When much of the nation went gaga recently over a $315 million Powerball jackpot, I remembered some wise words of George Washington.He called gambling “the child of avarice, the brother of iniquity and the father of mischief.” Had he lived long enough, he might have added, “the seducer of government.”Gambling doesn’t create character. Rather, it […]

In a matter of minutes today, the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments from Maine, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America and the Bush administration on the constitutionality of Maine Rx.It’s a very complicated process and justices usually take months to review arguments presented in dozens of briefs before issuing a ruling.The process may […]

Forgive me, but I’m about to speak heresy.Blame the outgoing governor of Illinois, who recently emptied his state’s death row. George Ryan commuted to life in prison the death sentences of 167 condemned criminals.The result: a firestorm of criticism, much of it from those who have lost loved ones to violent crime. Our instinct is […]

Pope John Paul II frequently and rightly denounces the “culture of death,” the soil that nourishes the odious crime of abortion.The Holy Father is correct, but here in the United States, some unlikely husbands of the culture fertilize the fetid soil: Catholics whose church condemns abortion and the very culture that sustains it.If it weren’t […]

Ninety-five percent of the Alaskan coast is open for oil exploration. To any reasonable person that would sound like plenty. But not to an oilman.President Bush, ignoring the mandate by Congress last year to spare the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge from oil rigs, won’t give up. He is making noise about inserting a drilling plan […]

How ready is America for the grown-up debate we need on health costs? Not very!Consider GE, where workers went on strike this week because the company dared to raise employee contributions to the health plan by anywhere from 50 cents to a dollar a day. This $200 to $400 annual increase came after GE’s overall […]

Creating a city of welcomeWhen Martin Luther King Jr. stood on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial one summer day in 1963 he was sad that, even though the Emancipation Proclamation “came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of captivity,” a century later African Americans were still not free.King delivered his “I […]

BIRMINGHAM, England – Virtually everyone assumes that Saddam Hussein is so brutal that replacing him will give Iraqis a better leader. Perhaps it is time to think again.As the current argument goes, American forces – aside from fulfilling the many and tangled aims of U.S. policy in Iraq – will not be invading Iraq, but […]

War is hell on civil liberties.And if you don’t believe that, the proof is as near your history book. Or, increasingly, your newspaper.In the history book, you’ll learn how Abraham Lincoln suspended habeus corpus and defied the Supreme Court while prosecuting the Civil War. And how, during World War II, Franklin Roosevelt sent 110,000 Americans […]

In its long-standing tradition of bucking every measure designed to protect our environment, the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers has filed a lawsuit against Maine to derail a new law regulating mercury switches in car lights and ABS brakes.The law, passed last year, prohibits automakers from selling cars manufactured after Jan. 1, 2003 if they contain […]