Opinion and commentary on news, politics, culture, and policy impact.
President Donald Trump’s fiscal year 2018 budget proposal calls for a number of energy policy reforms, some good and some bad. Some of the highlights include opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for drilling, selling off some government-controlled oil reserves, reinvigorating Yucca Mountain’s nuclear waste management activities, divesting power marketing administration assets, and diverting offshore…
Two months after unveiling his “skinny budget,” President Donald Trump officially submitted his completed budget to Congress. The proposal sends a strong message to Washington that the president intends to jump-start the country’s lagging economy and reign in the size and scope of the federal government. If implemented by Congress, the plan could spark economic…
This time it is the northern city of Manchester. At time of writing, 22 were dead and more than 50 injured after a suicide attack at an Ariana Grande concert at the Manchester Arena. The Islamic State, also known as ISIS, has claimed credit for the attack, which was carried out by a 23-year-old called…
This month, the Washington, D.C., Criminal Code Reform Commission gave Mayor Muriel Bowser and the D.C. Council a set of sensible recommendations on “modernization of the District’s criminal statutes.” It offers the mayor, council members, the public, as well as Congress and lawmakers in any jurisdiction much to consider. The commission has until Oct. l, 2018,…
The U.S. has long used international broadcasting as a tool in public diplomacy. Yet the nation’s international broadcasting agency—the Broadcasting Board of Governors—has been a distinct, freestanding agency within the U.S. government since the International Broadcasting Act of 1994. The reason often given for this independence is a fear of political influence from either the…
NATO heads of state will gather Thursday in Brussels for a so-called mini-summit (officially a meeting of the North Atlantic Council at the heads-of-state level). But if the alliance wants to attain real progress on increasing European defense spending, then NATO finance ministers should also make the trip to Belgium. The mini-summit will be the…
President Donald Trump has arrived in Italy for the G-7 summit, where foreign leaders will press him to abandon core elements of his “America First” agenda in favor of a more globalist agenda. As National Public Radio reported last week, “President Trump is expected to face pressure from European Union leaders … to keep the U.S….
It’s time to patch up America’s second “special relationship” after eight years of frayed feelings between the United States and Israel. That’s the message President Donald Trump is sending in his early-presidency trip to Israel and unprecedented visit to the Western Wall in Jerusalem. Trump said of his Monday visit to the Western Wall, a…
Diversity of thought continues to be decidedly unpopular at America’s top institutions of higher education. According to a new survey from Young America’s Foundation, top colleges invited 45 liberal commencement speakers this year … and a measly four conservatives. (Not all of the universities, which were drawn from U.S. News and World Report’s list, had…
A fiscal storm has been brewing over America for years, and things are only getting worse. Publicly held debt—the debt the U.S. is borrowing from credit markets (as opposed to debt owed to federal trust funds like Social Security)—is at its highest level as a percentage of gross domestic product since World War II. To…
As Congress and the Trump administration develop their budget plans for the fiscal year 2018 budget and beyond, there’s one area that can provide them significant savings: the out-of-control farm handouts. The current farm handout system, often referred to as the “safety net” for agricultural producers, consists of commodity programs such as two major new…
When should a business owner’s decisions be condemned as illegal discrimination? Imagine a print shop owned by a devout atheist. A Muslim woman, wearing a hijab, walks into the shop and orders a sign saying, “Allahu Akbar! Allah is greater than all!” Scenario A: The shop owner sees the woman’s hijab when she walks through…
Just hours after Hollywood filmmaker Joss Whedon launched a foul piece of propaganda celebrating Planned Parenthood, an undercover video surfaced that reveals a much darker reality about the nation’s leading abortion business. Though buoyed by well over $500 million in taxpayer dollars each year, Planned Parenthood offers little else in medical services beyond abortion—despite its rhetoric…
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani won a second term in office on Friday, securing about 57 percent of the votes cast in Iran’s carefully vetted and stage-managed presidential election. Rouhani, a pragmatic hardliner often mistakenly described as a “moderate” by Western media, outpolled a field of rival candidates that included Ebrahim Raisi, an ultra-hardline protégé of…
Editor's note: We get a fair amount of passionate comment addressed to or about Nolan Peterson, The Daily Signal's Ukraine-based foreign correspondent. When Peterson traveled to France to cover the final days of the French presidential election campaign, his reporting attracted your attention. Here's a sample at the top of the mailbag.—Ken McIntyre Dear Daily…
State capitals across the country are proving they are not immune to the malady that has afflicted the policy process in Washington. The latest case in point: Pennsylvania. In a quietly released statement issued late on a Friday afternoon, the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission, an agency of the state government, announced a proposal to effectively…
A three-judge panel on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit unanimously declared Friday that the Federal Aviation Administration’s registry of recreational drone owners is “unlawful as applied to model aircraft.” As a result, hobby drone fliers across the nation no longer face the specter of $277,500 in civil and criminal fines, as well as…
Four months after taking office, President Donald Trump is taking his first foray onto the world stage. Over the course of the next seven days he will travel to Europe and the Middle East, visiting four countries as well as the Vatican: Saudi Arabia, Israel, Belgium, and Italy. Across the Atlantic, he will take part…
Have you noticed that free checking accounts are now nearly nonexistent, and locally owned stores are increasing the $5 minimum charge on debit cards? These are not the result of some financial conspiracy. They are a direct result of Dodd-Frank regulations. After the financial crash of 2008, President Barack Obama decided to increase the role…