March 2015

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with senior editor Lee Smith on the Obama administration's pending nuclear deal with Iran.

From CNBC, discouraging news that:

The Honorable Harry Reid, minority leader of the United States Senate, interviewed on CNN:

Several of the likely Republican candidates for president have spoken out in defense of Indiana governor Mike Pence and his decision to sign the state's Religious Freedom Restoration Act. CNN reports that several White House hopefuls, including Jeb Bush, Ben Carson, Marco Rubio, Bobby Jindal, and…

Garrett Epps writes at The Atlantic that I am wrong to say there aren't "significant" differences between the federal Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) and Indiana's RFRA.

It was a story perfectly designed for the new journalism model of “outrage clicks.”

The question as to why Andreas Lubitz, the co-pilot of Germanwings flight 9525 would intentionally bring about the crash of the plane is at the source of much of the perplexity surrounding the Germanwings tragedy. Even if we suppose that Lubitz was suicidal, it is obviously one thing to commit…

Less than four months ago, Attorney General Eric Holder announced that the Department of Justice had concluded that the transgendered are among the classes of persons protected, unbeknownst to the framers of the legislation at the time, by Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Tuesday's press…

David E. Sanger and Michael R. Gordon at the New York Times report that:

Former Florida governor Jeb Bush will be a "special guest" speaker at the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference convention at the end of April. Bush, who is exploring a run for the White House, will attend the convention in Houston.

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with senior writer John McCormack on the recently-passed Religious Freedom Restoration Act in Indiana, and what the media gets wrong.

John McCormack joined MSNBC's Morning Joe this morning to discuss the Indiana religious freedom law:

Today in Massachusetts, at a ceremony for the the Edward M. Kennedy Institute, Senator Elizabeth Warren borrowed President Obama's lectern for a bit. Behind the lectern, Warren looked almost presidential:

A new poll of New Hampshire GOP primary voters from the Boston Herald and Franklin Pierce University finds Jeb Bush and Scott Walker are tied at 15 percent support, with a slew of other likely candidates close behind in the first presidential primary of the cycle. Here's the Herald on the…

Two big Clinton stories landed last week. The first is that Hillary Clinton destroyed the electronic copies of her State Department emails on her private server after the State Department subpoenaed her emails. The second is that Hillary Clinton had an aide running a "secret spy network" that was,…

While businesses across the globe scramble to exploit the potential opportunities to be found in a country with 1.3 billion consumers, operating in China comes with profound business risks as well.

During President Obama's tenure, religious Americans have been increasingly marginalized by an administration that can be intolerant or at least unaccomodating of beliefs that conflict with its policies, regulations, or legislative goals. Perhaps most notably, President Obama campaigned by…

The roundtable from ABC's This Week, featuring Bill Kristol, Fareed Zakaria, Matthew Dowd, and Jennifer Granholm:

Piero di Cosimo was, in all likelihood, the strangest painter of the 15th century. “Men could perceive the strangeness of his brain,” wrote his biographer, Giorgio Vasari. “He knew no pleasure save that of going off by himself with his thoughts, letting his fancy roam, and building castles in air.…

It was the middle of January, and the ski school was full. The price of private lessons was much higher than we were willing to pay. Cynthia, my wife, was obviously frustrated.  

"The single biggest threat to our national security is our debt.”

Among the preachers of climate apocalypse, Roger Pielke Jr. is a heretic. Pielke’s sin: refusing to fall in line and accept the claims that climate chaos is upon us and that the only solution to the pending catastrophe is to implement immediate and drastic cuts to carbon dioxide emissions in every…

As conceived by its creator, Matt Weiner, the television show Mad Men is a running catalogue of dissolution: Its various characters lie, cheat, steal, drink, smoke, and fornicate their way up the corporate ladder in a 1960s New York advertising agency. Weiner frames their sins as occupational…

Just last week the White House boasted that President Obama is setting the agenda despite Republican control of the House and Senate. He’s in a stronger position now than before the midterm elections in November. “The White House is declaring victory over Washington,” according to Politico.

London

The Obama White House is enlisting all its allies to make its case for the bad nuclear deal with Iran that, say administration allies, is better than no deal. The alternative, they claim, is war. And to what purpose? Many nuclear experts, Middle East analysts, and journalists argue, after all, that…

King v. Burwell, on which the Supreme Court heard oral arguments March 4, is the most politically important case on the High Court’s docket this term. If the King petitioners win a decision in their favor, it could explode the massive 2010 federal health care overhaul known as Obamacare, by…

Remember Michael Brown, the 18-year-old whose fatal shooting in Ferguson, Mo., last August triggered two waves of riots, a national protest movement, death threats against the officer who shot Brown, lamentations by college presidents regarding America’s enduring racial injustice, vilification of…

Iran is an opportunity, not a threat; it’s a potential partner, not an enemy.

During a terror trial in Brooklyn last month, federal prosecutors entered into evidence several files recovered in Osama bin Laden’s compound. The documents, consisting mainly of letters to and from bin Laden during the last year of his life, gained more and more attention over the weeks that…

Tel Aviv

The remains of Miguel de Cervantes were discovered this past week, having reposed under the crypt of the Convent for the Barefoot Trinitarians since 1616. While The Scrapbook is inclined to celebrate—if that is the word—the identification of literary remains, our excitement was tempered when we…

Des Moines

Run All Night is unquestionably the best of the seemingly endless series of thrillers Liam Neeson has made since 2008’s Taken made him a most unlikely action star at the age of 56. And yet, rather than being celebrated for rising above the others, Run All Night has been received so poorly by…

On its 40th anniversary, it is instructive to read Midge Decter’s utterly immediate and yet classic Liberal Parents, Radical Children (1975). The immediacy comes from her observations about what was then a new way of childrearing, the effects of which have lasted and are prevalent today. At the…

Fragile by Design is James Madison for depressives—and he’s even a protagonist. Charles Calomiris and Stephen Haber argue that states are essential for banking systems (and vice versa) and that rent-seeking bargains drive their joint structure. No mere reverse Panglossians, Calomiris and Haber…

After China supplanted Japan in 2011 as the world’s second-largest economy, some China scholars, as well as pundits and economists, began forecasting when it would supplant the United States as the largest. Extrapolating China’s remarkable 9-10 percent average annual growth in the prior three…

If you harbor any doubts that “conservative” is an all-purpose epithet in the press, then Simon Denyer, the Washington Post’s China bureau chief, will happily erase those doubts. Writing last week about threats to freedom of speech and scholarly inquiry in the former British colony of Hong Kong…

"Why Are So Many Seattle Restaurants Closing Lately?” asks a recent Seattle magazine headline. The Scrapbook is no restaurateur, let alone knowledgeable about the local economy, but we’ll guess it has something to do with the fact that Seattle’s new $15 minimum wage starts phasing in on April 1.…

Douglas Laycock, a professor at the University of Virginia Law School, writes in an email: 

Bashar al-Assad told Charlie Rose that some Americans are sugarcoating ISIS. Moreover, the Syrian dictator claimed, ISIS has expanded since the beginning of the strikes."

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the March 30th issue.

They come and they go and, now, Harry Reid has said he is going.  When he announced his decision to retire, the predictable chorus of “attaboys” followed. He was a “fighter,” many of his colleagues said. President Obama went the extra mile and spoke fondly of Reid’s “curmudgeonly charm that’s hard…

Former Michigan governor Jennifer Granholm, a supporter of the Ready for Hillary super PAC, threatened Martin O'Malley that he "better watch it" in the presidential race. Why? Because, Granholm said she "was thinking that he might make a nice member of a President Clinton administration."

In an appearance on ABC's This Week, Indiana governor Mike Pence defended his state's Religious Freedom Restoration Act by noting that Barack Obama had voted for the same law as an Illinois state senator.

Martin O'Malley, a likely Democratic presidential candidate, took a shot this morning at Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush, saying that the presidency is not a "crown" and need not "be passed between two families." Of course Clinton's husband Bill Clinton was president. And Bush's father, George H.W.…

An Iranian journalist writing about the nuclear negotiations between the United States and Iran has defected. In an interview Amir Hossein Motaghi, has some harsh words for his native Iran. He also has a damning indictment of America's role in the nuclear negotiations.

Why would a young Jewish American equate the democratic state of Israel with Nazi Germany?

Hillary Clinton is worse than Richard Nixon, says the Republican National Committee.

Blogs and social media has been abuzz with talk of a supposed “German news report” indicating that Andreas Lubitz, the co-pilot of Germanwings flight 9525, was a Muslim convert. In fact, there is no such report. The rumor that Lubitz converted to Islam got started on the German site Politically…

A member of the Virginia State Bar (VSB) passes along this email, sent along last night to the members by VSB president Kevin E. Martingayle:

They are men, mostly. They are young, mostly. They are visionaries on a mission -- to systematize and make all the world’s knowledge accessible (Google); to connect all the world’s people with each other (Facebook); to change the way books are read and the sound of music is heard (Apple, Amazon);…

I don't think very much of Vox.com and its journalistic standards. I've made the case against them before in detail, but the evidence of their general lack of professionalism is still piling up. Vox has a daily email newsletter written by Matthew Yglesias, and today's missive contains the following…

On Thursday, Indiana governor Mike Pence signed the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) into law, and some celebrities, politicians, and journalists--including Miley Cyrus, Ashton Kutcher, and Hillary Clinton, just to name a few--are absolutely outraged. They say the law is a license to…

On Thursday, Indiana governor Mike Pence signed the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) into law, and some celebrities, politicians, and journalists--including Miley Cyrus, Ashton Kutcher, and Hillary Clinton, just to name a few--are absolutely outraged. They say the law is a license to…

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with editor William Kristol on whether Senator Schumer's Israel record will hurt his chances to replace Harry Reid as minority leader.

