June 2016

We're used to hearing Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren shout about college affordability, rallying hoards of debt-ridden youth with stats of bankers' bonuses compared to rising tuition costs.

It's two weeks from the start of the GOP convention in Cleveland, a time in which a traditional party nominee would be consolidating his base of support and seeking to broaden his appeal. So, what's Donald Trump doing? Attacking the GOP-friendly Chamber of Commerce; boasting about the…

On Wednesday morning, anti-religion (and anti-philosophy) archvillain Neil deGrasse Tyson tweeted a lamentation from his heart: There are too many dumb people on Earth. Our only hope as a race is to form a scientistic utopia; an Elysium whose access is restricted to the intelligentsia and whose…

The Pentagon announced it was lifting a ban on transgender individuals serving openly in the military Thursday, permitting them to enlist and banning dismissals based on their gender identity.

As Russian influence spreads across Eastern Europe, Lithuanian Foreign Minister Linas Linkevicius said conventional military involvement by Russia in the Baltics is not expected, "because that would be stupid to challenge NATO."

President Obama wanted to get something off his chest Wednesday and went off on what he later conceded was "a rant" about just who is—and is not—a populist.

Senate Democratic leaders Harry Reid and Chuck Schumer held a press conference Thursday morning alongside Planned Parenthood's executive director in an effort to justify their decision to block $1.1 billion in federal funding to combat the Zika virus.

Bill Kristol appeared on CNN Wednesday night with host Don Lemon and American Conservative Union chairman Matt Schlapp to discuss the 2016 election. Kristol responded to the idea, expressed by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and others, that Donald Trump could be moving toward a "pivot" to…

In the 2012 presidential election, the joke was that Mitt Romney spent $1 billion to flip North Carolina to the Republicans.

The Senate Appropriations Committee passed a measure Wednesday combating the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement, despite resistance from a group of Democrats. The committee passed the amendment, which is an outgrowth of the February Combating BDS Act of 2016, 21-to-9, as…

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On Monday, Rep. Nancy Pelosi said in a statement, “House Republicans’ Select Committee has now wasted more than two years and $7 million in taxpayer dollars retreading the same facts and conclusions exhaustively detailed in previous congressional reviews." Despite the various revelations that the…

More than half of likely Republican voters would like someone other than Donald Trump to be their party's presidential nominee. That's according to a new Fox News poll released Wednesday, which asked who those voters would prefer the win the GOP nomination. Just 48 percent said they would prefer…

A senior International Monetary Fund official expressed optimism about Iran's ability to increase global confidence in its economy Wednesday, after months of international reluctance to invest and trade there despite sanctions relief from the Iran deal.

President Obama said globalization is an irreversible reality Wednesday, indirectly rebutting GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump's criticism of the United States's participation in international trade deals.

Wimbledon started on Monday, which gave me—finally!—something to cheer about.

Multiple members of Donald Trump's convention roster are listed as day-to-day after straining to deny they'll appear in Cleveland on his behalf.

By now we're used to Congress's abysmal public approval ratings and the complaints of our fellow citizens. "They're doing what with my tax dollars!?" they exclaim. "Geez. It's almost like there's something in the water."

How bad is Hillary Clinton, really?

A new survey of likely voters in several swing states finds presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump trailing Democrat Hillary Clinton by anywhere from 5 points to 12. But two hypothetical GOP candidates perform much better than Trump against Clinton, with one Republican beating her in all seven…

For six years, it has been abundantly clear that Americans want Obamacare to be repealed—but only if a well-conceived conservative alternative is positioned to take its place. That's why the recent release of the House GOP health care plan is a big deal. The new plan would of course repeal…

The relationship between motorists and bicyclists in major American cities is, er, "complicated," as the euphemism has it. Most U.S. cities lack any real bike infrastructure—think distinct, separated lanes, like in Amsterdam and Copenhagen—which means that cars and cyclists are forced in most cases…

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A state museum in Munich returned Nazi-looted paintings to Nazi officials rather than the rightful owners after World War II, according to charges from a British NGO. Researchers with the Commission for Looted Art in Europe found that after the war, the Bavarian State Painting Collections sold art…

As quick and fluidly reasoned as the decision to summon a rideshare from your iPhone, Manhattan Institute fellow Jared Meyer's monograph-as-minibook Uber-Positive targets the Uber enthusiast. A red and electric blue pop-art style pamphlet, it clocks in at 37 generously spaced pages of glossy…

Republicans remain divided on the question of whether delegates should vote their conscience at the party's convention next month—a move that could block Donald Trump from the nomination for president. An effort by some delegates to the Republican National Convention in Cleveland to insert a…

The end of any administration usually leads to contentious fights in Congress over spending priorities, and 2016 is no different. When it comes to preparing for the potential effects of the Zika virus, Democrats in Congress and the President have stymied efforts to protect a favored constituency.

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with senior writer Stephen F. Hayes on the 800-page Select Committee on Benghazi report.

Pat Summitt, the women's college basketball coach who won more games than anyone to have led a program at the Division I level, died Tuesday at age 64.

There was always something wrong about saying Buddy Ryan coached defense. The units that he sent onto the field may not have been in possession of the football, but there was nothing defensive about them. They were the aggressors. They didn't stop offenses; they routed them. Destroyed them.…

The Supreme Court announced Tuesday morning it would refuse to hear Stormans v. Wiesman, a case from the state of Washington where a family-owned pharmacy was objecting to a state regulation that forced them to prescribe the morning after pill, also known as "Plan B." Unlike traditional…

As a group of Republican delegates continue their push for the freedom to vote their conscience when casting presidential nominating ballots at the Republican National Convention, John McCain said Tuesday that it's within their rights to vote how they see fit.

Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer used logic frequently employed by pro-gun advocates to help justify his majority opinion in the Texas abortion clinic case decided Monday.

In a clip posted earlier today by member of European Parliament and leader of the UK Independence Party Nigel Farage, the architecht of Brexit had his day in the sun before his fellow MEPs.

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Congress has a terrible time with deadlines. It's not that it's unable to meet real deadlines. Just the opposite, in fact: If it absolutely has to pass legislation by a given day it invariably figures out a way to get it done, no matter who is in charge. The trick is convincing everyone that there…

President Obama hosted the 2015 WNBA champion Minnesota Lynx at the White House on Monday for the third time in five years. As the president wound down his remarks praising the players for the examples they set for young people, he quoted one of the Lynx's players, Maya Moore:

Among the many revelations that will emerge from the voluminous majority report of the Benghazi Select Committee when it is released Tuesday is this one: Barack Obama skipped his daily intelligence briefing one day after the Benghazi attacks on September 11, 2012. The president's briefer handed a…

The final majority report of the Benghazi Select Committee is set to be released later Tuesday morning. Representatives Jim Jordan and Mike Pompeo have signed onto the official majority document and authored a supplemental, 51-page "additional views" report of their own.

In a 5-3 decision Monday, the Supreme Court declared that a 2013 Texas statute regulating abortion clinics was unconstitutional. The Texas law, which would have established the same health and safety standards for abortion clinics as outpatient surgical centers and require a doctor on staff to have…

In a set back for the pro-life movement, the Supreme Court released a 5-3 ruling Monday that safety regulations passed into law by the state of Texas represented "a substantial obstacle to women seeking abortions, and constitutes an 'undue burden' on their constitutional right to do so."

The Democratic Platform Drafting Committee voted against an amendment that would have condemned Israeli "occupation and illegal settlements" and legitimized the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement Friday.

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with staff writer Jay Cost on his recent story "With Trump, the GOP Is Heading Toward Oblivion."

A group of Republican activists from Vermont and Virginia have written a letter to the delegates attending the Republican National Convention, urging those delegates to withhold their vote for Donald Trump unless and until the New York businessman releases his tax returns.

The cathartic and palliative HBO political satire Veep has been a weekly spoonful of Mylanta to soothe our stomachs this emetic election year. The show's recently concluded fifth season chronicles the browbeating Selina Meyer (Julia Louis-Dreyfus), the titular former vice-president, laboring to…

The Daily Signal reports today that the Department of the Interior has declared visitors to the parks "are welcome to use restrooms that best align with their gender identity."

Paris

Mapping out the micro-aggressions minefield may have seemed like a good move amidst the plague of protests at University of Missouri's Columbia campus last fall. But they were bound to miss some: Sure enough Mizzou's glossary of inclusive language has failed to meet its own standards for inclusion.

The inner suburbs of Northern Virginia are not known for bleeding red. In fact, they've been known to turn the state politically purple or blue. But when Libby Garvey was nominated for a second term on the Arlington County Board June 14, some asked whether the town was heading toward the right.

Over the weekend, the New York Times reported on the Republican National Committee's efforts to squelch the "Dump Trump" movement among delegates. The article ended with this ominous line:

Writing in the Wall Street Journal, executive editor Fred Barnes argues that unless Donald Trump's 2016 course is corrected, the election this fall might very well be a repeat of Barry Goldwater in 1964.

