The idyllic holiday scene — piles of presents, smiles all around — rarely matches reality. Who among us hasn’t faced the awkward silence of a gift that falls flat? Who hasn’t been disappointed by one we’ve received?

Why then, do we get it wrong so often? Why are we so bad at giving gifts? I’ve researched these questions through the ...Read more

President-elect Donald Trump’s latest promise is to eliminate Daylight Saving Time, which would mean putting the U.S. on Standard Time year-round.

Billionaire DOGE bosses Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, meanwhile, seem to want to make Daylight Saving Time permanent. Is this just a miscommunication? Or is the incoming administration as divided...Read more

The first thing I do each morning is check my watch — not for the time but for my sleep score.

As a runner, when the glowing red letters say my score — and my training readiness — are poor, I feel an instant dread. Regardless, I scroll on, inspecting my heart rate variability and stress level — snapshots that influence the tone I carry ...Read more

Reeling from a divisive and turbulent election season, many of us seek spaces of solace, light, unity and worship as we turn toward the winter holidays.

The cosmos and its reflection within us harbor such spaces.

By viewing and embracing scientific insights through the lens of humanity, you form a connection with your place in the universe. ...Read more

Taking off from Mérida’s airport, in Mexico’s southeastern Yucatán state, offers some breathtaking views: the emerald waters of the Gulf of Mexico, the unusual geography shaped by an asteroid millions of years ago. But you might also note something else: gaps in the forest cover gashed out by massive real estate projects — private ...Read more

Most Americans who marry say “I do” between 25 and 30 — ages when serious illness is probably not the first thing on their minds. But in a way, tying the knot is a major health decision. For men, just being married is a predictor of living longer. For women, the picture is more complex.

Among men with prostate cancer, married men survive ...Read more

Did you miss it? On Tuesday, the electoral college made official what we've known for six weeks: Donald Trump defeated Kamala Harris for the presidency.

Americans could be excused for being unaware that electors met in all 50 state capitals and the District of Columbia to cast votes. In nearly every presidential election year, the ...Read more

Now that pollsters are declaring President Joe Biden a “failure,” historians will reckon with too many economic signals rendering the prevailing narrative little more than media noise.

From the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 that ushered in the longest period of unemployment below 4% since the 1960s to the Infrastructure Investment and ...Read more

Russian President Vladimir Putin has sought to project an image of economic strength while prosecuting the war in Ukraine, as if he could easily outlast the West’s efforts to counter his aggression. If President-elect Donald Trump and other Western leaders want to negotiate a prudent peace deal, they shouldn’t buy it.

More than most ...Read more

Sacramento-area congressman Kevin Kiley took to the floor of the House of Representatives recently to declare the following:

“Mr. Speaker, I am very happy to report that the newly formed Department of Government Efficiency has honed in on perhaps the single-greatest example of government waste in United States history,” the Republican from ...Read more

It seems everyone has a theory on the nocturnal drone sightings that have alarmed residents in the Northeast. They’re from our government, they’re from a foreign country, they’re planes, they’re just normal drones, they’re extraordinary craft that elude regular detection.

One thing we are sure of: The Biden Administration has dropped ...Read more

Even a terribly wrong-headed decision by the U.S. Supreme Court on a president’s post-White House criminal immunity can’t undo Donald Trump’s 34 felony convictions correctly ruled Acting Manhattan state Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan.

You remember Merchan, who oversaw Trump’s Stormy Daniels hush money trial downtown in the spring ...Read more

Last month, the Supreme Court heard arguments on whether banning essential health care for trans youth is constitutional. What the justices (and lawmakers in many states) probably don’t realize is that they’re putting teenage lives at risk when they increase anti-trans measures. A recent report linked anti-transgender laws to increased teen ...Read more

In February 1992, chicken magnate Frank Perdue received a pie in the face from a protester in a chicken costume during a meeting of the University of Maryland Board of Regents in Baltimore.

Perdue was founder, president and CEO of one of the nation’s largest poultry processors. More than that, he was the face of the poultry industry because ...Read more

It’s wrong for the incoming president to start suing newspapers and it’s a transparent effort to bully the press, but there Donald Trump stood Monday, proclaiming that “we have to straighten out the press. Our press is very corrupt. Almost as corrupt as our elections.”

Neither the press nor elections are crooked, but Trump is now suing...Read more

As Haiti endures a devastating crisis marked by escalating violence and lawlessness, urgent international intervention is required to address the growing chaos. With President Joe Biden preparing to leave office and Donald Trump poised to take power, the need for decisive action is clear.

Haitians are enduring unprecedented levels of brutality....Read more

Polio came for 5-year-old Lynn Lane when she was visiting her grandmother in rural Indiana. Suddenly, her arms and legs became weak, and by the time she got to a hospital in Indianapolis, she was totally paralyzed and in respiratory failure. Lane spent the next several months in an iron lung.

"I don't really remember too much about that," Lane,...Read more

The Dec. 16 shooting at Abundant Life Christian School in Madison, Wisconsin, has shocked the nation, not only for its horror but for its unique profile. This time, a teenage girl opened fire inside her school, killing a teacher, another student, and apparently herself, and injuring six others. Although female school shooters are exceedingly ...Read more

Much of the discussion around the issue of using taxpayer dollars to help families send their children to private schools has centered on coming up with a compromise, because it’s inevitable this is the year — finally — that Idaho legislators approve some form of taxpayer-funded private education.

It’s a tempting position to take: “...Read more

The commutation of the prison sentence of former Luzerne County judge Michael Conahan by President Joe Biden is a disgraceful act that dishonors the children and families victimized by the judge and his accomplice, Mark Ciavarella, during the notorious "kids for cash" scandal two decades ago.

It is a particularly bitter irony that the scandal ...Read more