President Donald Trump reads the polls, too.

Terrified of a “Blue wave,” he’s working furiously to keep Democrats at bay and democracy on the ropes. First, he promised $5,000 checks to all Americans — a flat-out bribe, payable if Republicans remain in power. Then Trump told cheering supporters to “cheat like hell!”

There’s no ...Read more

The U.S. Supreme Court sided with democracy last week when it put a stop, at least temporarily, to President Donald Trump’s yearslong attempt to derail free and fair elections.

In an unsigned emergency decision, the court’s 7-2 majority (Associate Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito dissented) upheld an injunction and ruled that “...Read more

Fed Chair Kevin Warsh and the other 11 members of the central bank’s Federal Open Market Committee last week carried out their mission to control inflation by managing monetary policy and raised the key interest rate to 4%, even though President Donald Trump has been demanding that borrowing costs be cut.

Actually, more than demanding, as ...Read more

The funny thing about American capitalism is that it requires abundance to truly thrive, and yet capitalists prefer the illusion of exclusivity and scarcity to control the market.

It wasn't too long ago when the Great Recession exposed the phrase "free market" as a synonym for "less accountability." We also learned then that "job creators" just...Read more

Donald Trump Jr.’s lavish Bahamas wedding was already a bad look, coming amid America’s brutal affordability crisis and when gaping inequality is on the rise. But the news that it was largely funded by Russian oligarch Umar Kremlev shifted this story from distasteful to dangerous. It is more concerning still that this is no isolated incident...Read more

U.S. measles cases now number nearly 3,300, with no sign that the outbreak has abated. This is the highest number since 1991, when 9,643 cases were reported, a total that reflected a decline from previous years following the addition of a second dose of the measles vaccine to the childhood immunization schedule. The federal government’s ...Read more

The rapid expansion of data centers has become one of the most tangible expressions of the artificial intelligence revolution. But debate about their environmental, economic and social impact threatens their future development. And rightly so. Although the digital economy is often seen as weightless, every cloud service and AI application ...Read more

Wondering why so many things seem to have been going wrong this year, from contaminated lettuce to measles outbreaks to air-traffic-control-related flight cancellations? The reduction in federal government capacity caused by the Trump administration’s job cutbacks may be a factor.

The administration has made shrinking the federal workforce a ...Read more

I favor higher taxes on the ultra-wealthy. But I worry that California’s proposed tax on billionaires will inflict lasting damage on the economy and undermine the state’s status as a global home for innovation.

A growing body of economic research suggests that high taxes can make states less attractive to entrepreneurs. If California drives...Read more

Anthropic PBC researcher Jacob Coxon quit last week and posted on social media that it was because “the people building AI earnestly believe that it could kill us all by the end of the decade.” Evan Hubinger, who leads the artificial intelligence company’s alignment science team, put the odds above 10% in the next 10 years. Anthropic Chief...Read more

President Donald Trump won a surprising number of Gen Z voters in 2024, with a particularly strong performance among young men. Although Kamala Harris still won a majority of the 18-29 age cohort, Trump received the largest share of the youth vote for a Republican candidate since George W. Bush in 2004. But as the midterm elections approach and ...Read more

When police in Salem, Ohio, received a call for assistance for an injured cat, they couldn’t have been prepared for what they found. He had been shot with a crossbow, lost the use of his legs and, with the bolt still lodged in his body, lain in agony for days before a kind person discovered him. Despite the shocking nature of this crime, it ...Read more

Heard the latest? President Donald Trump, after deciding that Lake Ontario will henceforth be known as Lake America, has floated the idea that New Mexico should be renamed New America. This continues a trend that began on Trump’s first day in office, when he issued an executive order renaming the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America. Can ...Read more

It used to be conservatives who wanted to tread carefully with new things. These days, it’s progressives sounding the alarm on artificial intelligence. And I’m not just talking about the risk of human extinction.

Two of the country’s largest school systems have dramatically restricted AI access for students this year. They also happen to...Read more

Donald Trump Jr. has a lot more in common with his dad than just a name, sharing the president's penchant for shady dealings and for kleptocratic Russians. Sometimes the two proclivities go together. That was the case in May, we learned this week from ProPublica, when Don Jr. married his second wife during a three-day Bahamian bacchanal ...Read more

LOS ANGELES -- They’re as far away as a couple of thousand feet over your head, and as close as your radio and cellphone.

They were aloft before GPS, before Waze and Google Maps, and they still are.

Where, literally, would Angelenos be without the flying eyes that guide us to our destinations through our traffic mangles and bring us close to...Read more

The AI-industrial complex is in turmoil after several of its executives and engineers warned the technology could kill some or all humans, possibly before the 2036 election. This could be real cause for alarm or just brilliant marketing. Whatever the case, artificial intelligence is already harming humans through environmental devastation ...Read more

This week, four of the six conservative justices helped to block the Trump administration’s mail-in ballot scheme from going into place this Election Day. That’s a relief, but such partisan shenanigans aren’t permanently out of the question.

First, we can’t assume federal attempts to interfere with state-run elections are forever off ...Read more

A major change by the Trump administration will reduce future power prices around the country. Unfortunately, it took a unilateral act of the executive branch rather than an act of Congress.

On Monday, EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin announced sweeping changes to the U.S. power sector. The agency is rolling back greenhouse gas requirements on ...Read more

Just weeks ago, Crystal Salter was cuddling in bed with her two young daughters.

Salter was soaking up time with her girls. Until her boyfriend stormed in with a gun and shot her multiple times in the face and torso. He was found later in his car, having turned the gun on himself.

How can a child ever feel safe again having witnessed something...Read more