The delegate-led effort to stop Donald Trump from receiving the Republican nomination for president continues to grow. That's according to participants in a conference call Sunday evening that coordinated efforts from activists and Republican National Committee delegates who oppose Trump's…

Sunday's Washington Post contained a book review of White Rage: The Unspoken Truth of Our Racial Divide by Carol Anderson, Ph.D. (A good rule of thumb: Be wary of authors who broadcast their academic achievements on the cover of their books.) The review, by Pamela Newkirk, included the following…

It is fashionable these days, and not only in America, to blame the woes of the electorate, and the consequent rise of politicians playing on those woes, on "the Establishment." It is the fault of this never-really-defined group that Britain is leaving the European Union, with consequences only now…

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The defense spending authorization bill passed the Senate with an amendment tacked on that would extend mandatory draft registration to women—and some feminists aren't having it. You'd think a gender-inclusive Selective Service would be a coup for feminist groups still clinging to the Equal Rights…

In 2002 the Washington State Department of Corrections made a software programming error that wasn't caught for a decade. Over this period, the error allowed thousands of prisoners to be released before their sentences were completed.

Notes from the Bay Area

A veteran al Qaeda fighter, and an expert in document forgery who has decades of experience helping jihadists travel internationally without detection, has gone missing after being released from the detention facility at Guantanamo.

In this episode of THE WEEKLY STANDARD Confab, Eric Felten talks with economist Stephen Moore about Hillary and economic stimulus, and contributing editor Max Boot about the situation in the Baltics.

Two new polls released Sunday morning show Hillary Clinton leading over Donald Trump.

It was a British-born American patriot, Thomas Paine, who first proposed a "basic income" plan in 1797. The idea has been recycled every few decades since the 19th century by various utopian communes and left-wing economists. Now, it seems, the idea's close to becoming a reality in Utrecht.

This week, Rep. Nancy Pelosi unmasks the Air Condititoning Crook, another presidential candidate releases his Supreme Court short list, and there is big mews from the U.K.

Great Britain has voted to leave the EU and that may, or may not, be a good thing. Too soon to tell, as they say. Unless, that is, you are part of the elite media or the establishment left in which case, you know exactly. And these people, of course, are always right about these things.

Congressional Democrats emerged from the Capitol building Thursday afternoon from their 25-hour long "sit-in" in the House of Representatives sleepy but satisfied with what they'd accomplished. They may not have secured a vote on gun control legislation they were demanding in the wake of the…

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If Hillary Clinton's campaign headquarters isn't in a state of panic right now, it should be.

At times it is better to be lucky than good. And yesterday Donald Trump was lucky indeed to find himself in the UK for the re-opening of one of his hotel/golf courses, on what the tabloid Sun calls Britain's "Independence Day". Trump is not alone in believing that Britain's decision to leave the…

Reporters around the world were left terrified, heartbroken and angry over the vote in the United Kingdom to withdraw from the European Union.

Over at Ricochet, former WEEKLY STANDARD writer Jay Nordlinger and Mark Helprin discuss Donald Trump and "the F-word"—that being "fascism".

The billionairess better half of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation came to the nation's capital Friday to discuss the behemoth charity's data-driven development projects. And yet, the one Gates project of pressing interest to the population of this country got barely more than lip service.

In a speech to the European Parliament Thursday, Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas accused rabbis of "demanding" that the Israeli government poison Palestinian water.

Now that Marco Rubio is vying to keep his Senate seat, he has one serious challenger in the primary: Carlos Beruff.

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the books you should read to better understand the British view of the world in the wake of the Brexit vote.

Believe it or not, there are head-spinning stories about dysfunctional New York politicians that do not involve Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump. Governor Andrew Cuomo and New York City mayor Bill de Blasio are in a forced marriage. Their partnership, such as it is, takes its cues from congressional…

The United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union Thursday, spurring the resignation of Prime Minister David Cameron and a drop in markets, as well as praise—or resigned acceptance—from major American political figures.

Following the "Brexit" versus "Bremain" debate from afar (and by the way, now that the referendum is finally over, can we please retire those hideous portmanteaus?), one got the sense that the two opposing camps were arguing on entirely different grounds. They weren't so much debating as making two…

London

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London

I have a simple rule for politicians who profess their belief in the primacy of the market economy: Don't spend taxpayer money to provide a service that competes with the private market.

British Prime Minister David Cameron has announced his plans for resignation after consultation with the Queen.

Pristina, Kosovo

Readers of Jonathan Last’s email newsletter (you can sign up for it at newsletters.weeklystandard.com!) are already familiar with last week's amazing exploits at the bottom of the world. It's winter in Antarctica, which means constant darkness (the next time the sun rises there will be in…

After the Republican House majority declined to schedule a vote on gun control legislation last week, Democrats sprang into action. Well, the minority staged a “sit-in," so technically we should probably say "shrank into inaction." Either way, it was a cheap political stunt. And we fear that, given…

This new Matisse cut-outs show is odd, since you can see some of the greatest artworks of the 20th century and still leave feeling disappointed. Good curatorship, like good umpiring, is most obvious when it’s not there: John Elderfield helped set the bar impossibly high with the Museum of Modern…

Rarely has a vote had such an immediate effect. On May 7, Austin residents elected not to overturn restrictions on ridesharing companies their city council passed in December. Two days later, both Uber and Lyft ceased operations in the Texas capital. The new rules required transportation network…

Everyone except the most rigid secularists would agree that the Bible has been the most influential book in American history. The American Bible Society (ABS), founded in 1816, has been the most important agency in putting Bibles into Americans’ hands. Tracking the number of Bibles the ABS has…

Scrapbook friend Daniel Gelernter, an occasional contributor to these pages and an NRA-certified firearms instructor in his spare time, emailed us last week with some reflections we thought worthy of reprinting here:

AMERICA IS AT WAR, says President Bush, and that is just as well, for only major military undertakings offer any hope of curtailing the threats posed to the United States by global disorder, including terrorism. In the first wave of anger after September 11 there was enthusiasm for a counterstrike,…

At 2:35 a.m. on June 12, Omar Mateen called 911 from the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida. For 30 minutes he'd been on a killing rampage and he wanted the world to know why. He spoke for less than a minute.

Jesus’ wife has finally taken the sad step that culminates many a marriage: the gruesome divorce. Harvard Divinity School professor and historian of early Christianity Karen L. King, who has spent the past four years championing a one- by three-inch papyrus scrap bearing the Coptic words "Jesus…

Drive over the Potomac River from Virginia into Washington across the 14th Street Bridge, and you can’t miss a large electric sign overhead. "SafeTrack Is Here," it says. "Rethink Your Commute." That's supposed to be helpful advice. Properly understood, it's a warning.

As The Scrapbook briefly noted in February, the new offices of The Weekly Standard have afforded us a front-row seat to the ongoing demolition of the Washington Post building. The old Post building site, we should report, is now a mere hole in the ground—the Post itself moved a few blocks away—and…

In the wake of the miserable May jobs report and the even more miserable first-quarter GDP numbers, Hillary Clinton revealed her long-awaited agenda to fix the economy: Raise the minimum wage; hike taxes on the rich; and spend a quarter-trillion dollars more on public works. Clinton is calling for…

At 7 a.m. on July 1, 1916, the British Army unleashed a hellish assault against German positions on the Western Front in France, along the River Somme. The roar was so loud that it was heard in London, nearly 200 miles away. The barrage​—​about 3,500 shells a minute​—​was designed to obliterate the…

On Memorial Day, I was in my basement looking for a cat. (Yes, it was a cat, as opposed to my cat—but that's another story.) Anyway, I was sorting through the clutter when I came across a bag containing various tokens of my youth. At the bottom of the bag, I peered in and saw one of my possessions…

As we approach July 4, 2016, the 240th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, it is proper to recall what the philosopher Leo Strauss, in his introduction to Natural Right and History, called the “weight and elevation" of our founding principles. But fine principles are one thing. One must…

Barack Obama’s habit of avoiding Islamic nomenclature and highlighting American gun violence whenever Muslim terrorists strike is surely, in part, a product of his fear of anti-Muslim xenophobia in the United States. Before the rise of Donald Trump, Americans on the right might have scoffed at that…

Our Constitution distributes power broadly across three branches of government, and the federal, state, and local levels. Yet during presidential campaigns, candidates for offices across the country unite behind their party’s presidential nominee. This person becomes the representative of the…

The BBC projects that the United Kingdom has voted to leave the European Union, as are other media outlets:

Writing for the Supreme Court in the Texas affirmative action case, Justice Anthony Kennedy said that the school's use of race in admissions "can make a difference [as] to whether an application is accepted or rejected." The question for the Court, as Kennedy put it, was whether, "drawing all…

Congressman Patrick Murphy of Florida has long been considered by national Democrats as the party's best chance to snatch Republican Marco Rubio's seat. The young, attractive, establishment-friendly House member (from a wealthy family, no less) looked like a much surer and smarter bet when Barack…

A Democratic senator who voted for the Iran deal said Thursday that it is not America's responsibility to promote foreign investment in Iran, despite efforts by Secretary of State John Kerry to encourage investment there.

Democrats are still making due process the enemy of their efforts following the Orlando shooting—or they're trying to, at least.

A California jury has decided that Led Zeppelin did not lift "Stairway to Heaven's" acoustic guitar riff from the band Spirit, whose instrumental composition "Taurus" bears similarity to the iconic rock song.

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with the Hoover Institution's Adam J. White on the Supreme Court's rulings on President Obama's amnesty executive orders and affirmative action.

Keith Whitley once sang, "you say it best when you say nothing at all." Today, the Supreme Court hopes we all share that sentiment.

