Peter Morici: New Year’s resolutions for Washington policymakers
President Trump is the most activist president since Franklin D.
Roosevelt. No institution is safe from his scrutiny, but entering his final three years, we should consider the global challenges that confront the nation, no matter who controls Washington. Regardless of its origins, climate change is here. Whether Americans employ...
Roman Martinez: The Postal Service can’t deliver without financial reforms
The United States Postal Service has reached a pivotal moment. Challenged by technological disruptions and constrained by outdated regulations, it is in the midst of a major restructuring plan to modernize operations, achieve service excellence and survive financially. But to enable its transformation, the Postal Service urgently needs legislative and...
Craig Haney: Prison methods are as bad as you’ve heard, and spilling onto the streets
I was one of the researchers in the well-known Stanford prison experiment in 1971, demonstrating the destructive dynamics that are generated when one group of people — randomly assigned as “guards” — is given near-total power over a group of “prisoners.” In six short days, inside a simulated prison environment,...
Daniel DePetris: The foreign policy moves Donald Trump got right in 2025
For President Donald Trump’s supporters, 2025 has been a year of transformation. For his opponents, it’s been nothing short of a long nightmare. The holiday season is a perfect time to look back, reflect and remember the consequential moments of the past year. As human beings, we generally fixate on...
Kevin Frazier: Beware of panic policies
“As far as human nature is concerned, with panic comes irrationality.” This simple statement by Steve Calandrillo, law professor at the University of Washington, and Nolan Anderson, a research specialist at the Eastern Illinois University, has profound implications for public policy. When panic is highest, and demand for reactive policy...
Counterpoint: Meet the AI agents of 2026 — ambitious, overhyped and still in training
If 2025 was the year artificial intelligence became unavoidable, 2026 will be the year everyone starts talking seriously about AI agents. An AI agent is a software system designed to plan and execute tasks autonomously, make decisions and interact with digital tools or environments with minimal human oversight in pursuit...
Point: Get ready, 2026 is going to be great
Americans should treasure their time with family and friends during the too-busy and too-short holiday season and be excited for what’s in store for next year. Although my predictions for 2026 come with an asterisk because it is impossible to forecast the future accurately, and black swan events can throw...
Maureen Flatley and Taylor Barkley: AI can help fix what’s broken in foster care
President Donald Trump’s executive order directing states to deploy artificial intelligence in foster care isn’t just welcome — it’s overdue. The provision calling for “predictive analytics and tools powered by artificial intelligence, to increase caregiver recruitment and retention rates, improve caregiver and child matching, and deploy Federal child-welfare funding to...
Cal Thomas: Wrong predictions? Never mind.
End of the year predictions about the future have been around at least since the days of Nostradamus, but what about past predictions? There were plenty of predictions that electing Donald Trump the first time, and then reelecting him, would cause economic Armageddon. Democrats and their media mouthpieces have consistently...
F.D. Flam: Experimenting on dogs is getting harder to defend
Medical experiments on research dogs could be phased out soon — a change that’s based as much on science as ethics. Pressure is coming from within the scientific community as well as from activists, following a string of scandals involving inhumane living conditions. It follows a similar phase-out in the...
Allison Schrager: The economy needs a little bit of unfairness
There are a lot of reasons, some deserved and some not, for Americans’ distrust of their institutions. Lately I have been thinking about one of the more counterintuitive ones: Our schools, governments and even employers are trying too hard to make things fair. In so doing, they are not only...
Lynn Schmidt: When medical misinformation costs lives — balancing free speech and public health
In my corner of the world, it feels like 2020 all over again, experiencing the push and pull between losing someone I love due to medical misinformation, all while holding respect for free speech. The tension between combating medical misinformation and protecting free speech represents one of the most challenging...
Kathleen Enright: As Americans look for unity, the charitable sector provides a model
As the United States confronts the limits of its own divisions, it can feel as though blame has replaced problem-solving in nearly every area of public life. That perception has led to public trust in just about every major institution — from government to media, religious institutions and nonprofits —...
