Americans, finally facing the prospect of the mano-a-mano portion of the 2020 presidential campaign, have already learned that previous complainers about the negativity, underhandedness, and attack-dog nature of politics didn’t know how good they had it. Abetted by technologies that increase the reach and power of smear campaigns and by mechanisms that allow far more money to…
Read More »

Efforts by America’s founders to control factions in perpetuity, via both direct and spontaneous means, appear to be failing.

I just returned to the United States after a short-term teaching stint at European University in Tbilisi, Georgia. It seems I’ve arrived home on the tail end of a controversy over the venerable Marbury v. Madison decision. According to luminaries at the Washington Post, anyone who questions the greatness of Marbury is a “crackpot”…
Read More »

More than half of Americans receive more money from gov. transfer programs than they pay in federal taxes.

In January, the winds of political change often blow with ferocity. The District of Columbia is now bracing itself for a gale-force disruption as Donald Trump prepares to become the 45th President of the United States. An upheaval in foreign affairs, trade, and immigration policy is in the offing. It’s tempting to focus solely…
Read More »

Thursday, December 15, is Bill of Rights Day, a time when citizens are told to celebrate the first ten amendments to the Constitution. Scholars such as Yale’s Akhil Amar describe the Bill of Rights as “the high temple of our constitutional order—America’s Parthenon.” Most of the public buys into this and believes that the…
Read More »

The third installment in the Divergent movie franchise, Allegiant, inserted itself into cinematic pop culture with a whimper on its opening weekend, but the movie seems to be completing a unexpectedly weighty arc on the nature of politics. While almost certainly unintentional, the thematic arc is intriguing because it brings to life the warnings…
Read More »