President Obama expressed frustration in a public statement at the White House Thursday over a split vote on a case before the Supreme Court, focusing his ire on Senate Republicans for refusing to confirm his replacement for the late Justice Antonin Scalia. Obama bemoaned the Court's 4-4…

Donald Trump's path to 270 electoral votes remains blocked by a number of toss-up states trending toward Hillary Clinton, a new forecast from election analyst Larry Sabato and recent polls show.

Hillary Clinton's speech in North Carolina on Wednesday was loaded with zingers.

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Michael Middleton, interim president of the University of Missouri system, took the helm of the troubled system last fall after campus protests at the flagship Columbia campus, Mizzou, felled then-president Tim Wolfe. Now, Middleton intends the school to be "a model of diversity"—to guide other…

Last week, an internal State Department memo criticizing the administration's Syria policy was leaked to the press. Fifty-one American officials variously involved with Middle East policy signed a letter calling for military action against Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. "A judicious use of…

Last week's primary defeat of Virginia congressman Randy Forbes, chairman of the Seapower and Projection Forces subcommittee of the House Armed Services committee, was one more surprise in an increasingly unpredictable political year. Virginia Republican primary voters, however, have already proved…

London

Security features on Hillary Clinton's private email server she kept while Secretary of State were temporarily disabled, according to new emails released under a court order. The Associated Press has the story:

House speaker Paul Ryan said Wednesday that the House GOP's new Obamacare replacement is focused more on quality than quantity.

For six years congressional Republicans have been making the case that Obamacare had to be repealed. On Wednesday, House speaker Paul Ryan revealed what he dubbed a "better way" for America on health-care policy. It's also a policy proposal Republicans in the House hope to run on in 2016.

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with online editor Michael Warren on Rubio's last-minute campaign announcement.

A group of think tank scholars, congressmen, and intelligence officials is urging an intergovernmental financial watchdog to keep Iran on its so-called blacklist, despite Obama administration officials' vocal encouragement of trade and investment in the Islamic Republic.

Twitter user @ThomasHCrown breaks down how Donald Trump's campaign strategy—pitching himself—comes from a page right out of the handbook for Trump's first career in real-estate development. Take a look at his Twitter essay below:

The Senate blocked legislation Wednesday that would expand FBI surveillance powers.

Mary Eberstadt has new book about religious freedom called It's Dangerous to Believe.

Some Republicans eager to unify behind Donald Trump argue unification is important not only to win the presidency, but to win Senate and other races in 2016. A new Quinnipiac poll in one important swing state suggests that keeping distance from Trump could be helping at least one Republican senator…

The Department of Education's civil rights office announced Wednesday that a transgender elementary school student in South Carolina will be allowed to pick the restroom with which the student identifies.

In the wake of the Orlando nightclub shooting last week, Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives are reviving an old protest tactic popular among Occupy Wall Street and college activists: the sit-in.

The Medicare trust fund that pays the hospital bills of elderly patients is set to run out of reserves two years earlier than previously projected, the program's trustees said Wednesday.

Last week, the Claremont Institute hosted a fascinating panel discussion at the Kirby Center, Hillsdale College's beautiful embassy in Washington. The topic was, of course, Donald Trump.

Why did Marco Rubio, who vowed to not run for reelection to the Senate, change his mind? "Had to," he told me Wednesday morning, shortly after the news broke the Florida Republican would, in fact, run again for a second term.

The Republicans will be holding their convention in Cleveland in less than a month. One would think that the party would want to do whatever it takes to make a good impression upon the host city, especially since Ohio is one of those battleground states. One sure way not to make a good impression…

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It would be irresponsible to speculate as to whether Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor had grown envious of her colleague Ruth Bader Ginsburg's Internet celebrity. (The octogenarian Ginsburg was been widely feted as the "Notorious RBG," and there's even a popular line of t-shirts that sports…

I only have one friend in Cleveland: Pastor Alistair Begg of Parkside Church, one of the greatest expository preachers in America. I am not sure that Begg, being from Scotland, even understands or appreciates the game of basketball (although I suspect he does now). But I am not aware of any old…

January 2015, Washington, D.C.

London

Echoing fellow Wisconsinite and House speaker Paul Ryan, Governor Scott Walker said Tuesday that delegates to the Republican National Convention ought to vote how they see fit.

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with frequent contributor Ronald Radosh on the executions of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, 63 years later.

Republican senators shrugged off the potential ramifications of Donald Trump's fundraising deficit Tuesday and laughed about the possibility of the businessman self-funding his campaign as promised.

Representatives of both political parties agree that the current tax laws inadvertently create an incentive for multinational corporations to invest abroad. The high domestic tax rate on corporate income, combined with our worldwide tax system that double-taxes profits made overseas and then…

In Commentary, Abe Greenwald discusses the logic some are using to deny that the Orlando shooter's actions were connected with Islam or ISIS, and the problems such assertions create.

A recent New York Times story by Jonathan Mahler and Matt Flegenheimer on Donald Trump's relationship with Roy Cohn, the former aide to Joe McCarthy and high-powered New York lawyer, includes this amusing anecdote:

A new poll of swing states finds Donald Trump running close to Hillary Clinton in Ohio and Pennsylvania, but also getting thumped in the crucial prize of Florida.

A dive into Hillary Clinton's plans to capture the youth vote in November revealed that her strategy largely revolves around stealing Bernie Sanders.

Donald Trump suggested to a group of evangelical activists that America's leaders don't deserve prayer because they're "selling Christianity down the tubes." Trump also said it was more important that people pray "to get everybody out to vote" for him in the general election.

Summer vacation may be upon us, but that doesn't mean that the learning need stop. Consider getting the youngsters in your life Alpha is for Anthropos, an illustrated text designed to teach children—and Greekless grownups—their Alpha-Beta-Gammas.

Nicholas Confessore and Rachel Shorey write in the New York Times that,

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New field research from University of Michigan Law School professor Sonja Starr and Princeton post-doc Amanda Agan shows that hiding job applicants' criminal records until the final stages of the hiring process—known as "banning the box"—doesn't work so well.

The latest filing reports released by the Federal Election Commission show Democrat Hillary Clinton with nearly 40 times as much campaign cash on hand than her Republican rival, Donald Trump.

There is no shortage of researchers and educators who tell us that art is good for our health and well-being, our quality of life, and as a means for understanding ourselves and others. Where too many people come up short is paying to get into art museums—$25 at the Boston's Museum of Fine Arts and…

Since capturing the nomination in May, Donald Trump has turned his sights on Hillary, spending the bulk of his time chronicling her failings as Secretary of State, the rampant pay-for-play corruption at the Clinton Foundation, and the criminal violation of national security protocols on her secret…

If you’re in the Northeast, it's a pretty good day for a late-afternoon nap, and not just because of the daunting heat on this first day of summer. You're going to want to rest up so you can catch the match-up of the week tonight with a 10 p.m. EST first pitch, when the Los Angeles Dodgers host the…

In the past week, Donald Trump has staked out two wildly different stances on gun control: He has publicly appeared to back the Democrats' top gun control initiative in Congress while at the same time endorsing the possession of concealed weapons among people drinking alcohol in bars and…

Donald Trump's former campaign manager Corey Lewandowski heartily defended his ex-boss in a half-hour interview on CNN Monday, after news broke that he had been fired from the campaign.

Hillary Clinton and Democratic supporters are launching $23.3 million worth of TV advertising buys in battleground states, NBC reported Monday. As for planned spending by pro-Donald Trump forces in the same states? $0.

The Obama administration's Department of Justice changed course Monday and released the unredacted transcript of Orlando gunman Omar Mateen's 911 call.

In his June 14 remarks following the terrorist attack in Orlando, President Obama reassured us: He has known all along that when it comes to terrorism, the enemy we face is none other than "radical Islam."

Obama administration officials admitted that two uranium particles discovered at Iran's Parchin military facility last year are likely evidence of the country's nuclear weapons past, the Wall Street Journal reported Monday. The findings contradict Iran's repeated claims that it was not secretly…

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with online editor Michael Warren on the firing of Trump campaign manger Corey Lewandowski.

Donald Trump has fired his campaign manager Corey Lewandowski, after previously saying he would remain "loyal" to campaign operative. The New York Times reports:

Sometimes sports are more than just . . . well, sports. After all, American hockey fans will never forget the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, and the famous "Miracle on Ice." It was great hockey, to be sure, but it's remembered more as a moment when the U.S. was able to reach past a series of…

Speaker Paul Ryan is calling on President Obama to release the Orlando shooter's full 911 call transcript, without censoring references to ISIS.

Dustin Johnson won the U.S. Open on Sunday, and he did it in defiance of his own history in the big tournaments and the pedantry of the people whose job it is to enforce the rules. They might have been medieval scholars debating the number of angels able to dance on the head of a pin.

This wasn't supposed to happen.

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Michel Houellebecq has a show of his own art photography opening in Paris on June 23—the day Britain votes on whether to leave the European Union.

The Foundation for Constitutional Government has released a new episode of Conversations with Bill Kristol, and the returning guest is former world chess champion and human rights activist Garry Kasparov.

In its final year, the Obama administration is ramping up efforts to impose regulatory expansions affecting large swaths of the economy. The next target: higher education. The administration is poised to create a college tuition death spiral—and students and taxpayers will pay the price.

Donald Trump is struggling to raise cash for his campaign against Hillary Clinton.

