ArcaMax

In 1990, George H.W. Bush, listening to then-White House Chief of Staff John H. Sununu, nominated David Souter to the U.S. Supreme Court. Sununu, who as governor of New Hampshire had nominated Souter to the Granite State's supreme court in 1983, assured Bush that Souter would be a "home run" for the conservative cause.

That's not what ...Read more

During the national debates of 1788, the great Virginian James Madison worried that mere "parchment barriers," or constitutions, wouldn't be enough to stop an "overbearing majority" from seeking power and stripping minorities of their voice and rights.

What he envisioned, in other words, was someone like Abigail Spanberger.

The governor ...Read more

The Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, has fired Secretary of the Navy John Phelan. This comes after Hegseth fired Army Chief of Staff General Randy George. Hegseth keeps firing senior leaders, often arguing the fired were "woke," but the common thread seems to be that they had good relationships with the president and were competent.

When I...Read more

Back in 2020, National "Public" Radio promoted a nasty little book called "In Defense of Looting." NPR summarized the "Marxist-informed" author Vicky Osterweil in the wake of the "racial justice" rioting in cities: "She argues that looting is a powerful tool to bring about real, lasting change in society."

It's interesting to imagine how they...Read more

Hypocrisy was triumphant, as it usually is in arguments over redistricting, in Virginia this week, as voters approved a "fairness" constitutional amendment allowing the Democratic-majority legislature to enact a congressional districting plan that is expected to increase Democrats' edge in its congressional delegation from 6-5 to 10-1. This is a...Read more

In a famous Supreme Court one-liner, reminding the legal community of the finality of the court's rulings, the late Justice William J. Brennan Jr. is reputed to have said that the Constitution means whatever any five of us say it means. This reflects the basic math that five is a majority of nine. It also reflects the theory of realism in ...Read more

The United States Supreme Court has entered its most consequential season.

From April through June, the justices release rulings that do more than interpret the law -- they shape the direction of the country. Cases argued in the quiet months of winter now emerge into public view, often carrying the full weight of the nation's deepest ...Read more

America has a spending problem. It also has a health care problem. These are not two separate crises but rather the same crisis wearing different clothes. The Cato Institute's new "Handbook on Affordability" is a great resource to understand the root problem and how to fix it.

Start with a recap of the fiscal picture. The federal government ...Read more

There simply is no other explanation for it. Not ignorance, not well-intentioned stupidity, not misguided but honest mistakes.

No one could inflict the kinds of cruelty that our politicians do unless they despised their constituents.

The horrible effects of destructive public policies are everywhere: in all our larger cities, in state ...Read more

There's a growing impulse in American politics to blame the free market -- and the technologies it produces -- for every bout of economic indigestion, as if a shadowy cabal of innovators is deliberately dismantling the middle-class way of life.

That impulse is no longer abstract. It has become physical.

People are now attacking data centers....Read more

Many speeches will be delivered this year about the Declaration of Independence as we celebrate its 250th birthday.

However, I think the greatest was just delivered by Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas on April 15 at the Civitas Institute at the University of Texas, Austin.

The force of Thomas' words does not just result from his deep ...Read more

The April 21 seizure of the oil tanker M/T Tifani in the Bay of Bengal signals the obvious. The U.S. has the military and economic power -- and a president with the political will -- to globalize its remarkable war to denuclearize ayatollah Iran.

Media reported Navy SEALs boarded the Indian tanker, which was carrying a 1.8-million-barrel ...Read more

Prices rise. People blame capitalism.

Politicians promise "solutions."

President Donald Trump wants to cap credit card interest rates.

My socialist mayor wants to freeze rents.

Elizabeth Warren wants politicians to decide what prices are "excessive."

So I was surprised to see economist Donald J. Boudreaux's new book titled "The Triumph of ...Read more

Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, who has served as the Senate's Democratic Whip for more than 20 years, went down to the Senate floor on Jan. 21, 2025, to speak about a bill aimed at protecting the lives of certain newborn babies.

He was against it.

The Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, as described in its official summary, would ...Read more

On Monday, CNN host Jake Tapper became the latest dancer in a conga line of Stephen Colbert cheek-smoochers as his CBS late-night "comedy" show winds down. Liberals get together on television sets to pose as today's equivalent of the Founding Fathers.

In this case, Tapper displayed a pocket square with the First Amendment language that "...Read more

PITTSBURGH -- Despite having moved away for nearly 20 years, when you've called Pittsburgh home for any length of time, two things often happen: You want to come back to raise your children, and you want to be part of something, big or small, that makes it better.

Bill Demchak wanted to do both, and as CEO of PNC Financial Services, he had ...Read more

You aren't going to believe the latest lawsuit fad in America: suing companies as monopolistic for cutting prices to consumers. In legal mumbo jumbo, this is called "predatory pricing" -- keeping prices lower than charged by competitors. The idea is to keep prices so low that rival firms can't compete. Quick, throw Walmart, Home ...Read more