The "surge" has failed to produce an Afghan government that can stand by itself, and U.S. bureaucratic incoherence is to blame.

Expect no grand political realignment this November. Neither party has the right diagnosis for what ails America, and much less a cure.

Opponents of the "death tax" are really aiming at the idea of progressive taxation itself. Years of perfecting a deceptive pitch have brought them to the edge of victory.

Using the tax code to accomplish what the legislative process is supposed to do is bad for both.

My title, “Goodbye America!” is taken from a song in the super popular Russian flick Brother 2 (the 2000 sequel to the also popular post-Soviet crime film, Brother). The film’s protagonist, Danila, accompanies his brother to Chicago, where he tries to “do justice”, becoming involved in a series of encounters with different types of Americans, […]

The usual grumblings attend the day on which we commemorate the most famous illegal immigrant in the history of the Americas, an undocumented wanderer from Spain who brought plagues, fire and the sword from the Old World to the New.Columbus Day is our most confused holiday celebration, one in which the public understanding of the […]

GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney made his most significant public appearance since last week’s presidential debate. You can read the whole thing here. It was for the most part a frank and brave speech, but it defended some unpopular points of view even as it sharpened the contrast between the two men vying to lead […]

The border artillery battles between Syria and Turkey keep heating up, though Syria keeps making loud noises about wanting to end the violence. It’s not entirely clear whether this represents duplicity at the top or chaos on the ground; Syria’s central command may not be able to hold its local commanders on a tight leash.Turkey […]

The current political campaign has always looked like a close contest that may remain undecided until the closing days and even hours of the race, but it’s also interesting as a window into the state of American politics. Possibly because I’m so old myself that this is the fourteenth such campaign I remember (when I […]

I want to make one correction to an assertion I made in my last blog post.  In it, I said that delivery of services like education and health care is something that “states accomplish, and not the institutions that check them.”This is a big overstatement.  The checking institutions actually play a big role in improving […]