“If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we could then better judge what to do, and how to do it . . . ‘A house divided against itself cannot stand.’ I believe this government cannot endure, permanently half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved—I do not expect...

In September 2009, I posted a commentary with that title with the following opening . . . “During an awards ceremony, a Rap star takes the stage away from one winner and shouts that another should have won. “A political pundit calls the President a racist. “In the middle of the President’s address to a joint session of Congress, a...

In a Q&A session last month after a performance of the Broadway show Company, a woman in the audience was asked to put her mask back on. When she refused, singer Patti LuPone unloaded on her. “If you’re not going to follow the rules, Get The F*** Out of Here!” “I pay your salary!” the woman yelled back before she...

Tonight, at 8:00 p.m. Eastern time, the House select committee investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol will present its case to the public. Over the next few days, the presentation will lay out a timeline of events before and after the attack took place using testimony by many with direct knowledge of events. A New York Times story...

Thirteen mass shootings since last Friday, and while victims’ families grieve, we all continue to hear and read the same words and see the lack of meaningful actions from lawmakers: “thoughts and prayers”; moral outrage commentaries (this being one of them); bipartisan talks; and proposed water-downed bipartisan bills. According to a CBS/YouGov national poll: 81 percent of Americans favor background...

America is paralyzed by mistrust and extremism. The Southern Poverty Law Center’s “Intelligence Project” has identified 488 anti-government groups around the country that flourish exploiting lies and false conspiracies. “In 2021,” the project reports, “the conspiratorial and permanently dubious view of government was pervasive, as evidence by the movement’s popularity on such issues as COVID-19 regulations, local school curriculum, the...

In honor of Memorial Day, last Friday I began by describing the longest battle American forces faced in the the Hürtgen Forest during World War II. I wrote how my father, Private James Lichtman, survived an 88mm German canon attack, and a minefield as he crawled to an aid station to receive medical attention for his frozen feet. This is...

After learning of yet another mass shooting in a fourth-grade Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, Golden State Warriors’ Coach Steve Kerr brushed off questions about the upcoming playoff against the Dallas Mavericks to offer a passionate and compelling voice about gun violence in America. “When are we going to do something,” Kerr shouted at his pre-game press conference. “I’m tired....

The lead story in Sunday’s New York Times sums up how far Donald Trump has usurped many Republican state legislatures, political leadership in Congress and how far the Republican party has fallen off the radar of credibility and responsibility to the country. “At least 357 sitting Republican legislators in closely contested battleground states have used the power of their office...

“Now is the winter of our discontent made glorious summer by this sun of York.” —Richard III, Act I, sc. 1 In March 1954, Democratic presidential candidate Adlai Stevenson spoke to a crowd of supporters about the poison that had infected much of the American public by a demagogic United States Senator. “We are witnessing the bitter harvest from the...