“We really do earnestly believe AI could kill all humans! I personally think it is >10% within the next decade.”—Evan Hubinger, Anthropic’s Alignment Science Lead, September 2026 Artificial Intelligence identifies patterns, evaluates information, predicts outcomes and selects actions. That is the basic function. The ethical problem begins when the system is given authority. Alignment is the attempt to ensure that...

BREAKING: News organizations responded forcefully on Monday after President Trump barred CNN, MS NOW and Politico from the White House. They went to federal court—and, in an extraordinary show of solidarity, ABC, CBS, Fox News and NBC agreed to suspend video coverage of the president until further notice. “I want it clearly understood that from now on, ever, no reporter...

Tonight, protesters are surrounding the Kennedy Center, the living memorial to John F. Kennedy and the heartbeat of Washington’s cultural life. They are there because Donald Trump has raised the possibility of demolishing it amid a legal battle over his effort to put his own name on the building. A federal judge has ruled that only Congress can change the...

In 1998, at the height of the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal, Secret Service Director Lewis Merletti was driving to work when a radio report stopped him cold. President Bill Clinton had been accused of having a sexual relationship with White House intern Monica Lewinsky. When Merletti arrived at his office, his deputy informed him that Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr wanted to question...

One of my favorite movies is Mister Roberts, the 1955 comedy-drama set aboard the USS Reluctant in the Pacific during World War II. Henry Fonda plays Lieutenant Doug Roberts, the ship’s executive officer, serving under James Cagney’s Captain Morton, a petty authoritarian who makes life miserable for his crew. When Morton denies the exhausted sailors shore leave, Roberts intervenes. He...

“Politics had infiltrated every corner of government—a strong-arm takeover of the agencies by the Nixon White House.” —Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, All the President’s Men I recently reread All the President’s Men and was taken back to a time I believed America would never experience again. NEVER. More than half a century after Watergate, the country is AGAIN confronting...

“Cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government.”—George Washington’s Farewell Address, 1796 “Our machines and ballot counting systems are exposed to hacking and manipulation and corruption…. Hundreds of thousands of non-citizens and dead people are listed and active on the voter rolls.”—Donald Trump, Election...

I’ve written about Georgia Senator Jon Ossoff before, but after watching his questioning of Jay Clayton, President Trump’s nominee for director of national intelligence (DNI), I think he deserves another look—particularly in comparison with Atticus Finch, the central character in Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird. The comparison is not exact, nor should it be. Atticus is a fictional Alabama...

There’s a moment in Cool Hand Luke when Luke, played by Paul Newman, is returned to a prison camp after escaping. Determined to break his will, the guards order him to dig a hole. After the hole is dug, another guard instructs him to fill it in. Dig. Fill. Dig. Fill. The exercise is not about punishment. It’s about submission....

Conclusion: The Words That Made Us and Still Must.  In December of 1776, the Revolution was not moving toward triumph. It was close to collapse. Washington’s army was exhausted. Enlistments were running out. Men who had already given much were being asked to give more. Then Thomas Paine’s words were read aloud… …  “These are the times that try men’s...