Thomas Paine’s “Common Sense” may have persuaded the American colonists of the need for independence, but it is one thing to favor independence and quite another to pick up arms to obtain it.

We tend to think of war as being won by large armies on vast fields commanded by generals. But small victories can have a big effect. One such ...Read more

The president of the United States posted a racist video Thursday night depicting Barack and Michelle Obama as apes. On Friday, the White House dismissed criticism — but the president deleted the post. Was this episode disappointing? Yes. Surprising? Not anymore.

Last spring, after Pope Francis had died, Donald Trump posted an AI image of ...Read more

You may have missed it, what with President Donald Trump’s endless pyrotechnics, but California voters will decide in November who succeeds Gavin Newsom, the highest-profile governor since the Terminator returned to Hollywood.

Unfortunately for those attempting to civically engage, the current crop of contenders is, shall we say, less than ...Read more

I am living with ALS, or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, often called Lou Gehrig’s disease. The average survival time after diagnosis is two to five years. I’m in year two.

When you have a disease like ALS, you learn how slowly medical research moves, and how often it fails the people it is supposed to save. You also learn how precious time ...Read more

America’s largest libertarian thinktank just produced a study that blows up the Trump administration’s claims about the horrible economic damage immigrants are doing.

Specifically that, in the words of our Secretary of Homeland Security, they “suck dry our hard-earned tax dollars” who “snatch the benefits owed to AMERICANS,” as she...Read more

Generative artificial intelligence is all the rage these days. We’re using it at work to guide our coding, writing and researching. We’re conjuring AI videos and songs. We’re enhancing old family photos. We’re getting AI-powered therapy, advice and even romance. It sure looks and sounds like AI can create, and the output is remarkable.

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President Donald Trump’s penchant for tariffs has turned many Democrats into born-again free traders. Now his affection for industrial policy has them sounding like free-market enthusiasts.

On Monday, three high-ranking House Democrats expressed concern about the administration’s move to buy pieces of various mining interests as a means of ...Read more

After the dreadful year 2025, I’ve decided to parse my anger. It’s a good time to specialize so as not to wear out one’s psyche.

There are so many reasons to be mad; the mostly baseless and endless attacks on higher education, the dismantling of life-saving research, ICE, the subverting of policy that redresses shameful social harms. But ...Read more

Bernie Sanders and Ron DeSantis don’t agree on much, but the data-center boom is a rare exception. Vermont’s Democratic Socialist senator and Florida’s right-wing governor want to slam the brakes on the hundreds of resource-intensive new facilities springing up across the country to power the artificial intelligence industry. And both ...Read more

In a series of YouTube ads viewed more than 195 million times, a red-lipped Taylor Swift tells viewers about a “new thing” in Florida: Just visit a website, answer two questions and the state will send you a $6,400 stimulus check.

Sound too good to be true? It was — and the narrator wasn’t Swift but an AI deepfake. The ads, since taken...Read more

For much of the past nine months, there’s been next to no talk of compromise between a Trump administration determined to deport as many undocumented residents as possible and Democrats in so-called sanctuary states such as Gov. JB Pritzker.

But suddenly, in the wake of the shocking killings of two American citizens in Minneapolis by federal ...Read more

Maya Angelou’s often-quoted advice — When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time— is quoted so often because it’s so obviously true.

On Jan. 6, 2021, President Donald Trump showed the world who he is: someone willing to undermine, interfere with and ultimately attempt to overthrow any election result that doesn’t ...Read more

What a difference a single year makes. The once-dominant push to radically reshape society in hopes of averting climate catastrophe has collapsed. Look at Davos, the talkfest long dominated by climate advocacy. That consensus has been all but abandoned by its once strongest proponents.

Emblematic of the shift: European Commission President ...Read more

It was a war fueled by colonialism, launched with the intent of humiliating a weaker country, fought in the name of revenge and waged by a racist president.

So leave it to President Donald Trump to spike the proverbial football over the U.S. victory 178 years ago in the Mexican-American War.

Abraham Lincoln first earned national attention by ...Read more

If you’re a climate-change denier in the eastern U.S., including the president, then the past few weeks have been a dream. It’s cold and snowy where I live, you might say, colder and snowier than in years. Therefore, climate change is a hoax, just as I’m always saying. Would I be able to hold this snowball otherwise? Check and mate.

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It’s impossible to know whether the U.S. president will carry out his threats to strike Iran, how the regime might retaliate or what the long-term fallout would be. What’s surer is that neutering the threat posed by Iran and encouraging a better future for its people will take more than bombs and missiles.

With possible talks in flux, ...Read more

Even if the administration has temporarily backed off threats to invoke the Insurrection Act to quell protests in Minnesota, the idea will come up again. That’s partly because the power — which would allow the president to use active-duty troops to conduct domestic law enforcement — is dangerously vulnerable to abuse.

What’s known as ...Read more

Americans are getting bigger-than-usual tax refunds this year. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has been talking up this windfall for months, saying that it will help spark “a non-inflationary boom.”

That’s unlikely. First, the estimated $90 billion to $100 billion increase in refunds, a result of several provisions of the budget law ...Read more

The U.S. government is using unaccountable federal forces to violently suppress dissent and reinforce its power through force and fear. This behavior is designed to make the people feel powerless and the governing authority impenetrable. It may feel shocking in America today, but it’s a common approach used by repressive regimes around the ...Read more