Political Commentary & Opinion
Analysis, commentary, and opinion essays on politics and policy from The Daily Signal’s contributors and experts.
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Manchin’s Support May Hand EPA Power to Throttle Coal Industry
The new spending bill that drew backing from Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., contains funding provisions that could allow the Environmental Protection Agency to work around the Supreme Court’s recent ruling reducing the agency’s ability to regulate emissions from coal plants. The economic package would make $45 million available to the EPA to regulate greenhouse gases…Jack McEvoy -
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Why Sen. Pat Toomey Did Right Thing in Stopping Burn Pit Bill
Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa., was right last week to stop legislation that would have presumed a host of health conditions are linked to American service members' exposure to burn pits. First, Toomey was right because the automatic presumption that many illnesses suffered by veterans are connected to burn pit exposure (ranging from chronic sinusitis to…Frederico Bartels -
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Historical Revisionism at Jefferson’s Monticello, Madison’s Montpelier Decried as ‘Attempt to Colonize Culture’
George Washington’s home is a good place to visit for education and history. But Thomas Jefferson’s home is bad, and James Madison’s is ugly, at least in terms of history. That’s the assessment of a new report, “A Tale of Three Presidential Houses: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly,” on three Virginia presidential homes…Fred Lucas -
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Sen. Mike Lee’s ‘National Pregnancy Center Week’ Resolution Salutes ‘Life-Affirming Work’
“Pregnancy Resource Centers are a vital resource to women across the country, providing a wide range of health care services to those in need,” Sen. Mike Lee said in announcing a resolution he has introduced in the Senate recognizing the centers for their dedication to the pro-life cause. The centers “go above and beyond the call of…Gillian Richards -
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The New Age of Orwellianism
Community organizer and left-wing social activist Saul Alinsky wrote, in his 1971 book “Rules for Radicals,” that “he who controls the language controls the masses.” Alinsky, whose work profoundly influenced at least one notable fellow Chicagoan, Barack Obama, was in that quip channeling George Orwell’s famous dystopian novel “1984.” “Newspeak,” the language of Orwell’s fictional…Josh Hammer -
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2 California Parents Fight Transgender Bills
As California lawmakers consider two sweeping bills on gender ideology, one California mom says she’s over this “extreme liberalism.” “We’ve had enough of this extreme liberalism,” Erin Friday, a registered Democrat, told The Daily Signal in an interview. Friday, 55, is the leader of a local Parents of Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoric Kids chapter. For her, the…Douglas Blair -
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I’m a Conservative College Student. Here’s How Universities Are Failing to Prepare Our Future Leaders.
Polite discourse among citizens about political issues has become increasingly hard to find in recent years. This is especially true at colleges and universities around the country, where students are supposed to use debate and discussion with classmates to help develop their opinions. This begs the question: If college-aged students are afraid to engage in…Lindsey Aden -
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Trading for Brittney Griner or Other Prisoners Held Abroad Is Politically Expedient, but Ill-Advised
Last week, I wrote in The Federalist about Brittney Griner, a player for the Phoenix Mercury of the WNBA, who was arrested in Russia in February for possession of a small amount of cannabis oil. Since then, Griner’s trial is playing out as predicted. In Russia, such cases are tried by judges, not juries, and the…Simon Hankinson -
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DOJ’s Partisan Shell Game Raises Ethics Issues About Pamela Karlan
As a tenured law professor at Stanford University, Pamela Karlan earned $1 million a year. We now know that she stayed on the Stanford payroll, at that same impressive salary, during the entire 17 months she served as the Justice Department’s principal deputy assistant attorney general for civil rights. Karlan left her DOJ post on…Hans von Spakovsky -
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Increasing Assaults on Thomas Jefferson Ignore His Complexity and Contributions to Freedom
Thomas Jefferson is coming under increasing attack, even at Monticello, his former estate, now a museum near Charlottesville, Virginia. The main focus seems to be on slavery, not on Jefferson’s many unique accomplishments. According to the New York Post, “Books by critical race theory proponents Ibram X. Kendi and Ta-Nehisi Coates enjoy pride of place…Allan Brownfeld -
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Is Texas the Model for Good Health Care Policy?
Health care affects every single American. Republicans and Democrats argue over the best way to provide the essential service to the population. But in Texas, a sweeping series of health care reform bills was able to make their way through the state Legislature. And it was done on a bipartisan basis. Dave Balat, director of…Douglas Blair -
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Democrats’ New Proposal Does Nothing to Lower Inflation
The first thing to remember about the reconciliation bill Sens. Joe Manchin and Chuck Schumer agreed to Wednesday is that, despite its utterly preposterous name, it has absolutely zero to do with inflation. The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 is crammed with the very same spending, corporate welfare, price fixing, and tax hikes that were…David Harsanyi -
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Government Eyes Collecting More Data on Americans to Address Pay Discrimination
The federal government collected data on 100 million Americans from 70,000 employers to prioritize investigations for what a report calls “systemic” pay discrimination. The government also is open to more expansive data collection in the future to address pay disparities. “Is this going to be a smoking gun that definitively answers whether there is pay…Fred Lucas -
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Extending Enhanced Obamacare Subsidies Would Be Costly, Ineffective
The deal struck by Democratic Sens. Chuck Schumer of New York and Joe Manchin of West Virginia on the so-called Inflation Reduction Act would extend what was sold as a temporary expansion of Obamacare subsidies during the COVID-19 pandemic. The extension would be for three years, at a cost of $64 billion. Democrats claim that…Edmund Haislmaier -
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Monkeypox Primarily Affects Gay Men. Why Are We Scared to Say It?
Monkeypox seemingly sprung out of nowhere to infect large swathes of the globe, replacing COVID-19 as the malady du jour. Experts say the number of monkeypox cases is severely undercounted, and the World Health Organization just declared the disease a global health emergency. Monkeypox has hit America particularly hard. Our nation has the most recorded…Douglas Blair -
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Inflation Reduction Act—or Radical Green New Deal?
Make no mistake, the so-called Inflation Reduction Act unveiled Wednesday by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., will do nothing that its supporters state—in fact, it will do quite the opposite. If passed, the act will increase the prices that Americans pay for energy, make the United States less energy…Jack Spencer -
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Republicans Might Skip Liberal Interviews? Good
It’s way too early to talk about the 2024 presidential campaign, but it cannot be staved off any more than you can stop Jim Acosta from yelling. Liberals are already alarmed about the press strategy of the Republican contenders. New York Magazine posted David Freedlander’s article “Why Republicans Stopped Talking to the Press.” This headline…Tim Graham -
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Fact-Checking 6 Claims About Life After Roe v. Wade
When the Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade on June 24, Americans went to their computers to find out what life was going to be like in a post-Roe America. From June 23 to 24, Google trends show a 98% increase in searches for the phrase “abortion rights.” And June 23 to 25 saw a…Virginia Allen -
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So-Called Inflation Reduction Act Would Make Stagflation Worse
After more than a year of expressing his concerns about the impact of inflation, Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., has signed off on a massive tax and spending bill that only would push prices for working families even higher. The deal, which Manchin made with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., was reached only hours before…Matthew Dickerson -
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‘It’s Hurting People’: Sen. Mike Lee Calls for End of Obamacare
A leading conservative senator, blaming Obamacare for skyrocketing health care prices in his state, laid out policy solutions Tuesday to create a health care system that puts Americans and their doctors back in charge. “If you allow the worker to get pretax dollars, get non-tax dollars, and allow the worker to purchase his or her…Samantha Aschieris