Matthew Continetti, writing at the Washington Free Beacon, explains why Jeb Bush has a problem in his foreign policy adviser James Baker. Baker recently spoke at a conference for the left-wing group J Street. Here's an excerpt from Continetti's column:

Senate minority leader Harry Reid is retiring after the 2016 elections, the Nevada Democrat announced Friday. In a video message, the 75-year-old Reid claimed the decision had nothing to do with being in the minority, or with difficult reelection prospects, or with his recent accident in his home.…

Bloomberg reports that:

Caitlin Macneal at Talking Points Memo writes that:

The National Republican Senatorial Committee responds to Harry Reid's retirement:

The top Democrat in the Senate, Harry Reid of Nevada, will not run for reelection. He made the announcement in a YouTube video:

Former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee met with about 40 conservative scholars in California Thursday in preparation for a potential presidential run in 2016. The discussion and Q&A session occurred at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution, and included in attendance George Shultz, Ronald…

Fifty years ago, a wildly heated cultural battle broke out between two movie critics: a New Yorker named Andrew Sarris and a San Franciscan named Pauline Kael. Sarris was the chief American expositor of the “auteur theory,” which emerged from French film magazines in the 1950s and asserted that the…

On February 12, the Pentagon quietly declassified a top-secret 386-page Department of Defense document from 1987 detailing Israel's nuclear program – the first time Israel’s alleged nuclear program has ever been officially and publically referenced by the U.S. authorities.

The battle for Tikrit has not been going well for the Iraqi army, its Shia militia allies and their Iranian advisors. So the U.S. has begun flying air strikes in support. And, as the New York Times reports 

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with staff writer Michael Warren on how President Obama's Bergdahl and Iran Nuke deals keep just getting worse.

The super PAC supporting former Texas governor Rick Perry has a new web ad focusing on the Republican's farming roots and showcasing his recent trips to Iowa. "My background is off of a dry-land cotton farm 200 miles west of Fort Worth, Texas," says Perry in the video. "I understand blue-collar,…

Governor Chris Christie has a big fan in Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. The New Jersey governor posted a video on the social media website from his latest town hall event. Zuckerberg "liked" the post and even commented. Check out a screenshot below:

If you pay any attention to the ways in which radicalism dominates the culture of the university these days, you're likely to feel as though you've gone through the looking glass. "White privilege." "Trigger warnings." "Rape culture." All of this (and much else) has turned academia into a bizarre,…

The White House announced the pope's visit in September:

A French prosecutor named Andreas Lubitz, 28 years old, as the co-pilot who may have been responsible for the downed European flight. 

As President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry close in on a nuclear deal with Iran, it's worth remembering that the Bill, Hillary, and Chelsea Clinton Foundation received money from "a front for the government of Iran" called the Alavi Foundation.

Last week, to much fanfare, Glenn Beck declared that he was leaving the Republican party and becoming an independent. During a Tuesday night appearance on the O’Reilly Factor, Beck explained his decision thusly:

The United States Army has charged Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl with desertion and "misbehavior before the enemy." Bergdahl allegedly abandoned his post in Afghanistan and was held captive by Taliban-aligned forces for nearly five years before the Obama administration negotiated a deal with the Taliban…

Bloomberg reports that:

Bowe Bergdahl, the American soldier held captive in Afghanistan by Taliban-affiliated terrorists for nearly five years, will be charged with desertion. Bergdahl was returned to the United States last year in exchange for five Taliban commanders being held at the detention facility at Guantanamo…

Sarah Ferris writes, at The Hill, that:

Seems the answer, according to Gallup, is Not so much.

Since Politico, a politics-focused website and newspaper, launched its subscription-based news service Politico Pro in 2011, government agencies have increasingly turned to the service to keep abreast of the latest developments in their spheres of policy. Government records show fiscal year 2011…

Almost two years ago, Tim Miller, the then executive director of the America Rising PAC, authored a letter to look into possible favoritism from Hillary Clinton's State Department epartment to longtime Clinton associate Terry McAuliffe. The letter, addressed to the State Department, was…

Water, Water Everywhere

As Craig Whitlock of the Washington Post is reporting, after a hasty departure from Yemen:

Charles Krauthammer articulated a major hurdle that Ted Cruz will face as he runs for the presidency:

In an interview this evening on Fox News, State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki would not promise that Americans would get to see the details of a nuclear deal with Iran before it's "signed, sealed, delivered."

Marco Rubio said that if President Obama inks a deal with Iran, he'd revoke it if he becomes president of the United States. He made the remarks in an interview with Hugh Hewitt:

Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas offered an amendment on the Senate floor this afternoon to "defend the U.S.-Israel alliance" at the United Nations. 

The Wall Street Journal editorial board greets the announcement of Ted Cruz’s presidential candidacy by taking the Texas senator to task for, of all things, being too much like President Obama.  The Journal notes that both men decided to launch a White House run as a 40-something first-term senator…

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with senior editor Andrew Ferguson on the 2016 field, his recent cover story on Bush, and how Jeb Bush and Ted Cruz are faring so far.

The A-10 may now have all the supporters it needs to stay operational.  As Stephen Losey of Air Force Times reports, Chuck Norris:

Indystar.com reports:

Louisiana governor Bobby Jindal released a statement Tuesday blasting President Obama as an "inept commander in chief. Jindal, who may run for the GOP nomination for president, criticized Obama's willingness to dismiss the Iranian supreme leader's "death to America" exhortations as "political…

A spokeswoman for former Florida governor Jeb Bush says the possible Republican presidential candidate "disagrees" with one of his foreign policy advisers who spoke at a left-wing anti-Israel group this week.

Former Maryland governor Martin O'Malley sounds a populist note in a short new video that suggests the Democrat may be preparing for a presidential run.

A pair of statements about an hour apart on Monday by two top Obama administration officials give a clear if jarring look into the funhouse mirror that is current U.S. policy towards Iran and Israel. The two comments are recorded by CNN senior White House correspondent Jim Acosta on his Twitter…

Hillary Clinton is a fairly weak candidate for the presidency, in many ways:

Senator Rand Paul, who is expected to announce a presidential run on April 7, made the case on Fox News tonight that the eventual Republican nominee needs to "go after" the "corruption" of Bill and Hillary Clinton:

Four months after the publication of an infamous Rolling Stone piece depicting a violent gang rape at one of the University of Virginia's fraternities, and the magazine's subsequent retraction due to numerous inconsistencies and gross journalistic malpractice (see Philip Terzian's "A Credulous…

A report on the 2014 Gaza War was released this month by the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (JINSA), a pro-Israel think tank. The report contains observations, implications, and recommendations regarding the war last summer between Israel and terrorist group Hamas. However, the…

In the middle of March, the Navy, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard published a revised version of their 2007 paper, A Cooperative Strategy for the 21st Century. The 2007 edition reflected the strong influence of 9/11, U.S. operations in Afghanistan, Iraq, and the global campaign against Islamist…

A fact sheet on the Defense budget from the Foreign Policy Initiative:

Lynchburg, Va.

In an email to supporters, the Democratic party is warning about Ted Cruz, the first Republican to jump into the 2016 presidential race. The prospect of a President Cruz is "really, really scary," the Democrats write in an email.

Myron Magnet, writing for City Journal:

Ted Cruz announced at Liberty University in Virginia that he's running for president of the United States. Here's video:

Ted Cruz, who tweeted last night that he's running for president, released his first Spanish language web ad. The ad touts his biography:

It has now been five years since President Obama signed Obamacare into law — and more than two years and two months since any poll found it to be popular.  The last time a poll found Obamacare to be popular was during Obama’s first term. 

A half-century of estrangement is over, President Obama declared late last year, in a surprise announcement that he was transforming U.S. policy towards Cuba. Having broken the ice, the administration hopes that normalizing diplomatic relations and lifting the economic embargo will, as the recently…

Finally, a debate about Iran. Last week, 47 Republican senators released a public letter addressed to the leaders of the Iranian regime. The letter made what might have seemed a self-evident point: If the Obama administration reaches a deal with Iran, Congress will not be bound by parts of the deal…

President Obama is headed for disaster in the nuclear deal with Iran. The nearly completed agreement, as best we know, would allow Iran to keep its nuclear infrastructure intact and its centrifuges churning out enriched uranium. The mullahs would be free to build an arsenal of nuclear weapons in as…

Readers are no doubt aware that, on the Sunday after the 50th anniversary reenactment of the march on Selma, Alabama, the New York Times published a front-page photograph of the marchers. There’s President Obama, front and center in shirtsleeves, alongside his wife and two daughters; and there’s…

Abraham Lincoln was a remarkable leader in so many ways it is only natural that shelves upon shelves of books have been written about our 16th president. The first Republican president was an astute politician who knew how to include his opponents on his team. He of log cabin fame knew how to use…

What does the likely victory of Iraqi forces retaking Tikrit from the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria tell us about the current U.S. military strategy in Iraq?