Laryngitis

Did House speaker Paul Ryan tacitly lend his support to Republican National Convention delegates to dump presumptive nominee Donald Trump at the convention? In an interview with NBC's Chuck Todd that aired on this Sunday's Meet The Press, the Wisconsin Republican seemed to do just that.

Sunday is Father's Day, and THE WEEKLY STANDARD has had a lot to say about dads over the years. Senior writer Jonathan V. Last wrote last year about how fatherhood brings about a shift in man's own perception of his manliness:

In this episode of THE WEEKLY STANDARD Confab, Eric Felten talks with Christopher DeMuth about how the executive branch swallowed Washington and Ethan Epstein pops in to talk about thefts big and small involving North Korea.

This week, we learned about Donald Trump's philosophy about keeping a "fat guy" around. SMOD gets a tough primary challenge. Finally, Rep. Trey Gowdy wears... this...

The past few days have been a period of crisis for both pro-Europe Tory and Labour leaders in the United Kingdom in the run-up to the June 23 referendum on Britain's exit from the European Union: The British electorate looks increasingly willing to cast off EU membership. Just this past week, six…

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You have to hand it to the GOP primary voters who helped Donald Trump secure the nomination. Sure, they let themselves be seduced, but at least they made the guy work for it. His wooing and winning of these voters, which I wrote about in March, was a masterstroke.

Janet Yellen, keeper of the Federal Reserve Bank's money store, announced on Wednesday that free money remains on offer, at least for a while longer. Even cash-rich companies such as Apple can't resist accepting that offer, and our deficit-ridden government can keep on borrowing at phenomenally low…

Is the Republican National Committee concerned delegates to the national convention may revolt against nominating Donald Trump for president? CNN reports that RNC chairman Reince Priebus has been "quietly having conversations with state party leaders" about the latest chatter that some delegates…

Florida congressman David Jolly dropped his Florida Senate bid Friday, clearing one of a few possible hurdles for Marco Rubio to run for the seat he intended to vacate.

A government spokesman called the wealth of signatories on a memo objecting to President Obama's Syria policy "unusual" Friday.

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with executive editor Fred Barnes wrapping up the week in review, the history of TWS at 20, and how the mainstream media teamed up against Trump in the wake of the Orlando shooting.

The defense spending authorization bill that passed the Senate earlier this week included a controversial provision to extend draft registration to women, which supporters have heralded as inevitable progress toward more perfect gender equality.

Breitbart reported Thursday that Nebraska senator Ben Sasse crossed the aisle to join Democrats in their filibuster this week for gun control laws. As media outlets go, Breitbart is solidly in the tank for Donald Trump, and Sasse has been the leading Republican critic of Trump in the Senate, so it…

The WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with Thomas Joscelyn from the Foundation for Defense of Democracies on his recent story "Jihadists Under Investigation."

Earlier this week, President Obama lashed out at Donald Trump and others who criticized the president for refusing to say that the Orlando terrorist was motivated by radical Islamic ideology:

Illinois congressman Adam Kinzinger, an Iraq war veteran, has condemned Donald Trump's suggestion that American soldiers stole funds intended for Iraqi reconstruction, calling the presumptive Republican nominee's comments a dishonor.

During his first trip to the United States since taking office, Ukraine's new prime minister Volodomyr Groysman appeared—as his rabbi described him—as "a man of action who doesn't talk too much but gets a lot done." Groysman, 38, was elected in April after months of government infighting and…

In an interview with Chuck Todd that will air on Meet the Press Sunday, Speaker of the House Paul Ryan says this:

Nancy Reagan would be memorialized next to her husband's namesake airport under legislation introduced this week that would rename an adjacent park in her honor.

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Matthew Continetti, editor of the Washington Free Beacon and a contributing editor for THE WEEKLY STANDARD, writes about the Republican party's "self-immolation" as it prepares to nominate Donald Trump as its presidential nominee. Here's an excerpt:

Forget the teachers unions. Bill Gates's hubristic save-the-world philanthropy and perpetual tone-deafness have now alienated an entire nation. Bolivia—a healthy poultry-producer actually on the economic up-and-up under an anti-imperialist regime—rejected his offer of 100,000 hens.

Starting July 1, a new law in Tennessee will permit faculty and staff at all of the state's public universities to carry concealed firearms. Until then, the campuses remain "gun-free zones."

Washington wants more ex-cons—oops, we're not supposed to use that term anymore—to go to college. Schools as varied as Columbia University, Arizona State, and Nyack College are among dozens of institutions that have signed on to the White House's "Fair Chance Higher Education Pledge." The idea is…

“Trust me, he's only hanging on by a thread."

Distant newsrooms have sent word to Chicago that Republican moderate Mark Kirk is dead meat in his bid to win a second term as Illinois’s junior senator. He reliably tops newspaper lists of "Most Endangered GOP Senators in 2016."

Few cultural experiences can match that moment when, for the first time, you approach the great Pergamon Altar in Berlin. Because it is famous, but not as famous as the Ara Pacis or the Elgin Marbles, many visitors will encounter it in complete ignorance that something so big or so imposing has…

The system was blinking red for months prior to the June 12 terrorist attack in Orlando. Since early 2015, the FBI has repeatedly warned the American public that the threat of violent attacks is growing and that there are too many potential terrorists to track. Then Omar Mateen, a 29-year-old…

After the 9/11 attacks, politicians divided into two camps. The 9/12ers were the largest. They believed the world had changed and America faced a frightening new threat from Islamic terrorists. But there were plenty of 9/10ers. They were mostly liberals and Democrats who felt the world wasn’t much…

Brock Turner’s victim's account of her experience of sexual assault on the Stanford campus is now justly famous. The statement, running to more than 7,000 words, was released to the media on June 3, the day after Turner received a six-month jail sentence and probation for his three felony…

The sign at the trailhead warns hikers that they are entering bear country. Which causes one to think, "Well, of course it is." It would be impossible to imagine this country without bears—both grizzlies and the lesser, but still-formidable black bear. Nor could you imagine this country without…

After decades of decline in the rate of violent crime, last year saw it spike and then some. In big cities across the country, murders were up 17 percent. And that masks how bad it is in some particularly traumatized urban areas—parts of Chicago, for instance, have become killing fields. Scholar…

When John F. Kennedy addressed the Canadian parliament in 1961, he depicted relations between the two nations in beautiful prose: “Geography has made us neighbors. History has made us friends. Economics has made us partners. And necessity has made us allies. Those whom nature hath so joined…

"Why aren’t we talking this week about bringing this Congress together on an issue like making sure that individuals who are on the terrorist watch list can't buy guns?" Connecticut senator Chris Murphy asked that question shortly before he filibustered for gun control measures on June 15. A few…

American government has assumed a new form. The federal executive branch—the president, his political appointees, and the hundreds of agencies that report to them—has come to exercise lawmaking powers that were long the unquestioned preserve of Congress. For decades now, the executive has made law…

The killing of Harambe the gorilla at the Cincinnati Zoo last month was an unfortunate necessity, a lethal act required to save the life of an imminently endangered child. But listening to the public outpouring of grief and outrage—stoked by the media—one would think that the shooting of the animal…

One of the big arguments for Donald Trump’s prospects as the GOP nominee is that he would "redraw the map." Trump's appeal with blue-collar voters is allegedly such that he could ensure victories in rustbelt states such as Ohio and Pennsylvania that have eluded Republican candidates in recent…

Only a very rude mechanical could have failed to notice that this past April marked the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death. It has been a year of discoveries. In a private library on the Isle of Bute, a copy of a vamped First Folio came to light, along with the meaning of the word vamped. And…

"Omar Mateen shattered the tenuous, hard-fought sense of personal safety that many gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender Americans have begun to feel as the movement for equality has made significant gains in recent years. His bullets and the blood he left behind that early morning were a reminder…

Everything has a history and a pre-history, and that includes Donald Trump and his angry hordes. Trump is by no means the first American tycoon to stir up fears and resentments and attempt to ride a populist wave. One of his notable predecessors, mostly forgotten today, is Robert Welch.

[img nocaption float="right" width="213" height="305" render="<%photoRenderType%>"]997[/img][img nocaption float="right" width="340" height="677" render="<%photoRenderType%>"]998[/img]Wings of Morning The Story of the Last American Bomber Shot Down over Germany in World War II by Thomas Childers…

I’ve never liked feeling stereotypical. Which is why I would like you to know that this story does not involve a vanilla latte. As bland, generic—dare I say, basic?—as my tale might otherwise be, some lines cannot be crossed. Despite being the premier Starbucks drink of choice for women in their…

Barack Obama is confused. After 49 people were murdered last week in a gay nightclub in Orlando, in the most deadly Islamist attack on U.S. soil since 9/11, the president turned his wrath on domestic opponents.

President Bush’s speech before Congress Thursday night conveyed both the determination and the reassurance the American people needed. But what gave the president’s address historic significance was the courageous and visionary mission he set for his administration and for the nation. For Bush…

Tallinn, Estonia

Before we start, let's just get one thing straight: A renewal of the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban will not crumble under fire from the "lobbying" power of the NRA.

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with staff writer Jay Cost on Trump's poll numbers and the upcoming GOP convention.

Back in March, Speaker of the House Paul Ryan declared that he would speak out against Donald Trump when he saw "episodes where conservatism is being disfigured" or "comments that mislead the people as to who we are as Republicans." True to his word, last week Ryan strongly condemned Trump's racial…

Senator John McCain said Thursday that President Obama was "directly responsible" for the Orlando terrorist attack last weekend, pointing to the administration's policies that he says have allowed ISIS to grow into "what it is today".

