ArcaMax

Never mind how Donald Trump's threatened trade war ultimately pans out. Though a 25% border tax would hurt the economies of Canada and Mexico more, Americans would also feel the ill-effects. But America is already suffering. Start with the shame of menacing and sliming our good neighbors with lies.

Even if it's part of a twisted game of ...Read more

A bill that would have required the president to sanction the International Criminal Court has failed in the Senate. It may return, or President Donald Trump may unilaterally impose sanctions on the ICC, as he did in his first administration. Either result would raise serious constitutional concerns and deal a grave blow to human rights ...Read more

It's enough to make you -- and certainly me -- sick. In the midst of a national tragedy, he can't help himself. At a time when almost nothing is known for certain about the cause of the terrifying plane crash in Washington, he can't stop himself from playing the blame game. There is absolutely no evidence that it had anything to do with the ...Read more

The last time Americans faced the possible spread of Ebola to U.S. territory, in 2014, Donald Trump irresponsibly stoked public fears and barked at Barack Obama while doing nothing useful to protect us. Now the same deadly virus has showed up in the crowded capital of Uganda -- where a nurse has died -- and is threatening to spread further, ...Read more

When a marriage is in crisis, a point often occurs when constant bickering, arguing and fighting yields to detachment and hopelessness. The yelling stops. It's quiet.

But it's not peace. Exhausted, dispirited and contemptuous, one or both partners give up trying to convince the other that they're wrong or ought to change. They accept that ...Read more

When Bob Hill was writing newspaper columns, it was a different era. But after our conversation, I realized some things are still very much the same. Bob is 82 years old. He's published a new memoir called "Out Here: Essays And Encounters From The Heart, Soul, And Left Field." It is a treasure trove of anecdotes about his time as a newspaperman ...Read more

If, like most people in the United States, you wanted something done about immigration, you got your wish this last week.

It may not be what you wanted. You might think it's stupid or cruel or racist or fascist. But something is by God being done, and it's being done by President Donald Trump.

Will it make things better? No one knows, but it...Read more

Donald Trump is executing a shock and awe strategy, burying the public in a smoky cloud of flamboyant proposals. Some, like ending birthright citizenship, are quickly slapped down in the courts. Some, like threatening to invade Greenland, are dismissed as moronic. But all are radical enough to provide news media with easy entertainment.

The ...Read more

I am writing this in La Paz, Mexico, a beautiful oceanfront city that is the capital of Baja California Sur and the home of a UNESCO wildlife preserve where today my daughter went diving with the sea lions. Breathtaking. All week, we have been taken care of by the good people of this beautiful country. I'm supposed to be relaxing, but ...Read more

The president has declared war on the nation, the nation as we have known it. -- Anonymous

If you ever go to Canterbury Cathedral in England, drops of blood from ages ago are still there on the altar floor. Legend has it that the Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Becket, was brutally murdered by four knights serving King Henry II, whom Becket ...Read more

In the 1787 Constitutional Convention, the framers were clear on what they were NOT creating: a monarchy. One delegate expressed the group's absolute conviction that the founding document must exclude even the "fetus of monarchy."

Yet, 238 years later, watching Donald Trump's inaugural week, it was both awful and comical to see the royal ...Read more

It's an excellent time for bullies and bros in Donald Trump's Washington, where the president wasted no time confirming that if he has his way -- namely, whatever he wants -- it's going to be all thuggery all the time.

There's a fresh flood of new examples each day. They're intended to overwhelm us, and it's working. Here's one: Trump gleefully...Read more

Not a month old, the second Trump presidency is barreling toward the decline that big-mouth leaders have been sending their countries for centuries. Theodore Roosevelt warned of such dangers.

Speaking at the 1901 Minnesota State Fair, he famously shared the African proverb, "Speak softly and carry a big stick."

Roosevelt elaborated: "If a ...Read more

The Trump administration's three executive orders targeting diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility (DEIA) initiatives take a "shock and awe" approach that upends longstanding bipartisan federal policy meant to open doors that had been unfairly closed. In his first few days, President Donald Trump is undertaking a deliberate effort to ...Read more

The Justice Department has ordered its civil rights division to halt any ongoing litigation from the Biden administration and not pursue any new cases or settlements, according to a memo sent to the temporary head of the division that was obtained by The Washington Post. It's a freeze on everything, which is a prelude to an about-face when/if ...Read more