Will anyone go to the movies 25 years from now? Will there even be movie theaters 25 years from now? These are not idle questions. New research from the Motion Picture Association of America shows how the moviegoing audience of those between the ages of 25 and 39 has contracted…

The Hollywood Ten, a group of screenwriters and directors who briefly went to prison in 1950 for contempt of Congress when they refused to answer questions about Communist party affiliations from the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC), have, in the past few decades, become cultural…

Liberals have a favorite new legal doctrine. The Logan Act is a federal law enacted in 1799 that, in theory, penalizes American citizens who try to influence foreign governments “without authority of the United States.” Even though the law is still on the books, The Scrapbook describes the Logan…

A visit to a law school decades ago and a visit today would reveal strikingly different campuses. Before the 1980s, legal ideas generally considered conservative or libertarian were rare, and their defenders were regarded as borderline eccentric. Today, the environment is far more hospitable.…

Sacramento

Literary critics have one big fault, and film critics have another. The best critics of the novel undervalue story-telling even as they push the merits of literary gruel: dull, highbrow tomes filled with “ideas.” The result is excessive praise for Mrs. Dalloway and not enough for The Natural,…

"I can be pretty handy in a roughhouse.” So said F. R. Leavis, all five-foot-six, 125 pounds of him, when offering to support some of his arty students at Downing College, Cambridge, whose protest meeting during the Suez Crisis of 1956 was threatened by members of the Boat Club. We may have trouble…

The consensus across America, and perhaps especially along the I-95 corridor, seems to be that Jeb Bush and Hillary Clinton are on a nearly inevitable collision course, with one or the other poised to be declared president-elect on November 8, 2016. At a minimum, they are viewed as the…

Urbandale, Iowa

On a bright, zero-degree morning last month, as I was happily making my bed in the attic of friends in Brooklyn, I thought with a shudder of Ignác Hrubý. Being a houseguest is one of my joys. It combines security and adventure, familiarity and independence. Having houseguests used to be a joy, too.…

On March 10, Senator Ted Cruz said the following: “On tax -reform, we, right now, have more words in the IRS code than there are in the Bible—not a one of them as good.” It’s no surprise that Republicans in Congress tend to hate taxes and love the Bible, and as Republican rhetoric goes, this is…

If you’re an establishment Republican, ripples of doubt are intruding on your normal placid contentment.

Difficult, they say, to pass a family business on to the third generation. Proof of this assertion is the business known as the City of Chicago, run by the Daley family for two generations but now turned over to non-Irish carpetbaggers, with no future Daley in view. In the interregnum between Daley…

"A matriarchy is a social organizational form in which the mother or oldest female heads the family. .  .  . It is also government or rule by a woman or women,” runs the entry in Wikipedia, adding helpfully that it can be a description for a society in which “the culture centers around values and…

It's official: Ted Cruz is running for president. He made the announcement shortly after midnight on Twitter. "I'm running for President and I hope to earn your support!"

"There are three principles of conduct which the man of high rank should consider specially important: that in his deportment and manner he keep from violence and heedlessness; that in regulating his countenance he keep near to sincerity; and that in his words and tones he keep far from lowness and…

THE WEEKLY STANDARD Casual Podcast, with David Skinner reading his casual essay "A Winter's Tale."

Iowa took umbrage, last week, over something an operative for Scott Walker said.  Or, to be precise, something she once tweeted.  For her indiscretion, Liz Mair was forced to resign from Walker’s political action committee. Walker is not yet an officially declared candidate for president but that…

The prime minister of Israel delivered a speech announcing positions on the peace process and Palestinian statehood that contradicted the views of the U.S. president and the international community.

California governor Jerry Brown said, "Yes, I would" run for president if I were ten years younger. He made the remarks this morning to NBC:

President Obama insisted in an interview with the Huffington Post that "by hook or by crook" he'll be a successful president. He made the comments in answering a question about whether he'd become a "more progressive president over time."

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the March 23rd issue.

“Fed Puts Interest-Rate Hikes in Play,” led the Wall Street Journal’s page one, following Federal Reserve Board chair Janet Yellen’s latest press conference. “Don’t bet on June for Federal Reserve hike,” countered page one of the business section of USA Today. To which I would add a headline for…

Is former Maryland governor Martin O'Malley moving closer to running for president? A short video on the Democrat's Facebook page looks like the beginning of a campaign ad.

Matthew Rosenberg and Mark Mazzetti of the New York Times report:

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with editor William Kristol on the President's nuclear deal with Iran, whether we'll learn more this weekend, and Hillary Clinton's speech to camp counselors.

On Thursday, the House voted to override a rule from the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), implemented last year, that allows unions to hold elections to organize a workforce in as little as eight days. (The average length of time for a workplace election is 38 days.) Crucially, the NLRB rule…

Former Texas governor Rick Perry responded to news that the Obama administration is instituting new regulations on hydraulic fracturing.

In his annual statement marking the Persian new year, President Obama said he believes that Iran and the U.S. “should be able” to resolve the dispute over the mullahs’ nuclear program “peacefully, with diplomacy.”

To hear administration officials tell it, the "fourth quarter" of the Obama presidency will be focused on economic growth and what the president calls “middle-class economics.” Brian Deese, senior advisor to the president on climate and energy, emphasized this at a Friday breakfast with reporters…

Countries that choose to host North Korean embassies (the United States is, quite rightly, not among them) take a real risk. Not only is the regime that they serve a horror show, but many of the country’s “diplomats” are literally criminals. When not conducting “diplomacy,” they engage in money…

Secretary of State John Kerry has released a statement mourning the death of the mother of Iran's president.

So the madness has begun with two big upsets, yesterday. In one, Georgia State guard, R.J. Hunter drained a three with that many seconds left in the game to upset three-seeded Baylor. After the game, Hunter’s father, who is also team’s coach, had some words for President Obama who had picked…

Since Benjamin Netanyahu's victory in Israel's recent elections, the Obama administration has made its displeasure with the results abundantly clear. To help justify changes in its posture towards Israel, the White House appears anxious to point out what it sees as "divisive" rhetoric and attitudes…

President Obama uses his Nowruz statement to speak directly to the Iranian people. In doing so, he compares Iranian hardliners to those Americans who are skeptical the president's deal with Iran will prevent the rogue nation from getting nuclear weapons capability. 

Given that Obamacare’s supporters like to take the Congressional Budget Office’s overly optimistic scoring of the president’s signature legislation as gospel, it’s fun to look at how poorly Obamacare is actually doing in relation to earlier CBO projections.  When the Democrats rammed Obamacare…

Florida senator Marco Rubio took the floor of the U.S. Senate Thursday to call the Obama administration's treatment of the state of Israel a "historic and tragic mistake." Rubio's address came on the same day as a report the White House is considering not defending Israel in front of attacks from…

The Obama administration appears to be moving toward a shift in its relations with a foreign ally, and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has nothing to say. White House officials have been suggesting the United States may not continue support Israel from charges and attacks by international…

Addressing the Cleveland City Club on Wednesday, President Obama put up a trial balloon for a controversial concept: mandatory voting. According to Fox News, Obama said, “If everybody voted, then it would completely change the political map in this country,” and called the idea ‘potentially…

Kosovo Albanians, overwhelmingly Muslim, love America—which rescued them from Serbian aggression in 1999—and desire diplomatic relations with Israel. Kosovo does not recognize the Palestinian Authority and does not belong to the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC).

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with senior editor Lee Smith on Obama's nuclear giveaway to Iran and why Netanyahu's victory won't stop the administration from pursuing a bad deal.

In the aftermath of Benjamin Netanyahu's inconvenient (to Barack Obama) victory in the Israeli election, it looks like the administration is heading towards exacting revenge. The administration's threat is that under President Obama the United States will "join the jackals"—the permanent, global,…

Former Texas governor Rick Perry said he was "alarmed" by reports the Obama administration is considering not supporting the state of Israel at the United Nations. Perry, who may run for president in 2016, said he urged Obama to "turn away from such a path."

Senate Democrats continue to block a vote on a bill to help sex-trafficking victims because the bill does not fund elective abortions, but Senator Pat Leahy of Vermont signaled Thursday that he's open to a potential compromise to pass the bill.

In response to Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu's recent remarks and reelection, a senior Obama administration official tells Politico that the United States may withdraw support of Israel at the United Nations.

Is Hillary toast?

Louisiana governor Bobby Jindal responded to a report that the Obama administration may consider changing the United States's longstanding position of defending Israel within the United Nations against criticism of that country's settlements. “We are signaling that if the Israeli government’s…

Senator Chuck Grassley has sent two letters to the State Department to ask about Huma Abedin's special government status when she was a government employee--and for information on Abedin's email use while working for the government. Abedin is a close aide to Hillary Clinton, and worked for the…

Bloomberg reports that:

Bill Kristol recommends that Congress act to prevent Israel from being thrown to the jackals in the United Nations. The boss weighed in on Twitter:

The U.S. government might impose sanctions on Israel or allow its greatest ally in the Middle East to be tried in the International Criminal Court, according to Politico. Michael Crowley reports:

Budweiser Derangement Syndrome is a real problem for the 139-year-old brewer. Despite being a perfectly serviceable mid-priced beer (perfect for hot summer days, sporting events, and when one is too full to stomach an otherwise excellent Dogfish Head 90 Minute IPA), it’s pilloried across the…

Mark Halperin shared a New Hampshire focus group, mostly made up of strong Hillary Clinton supporters, this morning on MSNBC:

In an interview with Vice, Barack Obama struck his favorite pose -- that of disinterested, objective observer on the passing political scene. Asked about congressional resistance to cap and trade, our social-critic-in-chief responded:

In a comment unprompted by any question from the media, White House press secretary lashed into some of the rhetoric Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu used in his reelection campaign. The White House even suggested it had hurt Israel's democracy and America's relationship with its greatest…

Senator Joe Lieberman, writing in the Wall Street Journal:

On Tuesday, 42 Senate Democrats prevented a vote on a bill to help the victims of sex trafficking because the bill does not provide federal funding for elective abortions. Here are five reasons why this filibuster is insane. 

