Politics
/ArcaMax

Commentary: Hosting Super Bowl, New Orleans showed LA what recovery can look like
Philadelphia and Kansas City played Sunday in Super Bowl LIX — well, at least Philadelphia did — but the aura surrounding the game was all about New Orleans and Los Angeles.
The Big Easy gave everyone the perfect where: the Superdome, Bourbon Street, big bands, beads, parades and music for miles. The why was for Los Angeles, a response to ...Read more
POINT: Cellphones are distractions, not toys
In today’s digital age, the ubiquitous presence of cellphones has transformed them into essential tools for communication, information and entertainment. However, when placed in the hands of children under 16, these devices can become detrimental, leading to physical inactivity, social isolation, and addiction driven by sophisticated ...Read more

Noah Feldman: JD Vance is playing a dangerous legal game
The federal district courts have been standing up to Donald Trump’s illegal executive actions, blocking or pausing multiple orders from the denial of birthright citizenship to unprecedented data access for Elon Musk’s “Department of Government Efficiency.”
It’s neither surprising nor especially worrisome that Musk is now attacking the...Read more

Commentary: Time for justice at the International Criminal Court over Israel
The wheels of justice may turn slowly, but they’re finally catching up with officials at the International Criminal Court after President Donald Trump signed an executive order sanctioning those who target U.S. citizens or allies.
This comes on the heels of the House-passed Illegitimate Court Counteraction Act. And while the Senate failed to...Read more

Commentary: We have a historic opportunity in Gaza. Let's not squander it
In this never-ending stream of jaw-dropping announcements coming out of the White House, it’s easy to get overwhelmed and distracted. That’s what administration officials want.
But despite the head-scratching and deeply worrying claim from President Donald Trump last week that the U.S. could turn Gaza into the “Riviera of the Middle East...Read more

Commentary: Trump's Gaza proposal -- and the Madman Theory
Is Trump's Gaza suggestion that he intends to relocate the Palestinian population from Gaza and turn the region into “the Riviera of the Middle East” an example of the "Madman Theory" or is it a negotiation tactic?
The term "Madman Theory" is a concept that primarily came into vogue during the presidency of Richard Nixon in the 1970s. ...Read more
COUNTERPOINT: Let parents and teachers, not bureaucrats, make decisions about cellphones in schools
Should kids have access to smartphones in school? Some argue the smartphone problem leads to distraction. Others say smartphones are necessary for reasons related to safety or other concerns.
In reality, it is a more complicated question than it appears. Yet, oftentimes, when complicated questions arise, broad state-level policies that take the...Read more

Joe Battenfeld: Elizabeth Warren, increasingly unhinged, irrelevant
Elizabeth Warren is losing it, reduced to becoming an irrelevant complainer who does nothing for her Massachusetts constituents while railing daily against President Donald Trump.
Nobody even reads Warren’s unhinged letters, except maybe Trump to get a laugh.
She is part of the baggage the Democrats need to throw overboard if they ever want ...Read more

Trudy Rubin: Trump's new foreign policy doctrine -- Kick your friends, help your enemies
Harm your friends, help your enemies.
That neatly summarizes the first two weeks of President Donald Trump's foreign policy. And that's before even getting to the potential damage done by his dangerous choices to head defense, health and human services, the FBI, and national intelligence.
Trump has been kneecapping U.S. allies while Russia, ...Read more

Editorial: A federal republic -- New York and other states can't be conscripted for Trump's purposes
Not content to deploy his immigration agents nationwide, President Donald Trump is attempting to force states and localities to join in his crackdown, having the Justice Department sue the state of Illinois and the city of Chicago over their sanctuary policies and getting the Department of Transportation, among potentially other federal agencies...Read more

Editorial: Judges must be obeyed -- Ignoring judicial orders cannot be allowed
This week, Rhode Island Federal Judge John McConnell ordered the Trump administration to immediately restore funding it had frozen during its illegal wide-ranging funding suspension last month.
What was remarkable was not just that McConnell had to issue this order, but that he’s done so twice now, after the administration has simply failed ...Read more

Editorial: The immigrants may go. But the work won't
In 2023, most Americans were spending $438 per month on groceries that five years ago cost them $335. If experts on Pennsylvania farming are to be believed, consumers need to brace themselves for prices to continue to rise. The reason is not just the global avian flu pandemic. It's the federal government's immigration policies.
As stories ...Read more

Commentary: Trump wants to extend the 2017 tax cuts. Here's how that would affect regular Americans
The tax cuts enacted under the first Trump administration largely expire at the end of 2025. President Donald Trump and his fellow Republicans are eager to extend them, but doing so without concurrent spending cuts would raise deficits by more than $5 trillion through 2035.
How might policymakers pay for extending the 2017 tax cuts? Various ...Read more

Commentary: Loyalty, democracy and the future of American politics
The place of loyalty in this country’s political system has been at the forefront of political conversations since the November election returned Donald Trump to the Oval Office. Loyalty has long been seen as what the president values most in his relationship with others.
In his 2024 presidential campaign Trump did not try to hide any of that...Read more

Commentary: To protect transgender rights in the future, we must look to the past
“We don’t have a history of de jure discrimination against transgender people, right?” Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett asked during the Dec. 4 oral arguments in U.S. vs. Skrmetti, a case involving access to gender-affirming care for minors.
Then-Solicitor Gen. Elizabeth Prelogar, arguing for such care and against a Tennessee law ...Read more

Editorial: Trump's firing of Coast Guard leader is no way to treat a public servant
Hours after President Donald Trump called for a society that is "merit-based" in his inaugural address, he fired the first woman to head a military service in American history.
Four-star Coast Guard Adm. Linda Fagan was waiting to have a photo taken with the new president the same night she learned she was being dismissed, according to The New...Read more

Commentary: Pam Bondi is already targeting Trump's enemies
U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi has no appreciation for irony.
In a memo issued on her first day on the job, Bondi created a “Weaponization Working Group.” Quoting President Donald Trump, she wrote that the Department of Justice had engaged in an “unprecedented, third-world weaponization of prosecutorial power to upend the democratic ...Read more

Editorial: Democrats double down on 'Stop Trump' agenda
The Democratic pols who painted President Donald Trump during his campaign as a dictator who was a threat to our democracy if not civilization haven’t taken their feet off the gas.
Resistance to the man they love to hate has doubled down inside the Beltway, with a zeal that ignores the fact that Trump is in office because voters preferred him...Read more

Editorial: Birthright citizenship helps make America great
Amid the flood of executive orders issued from the White House on Jan. 20, one is especially misguided, both in legal and policy terms: Beginning in 30 days, the order declared, children born in the U.S. to mothers who are undocumented immigrants — or even legal temporary residents — may no longer automatically be granted citizenship of ...Read more

Tom Philp: California Democrats' 'affordability' agenda is bankrupt. Three reasons why
Fiscal darkness is gathering in California, where as many as three crises could converge in mere months — all while Democrats have put “affordability” at the top of a mythical agenda.
It’s so potentially bad that Gov. Gavin Newsom has been in Washington sucking up to President Donald Trump, playing down that he ordered the legislature ...Read more