It’s become difficult to decipher between reality and alarmism these days. To add insult to injury, President Trump can’t seem to take two steps without being ridiculed from every direction. The latest point of contention has been his decision to disengage from the Paris Climate Accord (PCA). But is all the noise justified? Perhaps not, Read More…
In April Senator Jon Tester joined an unsuccessful partisan effort to filibuster Judge Neil Gorsuch’s nomination to the Supreme Court. To justify his actions, Tester said at the time, “With Judge Gorsuch on the bench, I am deeply concerned that dark money will continue to drown out the voices and votes of citizens.” It seems Read More…
As the 2017 legislative session has come to an end, we want to make sure that Montanans have a clear view of what’s happened the past few months in Helena. The mission of the Senate and House Republicans from Day One has been to help create more opportunities for all Montanans by making our state Read More…
The special election to select a new congressman for Montana is less than 80 days away and the process for conducting the election has been turned into a political football. First, Gov. Steve Bullock scheduled the election at the earliest possible time, 85 days after Ryan Zinke resigned to serve as President Trump’s secretary Read More…
(The Conversation is an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts.) (THE CONVERSATION) The recent terrorist attacks in Spain and Finland once again compel us to ask: Who joins the Islamic State, and why? As a professor of modern Middle Eastern history, I have spent the majority of my professional Read More…
(The Conversation is an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts.) (THE CONVERSATION) Saturday, August 19 is World Humanitarian Day – a time to remember the tremendous humanitarian need around the world. World Humanitarian Day is also a time to remember the sacrifice of those who risk their lives to Read More…
(The Conversation is an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts.) (THE CONVERSATION) Editor’s note: The following is a roundup of archival stories related to the debate over what to do with Confederate statues. The impetus for the “Unite the Right” rally held in Charlottesville, Virginia on August 12 was Read More…
With its compelling action scenes and incoherent plot, the Charlize Theron spy thriller “Atomic Blonde” received mixed reviews. Even critics who praised it acknowledged its flaws. No one, however, thought it was kiddie fare. Except, that is, the people sitting next to us at the AMC Century City in Los Angeles. They brought two children Read More…
The terror attacks we just witnessed in Spain and Finland aren’t the “new normal.” Terrorism is inherently abnormal. But it is the new norm. With the caliphate in collapse in the Middle East, these low-cost/high-payoff attacks loom ever larger for ISIS and other terror franchises: They keep the message alive and grab global publicity. Attacks Read More…
X Story Stream recent articles “They had found a leader, Robert E. Lee — and what a leader! … No military leader since Napoleon has aroused such enthusiastic devotion among troops as did Lee when he reviewed them on his horse Traveller.” So wrote Samuel Eliot Morison in his magisterial “The Oxford History of the Read More…
X Story Stream recent articles Due to the rise of prenatal screening tests in Europe and the United States, the number of babies born with Down syndrome has begun to diminish significantly. And no one, as CBS News puts it, is “eradicating Down syndrome births” quite like Iceland. Now, the word “eradication” typically implies that Read More…
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Defense Secretary Jim Mattis insist that the United States will seek to stop North Korea’s nuclear-missile program through economic pressure “backed by military options.” There is a middle ground, however — and it might be the most effective way to stop North Korea. The administration has good reasons for Read More…
Last week, President Trump promised to “spend a lot of time, a lot of effort and a lot of money on the opioid crisis,” which he declared a “national emergency.” Judging from the president’s campaign rhetoric and his comments since taking office, which have focused on building a border wall to “stop the drugs,” much Read More…
New York Democrats, unwilling to be left out of the hyper-emotional feeding frenzy over removing Confederate-linked imagery, are racing to get in on the action. Indeed, they’re searching high and low for something — anything — to obliterate in the name of social justice. (Not to mention political self-promotion.) Mayor de Blasio, for starters, sanctimoniously Read More…
Steve Bannon’s White House departure Friday was largely predictable — but not so its impact on Donald Trump’s presidency. At the least, it may help stem some of the infighting among Trump’s staff that has frequently undercut the president’s ability to push his agenda. Bannon’s removal became all but certain when he gave an interview Read More…