Churchill presents a wonderful metaphor, inspired by Edmund Burke, of the importance of consistency in leadership. He describes the ship of state, buffeted by winds, tacking left and right, from policy to policy, but always heading toward a main point in the distance. Lesson: circumstances call for…

I walked into my local Starbucks yesterday morning with a certain foreboding. As everyone must know, the chief executive officer of Starbucks, one Howard Schultz, had commanded that Starbucks employees ("baristas," in corporate parlance) write this phrase -- #RaceTogether -- on the coffee cups they…

Clinton Makes Trouble For Cuomo

On Tuesday, Republican congressman Aaron Schock announced his resignation in the wake of several damaging revelations. Politico reported that Schock billed his campaign for 90,000 miles that he never actually drove. The Chicago Tribune reported that property Schock owned was tied up in a…

A new law introduced in Congress seeks to prevent foreign diplomats and employees of the United Nations from receiving taxpayer-funded Obamacare subsidies. The bill has been introduced in the House of Representatives by Republicans Ed Royce and Paul Ryan.

On CNN this morning, White House aide David Simas avoided congratulating Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the Israeli elections. Instead, he would only congratulate the Israeli people on having an election.

Barack Obama did not like when Israeli prime minister Benjmain Netanyahu used a joint congressional meeting to criticize his Iran plan. But yesterday the president let the Irish prime minister, Enda Kenny, use his podium to attack Congress on immigration at a St. Patrick's Day reception at the…

Possible Republican presidential candidate Carly Fiorina lashed into probable Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton last night on Fox News:

Al Gore is "gaining steam" in the presidential race, stated a report last night from Fox News. Watch Peter Doocy's report on Bret Baier's Special Report:

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with editor William Kristol on Netanyahu's victory.

Israel prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has claimed victory in today's election. "Against all odds:a great victory for the Likud," Netanyahu tweeted. "A major victory for the people of Israel!"

A clear chart showing the Israel election polls, using the numbers Israeli news channels 1, 2, and 10, shows Likud in a very tight race with Zionist Union:

Politico reports:

Federal agencies set a new record for improper payments last year, shelling out $125 billion in questionable benefits after years of declines. The Feds, as the AP reports, blew the billions on (among other things):

Josh Rogin reports:

Less than a week ago, General Martin Dempsey, Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, was saying:

Treasury Secretary Jack Lew, a former State Department official, sidestepped questions about Hillary Clinton's exclusive use of a private email address in testimony today on Capitol Hill:

Asked today on MSNBC whether he'd sign the letter to Iran again, Ted Cruz insisted he would. But with one slight modification. He'd use larger print. 

Senator Ben Sasse has introduced a law to eliminate the amnesty tax bonuses, according to a press release from his office.

When President Obama attended the G-20 summit in Brisbane, Australia last November, the entire delegation required over 5,000 room nights at five different hotels over the course of the summit, costing $2.1 million. Transporting all those people around Brisbane was not cheap: the State Department…

A Jewish fraternity at Vanderbilt University has been the target of apparent anti-Semitic vandalism. The Vanderbilt Hustler reports:

Hillary Clinton is planning to announce a run for president very soon, but in the meanwhile, she's continuing to give high dollar paid speeches. The former secretary of state delivered one last week in California to woman eBay executives. And she's got " another on Thursday in Atlantic City before…

Tom Cotton’s letter to the Iranian regime has spurred furious blowback from liberals. They want the president to cut a deal with Iran, and Cotton’s letter gets in the way; thus, they’ve engaged in a specious fight over inter-branch protocol. Never mind that the president is looking to sign an…

Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas delivered his maiden speech from the floor of the Senate on "Ending America’s Retreat, Restoring America’s Military Dominance," as the speech was titled. Watch here:

The Washington Post’s E.J. Dionne doesn’t like the Iran open letter released by 47 Republican senators last week. And his column today makes clear that he really doesn’t like my support of that open letter.

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with senior writer Stephen F. Hayes on Secretary of State John Kerry's Syrian mess.

Randi Weingarten, the president of the American Federation of Teachers, says that she knew about Hillary Clinton's private email. Weingarten made the comment in Twitter, in response to a question from a Jeb Bush spokesman. Tim Miller, the Bush spokesman, tweeted, "@rweingarten also if not secret -…

Speaking today at the acceptance ceremony for the Irish American Hall of Fame award, Hillary Clinton joked about taking a DNA test:

Scott Walker may not be a candidate for president yet, but the Wisconsin governor’s growing political action committee staff is already going after a potential rival in the Republican primary. GOP strategist Liz Mair, CNN reports, has just signed on to consult for Walker’s Our American Revival PAC,…

CBS News reports on another troubling foreign donation to the Clinton Foundation: 

The Republican National Committee has released this web video, hitting the White House, the State Department, and the Clinton campaign for avoiding questions related to Hillary Clinton's exclusive use of private email to conduct official business:

Bill Kristol joined C-SPAN this morning to talk about the Iran nuclear deal and to take calls. Watch here:

Later today Hillary Clinton will be inducted in the Irish America Hall of Fame. The former first lady "is being honored for her work on behalf of the Irish peace process," according to Irish America magazine, the sponsor of the award. 

Sunday night, Stephen Hayes noted (via Twitter) a Times of Israel article that the 2015 Worldwide Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Communities delivered annually by Director of National Intelligence James Clapper to a Senate committee had "removed Iran and Hezbollah from its list of…

Speaking with Bill Kristol, longtime Bill Clinton aide Paul Begala said he wishes Hillary Clinton "had a really tough primary challenge." But, he admits, it's not likely this time around:

Elections have grown increasingly contentious in countries across the globe. This makes sense; governments have become immensely powerful in the face of growing challenges,  governments control a much greater share of the economy, and the benefits of dispensing government largesse are increasing…

In the mid-1960s the most celebrated folk musician of his era bought a house for his growing family at the southern edge of the Catskills, in the nineteenth-century painters’ retreat of Woodstock. He was a “protest singer,” to use a term that was then new. His lyrics—profound, tender,…

Tel Aviv

Charlie Parker never achieved stardom, at least not by the standards of the music business. He never had a gold record to hang on the wall or enjoyed a significant radio hit. He never had a contract with a major record label. His face didn’t appear, even in a bit role, in a Hollywood film. If you…

Not only has the Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee backed away from its decades-long warning about cholesterol (see Geoffrey Norman elsewhere in this issue), but it has also finally spoken out on a subject of vital importance to The Scrapbook: coffee consumption.

Here’s a generally accepted syllogism: The Weimar Republic saw an explosion in the arts, particularly of modern forms like expressionist painting and atonal music. When Hitler swept away the freedoms of the Weimar era and assumed dictatorial powers, he targeted “degenerate art”—the Nazis’…

There have been a lot of memorable eggs in my life but I suppose the best of them would be those I gathered myself from the little henhouse we kept at the edge of the meadow for a couple of summers. I’d knock off this chore (and I never thought of it as that) first thing in the morning, and those…

Upon learning that Hillary Clinton used a private email account to conduct all official business during her tenure as secretary of state, CNN’s Dan Merica remarked, “GOP aides on the Benghazi committee have long said they were going to find something others hadn’t. And they did.” The New York Times…

There’s a thick vein of subversion in any good conservative journalist, and in M. Stanton Evans, who died last week, the vein ran wide and deep. Always, though, it was tempered by good humor, a sly appreciation for human absurdity, and an implacable love for his country and for what his friend…

It used to happen regularly. Some poor science writer for a magazine or newspaper would try to humanize an astronomy fact: The distance light travels in a year is enormous! It’s 5.88 trillion miles! Or try to tell a biology story in everyday terms: The grana stacks, where photo-synthesis happens in…

If Boris Nemtsov, the Russian statesman and activist killed in Moscow last week, had been a character in a political thriller—and he certainly had the looks and charisma for the part—the script might have been criticized as lacking subtlety. There is the opposition leader gunned down on the eve of…

In a Platonic dialogue, Socrates describes Homer as “the best and most divine of the poets.” Not a bad blurb, if taken at face value. Such an exalted position, however, could not remain unchallenged. Homer’s excellence, not to mention his very existence, has been frequently called into question…

For most historians most of the time, reach exceeds grasp—necessarily so, for reasons intrinsic to the craft. Save for its occasional grandmaster, a Gibbon or a Namier, past mysteries lie too deeply embedded to be definitively solved in a later age. The Man Who Would Not Be Washington provides a…

On the day that Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu was leaving for the United States to give what the Washington Post called “the most important speech of his life,” my grandchildren were watching Big Hero 6. When I heard the smallest of the animated characters say, “We didn’t set out to be super-heroes,…

There is something magical about saying a thing is something that it obviously is not. Children know this instinctively. Calling a shoebox a castle, or a pencil a scepter, can elicit momentary raptures of delight in a child: not primarily for the functional reason that it allows him to immerse…

Three moments stood out for me as I watched Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech Tuesday from the gallery of the House of Representatives.

