ArcaMax

Under the dictatorship of the Shah, Iran was a close U.S. ally. There are tantalizing indications that American policymakers are looking to recreate that Cold War-era partnership and kick Israel to the curb.

This seems crazy.

Just a few months ago, the Trump administration and Israel went to war together against Iran, assassinated its supreme ...Read more

Two Western lowland gorillas just arrived at Louisville Zoo's Gorilla Forest from Zoo Knoxville in Knoxville, Tennessee. Obi and Andi are half-sisters and will hopefully create Louisville's next family group with 29-year-old male gorilla, Kicho. Their arrival piqued my curiosity about how zoos coordinate for breeding purposes as part of the ...Read more

So, Belgium is cool now? Scotland's cool? What next? Everyone starts trying to act Algerian?

Cool is supposed to be American territory. Vietnamese workers might be making sneakers at lightning speed for $1 a day, but who designs the sneakers? Whose basketball players put their names on the sneakers? Which country's youth wears those $400 ...Read more

The Platner fiasco has unleashed something of a brawl in the Democratic Party over how the sexting candidate with a Nazi tattoo came to be their rival to Susan Collins, now in her 5th term as Republican senator from Maine. Bernie Sanders thought his socialists could pass off blue-collar impersonator Graham Platner -- a product of the elite ...Read more

The Washington Post put it this way: Platner, before the latest allegation, faced scrutiny for old social media posts dismissive of sexual assault, a tattoo resembling a Nazi symbol that he has since covered up, sexually explicit text messages he sent to other women after he married in 2023, and allegations of physical violence by ex-...Read more

WASHINGTON -- The Trump whirling dervish has come and gone to Turkey -- to demand NATO hand over Greenland! -- leaving a city exhausted by his wild Fourth of July displays.

But first, it was so great to see legions of World Cup soccer fans all over the world, at all hours, cheering on their countries, especially the England and Mexico teams ...Read more

From Q-Anon nuttiness to JD Vance's "Deep State" quackery, wacko right-wing conspiracies have oozed into the center of Republican politics.

But don't let their goofiness obscure the fact that there is indeed a very real plot to rig America's economic and political system, causing wealth and power to flow uphill -- from the workaday majority ...Read more

Everything about President Donald Trump's Independence Day-eve speech at Mt. Rushmore was a much-unneeded reminder that the personification of crude, self-glorifying narcissism occupies the White House as we celebrate our 250th birthday. He chose the venue to suggest, not subtly, that he deserves to be etched on a mountainside along with -- God ...Read more

My sadly departed friend, Frank, was a unicorn. He lived 89 years in the town he grew up in, a village on the Connecticut shore. A reporter at his local newspaper for over half a century, he had turned down offers to work for more glamorous publications, among them Sports Illustrated and The New York Times.

Frank had considered the priesthood...Read more

Delegates from across the original 13 colonies signed the Declaration of Independence 250 years ago on July 4, 1776, detailing the abuses of the king of England that led to their fight for sovereignty. Their condemnation feels all too familiar today.

The Declaration of Independence proclaimed the country's original 13 colonies separate from ...Read more

The United States is heavily invested in Israel and Ukraine. One of the primary arguments used to justify extravagant American military spending, intelligence cooperation and diplomatic support on those two nations is that they are both democracies -- not merely countries with elections, and not merely flawed democracies, but shining beacons ...Read more

Americans seeking inspiration during this anniversary of independence should turn away from the nation's capital, where Donald Trump's narcissistic celebration provides only national embarrassment (and perhaps a few laughs).

They can look instead to the World Cup, where the performance of the U.S. Men's National Team is renewing the patriotic...Read more

Frederick Law Olmsted is well known for pioneering landscape architecture. We know him as the man behind Central Park in New York City, which was his first major park project. He is also well known for his work on the U.S. Capitol grounds and the Biltmore Estate in Asheville, North Carolina. What many may not realize is that Olmsted was also a...Read more

When I was 19, I knew a much older man who'd grown up in 1930s Alabama.

"We didn't celebrate the Fourth of July," he told me. "For us, it was the day Vicksburg fell."

Vicksburg, Mississippi, fell to Union troops on July 4, 1863. The Confederates surrendered, as was their habit. Long memories still mourn the Lost Cause of Black backs whipped ...Read more

Europe is now the fastest heating continent, and Paris is suffering greatly under 100-plus Fahrenheit temperatures. That has inspired some conservative Americans to politicize the French aversion to air conditioning. In return, many in France are blaming Americans' burning of planet-warming fossil fuels to power their ACs.

Whose voice hits ...Read more

He still hasn't given up. In the wake of the 6-3 decision of the Supreme Court tossing out his Executive Order abolishing birthright citizenship, President Donald Trump was back at it, insisting that Congress should act. He cared enough about the case that he took the unprecedented step of attending the oral argument. But he brushed off the ...Read more