Given the hyper-partisan era in which we live, one would expect a Democrat to cheer when the presumptive Republican nominee for president appeared open to legislation she was championing.

A nonpartisan department inside Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau's government successfully petitioned Google to remove webpages associated with former conservative leader Stephen Harper from its search results, Canada's iPolitics reports.

The Associated Press reports that things in Afghanistan are not going well:

Republican governor of Tennessee Bill Haslam talked openly Wednesday about a discussion he had with Donald Trump, but he didn't endorse the presumptive GOP nominee for president.

When Marco Rubio returned to the Senate in March, fatigued from losing a battle against the most overwhelming presidential candidacy of modern times, he pledged to do some honest days' work—and then quietly step aside.

A frequent—if not entirely fair—criticism of Republican opposition to Obamacare is that the GOP has only said "no!" With few exceptions, the argument goes, the Republicans have fought against healthcare reform without suggesting a substantive alternative of their own.

A Democratic senator has blocked a measure that combats the anti-Israel Boycott, Divest, Sanctions (BDS) movement due to its use of the term "Israeli-controlled territories." But the senator voted for a bill—now a law—that contained similar language months ago.

The Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution reads, "No person shall ... be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law...." Senator Joe Manchin isn't sure the belief that one is innocent until proven guilty is always such a good idea. On Thursday, The West Virginia Democrat…

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Congress is fighting over shoes.

A surprise fifteen hour filibuster led by Connecticut Democratic senator Chris Murphy has apparently proven successful. Politico reports:

The Senate passed the National Defense Authorization Act Tuesday by a wide margin, 85 to 13. One controversial provision included in the bill, however, will have to be reconciled with the House of Representatives: requiring that women register for the draft.

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with senior writer John McCormack on Donald Trump's suggestion that U.S. soldiers are "living comfortably" after allegedly stealing taxpayer money intended for Iraqis.

Having officially re-established its Air Force program after 45 years, Harvard University will once again offer all Reserve Officers' Training Corps (ROTC) services.

CBS reports that the Orlando nightclub shooter Omar Mateen posted a pro-ISIS message on Facebook just "moments before" the attack.

Maryland governor Larry Hogan said Wednesday he does not plan on casting a ballot for Donald Trump this November.

During a speech in Atlanta on Wednesday, Donald Trump said Kim Jong-un "acts up," but he would be willing to speak with the leader.

Three GOP senators sounded off Wednesday on Donald Trump's comment that American soldiers stole money intended for Iraqi reconstruction.

In an editorial embarrassing even by the low standards by which the New York Times editorial page ought to be judged, the editorialists at the paper argue this morning that the real blame for Omar Mateen's massacre at a gay nightclub in Orlando lies with…America and Republican politicians.

Donald Trump said Wednesday that he will meet with the National Rifle Association to discuss banning individuals on the federal government's terrorist watch list from purchasing firearms.

Hillary Clinton clobbered Bernie Sanders in the District of Columbia's presidential primary on Tuesday. The former secretary of state took 79 percent of the vote to Sanders's 20 percent.

An American veteran of the Iraq war who was among those soldiers tasked with "bringing baskets of money…and handing it out" to compensate Iraqis affected by the fighting has responded to Donald Trump's suggestion those Americans stole money.

Donald Trump is on course to be routed at the ballot box in November. He trails Hillary Clinton by 12 points in the latest Bloomberg News national poll, and has only led her in four polls out of thirty three since April, according to Real Clear Politics. A new ABC News/Washington Post poll finds…

A new ABC/Washington Post poll shows that Donald Trump's unfavorable rating has jumped 10 percentage points in the last month.

You've got to hand it to Alejandro Cao de Benos. While most Western apologists for North Korea obscure their sympathies with platitudes about wanting to "promote dialogue" or foster "cultural exchange," de Benos, a Barcelona native, is out of the closet as a pro-regime activist. In 2000, he founded…

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Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump suggested at a Tuesday rally in North Carolina that American soldiers in the Iraq War tasked with "bringing baskets of money, millions and millions of dollars, and handing it out" are "living very well right now."

Free college is still a potent rallying cry for the stalwart Bernie Sanders youth. Hope for debt-free education ought to be wilting along with Sanders' campaign—and yet, not unlike the delusional conviction of the socialist senator's young devotees, it has yet to fade.

Regardless of who wins in November, Donald Trump has permanently changed the political landscape. From the day he rode down that escalator like an orange conquistador, Trump effortlessly upended half a century of common wisdom about modern presidential campaigning. Just as the Pulitzer…

During a press conference Tuesday, President Obama said the terrorist responsible for the massacre at a gay nightclub in Orlando was inspired by propaganda produced by the Islamic State (also known as ISIS or ISIL).

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid continued his push Tuesday for a bill to ban the sale of guns to Americans suspected of terrorism, even if the government can't show probable cause to a judge that Americans on the terror watch list are plotting terrorism. But Reid suggested it's "foolishness" for…

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with Literary Editor Philip Terzian on recommended books for putting the attack in Orlando into perspective.

A new poll of likely voters in the general election gives Democrat Hillary Clinton a 12-point lead over Republican Donald Trump. The survey from Bloomberg found Clinton with 49 percent support to Trump's 37 percent. Libertarian Gary Johnson receives nine percent, while four percent say they "aren't…

The Orlando nightclub gunman said he carried out his attack because he wanted the United States to "stop bombing his country," according to a witness who spoke at a news conference Tuesday.

One of the interesting things about Donald Trump is how he's forging unlikely political alliances. For instance, if anyone had told me a year ago that David Plouffe—Obama's ace campaign strategist—would be blasting the GOP presidential nominee and I would agree with him, I would have been very…

A Democratic senator continues to block an amendment to a defense spending authorization bill Tuesday meant to protect state and local governments that reject anti-Israel boycotts.

Miami

President Obama used part of his speech Tuesday to renew calls for gun control, warning that failing to enact new gun laws will allow San Bernardino- and Orlando-style terrorist attacks "to keep on happening."

A Republican donor and former fundraising bundler for Mitt Romney has launched a new group, Better for America, to seek ballot access for a third-party conservative candidate challenger to Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. Maggie Haberman at the New York Times has the scoop:

At a Tuesday morning press conference, House speaker Paul Ryan argued against imposing a ban on Muslims entering the United States.

Hackers working for the Russian government stole opposition research information about Republican candidate Donald Trump from the computers of the Democratic National Committee. The Washington Post reports on the hack that hit systems from across the political spectrum:

Two new polls of the presidential race show a big opening for a third party presidential candidate to gain traction.

In light of the terrorist attack in Orlando, Minneapolis attorney Scott Johnson has a timely piece in the magazine recapping law enforcement's case against the 10 "Minnesota men" charged with seeking to leave the United States to join ISIS in Syria.

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Hillary Clinton is no fan of Donald Trump's rhetoric regarding ISIS. In fact, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee has repeatedly suggested that her likely opponent's public utterances are actually aiding the terror organization.

The Democratic party sent out a fundraising email to supporters Monday night that calls for "action" in the wake of the Orlando shooting that killed nearly 50 people. But the letter, signed by Democratic National Committee chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz, does not mention terrorism nor the…

In the wake of the Islamist terror attack that killed 50 people at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Hillary Clinton and congressional Democrats are vigorously pushing legislation to ban American citizens from purchasing guns if the federal government has a reasonable suspicion the gun may be used in a…

Senator Marco Rubio said Monday that he didn't want "politics to intrude" upon discussion of this weekend's terrorist attack in his home state. But when pressed by conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt, the Florida Republican suggested he is rethinking his decision not to run for reelection to the…

On the Monday after the Orlando terror attack, CNN.com's news homepage looked like this:

Hillary Clinton signed a fundraising email Monday that warned against "inflammatory anti-Muslim rhetoric" and called for "more than prayer" in the wake of Sunday's terrorist attack in Orlando that killed 49 people and wounded even more. The likely Democratic nominee said that what America…

After each jihadist attack in the West, our society rehearses the same ritualistic debate over what the terrorists' motivations really are. It is true that "radicalization," as it is often described, is a complex process. The men who become terrorists may have psychological or other issues that…

Protesters chanted "H is for hypocrisy" during a Hillary Clinton rally in Cleveland Monday. The protesters' calls were overpowered by a chorus of "We love Hillary," which Clinton let run for half a minute before she calmed the chaos.

In the wake of the terrorist attack on an Orlando nightclub Sunday morning, presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump seized on the crisis, first by tweeting that he saw it coming and now in a fundraising email headed "Make America Safe Again!"

Cornel West and James Zogby lobbied to include the term Israeli "occupation" in the official Democratic platform during a meeting of the party's platform drafting committee last week.

In the wake of yesterday's horrific shooting in Florida, this report is infuriating (emphasis added):

Hillary Clinton called to reauthorize an assault weapons ban Monday following Sunday's mass shooting in Orlando.

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with editor William Kristol on the Orlando attack.

As I highlighted in a recent WEEKLY STANDARD editorial, Obamacare has invented a dangerous new way to hide federal spending, including more than $100 billion designed to look like tax cuts.

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Following Sunday's mass shooting in Orlando, which has been called "the deadliest mass shooting in the United States and the nation's worst terror attack since 9/11," President Obama responded to the shooting by call it "an act of terror and an act of hate."