There should be movies like Focus every week. It’s a stylish and amusing film with glamorous actors, memorable supporting players, lush settings, and lots of twists and turns. Will Smith plays a successful con artist who chisels people all over the world. He’s amused when a two-bit newbie played by…

The Japanese, seemingly stuck in political doldrums, sluggish economic growth, and waning international influence, are pushing past those frustrations with a new government-led campaign to sell the world—and their own children—on their country’s distinctive traditional cuisine.

President Obama wants explicit legislative authorization to use military force against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS). The administration has sent a draft of an AUMF to Congress, which has begun hearings that could last a while.

The Scrapbook was delighted a few weeks ago when The Weekly Standard published Gordon S. Wood’s review of a new collection of essays by Bernard Bailyn (“History in Context: The American vision of Bernard Bailyn,” Books & Arts, February 23). To use a sports metaphor, this was a two-run homer:…

According to an article in the New York Times on Monday, March 2, “a debate . . . has roiled Colorado’s growing yoga world.” (And don’t start thinking about what kind of planet the “yoga world” is.) 

Democrat Jim Webb told ABC News that he has been getting "a lot of support" as he's exploring a presidential run.

Did Rand Paul just declare his presidential candidacy? In a recent tweet he calls himself a "candidate."

While addressing the press during a visit to Egypt, Secretary of State John Kerry spoke about the ongoing negotiations with Iran over that country's nuclear programs. As he and President Obama have several times in the past, Kerry cited a report that Iran's "Supreme Leader" issued a "fatwa" against…

Busy week for Washington and the political class it succors. So busy that a headline screaming for the attention of our leaders came and went barely leaving a footprint.

The AP is reporting that:

Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas explained the reasoning behind the letter he and 46 other senators sent to Iran about the nuclear deal this morning on CBS. Watch Cotton's interview with Bob Schieffer here:

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts sections from the March 2nd, March 9th, and March 16th issues.

James Carville, a former aide to Bill Clinton and a longtime defender of the Clintons, offered an explanation on ABC's This Week as to why Hillary Clinton might have used a private email account: to avoid congressional oversight.

Jonathan Karl of ABC News reported this morning that Speaker of the House John Boehner will announce an "investigation next week into Hillary Clinton's email practices as secretary of state."

In a Saturday night letter from President Obama's chief of staff Denis McDonough to Senate Foreign Relations Committee chair Bob Corker, the White House confirmed that in fact the United Nations will play a key role in any nuclear deal that may be reached with Iran.

Hillary Clinton was the butt of a joke from the commander in chief Saturday night in Washington. The line was delivered at the secretive Gridiron Club dinner, an annual event held by club made up of journalists.

After Gov. Scott Walker's performance today in New Hampshire, he was greeted by throngs of supporters (and members of the press), who wanted to shake his hand and ask him questions.

Joe Biden's no lightweight.

So all’s well. No more financial meltdowns. No more taxpayer bailouts of bonus-hunting, risk-taking bankers. The Federal Reserve Board’s regulators have decided that all 31 of the largest U.S. banks, including seven that are foreign-owned, would survive a severe recession with sufficient capital to…

Bowie, Md.

Eight days after a meeting on a potential free trade agreement between the United States and the European Union last month, two congressmen introduced a bill to influence the process and help prevent economic discrimination against Israel. Called the “U.S.-Israel Trade and Commercial Enhancement…

Concerned Veterans for America has released this video detailing the Veterans Affairs scandal ahead of President Obama's visit to the Phoenix hospital:

We received this email from a 40-year veteran of the federal workforce, who raises serious questions about Hillary Clinton and her emails:

In a preview of Barack Obama's interview with Vice, the president of the United States says he's "embarassed" Republicans sent a letter to Iran:

Barack Obama's top adviser, Valerie Jarrett, tells the New York Times Magazine that her "job," at least part of it anyway, is to be the president's "friend."

What would the shade of El Libertador think today surveying his beloved Venezuela? He would certainly be shocked at the dubious honor his country has been granted for claiming the number one spot on the world Misery Index for 2015. He would also surely wonder how the land of the intellectual font…

Iraq, with significant assistance from Iran and dangerous participation by Shia militias, has been on the offensive in Tikrit all week and is close to taking the city back from ISIS. Now:

The New York Post reports: 

As the White House claims that it was caught off-guard by the Clinton email scandal, or that President Obama didn't realize that his emails to hdr22@clintonemail.com weren't landing on State Department servers, it would be good to remind them: you told us so.

Scaring Putin: Britain plans to meet the NATO requirement that it spend 2% of its GDP on defense by “creative accountancy” rather than by “actually spending more money,” reports the Financial Times. The trick: count spending on intelligence services and war pensions as military spending. This is in…

Hillary Clinton's internal review of her personal email account did not involve opening and reading each piece of mail, according to a report in Time magazine.

Secretary of State John Kerry spoke at the Atlantic Council Thursday morning as part of the Road to Paris Climate Series and he compared the certainty of human-caused climate change to the law of gravity and to the temperature at which water freezes. He also questioned the right of anyone to…

It’s worth keeping score on how progressives are reacting to the Clinton email problems. Some of them (like Eugene Robinson) are tentatively pushing the issue now, one assumes because they don’t especially like Clinton and think that this might be the moment to pull a more liberal challenger into…

Finally, a debate about Iran. Last week, 47 Republican senators released a public letter addressed to the leaders of the Iranian regime. The letter made what might have seemed a self-evident point: If the Obama administration reaches a deal with Iran, Congress will not be bound by parts of the deal…

Former Texas governor Rick Perry released a statement Thursday citing his "concern" that President Barack Obama may not seek congressional approval for the ongoing nuclear weapons negotiations with Iran.

First time claims fell, as Reuters reports, by:

Lost in the maelstrom surrounding Hillary Clinton’s utterly bizarre decision to violate protocol and use a private email system to conduct public business while serving as secretary of state is another festering Clinton scandal. (Of Clinton scandals, there is no end, to mangle Ecclesiastes.) That’s…

Hillary Clinton’s email problems do not end with her illegal privatization of government communications or her Nixonian stonewalling of questions about how much of her public record she has destroyed in order to avoid public scrutiny.

The latest cover of Time magazine gives Hillary Clinton horns:

Here it is, the FCC's 400-page plan to regulate the Internet:

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with editor William Kristol on Hillary Clinton's private email servers, how it might impact her 2016 chances, and the Cotton letter signed by 47 Senators sent to Iran on the President's nuclear negotiations. 

If Martin O'Malley runs for president, he'll be running to win. He made the comment this morning in an interview on MSNBC's Morning Joe:

Three recent news items to consider:

In his latest fireside-chat style video, former Texas governor Rick Perry weighs in on foreign policy issues and calls for stronger American leadership in the world:

Under federal election law, candidates are not allowed to coordinate with the super PACs that support them. But since Hillary Clinton is not yet an official candidate, she's been coordinating with Correct the Record, a project of the Democratic-aligned super PAC American Bridge 21st Century.

A hundred years ago, the ADL was founded to combat the defamation of the Jewish people. The Factual Feminist wonders why it’s spreading gender propaganda in high schools.

With more than a year and a half until Election Day 2016, things are already gearing up for high-profile political contests, and not just on the presidential level. In Ohio, the quintessential presidential battleground state, first-term Republican senator Rob Portman is one of the Democrats’ top…

Jay Cost joined the Cato podcast to discuss his latest book, A Republic No More: Big Government and the Rise of American Political Corruption:

Concerned Veterans for America releases its second installment of from its "Leading from Behind" series. This one is on Iraq:

As Justin Sink of Government Executive reports:

 “Inspectors knew when North Korea broke to the bomb, but that didn't stop anything. North Korea turned off the cameras, kicked out the inspectors. Within a few years, it got the bomb.”

Stephen F. Hayes reported on Fox News that Hillary Clinton's top two aides, Huma Abedin and Cheryl Mills, used personal emails while working for the secretary of state at the State Department:

In a Capitol Hill hearing about President Obama's proposed Authorization of Use of Military Force, Secretary of State John Kerry was heckled by anti-war protesters:

Yesterday, Senator Ted Cruz said the following: “On tax reform, we, right now, have more words in the IRS code than there are in the Bible — not a one of them as good.”

Daniel Halper, online editor of THE WEEKLY STANDARD and author of Clinton, Inc., joined Fox News host Bill O'Reilly Tuesday to talk about the Hillary Clinton email scandal. Watch the video below:

Just a few weeks ago, everybody thought Hillary Clinton would cruise to the Democratic nomination. But with recent revelations -- the private email account, the foreign contributions to the Clinton Foundation -- where does she stand now?

Plans for a one million dollar granite sculpture for the new U.S. Embassy in London have been scrapped because the sculpture was too heavy for the planned site. As THE WEEKLY STANDARD first reported in December 2013, the State Department awarded a $1 million contract to Irish-born American artist…

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with staff writer Michael Warren on Hillary Clinton's email press conference at the United Nations.

During her press appearance today, Hillary Clinton acknowledged that about 60,000 emails, including sent and received, went through her home email server that she used during her tenure as secretary of state. About half of those, she said, were work related. UPI reports:

In an interview with The Hill's Molly Hooper, the boss discussed the 2016 election and the impact foreign policy will have on the Republican field.