Martin Schram: Teaching the world’s lost leaders
Just about a week ago, we saw how fast a viral video could virally whip around the world. It was taken during Australia’s Hanukkah-by-the-Sea family-fest that turned into a mass shooting tragedy. Yet it ended with that astonishing, made-for Hollywood heroic twist. It was quickly seen by just about all...
Counterpoint: Ban kids from social media? Yes, absolutely.
Should the United States follow Australia’s lead in banning children under 16 from social media platforms? Absolutely! Australia has set a new global standard by requiring platforms to act in children’s best interests. Its new law raises the minimum age to 16, requires age verification, and holds platforms financially accountable...
Point: Throwing parental rights on the barbie won’t fly in the United States
The world’s first social media ban of users under age 16 is in effect in Australia. Whatever parents’ genuine concerns and understandable frustrations around their kids’ safety online, the Aussie approach is not the answer and should not be emulated by U.S. lawmakers. The Australian ban covers Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat,...
Cal Thomas: Why stop at the Kennedy Center?
Earlier this month I attended the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts with my wife and two friends to listen to a wonderful performance of Handel’s “Messiah.” The Kennedy Center has been among the few places in Washington (sports arenas are another) where one can get through a...
Sharon Sedlar: When students fear for their lives, families deserve genuine choices
Sending kids to school shouldn’t be an act of courage — but for many families, it is. Just one mile from my home, at Carrick High School in Pittsburgh, there was a stabbing. During this horrifically violent episode, kids texted with their parents to let them know they were ok....
Robin Abcarian: Australia just banned kids from social media. Shouldn’t we all?
Earlier this month, Australia became the first country in the world to enact a social media ban for kids under 16. As the children of Oz wept and gnashed their teeth (I presume), Prime Minister Anthony Albanese urged them to “start a new sport, learn a new instrument or read...
Todd L. Pittinsky: The Ivies can weather the Trump administration’s research cuts — it’s the nation’s public universities that have the most to lose
Most of the media coverage of the federal government’s recent cuts in federal research money for universities has focused on its effects on a handful of elite Ivy League universities, such as Harvard, Columbia and Cornell. “When you take money away from a Columbia or a Harvard or other institutions,...
Joe Palaggi: The season to remember we’re still one nation
Every year around this time, the noise starts to drop. The pace eases a bit. Families gather, neighbors reconnect and people who disagree on just about everything still manage to pass plates across the same table. Something about late November into December nudges us toward reflection. Whatever you call it...
‘This year nearly broke me as a scientist’ — researchers reflect on how 2025’s science cuts have changed their lives
From beginning to end, 2025 was a year of devastation for scientists in the United States. January saw the abrupt suspension of key operations across the National Institutes of Health, not only disrupting clinical trials and other in-progress studies but stalling grant reviews and other activities necessary to conduct research....
Matt K. Lewis: Who can afford Trump’s economy? Americans are feeling Grinchy.
The holidays have arrived once again. You know, that annual festival of goodwill, compulsory spending and the dawning realization that Santa and Satan are anagrams. Even in the best of years, Americans stagger through this season feeling financially woozy. This year, however, the picture is bleaker. And a growing number...
Eva M. Meyersson Milgrom: You need more friends who aren’t like you
On a recent French language immersion course in Nice, I got to know one of my classmates, an academic from Russia. On the final day of class, I gathered the courage to bring up the war between Russia and Ukraine. This conflict is deeply personal for me. Though I am...
Brittany Shoup: Aging out at 5 — Pa. cutting off kids too soon
When Maya entered our preschool program at age 3, she struggled not only with academics — identifying colors, shapes and letters in her name — but with behavior. Transitions overwhelmed her. She often bolted from group activities, had difficulty regulating big emotions and sometimes resorted to hitting or throwing things...
