The Supreme Court recently announced a landmark decision making it unlawful to take race into consideration in college admissions. Generally speaking, the ruling was cheered by conservatives and bemoaned by progressives. In my view, the decision generated more questions than answers. First of all, most colleges could not really be considered “selective.” Of the roughly […]

People are getting so used to increasing crime rates in cities across America, an etiquette is evolving between some muggers and their victims. I learned about this while I walked with my friend and his wife from a Washington D.C. pub to their home six blocks from the Hill. “When you get mugged, there are […]

“Have you seen everything you want to see?” “Yeah. You?” “Me too. Let’s go back home.” That’s a paraphrased version of my parents’ conversation midway through their honeymoon in 1958. Unimpressed by the hype of an out-of-state adventure, they chose to hightail it back to the real world. (The real worlds of 1958 and 2023 […]

While the field of participants in the first Republican presidential debate on Aug. 23 in Milwaukee is essentially settled, the run up to the event is overshadowed by who might ditch it altogether and turn it into a meaningless gathering. It is yet another instance of the long shadow cast by former president Donald Trump […]

For those of you who haven’t been paying attention, Pennsylvania’s three-week-old budget impasse is the ultimate, binge-worthy summer drama. There are great storylines, with real-world implications with fascinating characters in leading roles. And, like any addictive warm-weather series, the chances are pretty good that politics-watchers in the Keystone State will be obsessively tuned into something […]

Lessons from Gettysburg. With apologies to the history buffs out there, this is not what you think. I spent four days on that hallowed ground last week, attending a conference. It was a Braver Angels conference, and if you haven’t heard of that organization, they are a grassroots nonprofit dedicated to depolarizing the country. How […]