Business is booming. Job productivity is up. Despite the left-wing lies that coal was not coming back, miners are mining like never before. Industry is rebranding and expanding, and educational reforms are underway with Betsy DeVos and her team in the Department of Education. Trump has trumped the media yet again, refusing to cave to Read More…
It is always maddening for me to hear left-wingers criticize those toward their right of being “unAmerican” and “unpatriotic.” It is maddening because the left, by its very nature anti-American, is by definition unpatriotic. This is not meant to be a criticism, even though there are doubtless individual leftists who will take it as an Read More…
While most of the US press was totally fixated on attaching the labels of racist, bigot, and white supremacist to the President, it totally missed one of the biggest stories in a generation—a nuclear war with North Korea was averted. The Cuban Missile Crisis occurred during the 13 days from October 16th to the 28th Read More…
The video that appeared more often than any other on my TV screen this past week showed protestors toppling a statue of a confederate soldier in Durham, North Carolina. Then kicking it, stomping on it, spitting at it. The Workers World Party is the group that pulled off this feat and they were also involved Read More…
“Nobody wants to buy something that was made by exploiting someone else,” Ben & Jerry’s and Fair Trade co-founder Jerry Greenfield likes to tell us. Let’s hope he doesn’t drive an electric vehicle, doesn’t use a laptop or cell phone, and doesn’t rely on wind or solar power. We’re constantly confronted with slogans and lectures Read More…
Health care is at the front line in a power play for America. A White House official announced Wednesday that the Trump administration will continue President Barack Obama’s unconstitutional payment of cost-sharing reduction (CSR) subsidies to insurers through August. Despite outward appearances and media commentary, this is not ultimately about health care. The Affordable Care Read More…
“Racism is evil — and those who cause violence in its name are criminals and thugs, including KKK, neo-Nazis, white supremacists, and other hate groups are repugnant to everything we hold dear as Americans.” (President Donald Trump, August, 14.) I now call your attention to this video of a lynching (warning, graphic.) Please note the Read More…
Obscured by the tumult surrounding President Trump’s horrendous response to the violence in Charlottesville, Va., the White House managed to take a significant positive step this week: issuing an executive order designed to lower regulatory barriers to infrastructure projects, and to speed up and simplify the process for obtaining necessary permits and clearances. It wasn’t Read More…
X Story Stream recent articles This year will mark my 30th anniversary as a syndicated columnist. During these years, I have written more words than I would have preferred about race. But race is America’s great moral stain and unending challenge. I’ve tackled school choice, affirmative action, transracial adoption, crime, police conduct, family structure, poverty, Read More…
Conservative: Mismeasuring the Trump Riddle Pollsters measuring President Trump’s popularity tend to ignore the “astonishing” fact that 60 percent of all voters had an unfavorable impression of him even back on the day he was elected, recalls Byron York at the Washington Examiner. Current polls show him at virtually the same level. Indeed, “considering all Read More…
X Story Stream recent articles WASHINGTON (AP) — Steve Bannon, the blunt-spoken and divisive strategist who rose from Donald Trump’s conservative campaign to a top White House post, was pushed out by the president Friday, capping a turbulent seven months that now has seen the departure of much of his senior staff. The former leader Read More…
X Story Stream recent articles Speaking truth to power: Nothing is more difficult, especially in politics. In business, after all, people have contracts and stock options, and if nothing else, at least they can find similar jobs at other companies. But there’s no such thing in government. There’s one treasury secretary, one head of the Read More…
X Story Stream recent articles WASHINGTON — Donald Trump has dropped all pretense and proudly raised the banner of white racial grievance. The time has come for Republicans in Congress to decide whether this is what they signed up for. Business leaders decided Wednesday that they’d had enough, quitting two presidential advisory councils before Trump Read More…
(The Conversation is an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts.) (THE CONVERSATION) A new study from Harvard has found greater risk of breast cancer in women who live in neighborhoods that have higher levels of outdoor light during the night. The findings are based on the Nurses’ Health Study Read More…
