Political Commentary & Opinion

Newspaper headlines have been bemoaning that more states will now have to require adults on food stamps—who are able-bodied and without dependents—to work. Since 2009, nearly all states have been able to waive the modest food stamp work requirement. But these waivers have gradually been expiring, and as of April 1, more states are once…

On Tuesday, Gov. Phil Bryant of Mississippi signed the Protecting Freedom of Conscience from Government Discrimination Act into law. To protect religious liberty in his state, he stood up against corporate bullies and leftist pressure groups. The Republican governor should be an inspiration to lawmakers everywhere. In the last few years, states and localities nationwide have…

Recent attacks in Brussels by terrorists and their connection with a plot to attack a Belgian nuclear power plant raise the question of whether nuclear material could ever be stolen to create a dirty bomb. There’s a lot of misconception about what a dirty bomb is and how one may be used in a greater…

A multi-county grand jury has indicted Oklahoma Sheriff Bob Colbert and Captain Jeffrey Gragg on three felony counts of bribery and extortion and recommended that Colbert be removed from office. The sheriff, according to the indictment, conspired with a captain in his office to extort $10,000 from a driver arrested on suspicion of possessing drug…

On March 30, the Supreme Court heard arguments in U.S. Army Corps of Engineers v. Hawkes Co. This case is one of a collection of land use cases that trickle into the Court from time to time, all representing the same problem: The Clean Water Act drastically limits the rights of landowners to build or…

New polling data is shedding light on the widespread impact of pervasive property seizures under civil asset forfeiture laws. In both Utah and Florida, a substantial percentage of respondents—nearly one in ten, in fact—acknowledged that either they themselves or someone they knew had property seized without criminal charges being filed. Civil asset forfeiture laws enable law…

Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wisc., is in Israel on his first foreign trip as Speaker of the House. As much as security and geopolitical relations will be at the forefront of the visit, the economic bonds between the two free-market democracies need attention, too. Vibrant economic growth is vital to Israel’s resilience and an important element…

“In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this,” Madison writes in Federalist 51, “You must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.” That meant that, in addition to performing its proper constitutional functions,…

Out of control spending drives national debt to unsustainable levels and the government knows it. The recently published 2017 fiscal year House Congressional Budget Resolution even features a chart titled “Spending is the Problem.” But Congress needs to practice what it preaches. The very same document proposes spending $57 billion more on discretionary programs than…

The March employment report showed continued growth in the labor market. While the Bureau of Labor Statistics found unemployment ticking up 0.1 percentage points, the good news was greater labor force participation and 215,000 new jobs created during the month. The payroll survey found widespread job growth throughout the service sector. The retail trade (+48,000),…