Politics
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John M. Crisp: Are you sure this is what you voted for?
No one can fault Donald Trump for failing to accomplish at least one of the things he promised while he was a candidate: disruption.
But is it too much? A MAGA friend assures me that Trump’s 77 million voters approve of his actions so far and that they are not having second thoughts.
But I wonder. If, before the election, Trump had described...Read more

Doyle McManus: Trump isn't an isolationist. He's a bully -- and that's hurting US influence in the world
WASHINGTON — When President Donald Trump announced last week that the United States will take over the war-blasted Gaza Strip, expel its Palestinian population and build a high-end beach resort, most of the reviews ranged from disbelief to outrage.
"The craziest and most destructive proposal any administration has ever made," said Aaron ...Read more

Commentary: Will children's right to equal education prevail?
Immigrant children are facing a new form of playground bullying: The Trump administration and its allies are trying to scare them away from school.
One of the Trump Department of Homeland Security’s first actions was to discard a core restraint on immigration enforcement. For decades, Democratic and Republican administrations have abided by ...Read more

Steve Lopez: Slow the spread of fire? 'We have to get rid of the palm trees'
Kathryn Barger's mother used to tell her that "trees do make a community."
But given the flammability of Southern California, which will soon be rebuilding and replanting after massive destruction from the recent fires, what kind of trees are safest?
I have some answers, because tree-loving readers have been responding to my column in which ...Read more

Mary Ellen Klas: Florida orange juice could be tariffs' most iconic casualty
President Donald Trump’s trade war with Canada is on hold for now but, if it resumes, it could deliver a fatal blow to one iconic American industry: Florida orange juice.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau urged Canadians to forgo “Florida orange juice altogether” as he slapped a (now-paused) 25% tariff on American exports from “red...Read more

Commentary: A mass exodus from civil service would be disastrous for our communities
Civil service is another term for “professional workforce” and we want this in government, right? And yet, as I write this, our government is being taken over by the opposite kind of worker.
The uncredentialed Elon Musk is running a massive government operation. His team of similarly-unaccredited private-sector tech wonks have taken control...Read more

Commentary: After the Assad regime's fall, will Syrian refugees return?
The sudden fall of Syria’s Assad regime in early December has raised an important question: Can the 6 million who became refugees during the 14-year civil war now go home?
Officials in Turkey, Austria, Denmark and Bulgaria have started publicly discussing plans to repatriate the Syrian refugees in those countries. Others — including France...Read more

Justin Fox: The blue state-red state tax divide isn't really that fair
The Trump administration’s many attempts over the past couple of weeks to halt federal spending have met mostly with approval from Republicans on Capitol Hill and outrage from Democrats.
That’s sort of what one would expect given that Trump is a Republican, but also kind of weird in that states and congressional districts that vote for ...Read more

Editorial: Managing health records shouldn't be this maddening
The U.S. health-care system exchanges tens of millions of patient records a day. Thanks to recent technological advances, the ability to analyze such large amounts of data has improved markedly.
Why, then, are patients still filling out clipboards of redundant information, or juggling multiple passwords and portals to make a doctor’s ...Read more

Commentary: Can Trump persuade North Korea to return to the negotiating table?
During a recent interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity, President Donald Trump stated that he would reach out to North Korean leader Kim Jong Un again in his second term to mitigate security threats.
This was not the first time Trump expressed his intention to reopen diplomacy with North Korea since taking office. On his first day in office,...Read more

Stephen Mihm: The FAIR plan was meant to insure against racism, not wildfires
With the wildfires in Southern California finally contained, the finger pointing has begun — with much of the ire aimed at the state’s patchwork system of fire insurance. There’s special scrutiny of the so-called “FAIR Plan,” a state-run insurer of last resort that has only $377 million in reserves. There are growing fears that this ...Read more

Commentary: Trump's Gaza plan echoes decades-old Israeli calls to expel Palestianians
On Tuesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Gaza, was received warmly by President Donald Trump at the White House.
Netanyahu, a longtime backer of Trump, beamed with satisfaction as the two men met with reporters and ...Read more

James Stavridis: Trump's 'Iron Dome' must succeed where Reagan's 'Star Wars' failed
President Donald Trump’s surprise announcement that the U.S. would pursue an Iron Dome-like national missile defense system has taken a page from Ronald Reagan’s “Star Wars” initiative of decades ago.
Like Reagan’s never-fulfilled plan for a system to “intercept and destroy strategic ballistic missiles before they reached our own ...Read more

Commentary: Dr. Anthony Fauci should come clean about COVID-19
Just before he exited the White House, one of President Joe Biden’s last official acts was to grant a preemptive pardon to Dr. Anthony Fauci, who has not been convicted of, or even charged with, any crime.
Significantly, the pardon dates to 2014, when the National Institutes of Health and Fauci awarded a multimillion-dollar grant to the ...Read more

Editorial: Gaza is not ours to occupy
President Donald Trump has proposed America occupy Gaza and forcefully resettle two million Palestinians in other nations. It is frequently a mystery how serious Trump is.
If he is serious, he ignores the long-term price the U.S. pays for inserting itself into other nations, especially those in decades-long conflicts. In Afghanistan, for ...Read more

Editorial: Trump's Gaza nonsense -- Crazy scheme harms real steps for Mideast peace
President Donald Trump’s fanciful plan for Gaza will not happen; still his wacky vision actually undermines legitimate efforts to improve relations in the Mideast, with Israel’s Arab partners like Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia looking for the exits.
Listening to everything that Trump spun Tuesday during three different public appearances, ...Read more

Michael Hiltzik: These are the legal obstacles that could stop Trump's assault on government in its tracks
Here's a phrase — three words, only eight syllables in all — that's going to gain paramount importance in the conduct of government policy by President Donald Trump over the next few years.
The phrase is "arbitrary and capricious." It's a guidepost for federal judges hearing challenges to agency rulemakings — whether by promulgating new ...Read more

Editorial: The NYPD's long learning curve -- Slowly getting better on stop, question, frisk
A dozen years ago, a federal judge ruled the NYPD’s practice of stopping, questioning and frisking New Yorkers by the hundreds of thousands to be unconstitutional — as the vast majority of stops, overwhelmingly of young Black and Brown men, weren’t based on sufficient individualized suspicion.
The 23rd — count ’em — report of the ...Read more

Tom Philp: California's smart and vocal farmers are silent about Trump as he wasted their water
Agriculture is a form of legalized gambling here in California, our land is prone to deluge or drought. Our farmers, relentlessly adapting, are as innovative as any set of suits in Silicon Valley, learning new ways to grow more food with less water.
As sure as the sun, our farmers have always shared their views of California politics as they ...Read more

Juan Pablo Spinetto: Trump's tariffs already hurt Mexico -- Even if they're on hold
“We're definitely making the factory in Mexico. We feel very good about that. We put a lot of effort into looking at different locations and we feel very good about that location. We are going to build a factory there and it's going to be great.”
Oh, those great days when Elon Musk had such rapport with Mexico that not only was he planning ...Read more