ArcaMax

As much as we know by now about Donald Trump’s creative approach to facts, even the man whom late-night host Jimmy Kimmel calls “Rant-a-Claus” can go a fib too far.

Trump seemed to hit his credibility limit last week when he took to Truth Social, his social media platform, to deny any knowledge whatsoever of Project 2025, a collection of ...Read more

“Black jobs”?

It’s a simple phrase, but what does it mean?

More specifically, what did it mean when Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump insisted in his debate with President Joe Biden that migrants crossing the southern border are taking “Black jobs”?

Trump’s comments in a debate viewed by many, including me, as a ...Read more

When does political protest seem to become an end in itself?

Climate firebrand Greta Thunberg, 21, seems to raise that question when looking at photos of her arrest last month outside the Eurovision Song Contest in Malmo, Sweden.

Wearing a black-and-white keffiyeh scarf and shouting, “Shame on you,” in a show of solidarity with the pro-...Read more

I never thought I would be writing a column to urge Joe Biden to step aside.

But his painfully poor performance in his debate with Donald Trump last week forced me to face a very uncomfortable truth. His debate showing was a capital-D disaster.

The horrible truth: Biden needs to bow out.

I don’t say that easily because, as someone who’s ...Read more

News of Donald Sutherland’s death at age 88 took me back to a day in 1971 when he was protesting the Vietnam War onstage with Jane Fonda and I was one of about 1,000 off-duty soldiers in their audience.

I hoped, in the spirit of John Lennon’s anthem, to give peace a chance.

We were outside Fort Lewis, Washington, now known as Joint Base ...Read more

Don’t get nervous, young folks, but talk about a national service mandate has been bubbling up again in Washington.

Such talk has been particularly vigorous among key advisers to Donald Trump as he begins what he hopes will be his transition back to the White House. Of course, talk of mandated national service is one step away from that ...Read more

’Tis the season for Donald Trump to audition potential running mates while the rest of us speculate on who the lucky winner will be.

The trial by political fire was on full display last week as the entire Democratic Party establishment seemed to rise up and pile on Rep. Byron Donalds of Florida, whom multiple news outlets have put on Trump’...Read more

As American politics have become more polarized in the era of former President Donald Trump’s MAGA movement, we also hear it sound more paranoid.

The dueling scandals of Trump’s hush-money trial in New York, where he was found guilty on all 34 felony counts, and the beginning of Hunter Biden’s trial on three felony gun charges in Delaware...Read more

As if suspicions, partisan and otherwise, have not dealt enough blows to our criminal justice system in recent years, along comes Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito’s flag flap.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin, an Illinois Democrat, who has continuously called for tighter ethics legislation regarding the high court, decried ...Read more

Graduation speeches are like life and Forrest Gump’s box of chocolates: you never know what you’re going to get.

I’m so accustomed to headline-making controversies touched off by commencement speakers whose views tilt to the left that the Harrison Butker dustup caught me by surprise.

Until now, the public has known Butker, 28, as simply ...Read more

One of the roles we old folks fall into is to wish we could painlessly and conveniently give young people the useful wisdom life has taught us so they won’t have to learn it the hard way.

Such are the thoughts that come to me as I witness the spread of militantly anti-Zionist protests across campuses similar to anti-war protests in the ...Read more

Although I usually find legislative processes to be a good remedy for insomnia, I followed the attempt by the often entertaining — especially when she doesn’t intend to be — Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene to revive the Hastert rule until it crashed and burned.

House Speaker Mike Johnson easily blocked an ill-planned attempt by his GOP ...Read more

Reports of the death of DEI, the widely praised and reviled — take your pick — employment policies to improve diversity, equity and inclusion, have been greatly exaggerated, as Mark Twain famously said of reports of his own death.

Still, in the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision to strike down affirmative action in colleges and ...Read more

When a friend reminded me that it’s almost time for the Democratic National Convention, I wanted to say, “That’s OK, I’m good with the last one.”

But, I didn’t. I’m too much of a political junkie to ignore this level of political history while it’s being made.

As a matter of historical importance, it’s not the party that ...Read more

When President Joe Biden’s administration last week announced the award of $2 million to help “reconnect” Chicago neighborhoods torn apart by massive expressway construction since the 1950s and ’60s, my first reaction was, “It’s about time.”

That was followed by a question: How are they going to do it?

Two million dollars doesn�...Read more

Black voters have traditionally been pivotal to the fortunes of the Democratic Party, but some recent polls have suggested that they are proving less bankable for President Joe Biden than in the past. Whether or not as many as 20% of Black voters have in fact deserted the Democrats, as some recent polls suggest, is a contested matter. But it’s...Read more

Can we now declare O.J. Simpson’s search for “the real killer” to be officially ended?

Not that I expected to find out more than we already know. The leading suspect in the slaying of his former wife Nicole Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman continued to be nobody else but O.J., up to his dying day.

Ah, now the mighty “Juice” ...Read more

Republican strategist Karl Rove has some excellent advice for Donald Trump, which, judging by his usual resistance to even the mildest criticism, Trump probably will refuse to hear.

But that doesn’t stop the rest of us from paying attention, especially President Joe Biden and others in his campaign as they try to gain some traction in what ...Read more

“DEI mayor.”

That’s how a troll on X, formerly Twitter, labeled a news clip of Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott delivering an update on the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge after it was struck by a massive cargo ship.

“It’s going to be so, so much worse,” the tweet concluded. “Prepare accordingly.”

I don’t know ...Read more

On his HBO show “Real Time,” comedian Bill Maher recently went after Democrats for “pandering” to minority groups for votes.

Poking holes in political posturing is right on brand for Maher, who turns sarcasm into an art form. That’s why I watch him sometimes when I feel my sunny optimism needs a dose of tough realities. Besides, even ...Read more