Kristol Clear Vacation

The boss joined George Stephanopoulos and guests on ABC's This Week to discuss Trump vs. Hillary in the general election and the shootings in Orlando.

In this episode of THE WEEKLY STANDARD Confab, Eric Felten talks with Michael Warren about the Week in Trump. And then Ron Rubin comes by to tell us how the federal government is trying to make payday loans not pay.

Federal officials are telling members of Congress the man who killed at least 50 people at a Florida nightclub may have pledged allegiance to ISIS. Omar Mateen, the 29-year-old U.S.-born citizen who opened fire at a gay nightclub in Orlando early Sunday morning, was reportedly "on the radar" of…

This week, we learned about Senator Mitch McConnell's childhood bully, we give our new robot overlords a big hearty welcome, and Donald Trump steals a line from Huggies.

Bernie Sanders held a rally in Washington, D.C. on June 9. On the same day, Sanders visited the White House for a “friendly conversation" with the president, and President Obama endorsed Hillary Clinton shortly thereafter. Tuesday June 7 Sanders lost the California primary, and on Monday the…

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We are about to prove that two negatives make a positive. According to most polls, almost 60 percent of voters dislike or hate Hillary Clinton, while a bit more than that dislike or hate Donald Trump. One out of every three voters who plan to vote for either Trump or Clinton say they are doing so…

Hillary Clinton isn't sure the Second Amendment is a constitutional right. But she's sure the right to abortion is.

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with senior writer Stephen F. Hayes assessing the strengths and weaknesses of Hillary and Trump going into the 2016 general election.

Gordie Howe, the National Hockey League's longest tenured player and a member of the sport's Mt. Rushmore, died Friday at age 88.

The State Department just released a "guide for educators to create gender-inclusive classrooms" for use by teachers and schools around the world. While the document is titled "Creating Supportive Learning Environments for Girls and Boys," the wording sometimes attempts to take into account recent…

Klaus Wivel is a reporter writing for the Danish weekly Weekendavisen. His book about Middle Eastern Christians, The Last Supper: The Plight of Christians in Arab Lands, was just published in the United States. Wivel sat down with me recently to discuss his book, the Christian community in the…

At some point in her life, every woman will attempt to talk another woman out of a bad relationship. We want other women to be treated with dignity and respect, but we know that some women project their hopes and dreams onto jerks and deadbeats. It's painful to watch, and any decent woman will do…

Late last month, at the end of a turbulent academic year at Yale, a petition appeared online that asked—demanded, really—the English faculty to change its requirements for majors. Although its specific demands are inconsistent, the gist is clear: The students don't want to take a two-semester…

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"I'm going to be your champion," Donald Trump declared after he won the California primary last week. "I'm going to be America's champion. Because, you see, this election isn't about Republican or Democrat. It's about who runs this country, the special interests or the people—and I mean the…

If Hillary Clinton is elected president, congressional Democrats are likely to push her to move to the left and embrace much of the agenda of Bernie Sanders, her opponent for the presidential nomination. If Donald Trump wins, Republicans in Congress intend to be a check on him, pressing him to…

President Donald Trump would take the Supreme Court seriously. He would appoint solid judicial conservatives to decide cases in accordance with the Constitution’s original meaning. He would not treat the federal courts frivolously, leveraging his judicial appointment power like a bargaining chip to…

Last month, I had to stay a night in Oxford. Having not set foot there since my 20s, I was looking forward to it. If memory served, there were good B&Bs near the Thames and the Cherwell. There were rooms at the colleges where one could stay for cheap. Any place would serve, as long as it was close…

Exceedingly popular these days in the social “sciences" are studies purporting to show that conservatives are a deranged bunch, full of outré psychological traits that make them vulnerable to authoritarian come-ons. Many have been the social-psychologists and behavioral and political scientists who…

Almost a half-century ago, the great Donald Westlake published a comic mystery novel, God Save the Mark. It’s probably not one of Westlake's very best efforts (though even a Westlake non-best-effort is awfully good). The "mark" of the title is a reasonably intelligent and likable young man who…

Hillary Clinton last week secured the number of delegates necessary to win the Democratic presidential nomination, and then she gave a speech. Did you know that she is the first woman to win the nomination of a major American party for president, and that this is a historic occasion? Fortunately,…

Minneapolis

Camp Shomera, on the Israel-Lebanon border

"That’s the good thing: As a president I can do whatever I want." Those are President Obama's words. He may have meant it as a joke, but it's true enough: He, or any president, can do whatever he wants, even unwise things—provided they are legal.

DEPUTY SECRETARY OF DEFENSE Paul Wolfowitz spent much of the last decade as a foreign-policy intellectual and dean of Johns Hopkins graduate school of international affairs doing two things: studying war and agitating for the ouster of Saddam Hussein. Now Wolfowitz has a prominent seat at The…

In May, Tennessee lawmakers banned all funding for the Office of Diversity and Inclusion at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. The $436,000 that had been budgeted for the office will instead be put toward scholarships for minority students in engineering. The UTK diversity office was…

In late April, the sixth season of Game of Thrones, the ardently watched HBO adaptation of George R. R. Martin's elephantine, quasi-medieval fantasy-novel series, A Song of Ice and Fire, launched its 10-episode run. This has been the first season of the six in which Thrones' writer-producers D. B.…

Since the Charlie Hebdo affair a year-and-a-half ago and the gratuitous, as it seemed, attack on the kosher supermarket in Paris, the condition of Jews in France has been a subject of much discussion and concern, and not only in France. An article in the London Telegraph immediately following those…

In the aftermath of Donald Trump's bigoted attacks on a federal district judge, one Republican leader after another last week condemned the candidate's remarks and then publicly declared their hope that Trump will change.

Several months ago it became clear that Trumpism is a corrosive force that corrupts everyone in Donald Trump’s orbit. What makes Trumpism corrupting is that it is not possible to pick and choose from the Trump buffet. You cannot endorse the border fence, hope for a good Supreme Court appointment,…

Sometimes even The Scrapbook is mystified by certain rituals of modern American politics. Take celebrity congressional testimony, for example. Here is a photograph of Dame Helen Mirren, the British actress, taken in Washington last week. She is taking an oath not because she was being sworn into…

Der Spiegel recently described the great German writers Thomas and Heinrich Mann and their progeny thus: “egocentric and self-deprecating, half-bound to one another, sexually irregular, the representatives of a different Germany. .  .  . [Today] Thomas Mann's family seems astonishingly modern." No…

A book about a statesman by a politician prompts two questions: Do we learn anything new about the statesman, and do we learn anything useful about the politician? In this case, the answer to both questions is yes.

Since Donald Trump became the presumptive GOP presidential nominee on May 3, Ted Cruz has declined to say whether or not he will support his former rival in the November election. "I am watching and listening and like millions of voters assessing the candidates. And I expect voters will continue to…

Newt Gingrich made a curious claim on radio host Mike Gallagher's Thursday program. The former House speaker reiterated his contention that Donald Trump's recent comments about federal judge Gonzalo Curiel's Mexican heritage were "totally, utterly unacceptable." Then Gingrich added, "I am glad…

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with deputy online editor Chris Deaton on how public figures like Milwaukee County sheriff David Clarke, Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders have tapped into voters in search of an authority figure.

One month after announcing his support for Donald Trump, Marco Rubio still believes that the presumptive GOP nominee is unfit to be commander-in-chief. "I stand by everything I said during the campaign," the Florida senator told THE WEEKLY STANDARD on Thursday when asked if he still believes Trump…

The Department of Veterans' Affairs fired three senior officials from the Phoenix VA health care system Wednesday, marking the first dismissals linked to the mismanagement in Arizona since the system's director was ousted in November 2014.

White House press secretary Josh Earnest insisted that President Obama's endorsement of Hillary Clinton will not "sway" the ongoing FBI investigation into Clinton.

Barack Obama endorsed Hillary Clinton for president in an online video released Thursday afternoon. "I don't think there's ever been someone so qualified to hold this office," Obama said.

Vermont senator Bernie Sanders reaffirmed his progressive platform and vowed to stay in the Democratic presidential primary after meeting with President Obama at the White House Thursday. But the self-proclaimed socialist signaled he may be inching towards realizing the calls from many Democrats…

President Obama warned of a submerged Manhattan without efforts to combat climate change during a fundraiser in New York City Wednesday night.

A panel at the South Atlantic Modern Language Association annual meeting in November plans to discuss how to use classes on Southern literature as “Trojan horses" to "build common cause with campus protest movements."

John Kasich said it's entirely possible he will not endorse Donald Trump.

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On the heels of President Obama's regrettable speech at Hiroshima, White House official Ben Rhodes, of "echo chamber" infamy, doubled down on the president's commitment to the nuclear disarmament agenda Obama laid out in Prague early in his first term. Specifically, Rhodes revealed that the Obama…

On May 18, the Department of the Interior announced a contract award of $329,042 for Tonkawa Indian Casino Hotel parking lot project. The casino, located in Tonkawa, OK, is owned and run by the Tonkawa tribe. Although the money comes from federal highway funds, the tribe has the discretion to use…

Scott Walker has said that he would support Donald Trump if he were the nominee, but the Wisconsin governor backed away from that pledge in the wake of Trump's racial attack on the federal judge overseeing a lawsuit against Trump University. Trump said the judge, an American citizen born in…

Bloomberg reports that Donald Trump plans to give a speech on Monday attacking Democratic rival Hillary Clinton:

Turkey is one or two meetings away from normalizing ties with Israel, Turkish foreign minister Mevlut Cavusoglu told the media Tuesday. Ties between the two countries have been frosty since 2010, when Ankara sponsored a flotilla to the Gaza Strip, a territory held by the terrorist organization…

During a meeting of the Democratic party's platform drafting committee Wednesday, committee member and businesswoman Bonnie Schaefer said that no one should be able to own a gun.

