CORRECTION: In a column dated Oct. 29, 2017, I incorrectly noted: “The vestry of Christ Church in Alexandria, however, is not capable of grappling with such complexities. Truly, pearls before swine. After all, it is so much easier just to obliterate painful history than to understand it and learn from it.”
This week's ISIS-inspired truck attack in lower Manhattan by Uzbek immigrant Sayfullo Saipov has prompted discussions on a number of fronts. There is blowback, the foreign-policy-chickens-come-home-to-roost indicated by an increasing number of radical Islamists emerging from the former Soviet republic of Uzbekistan, a Central Asian nation whose brutal dictatorship is financed and armed by our U.S. taxdollars.
Keep calm and carry on. Those words, though not appearing as extensively on posters in wartime Britain as often supposed, are good advice for Americans now appalled by the presidency of Donald Trump.
"Meet you at Peace Cross."
In northwest D.C. in the 1950s, that was an often-heard comment among high schoolers headed for Ocean City.
In an off-year long on election commentary but short on actual elections, the two main events on a Spartan political calendar are now upon us: New Jersey and Virginia will elect new governors next week, and the stakes are high, particularly for Democrats.
This year marks the hundredth anniversary of one of the worst mistakes ever made: the Communist revolution in Russia.
"Shout 'Allahu Akbar,' because this strikes fear in the hearts of the non-believers."
Well over a year after the FBI began investigating "collusion" between the Trump campaign and Vladimir Putin, Special Counsel Robert Mueller has brought in his first major indictment.
“All are welcome. No exceptions,” reads the cheap, blue sign zip-tied to the wrought iron fence between brick pillars outside Christ Church in Alexandria.
“All,” that is, except George Washington and Robert E. Lee. Or, anyone who reveres either of the two great generals. Or, even the memory of them.
President Trump is likely to name a new Federal Reserve chair over the next few days. Speculation is focused on current Fed governor Jay Powell and Stanford University economist John Taylor. The list may be larger; it could still include current Chair Janet Yellen or Kevin Warsh. Trump is soliciting opinions and advice from people inside and outside government. We will see soon enough.
"More is now required of us than to put down our thoughts in writing," declaimed Jeff Flake in his oration against President Trump, just before he announced he will be quitting the Senate.
Three weeks ago, I wrote a column about how both parties seem determined to lose the next elections. Since then, the pace has accelerated.
The clamor is more visible -- and more assiduously reported by mainstream media -- among the Republicans.
If President Trump actively campaigned against incumbents of his own party in primaries next year, it would be an unusual political occurrence. But it would not be without precedent. In fact, he wouldn’t even be the first ideologically flexible, wealthy New Yorker who occupied the Oval Office to do so.
We've fought in Afghanistan for 16 years now. Are we making progress?
If you wonder why Hollywood stayed so quiet so long about casting couch abuse behind closed doors, just look at how the entertainment industry enabled perverted sexual exploitation of women in front of the camera.
"The Kurds have no friends but the mountains," is an old lament. Last week, it must have been very much on Kurdish minds.
At last America is once again unified. We are, it turns out, all racists.
Because if retired Marine General and current White House Chief of Staff John Kelly, a Gold Star dad among so many other distinctions, is a racist, then every last one of us is.
I'm not a traditionalist. Progress is good. The fact that we've always done something a certain way is no argument for continuing to do it the same way.
Asked to name the defining attributes of the America we wish to become, many liberals would answer that we must realize our manifest destiny since 1776, by becoming more equal, more diverse and more democratic -- and the model for mankind's future.
Equality, diversity, democracy -- this is the holy trinity of the post-Christian secular state at whose altars Liberal Man worships.
Donald Trump is criticized, often justly, for misstatements of facts and failure to understand the details of public policy. But in two of his most recent controversial actions, he has taken stands upholding the rule of law and undoing the lawless behavior of his most recent predecessor.