Hillary Clinton said she deleted emails stored on her private server during her time at the State Department because she "didn't see any reason to keep them."

The first question in Hillary Clinton's press conference at the United Nations went to ... a Turkish reporter:

Just before Hillary Clinton's scheduled press conference at the United Nations in New York City, the former sercertary of state sent an email to supporters of her family's foundation.

Here's live video of Hillary Clinton's press conference, which is expected to start at the United Nations in New York City soon:

"In 36 years in the United States Senate, I cannot recall another instance" in which senators intervened in the conduct of U.S. foreign policy,” Vice President Joe Biden declared, outraged by the "open letter to the leaders of the Islamic Republic of Iran," signed by 47 Republican senators. 

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with senior writer Stephen F. Hayes on the Cotton Letter to Iran, the media, and its response.

Louisiana governor Bobby Jindal is encouraging all candidates -- Democrats and Republicans -- to sign the letter organized by Senator Tom Cotton warning that any Iran deal not accepted by Congress can be revoked.

Hillary Clinton will be holding a press availability today at the United Nations in New York City. But all members of the press won't be able to attend. Only those who requested credentials 24 hours before the event (or about 18 hours before news of the availability leaked out) will be credentialed.

A new poll from the Wall Street Journal and NBC News shows Florida senator Marco Rubio and Wisconsin governor Scott Walker have the most goodwill among Republican primary voters ahead of both men's possible bids for the presidency.

Tacked onto the end of the daily press release from U.S. Central Command (Centcom) Monday is a report that coalition aircraft bombed the "Khorasan Group" near Aleppo, Syria. Centcom describes the group as a "network of veteran al Qa'ida operatives." The coalition has targeted the group at least…

According to Miles's Law, "where you stand depends on where you sit." And so when Vice President Joe Biden hyperventilates over Republican senators' criticism of the Obama administration's negotiations with Iran, we must take him with a grain of salt. He used to have a seat in the Senate; now he…

Vice President Joe Biden has released this statement, in response to a letter organized by Senator Tom Cotton to Iran:

President Obama is responding to Scott Walker's latest move in Wisconsin with a sharply worded statement.

President Obama will wait until after a nuclear deal with Iran is made to make the case to the American people that it's the right thing to do. He made the comment today after being asked about this letter from nearly 50 U.S. senators to Iran, which stated, "The next president could revoke such an…

Tony Cook of the Indianapolis Star reports that:

My colleague Lee Smith has noted that both Hillary Clinton and Sen. Bob Menendez both suddenly found themselves in trouble just as the Obama administration was enduring heightened public scrutiny over their attempt to forge an agreement with Iran, and both may well have been voices of opposition.…

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with editor William Kristol on Hillary Clinton's privatized email server and the Republican field in 2016.

The White House admitted in today's press conference that in fact President Obama did exchange emails with Hillary Clinton while she was secretary of state:

In a tweet this morning, NBC News senior political editor Mark Murray writes: “With GOP Senators’ Iran Move, Politics Goes Beyond the Water’s Edge.” 47 Republican Senators sent to the Supreme Leader of Iran reminding him that Congress is not bound by deals that Congress does not approve. The…

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel is removing some of the money-making traffic cameras from the city’s intersections.  But, as David Kidwell of the Chicago Tribune writes, the mayor has:

Hillary Clinton has no defense for her baffling decision to shirk protocol and use a private email server when conducting government business as secretary of state. (In this, even the liberal Slate magazine agrees!) Rather than justify her conduct, Clinton’s sycophants have generally trotted out…

In an interview Sunday afternoon, Scott Walker strongly criticized Hillary Clinton's exclusive use of private email as secretary of state and rejected accusations that he's guilty of hypocrisy on the issue.

Last week, THE WEEKLY STANDARD reported that, based on 2013 tax filings, men made up the top eight most highly compensated employees at the Clinton Foundation, and that key women earned 63 cents for every dollar key men made. Friday, the Clinton Foundation responded to a Washington…

A group of nearly 50 Republican senators have written a letter to Iran to explain how the U.S. Constitution works. The letter is "An Open Letter to the Leaders of the Islamic Republic of Iran."

Even Kathleen Sebelius isn't going out of her way to defend Hillary Clinton. The former secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services denied using private email while she served in the Obama administration.

Is Barack Obama another Neville Chamberlain? I’ve been reluctant to make the comparison, but as talks with Iran have unfolded, it’s become impossible not to think of the 1938 Munich conference, where Britain and France agreed that strategically and economically vital Czech territory be ceded to…

President Obama’s legacy is in jeopardy. The fates of his main achievements—Obamacare, his amnesty for five million illegal immigrants, the Dodd-Frank financial institution reforms—are now in the hands of the federal courts.

President Obama has ignored the recent history of U.S. foreign policy, faithfully repeating failed strategies and turning his back on successes. The pattern is so strange and striking, we can almost hear it trying to tell us something. The something is this: You cannot be a nationalist and a…

Santiago, Chile

This past week I decided to change living arrangements chez Epstein. I turned my office into a den and our spare bedroom into an office. Sounds simple enough. I soon realized that I would have to hire professional movers to lug a couch, a weighty television set, and several bookcases and a few file…

Last week it was reported that the White House and Iran may be moving toward a deal over the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program. The proposed phased agreement, lasting 10-15 years, would initially attempt to freeze the program. But during the last years of the agreement, Iran would be allowed to…

The question that haunted the American motion-picture industry in the two months leading up to the Academy Awards broadcast was this: Is Hollywood racist? In December, leaked emails revealed how one of  Hollywood’s longest-serving studio chiefs, Amy Pascal, and its most prestigious producer, Scott…

In one of his more whimsical short stories, the late Israeli satirist Efraim Kishon pits two characters against one another in a game of “Jewish poker,” a game “played without cards, in your head, as befits the People of the Book.” The rules are simple: Whoever thinks of a higher number wins the…

Speaking of global warming, The Scrapbook could have used a little more of it this winter. Meanwhile we’ve been bundling up against the cold and curling up next to the fireplace with our favorite new book, Jay Cost’s A Republic No More: Big Government and the Rise of American Political Corruption.…

Sometimes a speech is just a speech. Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech about Iran policy on March 3 will not be his first address to Congress. It will make familiar, if important, arguments. One might assume that, like the vast majority of speeches, it would soon be overtaken by events in Israel and the…

Barack Obama wants us all to simmer down about Iran. He wants Senator Bob Menendez, a fellow Democrat, and the donors he represents to butt out of the sanctions debate. He wants Republicans to quit crying wolf about Iran’s nuclear weapons program. He wants the media to stop hyping terror threats.…

Why should I, an elderly literary gent who spends much of his time reading, talking, and writing about Shakespeare or W. B. Yeats, spend an hour every weekday watching a soap opera? How odd is it that after a hardworking class teasing out the syntax and ambiguities of Shakespeare’s Winter’s Tale,…

A noted historian of modern Germany, Richard J. Evans has entered the lists of historical combatants in recent years as a sharp opponent of counterfactual history—also known as “what ifs.” His entry into this particular fight, one that’s as enjoyable to witness as it is important to understand,…

There he is on the cover of Sgt. Pepper, tottering between Carl Jung and Fred Astaire, breathing fumes over Marilyn Monroe’s bare back and William Burroughs’s bald pate. Edgar Allan Poe, the original Man in Black—before Johnny Cash, before the Beatles in Hamburg, before the bohemians in Paris. The…

Last week National Review’s Jonah Goldberg and Kevin Williamson were left to sort out one of the most inane and idiotic media “fact checker” efforts The Scrapbook has ever seen. And when you consider what has appeared in these pages regarding PolitiFact, that’s saying something (see, among other…

In late 2001, when initial military operations in Afghanistan produced surprising successes, the opening skit on Saturday Night Live was a send-up of the daily press conference given by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. Actor Darrell Hammond made a perfect Rummy, complete with rimless…

Moorestown, N.J.

Roger Pielke Jr., a respected climate scientist at the University of Colorado, announced recently on his blog that he is being investigated by congressional Democrats. Rep. Raul Grijalva, the ranking Democrat on the House Committee on Natural Resources, sent a letter to the university demanding to…

Like many Americans, Supreme Court justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg napped through a portion of the president’s 2015 State of the Union address. This was hardly important news—she was caught napping during the 2013 address, too—but the story made a splash anyway, helped by a widely circulated…

Scott Walker was never going to win fans among the faculty at the University of Wisconsin. Four years ago, Wisconsin professors were in the state capitol protesting the governor’s plans to limit public employee collective bargaining powers. But, boy, did he make enemies this month when he proposed…

Is Barack Hussein Obama wrong to avoid appending “Islamic,” “Muslim,” “Islamist,” or even “jihadist” to the terrorism that has struck the West with increasing ferocity since the 1990s? This question has at least two parts: Is the president historically correct to do this? And is he politically…

The big speech last week was, of course, the one given before Congress by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. It was a forceful performance. Nancy Pelosi said that she was so dismayed by both the style and the substance of the prime minister’s speech that she was nearly reduced to tears.

