The American Civil Liberties Union is turning America’s own justice system against us — and keeping Khalid Sheikh Mohammed from paying the price for 9/11.
Seven decades on from his death, George Orwell is alive and well in publishing. Last year alone saw a slew of new releases about the man and his fictive worlds. There was Orwell: The New Life, a second and now definitive biography by Orwell authority D.J. Taylor. Masha Karp’s George Orwell and Russia explored the […]
It goes without saying that Abraham Lincoln was one of America’s greatest presidents. The strengths he brought to the job included intelligence, inspired leadership, unmatched rhetorical power, and a steady hand in dire times. No political leader is perfect, of course. Lincoln made mistakes during his astonishing journey from a small log cabin near Hodgenville, […]
The Jazz Age may have ended in 1929, according to F. Scott Fitzgerald, who called it an age of miracles, an age of art, an age of excess — one that once people lost confidence, “it didn’t take long for the flimsy structure to settle earthward.” However, according to social historian Michael Wolraich, there was […]
“She made vows to me,” intones Roy Tillman, Jon Hamm’s brutal, chilling North Dakota sheriff in the fifth and most recent season of Fargo, Noah Hawley’s FX television show modeled on the 1996 film by Ethan and Joel Coen. “A pledge, in sickness and in health. Consider it a debt unpaid, leaving me in limbo. […]
“I saw a Rohmer film once,” said Gene Hackman in Arthur Penn’s classic mid-’70s neo-noir Night Moves. “It was kind of like watching paint dry.” Funny as it is, this line is the cheapest of cheap shots — in part because Penn’s movie, starring the moody, recalcitrant Hackman as Detective Harry Moseby, is itself so […]
I was still at work in my office when the texts started coming in. “Are you watching this?” they all asked. “Get on Twitter immediately!” some suggested. The “this” that the messages referred to was the disastrous press conference held last Thursday night by President (as of this writing) Joe Biden, where he seemed confused […]
Argentinian President Javier Milei has done something truly astounding — something American politicians have universally failed to do. He delivered on a campaign promise to cut deficits and created a surplus in Argentina for the first time in 12 years. It only took him a few weeks from his inauguration to pull that feat off. […]
A lot of uncertainty remains over the shooting incident on Feb. 14 at the parade for the Super Bowl Champions Kansas City Chiefs. First, it was reported that two teenage suspects were responsible. Then, earlier this week, two adult suspects were charged and arrested. Local authorities still will not reveal exactly how many shooters they […]
Voters in New York City and other Democratic-run areas may be content with their pro-criminal district attorneys, but that doesn’t mean residents in other cities and counties should be. Maricopa County prosecutor Rachel Mitchell has declined to extradite Raad (or Saad) Almansoori from Arizona to New York City. “Having observed the treatment of violent criminals in […]
Married people are happier. The data show this again and again. The retreat from marriage is the biggest factor in the recent declines in happiness. Marital status is one of the most powerful predictors of well-being — more powerful than income. Some conclude that marriage makes people happier. Others conclude that happier people have an […]
It’s confirmed. Ann Coulter does have special powers. That’s the latest development after the conservative firebrand appeared on a discussion panel on HBO’s Real Time with Bill Maher last week and declared that because the media were omitting the races of the suspects, she knew they were not white men. Coulter’s response came after Maher […]
Robert Hilliard’s first historical novel, In Freedom’s Shadow, is one of those gripping, fast-paced stories that quite literally leaves you breathless in the opening sentence and holds you on for the duration until the very end. Hilliard, a western Pennsylvania native, wrote his first book, A Season on the Allegheny, 12 years ago to national […]
