Political Commentary & Opinion

Puerto Rican legislators and lobbyists have flooded Capitol Hill this year asking Congress to intervene on the debt-ridden island’s behalf. Sadly, the bailouts and bankruptcy law changes that Puerto Rico’s lobbyists seek would benefit Puerto Rico’s government without creating jobs or wage growth for most Puerto Ricans. Although most congressmen were not elected with Puerto…

By now, Beyoncé’s Super Bowl halftime ode to the Black Panthers has entered the national consciousness. We all know what she was driving at. She was channeling the meme of the “black lives matter” movement. But why use the symbolism of the Black Panthers? After all, the group has long and sordid history of violence….

AMMAN, Jordan—The Islamic State, gaining operating territory in North Africa, has made clear its intentions of destabilizing the nascent democracy in Tunisia. Hoping this sun-drenched Mediterranean nation remains a democratic success story for the region is not enough to ensure that the country succeeds in this post-revolution period. Keenly aware of a growing sentiment of…

Old-school feminists are not happy with young women these days. Seemingly commenting on why some young women favor Bernie Sanders over Hillary Clinton, feminist icon Gloria Steinem explained it is because they were thinking, “Where are the boys?” Clinton supporter Madeleine Albright also is none too happy with “women who don’t help out other women” (presumably those who do not support Clinton),…

The federal government is no stranger to waste—some examples are egregious. From July 2013 through June 2014, over 4,000 transactions, worth just short of $1 million, were conducted at casinos using the Department of Defense’s government travel cards. Furthermore, nine hundred transactions, totaling $96,576, were made at “adult entertainment establishments.” As of May, 2015, only 41 percent of…

A room with an ultrasound may seem like an unlikely setting for a chips commercial. But in an ad aired during the Super Bowl, Doritos cleverly suggested you don’t need to be outside the womb to have a serious chips craving. The ad showed an oblivious dad eating Doritos at his wife’s ultrasound. His wife…

Is the United States facing a constitutional crisis? Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Neb., thinks so, saying that the Democratic Party has largely gone post-constitutional and that even inside the GOP, there is a crisis of confidence in the American idea. Sasse believes that many lawmakers like the idea of being in power, not understanding what the job…

Friday’s labor report confirms that too many hardworking Americans are unable to find the jobs they seek because U.S. job growth remains anemic, and average wages are stagnant. Americans want to work, but they’re hampered from doing so by labor laws that do not represent their interests. The latest labor report numbers show that 41,000 additional Americans…

The federal government is broken, and congressional weakness is to blame. The authors of the Constitution made Congress the most powerful of the federal government’s three co-equal branches. Congress was designed both as the most powerful and the most accountable to the people. Consent of the governed in a republic depends on transparent policymaking by…

After last year’s serious misadventure concerning Ebola, Americans take viruses very seriously. This year, we are confronting a very different threat with the Zika Virus. Let’s get some facts on the table, then discuss how we should go forward. First, Zika is a part of a family of viruses called Flavivirues. These started in Africa and have…