Rep. Trey Gowdy, the chairman of the committee investigating Benghazi, said that there are "gaps of months and months and months" of Hillary Clinton's emails missing:

A former U.S. ambassador to Kenya, Scott Gration, who got fired in part for using a non-State Department email system, told CNN this morning it was "unfair" he was held to a different stand than Secretary of State Hillary Clinton:

President Obama, speaking today in Selma on the 50th anniversary of the historical Bloody Sunday march:

In remarks this evening at a Clinton Global Initiative event in Miami, former President Bill Clinton praised his foundation's acceptance of foreign donations:

President Obama and his family were there. President George W. Bush and his wife Laura attended. But missing from the 50th anniversary of the Bloody Sunday march in Selma, Alabama? President Bill Clinton and his wife, Hillary Clinton, as well as Jimmy Carter and George H.W. Bush.

President Obama used part of his address at the 50th anniversary of the historic march to push expanded voting laws.

Terry Eastland reviews A Conflict of Principles in the Wall Street Journal:

Possible Democratic presidential candidate Martin O'Malley, the former governor of Maryland, passed up an opportunity to defend his rival, Hillary Clinton, from growing criticism about her exclusive use of a private email system while she served as secretary of state. The moment came for O'Malley…

Sometimes -- not often, but sometimes -- anecdote is more revealing than data. Especially when the data are subject to major revisions, which is the case with most monthly economic data. This is one of those times. Last week’s jobs report -- 295,00 new nonfarm jobs in February -- was a bit more…

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with senior writer Mark Hemingway on his recent editorial "Hillary's Email Trickery."

The recent vicious attack on U.S. Ambassador to South Korea Mark Lippert (he was stabbed in the face in Seoul) is, in fact, not the first attack on an American ambassador in that country. The earlier attackers on Ambassador Donald Gregg’s residence in 1989, however, were radical students with…

A top defender of Hillary Clinton, former White House special counsel Lanny Davis, said on MSNBC that "everything" on Clinton's private email servers should be available to Republicans in Congress. Davis made the comments in response to a question about how Clinton can put the questions about her…

The Justice Department will bring criminal charges to Democratic senator Bob Menendez of New Jersey. CNN reports:

Mark Hensch of The Hill writes that:

Chief Justice Roberts has said he likes mystery novels; once, as a lower-court judge, he invoked Sherlock Holmes's "dog that didn't bark." But at the King v. Burwell arguments, Roberts himself was in effect the dog that didn't bark, saying far less than expected and thus leaving reporters to puzzle…

The dead enders defending Hillary Clinton’s frankly bizarre decision to break protocol and use a personal email address while conducting official business have seized on several arguments to defend their heroine. They trumpet the fact that current Secretary of State John Kerry is the first person…

Women hold fewer senior-level positions at the Clinton Foundation and earn less than their male counterparts, according to an analysis by The Weekly Standard.

Today is the sixth anniversary of Hillary Clinton's reset with Russia. That's when Clinton physically gave her Russian counterpart a "reset" button (though, in fact, she got the translation wrong):

As reporters and members of Congress begin to dig into the Clinton email scandal, former Democratic presidential candidate has announced an upcoming visit to Iowa. He'll be in the important caucus state from May 5-7, as part of a training sessions for the Climate Reality Project, of which he's…

Scott Walker has had a pretty good run as of late. He’s made some new friends and wrong-footed the right enemies and became, in fairly short order, a leader among the pack of Republican politicians running for president.  Perhaps even the leader. 

Stephen F. Hayes and Thomas Joscelyn report in the Wall Street Journal on the latest developments in uncovering how the Obama administration actively played down the threat of al Qaeda during President Obama's reelection campaign.

Another official from the Obama administration has been hired by the media. The latest is White House lawyer Michael D. Gottlieb, who's been hired by the National Journal Group.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu faced a daunting task at his address to Congress this week: convincing a friendly America, but a hostile administration, not to let Iran acquire an atomic bomb that could undermine the West and destroy Israel. His speech to Congress was so effective not…

THE WEEKLY STANDARD has obtained a video likely GOP presidential candidate Rick Perry is about to release on Iran. In his statement, Perry blasts the Obama administration for "desperately pursuing a nuclear agreement with Iran," and criticizes the concessions the administration has made in some…

The new Republican chairman of the House Armed Services Committee has recommended a defense budget $16 billion larger than President Obama’s proposed budget, but far below the figure that military and national security experts suggest is needed for maintaining readiness. Mac Thornberry, the 11-term…

At yesterday's oral argument in King v. Burwell, the solicitor general made a surprisingly partisan quip about Congress. It caught many commenters' attention, including law professors Michael Greve and Josh Blackman. As the transcript reads:

The biographies of the individuals responsible for the beheadings of James Foley and Daniel Pearl are eerily similar.

Following the death of Saudi King Abdullah at the end of January, and the succession of his half-brother, now King Salman, 79, many observers of the desert monarchy have speculated on its future.

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with frequent contributor Adam J. White on his King v. Burwell blog post "Kennedy's Constitutional Concerns, Then and Now."

In 2012, U.S. Ambassador to Kenya Scott Gration abruptly stepped down from his post. According to a Foreign Policy report by Josh Rogin (now a reporter for Bloomberg), Gration was the subject of a withering evaluation from the State Department:

When the revolt in Syria began in 2011, many policy analysts and former officials argued that the downfall of the Assad regime would be a major setback to Iran. I was one of them, and the claim was not complicated: Syria was Iran’s only Arab ally, provided its only ports on the Mediterranean, was a…

Ben Sasse of Nebraska, who rode his opposition to Obamacare to a seat in the Senate, has introduced legislation that should help Republicans avoid turning a potential victory at the Supreme Court into a defeat for the cause of repeal.  Sasse’s bill, introduced yesterday evening, is designed to keep…

In late February, Hillary Clinton, a self-proclaimed champion of women's rights and gender equity, came under fire for a Washington Free Beacon analysis that showed women on Mrs. Clinton's staff during her tenure in the Senate were paid an average of 72 cents on the dollar compared to male staff.…

President Obama's former top political adviser, David Axelrod, told the Hillary Clinton campaign that they'd have to answer questions about the secretary of state's exclusive use of private email. Axelrod made the comments last night on MSNBC:

The New York Sun editorializes:

Three years ago, Justice Anthony Kennedy voted to declare the Affordable Care Act unconstitutional. So it should come as no great surprise that he expressed constitutional concerns in today's ACA case, King v. Burwell. 

The revelation that Hillary Clinton used a private email address for most if not all of her official internal correspondence is raising all sorts of questions.  According to widespread reporting, Mrs. Clinton turned over some 55,000 pages of emails to the State Department two months ago, long after…

Derek Harvey appeared on Fox News to talk about his latest piece ("Obama's ISIS Strategy Empowers Iran") and the Osama bin Laden documents:

The Department of Justice released its report on Wednesday about the shooting death of Michael Brown by Officer Darren Wilson in Ferguson, Missouri on August 9, 2014. The DOJ confirms that physical evidence corroborates the essential claims Wilson made about the incident: That Brown reached into…

Can you kill your way to victory? Yes, if you are engaged in a hot war against a conventional enemy. Yes, too, if you face homicidal extremists. Killing them may be the only option. Indeed, death is the essential dimension of warfare. But, in defense of State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf (who…

State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said that it couldn't "definitively" rule out the possibility Hillary Clinton had classified information on her private email address:

Sherman marched right into it. At an event in Washington on Friday, the U.S. under secretary of state for political affairs, Wendy Sherman, held forth on the subject of the prickly relations between South Korea and Japan -- and did so in a way that seemed to blame the victims in the situation.

We'll all be discussing for quite a while the substance, context, and implications of yesterday's speech by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. I thought I might just offer a personal note on what most struck me yesterday, sitting in the gallery of the House of Representatives. 

A buried lede in the Associated Press story about Hillary Clinton's use of a private, home email server:

Retiring Democratic senator Barbara Mikulski spoke Tuesday evening at an event sponsored by EMILY's List, an organization dedicated to electing Democratic female candidates who oppose restrictions on abortion, about how much the group meant to her.

Retiring Democratic senator Barbara Mikulski spoke Tuesday evening at an event sponsored by EMILY's List, an organization dedicated to electing Democratic female candidates who oppose restrictions on abortion, about how much the group meant to her.

Robert Burns of the AP reports that:

Five years ago this month — on the night the Democrats passed Obamacare through the House without a single Republican vote — Paul Ryan proclaimed on the House floor, “This moment may mark a temporary conclusion of the health-care debate, but its place in history has not yet been decided.  If this…

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with editor William Kristol on his take on Prime Minister Netanyahu's speech, Iran policy, and Hillary Clinton's use of a personal email account while serving as Secretary of State.

In Clinton, Inc., Daniel Halper exposes how Bill and Hillary Clinton went about systematically rebuilding their brand in pursuit of a Hillary Clinton presidency. “Clinton, Inc.” is a great metaphor, but it is perhaps the subtitle of the book that is more resonant today: The Audacious Rebranding of…

Republican senators Marco Rubio of Florida and Mike Lee of Utah have returned to the pages of the Wall Street Journal to tout their latest tax reform proposal. The Republicans call their plan both "pro-growth" and "pro-family," and say it addresses inequities in the tax code for businesses and…

In a strong new web ad, the Republican National Committee whacks Hillary Clinton for the Bill, Hillary, and Chelsea Clinton Foundation accepting foreign donations while she held the job of secretary of state. The ad is titled "A Very Serious Matter" and is meant to coincide with the Clinton…

Ellen Bork, writing at the Foreign Policy Initiative:

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with senior writer Stephen F. Hayes on Prime Minister Netanyahu's speech and its impact on President Obama's Iran strategy.

