If you listen to pollsters and politicians, or consume heavy doses of social media and cable-TV news, you might come away thinking the nation is in a collective bad mood. We’re said to be irritable, even hostile. I’ve just come off a 18-day road trip that took me from New Hampshire to Florida, spending time […]

New Hampshire’s long reign as the nation’s premier presidential primary may be coming to an end. For the first time since 1968, an incumbent Democratic president seeking reelection will not be on the ballot. Lyndon Johnson performed poorly in that fateful year. Though his “uncommitted” slate finished first on March 12, the 42% garnered by […]

Thought the level of civil discourse in Congress could not get any worse? Guess what, it has! It now appears America’s top legislative body has become the political equivalent of the WWE. Earlier this week, Oklahoma Republican Sen. Markwayne Mullin nearly got into a fistfight with labor union leader Sean O’Brien in the middle of […]

9/11 is embedded in American memory — like Dec. 7, a Day of Infamy. But what has disappeared from public consciousness, despite its having been momentous in its own right, is 9/12. That was the day when, in all our unaccustomed vulnerability, we were suddenly the object of the world’s empathy. Messages of condolence streamed […]

THE CONVERSATION — There were smiles for the camera, handshakes, warm words and the unveiling of a couple of agreements. But beyond the optics of the first meeting in over a year between the leaders of the world’s two biggest economies, not an awful lot had changed: There was nothing to suggest a “reset” in U.S. and China […]

Donald Trump and Xi Jinping have the same political goals. For Trump, it’s embodied in his slogan, “Make America Great Again.” Xi’s motto might be, “Make Communism Great Again.” Both want to return to their version of the good old days. Before the Great Depression that began in 1929, the federal government played a limited […]

It’s curious, isn’t it, how a small, unexpected event can trigger off old memories. A couple of mine were triggered when I was standing in a busy mall one day. I saw a very young boy look across the crowded floor and begin to walk toward me. He had dark curly hair, chocolate pool eyes […]

News coverage since Hamas’s terrorist targeting of Israeli civilians has steadily shifted to the horrifying retaliation from Israel. The daily media cycle begins with rising Palestinian body counts, especially of children, the annihilation of all infrastructure and the increasing humanitarian crisis. Then it’s the hostage situation and Israeli self-defense via the war crime of all […]