The State Department said Wednesday that it would investigate a censored 2013 briefing video about secret talks with Iran, reversing its claim last week that the investigation had hit a "dead end."

June 7 was big day for Ted Cruz. For one thing, he got back in the saddle: That morning, Cruz spoke on the Senate floor—about national security and flooding in Texas—for the first time since suspending his presidential campaign in May. And that very afternoon, when the Senate Judiciary Committee…

The presence of a climate justice warrior who zip-tied himself to the White House fence and President Obama's "climate czar" on the Democrats' platform drafting committee has the party poised for a progressive shift on energy policy.

The boss joined Andrea Mitchell earlier on MSNBC to discuss the Trump candidacy and the recent controversy over Donald Trump's statements on Judge Curiel, and whether GOP leaders will abandon Trump for a conservative nominee.

This election has been one heck of a lab experiment. There's overlap between Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump, yet Trump "effectively split" the Tea Party between himself and Ted Cruz, who actually is something of a Tea Partier, whereas Trump is more of a "conservative-leaning populist" or just an…

Senator Orrin Hatch and Representative Tom Price have just reintroduced the Employee Rights Act, which would make some very necessary updates to labor law. Naturally, unions are engaged in the usual hyperbole attacking the legislation. See, for example, this March op-ed from the president of the…

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with editor William Kristol on Donald Trump's comments about the judge hearing the Trump University case.

Will Smith was asked to serve as one of the pallbearers at Muhammad Ali's funeral Friday. Smith and Ali became close when the former portrayed the boxer in the 2001 biopic, Ali. It'd be worth asking if he was thinking of Ali when he made his most recent picture, Concussion, playing Bennet Omalu,…

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A Department of Defense official said Tuesday that Russia could overrun NATO within 60 hours, but maintained it would be more difficult to do so after 2017.

Bill O'Reilly struck a nerve Tuesday evening when discussing the judge in the Trump University case with Charles Krauthammer.

Donald Trump announced tonight that he's giving a major speech on Hillary Clinton on Monday.

Dear Governor Romney,

Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell, like many Republicans who support Donald Trump, is upset with Trump and the tack he's taken in the presidential campaign.

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with executive editor Fred Barnes on his top three speech ideas for Donald Trump.

Donald J. Trump is making "indefensible" and "inexcusable" and "racist" arguments that are "offensive" and "un-American." He must be elected president of the United States.

Donald Trump said Tuesday it was "unfortunate" that his recent comments about the judge in the case against Trump University were "misconstrued" to be racial.

The Washington Post columnist Richard Cohen took Speaker Paul Ryan to task this week for Ryan's tepid endorsement of Donald Trump—"What I know about Ryan is that he could not be proud of endorsing Trump"—and compared him at length, and distinctly unfavorably, with a Republican from an earlier era,…

Months after three U.S. congressmen first made a formal request for a visa to travel to Iran, THE WEEKLY STANDARD reported Monday that the Iranian government finally issued a response. The congressmen were looking to make a fact-finding trip to examine Iran's nuclear program, the status of American…

Onward from the last third of the twentieth century, a social activist ethic has chipped away at the core curriculum of many liberal arts colleges (with only rare notable exceptions). And while the death of the liberal arts by identity politics may seem old news, there are still battles fought and…

Some Bernie Sanders supporters aren't willing to support Hillary Clinton even if she's the Democratic nominee.

Hillary Clinton's campaign manager asserted on CNN Tuesday the likely Democratic nominee is "exciting." Speaking with host Alisyn Camerota, Robby Mook argued Clinton's plans on health care and college affordability were what will excite voters as the Democratic primary wraps up.

House speaker Paul Ryan said Tuesday that presumptive presidential nominee Donald Trump uttered a “textbook definition of a racist comment" about the fitness of the federal judge in the Trump University case. But the Wisconsin Republican said he remained committed to supporting Trump because the…

The Price of Prosperity paints a bleak picture of America's future. It also explains the increasingly angry tenor of the nation's political "dialogue"—if you can still call it that.

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The Republican attorney general of Florida reportedly solicited a donation from Donald Trump’s foundation as the office was considering joining a multi-state fraud lawsuit against the New York billionaire.

The Salt Lake Tribune published a new general election poll of Utah voters Monday, and the results are as follows:

In recent weeks, there have been numerous reports that Donald Trump's campaign is disorganized and understaffed. A new report from Bloomberg seems to support that view, and suggests his campaign may be struggling to handle Trump's messaging in a way he finds suitable.

The Graduate Record Examination (GRE), a standardized test required for admission to most advanced degree programs in the humanities and sciences, is not doing its job, according to the company that administers it.

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with senior writer Mark Hemingway on whether Trump's attacks on a federal judge hearing the Trump University case will hurt his prospects.

BuzzFeed reports that in a radio interview Newt Gingrich condemned Donald Trump's attack on the federal judge overseeing a lawsuit against Trump, saying that the logic behind GOP nominee's attack "totally goes against our whole model of being an American." Trump said last week that the judge, an…

In February, THE WEEKLY STANDARD reported on the attempt of three congressmen, Reps. Mike Pompeo, Lee Zeldin, and Frank LoBiondo, to request visas to travel to Iran. Among other things, they hoped to use the trip to independently verify aspects of the Iranian nuclear deal since the Obama…

During Hillary Clinton's first time taking questions from the press in about a month, she was asked about the super delegate system.

Americans of the last generation may associate Cliveden with the Profumo affair of the 1960s, which began when Britain's secretary of state for war spotted a London party girl emerging nude from its swimming pool and began a liaison that would later bring down the government. So wrote Liesl…

For all the talk of how Donald Trump might affect Republicans down-ballot this November, Nevada representative Joe Heck says his effort to turn Harry Reid's Senate seat red is what will determine party control of the upper chamber come 2017.

Hillary Clinton took 8 minutes of questions from the press today:

Secretary of State John Kerry and Secretary of the Treasury Jack Lew are in China for two days of talks on a variety of issues with his Chinese counterparts. In his opening remarks for the U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue, Kerry said the Americans and the Chinese are increasingly anxious…

Elsewhere from the presidential campaign trail, Ohio Republican senator Rob Portman is being blasted by his Democratic opponent Ted Strickland for both endorsing Donald Trump and disavowing Trump's characterization of the Indiana-born judge in the Trump University case as a biased "Mexican":

The latest epside of Conversations With Bill Kristol features James Ceaser:

Seventy-two years ago Monday, nearly 160,000 Allied troops made the treacherous amphibious landing on the beaches of Normandy in France, under the command of American general Dwight D. Eisenhower. Their successful operation to take the 50 miles of beach from Nazi forces began in the early hours of…

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Memorial Day (cont'd)

This week, John Kasich grew a beard. Speaker Paul Ryan's endorsement of Donald Trump was hiding in plain sight. Here is everything you need to know about the Libertarian Convention and how it's playing out.

In an interview with George Stephanopoulos, Hillary Clinton refused to say that the right to bear arms is a constitutional right. The leading Democratic candidate used the question to push for gun control.

In this episode of THE WEEKLY STANDARD Confab, Eric Felten talks with Fred Barnes about The Donald running neck and neck with Hillary. Shannen Coffin explains the many investigations into Hillary Clinton's home-brew email server, and Vic Matus joins Eric Felten to discuss the looming season finale…

Hillary Clinton said Friday that the unemployment rate under President Obama, which dropped to its lowest point in May since 2007, was "disappointing."

With nearly a third of the schedule already over, baseball is rushing toward the long grind. It’s these three months, June, July, and August, where seasons are built or squandered, with September a berserkers' challenge to what's been earned here. Fans and scribes are right to romanticize the…

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The Federal Reserve Board's good ship Raise-the-Interest-Rate sailed into an iceberg Friday when the government reported that a mere 38,000 new jobs had been created in May—the lowest total since November 2010. And that the figures for March and April had been revised downward by 59,000 jobs. And…

TWS has a special affinity for the U.S. Navy's Blue Angels, as the son of one staff member flew with the team a decade ago and the friend of another is flying with it now. Yesterday, the Angels lost USMC Captain Jeff Kuss in an accident in Smyrna, Tennessee.

The economy added only 38,000 jobs in May and the workforce shed almost half a million people.

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with senior writer Stephen F. Hayes on the week that was on the 2016 campaign trail.

Madeleine Albright is dear to the Clinton family, having served as secretary of state under President Bill Clinton during his second term and being one of Hillary Clinton's loudest and most active surrogates.

"This is a win," protesters declared after three weeks occupying Seattle University's humanities college.

On Friday, inventor of the Dean Scream and Hillary Clinton supporter Howard Dean said the Democratic ticket for president needs some youth to prevent it from being too old.

