national issues for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. He previously spent five years as general editor at Newsweek, and was associate editor at Texas Monthly for a year. A prolific author, Lyons has written hundreds of articles, essays and reviews for such magazines as Harpers, The New York Times Magazine, Entertainment Weekly, Esquire, Slate and Salon. His books include The Higher Illiteracy (University of Arkansas, 1988), Widows Web (Simon & Schuster, 1993), Fools for Scandal (Franklin Square, 1996) and, with Joe Conason, The Hunting of the President: The Ten Year Campaign to Destroy Bill and Hillary Clinton (St. Martins, 2000).

Lyons graduated from Rutgers University and earned a Ph.D. in English from the University of Virginia. He taught at the Universities of Mas