X Story Stream recent articles “O mother What shall I cry? We demand a committee, a representative committee, a committee of investigation RESIGN RESIGN RESIGN” — T.S. Eliot, “Difficulties of a Statesman” WASHINGTON — Many have asked with rising hope in their voices: Will Steve Bannon be fired? It would certainly be ironic for the Read More…
X Story Stream recent articles WASHINGTON — Intelligence officers sometimes talk about “blowback,” when covert actions go bad and end up damaging the country that initiated them. A year later, that is surely the case with Russia’s secret attempt to meddle in the U.S. presidential election, which has brought a string of adverse unintended consequences Read More…
X Story Stream recent articles There’s a whiff of Weimar in the air. During the years of the Weimar Republic (1919-33), Germany was threatened by Communist revolutionaries and Nazi uprisings. Foreign Minister Walter Rathenau was assassinated, and violent street fighting was commonplace. Then Adolf Hitler took power in 1933. America is nowhere near that point. Read More…
X Story Stream recent articles Good morning, it’s Friday, August 18, 2017. I’m taking a week’s hiatus from this daily newsletter, and will be back in the saddle on August 28. My sidekick, RCP copy chief Tom Kavanagh, will send out next week’s emails touting the original coverage on our pages, but you’ll have to Read More…
My dream of a nation free from government schools and odious teachers unions, wherein parents responsible enough to bring another human into this world are also responsible enough to ensure that human is educated without the government’s help, is unlikely to soon become reality. However, further limiting the influence of our current, failing, monopolistic education Read More…
X Story Stream recent articles It might sound counterintuitive that Democrats, looking to defeat President Trump in 2020, would turn to an ultra-wealthy former businessman who supports the Trans-Pacific Partnership, warns against vilifying banks, and believes partisanship is a four-letter word. But Rep. John Delaney is betting on it. “Who?” That was the one-word reaction Read More…
So I don’t have to repeat myself throughout the article, I’ll say things loudly and clearly at the outset. The KKK, white supremacists, and neo-Nazis are evil. I deplore what they stand for and denounce it – as a follower of Jesus, as a Jew, as an American, and as a human being. I pray Read More…
Many Christian organizations are fearful for their safety after CNN published a bogus “hate map” concocted by the Southern Poverty Law Center. “Here are all the active hate groups where you live,” CNN’s headline declared. The list included among others American Family Association, Family Research Council, Alliance Defending Freedom, Liberty Counsel and Pacific Justice Institute. Read More…
As we’ve said here before, Donald Trump has to learn to just shut up and let things go. The failure to do that is the worst Achilles heel of a president who seems to have half a dozen Achilles heels. Because he can’t think on his feet, because he doesn’t know how to say the Read More…
X Story Stream recent articles WASHINGTON — We are past the time when mournful comments about President Trump’s disgraceful behavior are sufficient. It is no longer defensible for his lieutenants or Republicans in Congress to tell themselves that they’re staying close to Trump to contain the damage he could cause our country. If their actual Read More…
X Story Stream recent articles In the decade leading up to America’s War for Independence, much of the drama took place in and around Boston. Sam Adams was the ringleader on the colonial side and public enemy number one to the British. He had been thinking about liberty and independence since he attended Harvard decades Read More…
X Story Stream recent articles WASHINGTON — Last week, CNN fired Jeff Lord, its famously pro-Trump contributor, for mocking an activist whom The Daily Caller has reported is a racist and an anti-Semite. Lord addressed him by saying, “Sieg Heil!” What is wrong with that? Is CNN covering for racists and anti-Semites? CNN is the Read More…
X Story Stream recent articles BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — A van veered onto a promenade and barreled down the busy walkway in central Barcelona on Thursday, swerving back and forth as it mowed down pedestrians and turned a picturesque tourist destination into a bloody killing zone. Thirteen people were killed and 100 were injured, 15 Read More…
X Story Stream recent articles In the wake of a combative and controversial press conference, Donald Trump Wednesday found himself much the way he began his White House campaign: isolated from rank and file Republicans, business and community leaders, and former presidents. GOP officials dismissed White House-circulated talking points defending the president’s response to racial Read More…
(The Conversation is an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts.) Texas and 10 other states now have laws permitting concealed carry of guns at colleges and universities. So far in 2017, campus carry bills have been introduced in at least 16 other states. While state laws and campus policies Read More…