Monday night, it was revealed that Hillary Clinton used a personal email account the entire time she served as secretary of state. Not only does conducting official business with a private account violate federal law, it raises a host of concerns ranging from whether or not her communications were…

In an open letter released on Tuesday, Wisconsin governor Scott Walker said he would sign legislation banning most abortions after the fifth month of pregnancy, the point after which infants can feel pain and survive if born prematurely. 

Last week, I noted that Democrats on the House Natural Resources Committee were suddenly demanding extensive information from seven prominent climate scientists, all of whom to varying degrees were not sufficiently toeing the line on climate change alarmism. Now, National Journal reports that…

President Obama has repeatedly denied that terrorists have anything to do with the real Islam. But what would Obama say about the fatwa that Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, Iran’s leading political and religious authority from 1979 to 1989, issued condemning author Salman Rushdie to death for writing…

Nancy Pelosi reacts to Benjamin Netanyahu's speech by saying, "I was near tears throughout the Prime Minister’s speech."

According to CNN's Gloria Borger, it was a "political" moment when Israel prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu brought up the Holocaust in his speech today to Congress:

The complete transcript of Israel prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu's speech to Congress:

Israel prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the U.S. Congress that the problem with the proposed deal with Iran is that it "paves Iran's path to the bomb."

It almost seemed like Israel prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu was about to give the State of the Union Address when entered the House of Representatives today to give a speech. But with more cheers.

Dr. Ben Carson, a retired neurosurgeon who made political waves in 2013 with a pointed critique of President Obama at the National Prayer Breakfast, is taking a step closer to a presidential campaign of his own. Carson announced Tuesday he is launching an exploratory committee for a run in 2016.…

The Obama Administration’s defacto anti-ISIS partnership with Tehran is helping Iran’s Quds Force Commander Qassem Soleimeni and Ayatollah Khamenei “Finlandize” Iraq. Not only does this damage U.S. interests in sustaining an independent and sovereign Iraq, but the Obama Administration’s apparent…

Hillary Clinton is under increasing pressure for her exclusive use of a personal email address during her four years as secretary of state. In October 2011, Mrs. Clinton was interviewed by Savannah Guthrie of NBC's Today Show, and Guthrie asked about her personal email address. While Mrs. Clinton…

A CNN reporter, citing experts, said that Hillary Clinton broke the law by using her personal email account to conduct official State Department business while she was secretary of state.

CNN host Chris Cuomo said this morning that reports Hillary Clinton used her private email address to conduct official State Department business "smells terrible."

MSNBC host Lawrence O'Donnell responded this evening one his show to reports that Hillary Clinton only used a private, non-governmental email address while secretary of state:

Susan Rice told AIPAC It was "neither realistic nor achievable" to expect Iran to stop enriching uranium:

On Friday, congressional Republicans appointed Keith Hall to become the next director of the Congressional Budget Office. The announcement ended a careful two-month process that involved figuring out how to fill the position with a competent and credible individual, but without giving Democrats…

Steve Hayes and Tom Joscelyn joined Bret Baier over the weekend to discuss the newly released Osama bin Laden documents:

Reuters reports:

Sometimes, anecdote is more revealing than data. A few days’ gleanings:

The AP is reporting that:

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with editor William Kristol on Prime Minister Netanyahu's speech to a joint session of Congress, and the liberal democrats boycotting it.

Kate Davidson of the Wall Street Journal reports that:

The latest episode of Conversations With Bill Kristol, featuring University of Virginia professor and TWS contributor James Ceaser:

Israel prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu used a portion of his AIPAC speech today to list the times when Israel has defied U.S. warnings to act in its self defense.

Roger Williams, a two-term congressman from the Dallas suburbs and longtime GOP fundraiser, will be the new chair of the House Conservatives Fund, a federal political action committee that’s been practically dormant for several cycles. The 65-year-old Williams, who cut his political teeth as a…

Seventy years ago, on March 1, 1945, Franklin Roosevelt assured a war-weary nation that a new era of international peace and democratic government was at hand. The accords signed just weeks earlier at the Yalta Conference, he told Congress, laid the foundation for postwar cooperation between the…

Legendary investor Warren Buffett was asked this morning in an interview whether he'd still bet money on Hillary Clinton being the next president of the United States. Yes, he said, he still think it's "very likely" she'll be the next president. But he warned in the CNBC interview: "things could…

Dozing off as we pored through a raft of mostly meaningless polls this week, we were startled awake by one set of findings. The CNN/ORC survey released February 18 was The Weekly Standard’s own little fire bell in the night.

In an earlier life, The Scrapbook worked at the Washington Times under the storied foreign correspondent Arnaud de Borchgrave, whose long career at Newsweek was already the stuff of legend when he became editor in chief of the Times in 1985. As an underdog, upstart, scrappy competitor of the…

I'm a dodo bird. Or maybe a passenger pigeon. As a corn and soybean farmer, a chemical spraying, fertilizer spreading, genetically modified-seed planter, I’m as passé as a phone booth. I may be walking around, but I’m actually dead. I’m a zombie farmer. 

Every now and then a minor news story manages to capture, in its details, some particle of truth about contemporary history and the state of the culture. Case in point: a story in last week’s Washington Post entitled “Lyndon Johnson’s letter to MLK’s widow heads to auction after big fight.” Our…

When the sociologist Timothy Nelson asked low-income men who didn’t live with their children what the ideal father was like, eight of them spontaneously mentioned the same man: Ward Cleaver, the dad from Leave It to Beaver. That might make sense if Nelson’s interviews had taken place in the…

Not long after his inauguration in January 2009, President Barack Obama penned a letter to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader of Iran. As a presidential candidate, Obama had promised to conduct “tough, direct diplomacy” with the Iranians. And Obama figured, correctly, that all diplomatic…

Singer-songwriter Steve Earle was recently asked by the Texas Standard if he would ever move back to his home state, and he had a rather revealing answer: 

Last week, outgoing chief of staff of the Israel Defense Forces Benny Gantz told an American audience that it’s important the international community defeat both camps of regional extremists. The way Gantz sees it, on one side there are Sunni radicals, like the Islamic State, al Qaeda, the Muslim…

Kim Jong-un, seeking to escape international isolation, has found a willing partner in Russia’s Vladimir Putin and thereby revived Pyongyang’s Cold War art of pitting Moscow against Beijing, perfected by his grandfather Kim Il-sung. The collapse of the Soviet Union just prior to Kim Jong-un’s…

Failing upwards is a Washington tradition, but even The Scrapbook was taken aback by the promotion of Jennifer Psaki from State Department spokesperson to White House director of communications. Psaki, along with her State Department colleague Marie Harf, had acquired quite the reputation for…

In Chechnya, Georgia, and Ukraine, Russia works through bribery, fear, and force to destroy its opponents. In the West, it works through Interpol and the U.S. Treasury. If Moscow decides to target you, being in the United States won’t protect you from Russian harassment. In fact, it makes you a…

This is a meticulous account of the 90-year debate over the teaching of evolution in Florida’s public schools, and it is full of high drama and raw emotion. It is populated by dozens upon dozens of passionate culture warriors on both sides of the divisive issue. But unless you are a dedicated…

Last week’s Minsk agreement, by which France and Germany in effect codified the cession to Russia of Kiev’s sovereignty over southeastern Ukraine, has temporarily taken the issue of Russia’s aggression in Ukraine off the table and thus off the conscience of the West. But the question whether the…

Who could be against submitting a nuclear deal with Iran to Congress for approval? If you guessed Barack Obama, you’re right.

We do not like this world of ours today,” Adam Michnik writes in The Trouble with History. “We feel bad in this world of ours. Why is that?” 

What is America’s greatest contribution to the arts? Time was when many, perhaps most, people would have pointed to the Broadway musical as the likeliest candidate for admission to the pantheon. Theatergoers around the world have long rejoiced in the delights of the genre, including some whom one…

Chicago -- It was the skin​—​smooth and hairless as a newborn’s forearm​—​that I fastened on when I saw Sara Andrews, the first “transwoman” I had ever met, at the Kit Kat Lounge & Supper Club in Boystown, on Chicago’s North Side. The ambiance at the club was glitter balls, silver-leather…

When I tell you that, in my opinion, the three novels now known as the Fifty Shades Trilogy are the worst books I have ever read all the way through, I am not telling you anything interesting. To criticize E. L. James’s publishing version of winning the Irish Sweepstakes is to attack a cultural…

Over the holidays, I was at my sister’s place. The youngest generation was racing about the house screaming “Not in the face!” as they shot each other with foam projectiles launched from colorful plastic rifles. 

In spite of the Friday night passage of an eleventh hour, one-week stopgap spending bill to continue funding the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the department posted a lapse-of-funding notice and shut-down procedures on its website apparently intended if the last minute efforts failed.…

Secretary of State John Kerry contradicted National Security Adviser Susan Rice by saying that Israel prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu is "welcome to speak in the United States" and by saying that the U.S.-Israel relationship is at an historic high. Kerry made the comments this morning on ABC:

Israel prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu is on his way to address a joint session of Congress.

THE WEEKLY STANDARD Casual Podcast, with David Skinner reading his casual essay "Young Spice."