Opinion and commentary on news, politics, culture, and policy impact.
Last week, Russian President Vladimir Putin decided to impose a one-year ban on many agricultural imports from the United States and other countries that have imposed economic sanctions against Russia in connection with its actions in Eastern Ukraine—namely Australia, Canada, the European Union (EU), and Norway. The impact on the U.S. should be relatively small….
Americans need to start talking about the “N” word. In a provocatively titled article for The Hill, Adam Lowther and Colonel Eric Moore argue that it’s time the U.S. got serious about its nuclear weapons. The authors call for immediate modernization and improvement of the U.S. nuclear weapons complex and weapons systems. Furthermore, the authors…
Federal financial aid for higher education was supposed to grow the market, bring down costs and help families afford this critical step to financial security. But a recent report finds the effort to provide educational assistance to students has turned into decades of unaccountable federal spending on higher education. According to the report from the…
Detroit is facing a “water crisis,” a mess that has erupted since the city filed for bankruptcyprotection last year. Weak enforcement combined with city mismanagement led to bankruptcy, prompting the Detroit Water and Sewage Department to seek a remedy for the $90 million in unpaid bills owed by over half of its 170,000 residents. The…
Visiting America for the U.S.–Africa Leaders Summit last week, heads of African nations had plenty to say about the need to increase access to reliable, affordable energy. Yet some are trying to dissuade African investment in conventional energy sources such as coal and natural gas in an effort to stave off global warming. Roughly 550…
The State Department released a report earlier this month on implementation of the Best Practices Panel’s (BPP) recommendations on diplomatic security. Interestingly, the two most important ones were rejected by the State Department. The panel of five seasoned security experts was established according to the recommendation of the Benghazi Accountability Review Board (ARB). The BPP…
According to news reports, Iraqi prime minister Nuri al-Maliki has ordered Iraqi military forces to seize government buildings.The move comes in the wake of an ongoing dispute over forming a new government. After an Islamist insurgency over ran large swathes of Iraq, there was an effort to replace Maliki with a “unity” government that would…
The last several months have seen a wave of American companies merging with foreign companies, a process known as “inverting.” In effect, inversion is the corporate equivalent of a renunciation of American citizenship. By some estimates, about $250 billion of these deals have been consummated since the start of the year, and another $100 billion…
There’s been something of an energy boom taking place in the U.S. over the past few years, and it’s given the American economy a real boost. Now we just need the federal government to get out of the way and open opportunities to freely trade energy, and those benefits will grow substantially. U.S. coal exports…
Jimmy Carter has had a long-standing reputation as authoring the most ineffective foreign policy of any modern presidency. To be honest, Carter deserves better. When the man from Plains, Ga., moved to 1600 Pennsylvania Ave, he came wearing the anti-establishment headdress. In particular, when it came to foreign and defense policy, Carter promised that his…
Would you like to own a small business someday? If so, sorry — the Service Employees International Union would rather you didn’t. The SEIU has convinced the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to eviscerate the franchising model that many small-business owners rely on. Under the current model, these small-business owners pay for the right to…
You’ve no doubt seen those polls in which Americans are asked if they think our country is heading in the right direction. Perhaps you’ve even been asked that yourself. Whether the answer is yes or no, we all know it’s not scientific. It’s based on a general impression, and those impressions are shaped by what…
Thursday’s headline in the Los Angeles Times — “Argentina Defaults on International Debt” — spooked me, as it did investors. The stock market tanked on the news. All Americans should feel the same apprehension. Argentina has about $200 billion in debt including billions in restructured bonds that it still can’t make payments on. Now Argentina…
Russia could double down on Ukraine anytime now. Undeterred by the West’s questionable response to the tragic Malaysian airliner shoot-down — or the moral and material support to the Ukrainian rebels — or the carving off of Crimea, Russia seems ready to roll. News reports indicate Moscow has bumped up Russian forces near the Ukrainian…
As The Daily Signal reported last week, Meriam Yahia Ibrahim Ishag, the Suadenese mother sentenced to death for her Christian faith, has arrived safely in America. This represents an important victory for religious freedom, but Ishag’s story is far from an isolated event. At the release of the 2014 U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom…
The first U.S.–Africa Leaders Summit concluded this week. President Obama has, quite expectedly, characterized it as “an extraordinary event, an extraordinary summit.” The three-day summit yielded some positive notes and outcomes. Yet on balance, the summit was the Administration in a nutshell—compelling theatrics, nice sounding rhetoric, ambitious promises, and lingering doubts about implementation and follow-through….
“Direct primary care” is a rapidly growing alternative to the traditional “fee-for-service” model of paying for medical care. Instead of the patient or his insurance plan paying the doctor separately for each visit or service, the patient pays the physician a set monthly fee. In exchange, the physician is available to consult with and treat…
A state court in New York recently struck down that state’s cyberbullying law as violating the First Amendment. The case arose when a 15-year-old Albany County high school student, Marquan Mackey-Meggs, created an anonymous Facebook page called “Cohoes Flame,” from which he created posts about other teens, including pictures. The posts were graphic and often…
On Tuesday, the Washington Post published an op-ed by pro-pot author Radley Balko headlined, “Since Marijuana Legalization, Highway Fatalities in Colorado Are at Near-Historic Lows.” The piece leaves the reader with the impression that legalizing marijuana may have something to do with traffic fatalities going down in Colorado. He does admit that the fatality figures…
Military expert Steven Bucci, director of the Allison Center for Foreign Policy Studies at The Heritage Foundation, takes your questions on the current situation in Iraq. Q: What is the U.S. doing in response to the Islamic State’s violence in Iraq? The U.S. was again caught by surprise by the insurgent army known as the…