Hedda Gabler is a play largely trapped inside its protagonist's head. It's a sense preserved by Studio Theatre's production. Staged with Scandinavian simplicity, the production allows the characters and their emotions to come to the fore. The stage shows only the Hedda's tastefully decorated living…

Thursday morning Syrian president Bashar al-Assad's political and media adviser, Bouthaina Shaaban, spoke via Skype to an audience at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. Her webcast speech was part of an event hosted by an organization called the Global Alliance for Terminating al…

On Wednesday, the New York Times published a scathing editorial:

Democratic lawmakers might be the last group of people you'd expect to denounce the Declaration of Independence for asserting each single human being's equal claim to the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Yet, such is the story coming out of Louisiana this week. Democratic…

Hillary and Bill Clinton will hold eight events in California Friday, days before the primary, in an attempt to thwart the threat of a Bernie Sanders victory there.

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Thousands of Americans participated in that most benign of civic rituals in San Jose, California, on Thursday night: seeing a presidential candidate speak. Of course, that candidate was Donald Trump, so as these engaged citizens streamed out of the arena, they were subjected to astonishing levels…

As Chris Deaton reports, President Obama thinks “VFW halls all across America" have a warped view of the economy. Thanks to "some cable news stations" and "right-wing radio"—as Obama tells it—Americans falsely believe that the economy isn't roaring, that a lot of people are paying more in income…

If conservatives have been feeling a bit discouraged about politics lately, we should cheer up: There is good news from Tehran. For, according to the New York Times (May 31), the Iranian parliament has just affirmed its support for one of our own: “Iran Lawmakers Re-elect Their Conservative…

A  chamber comedy set among New York City academics, Maggie's Plan is so slight on the surface and so seemingly unambitious that its remarkable qualities sneak up on you. The "plan" of the title only begins to emerge after the first hour—and it is part of the considerable achievement of the…

The International Monetary Fund designated China’s yuan—also called renminbi (RMB), or "People's Currency"—an IMF-accepted reserve currency in November. So holdings of yuan (along with previously designated holdings of dollars, euros, yen, and sterling) enable IMF-members to access special drawing…

A tip of The Scrapbook homburg to Michael Ramirez, whose cartoons have graced these pages for many years now. Last week, he was awarded the most prestigous honor in cartooning, the Reuben Award. As Michael explained in a Facebook post, "The Reuben is the equivalent to the Oscar for Best Picture in…

Plato, Plato, Plato—Zeena Rivera is sick of Plato. It seems that she's been asked to read Plato in four—four!—courses during her two years at Seattle University's Matteo Ricci College, a small humanities program within the Jesuit-founded school. And no, it's not that she's upset that the Platonic…

I just bought a bottle of Waterman’s ink for $11.34, tax included. The bottle contains 50ml, or less than two ounces, of black ink. This makes ink far more expensive than wine, even quite superior wine. I would have complained—or at least exclaimed—about the price, but the man who sold it to me was…

Despite the acrimony among the Republicans who ran for the presidency in 2016, there was actually a fair amount of agreement when it came to their policy proposals. For instance, nearly every candidate put together a major tax reform proposal, and none differed terribly much from the others save…

The Scrapbook doesn’t fault our peers in the business for looking for creative ways to make a buck in a challenging media landscape. Then again, it's almost always easy to find fault with the New York Times. For a few years now, the media behemoth has been organizing trips to exotic locales with…

The State Department inspector general’s conclusion that Hillary Clinton violated federal records law should come as no surprise to anyone familiar with the controversy. The IG report, released in late May, is devastating to Clinton's constantly shifting defenses of her misconduct. And while the…

It would have been a magnificent sight a century ago, the kind that fills one with awe and dread. A fleet of great battleships, in which a nation had invested a great deal of its wealth and virtually all of its trust, making steam, weighing anchor, and putting to sea. They were leaving Scapa Flow…

I recently gave a talk at a synagogue in Miami on the subject of Jewish humor—specifically on the jokes Jews tell about themselves. Freud, in his Jokes and Their Relation to the Unconscious, wrote: "I do not know whether there are many other instances of a people making fun to such a degree of its…

Last week pictures of Qassem Suleimani started to circulate on social media, which is always a pretty sure sign that an Iranian military campaign is about to kick off somewhere in the Middle East. And indeed not long after, Iranian-backed Shiite militias, Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps units,…

His vast fortune, the equally vast array of women with whom he has slept, the sufficiency of the relevant equipment for such exertions, how other men are afraid of him, or are brought to tears because of him, or will bend to his will in their dealings with him: Donald Trump seems very concerned…

Donald Trump has achieved two things besides locking up the Republican presidential nomination. The first is widely acknowledged: He now has a real chance of beating Hillary Clinton. Sean Trende, the best of the big-picture political writers, puts the possibility Trump will win the presidency at 30…

Donald Trump is against the TPP trade pact because he did not negotiate it, but “incompetents" did. Hillary Clinton is against TPP, sort of, at least in its present form, because Bernie Sanders is. Time to take a look at where the national interest might lie, with the help of the 788-page…

Secret diplomacy has a special place in the annals of American history. Henry Kissinger’s furtive trip to China has been acclaimed as the quintessence of diplomacy. The Obama administration, steeped in its own brand of realism, is another devotee of secret talks, meeting with Iranian officials in…

MUCH HAS BEEN WRITTEN—and all the praise has been more than deserved—about the selfless emergency rescue workers who sought to save lives after the terrorist attacks at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on September11. Much less has been said—and almost none of it outside the financial…

Before the United States Air Force Academy's class of 2016 Thursday, Air Force Secretary Deborah Lee James gave an odd commencement address. Instead of dispensing advice or wisdom, James's speech was a fawning tribute to President Obama and his administration.

Despite strong opposition from federal and state elected officials of both parties, including a bill sponsored by Democratic National Committee chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is about to eliminate the only credit available to millions of low income…

After weeks of hesitation, House speaker Paul Ryan announced Thursday that he would be voting for Donald Trump, citing the businessman's ability to put the "issues that unite Republicans" into law.

The Media Research Center's NewsBusters website has carved out a beat identifying odd discrepancies in how much the press covers one topic relative to another. During primary election season, for instance, it reported routinely on Donald Trump's saturation of the nightly news, rendering his…

In New York's May 30 issue, Rebecca Traister's sprawling adoration of Hillary Clinton wades into the candidate's inner world, revealing that "she presents as … a nana," "sounds just like my mother," to know her is to love her ("she is so different one-on-one")—and a bit about what she's been…

In a little-watched case in the Midwest, the Obama administration's Medicare regulators were dealt an embarrassing blow this week by the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals.

A CNN report Wednesday identified accused Somali war criminal Yusuf Abdi Ali as a resident of the United States—and a security guard at Dulles International Airport, to boot. Ali was a commander under the brutal dictatorship of Mohamed Siad Barre instituted by military coup in 1969 but has been a…

President Obama's remarks on Wednesday in Elkhart, Indiana, appear to have been drafted long before the current political season began in earnest. Obama claimed, for example, that the Republican party is "beholden to China," the New York Times reported. That revelation comes as a surprise to those…

Recent polls have shown the Libertarian party ticket, composed of former Republican governors Gary Johnson and Bill Weld, earning as much as 10 percent of the vote when placed alongside the two most disliked major party nominees of the modern era.

The ascendancy of London's new mayor eerily resembles the election of a "moderate" totalitarian Islamist president of France in Michel Houellebecq's painfully sharp, controversially timed satire Submission. Meanwhile, the ever-growing slate of campus outrages reflects a subtler, no less insidious…

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Celebrating the start of National Ocean Month Wednesday, Secretary of State John Kerry spoke to students at Montgomery Blair High School in Silver Spring, Maryland. The group he addressed included the Chesapeake Bay Regional Champions of the Ocean Science Bowl, as well as the winners of the…

A government spokesman said Wednesday that the State Department purposefully removed part of a 2013 video about secret negotiations with Iran.

President Obama said Wednesday that people in "VFW halls all across America" and other places with access to cable news and talk radio have a warped view of the economy.

I don't know how important Jerry Brown's endorsement of Hillary Clinton will prove to be, but in the closing hours of the California Democratic primary campaign, and the closing days of the primary season itself, it cannot hurt. Brown is a four-term governor of California, three-time presidential…

Hillary Clinton avoided saying Tuesday whether the FBI had reached out to interview her as part of an investigation into her use of a private email server as secretary of state.

A plurality of voters say Donald Trump is the presidential candidate best equipped to take on ISIS, a new poll finds, with just two out of every five respondents trusting a former secretary of state with the task more than the real estate mogul.

At the Federalist, Rachel Lu grants that it's likely good politics, as I argued at National Review Online, for Donald Trump to oppose the Obama-led "criminal justice reform" efforts currently being debated in Congress. (Trump did in fact recently criticize such efforts.) She writes, however, that…

Wendy Warcholik and Scott Moody are a husband and wife research team who have spent the last couple years working on what they call the Family Prosperity Index. What they've done is create a database of indicators that demonstrate--in rigorous, econometric terms--what many conservatives have…

A joyless rite of passage, the SAT is a source of dread that most adults get to ignore until they're forced to confront it anew along with their high-school-age children. And as critics and reformers of the SAT have long pointed out, students would put down their pencils, close their booklets,…

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David French, the conservative writer, attorney, and war veteran, is reportedly weighing an independent bid for president. Back in 2014, French delivered a graduation address to a small group of home-schooled seniors, which he previewed at National Review Online. The address offers not only a…