Conservatives Can't Be Pro-Marriage and Oppose Gay Marriage
More bad news for marriage and families this week. A new study was released showing that 33 percent of children are now being raised by either a single parent or unmarried parents, compared to 1960...
View ArticleThe Terrorist Connection
Experts pretty much agree that military action alone won't put an end to terrorist movements such as the Islamic State. What else can be done? One way to shrivel terrorism's pool of embittered young...
View ArticleEconomic Happy Talk and the Politics of Denial
Democrats can't seem to get their message straight about the economy. Is it soaring because of the visionary leadership of President Obama or failing because of the intransigence of Congressional...
View ArticleA Fumbling of Roles: How Roger Goodell Became the Prosecutor of Atlantic County
In a letter sent Wednesday, 12 Democratic members of the United States House Judiciary Committee called for "the highest level of transparency" in the aftermath of an elevator video showing Baltimore...
View ArticleThe Same-Sex Marriage 'Debate' Is Based Upon Ignorance and Inaccurate...
On September 3, 2014, Judge Martin L. C. Feldman of the Federal District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana was the first federal judge to uphold a ban on same-sex marriage since the United...
View ArticleThe ACLU Supports Campaign Finance Reform and Free Speech
For an organization that works on issues as diverse as drones, women's rights, racial justice, war powers, immigration and flag burning, internal debates are inevitable and healthy. We welcome them....
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Obama Is Epictetus
The world is out of control; or is it? Barack Obama understands something most of us do not. Those of us who watched his speech last night, and who grew up in the half-century where America seemed to...
View ArticleMichael Brown Was No Angel -- Neither Was I
Growing up, I was no angel. Just ask my mom, who loves to tell stories about how she and my stepdad barely survived my teenage years. But they did survive -- and more importantly, so did I. Despite...
View ArticleNATO Sobers Up
Last week's NATO meeting in Wales showed an unexpected and sobering realism on the most pressing issue it has faced in some years, namely the Ukrainian crisis. Despite many pressures on the body to...
View ArticleObama's Last Chance to Control His Credibility
President Barack Obama has a precious opportunity to carve out a legacy for himself and carry out a coup against the reputation of weakness, repudiation and retreat that has dogged and haunted him. The...
View ArticleThe Drug War and the Mass Incarceration It Caused: Where We Are and Where We...
Where We Are (continued from Part 2) 6.) January - April: DOJ announced that it would be seeking to send the names of more low-level, nonviolent drug offenders, in federal prison, to President Obama...
View ArticleWhen Ralph Nader Was the Consumer's Hero
Ralph Nader is to blame. It's that simple. I'm not talking about the election of 2000, where his candidacy was enough to hand the presidency to George W. Bush and all that has followed. I'm talking...
View ArticlePolice Mistakes in Ferguson Involve Gender as Well as Race: The Forgotten...
"Michael Brown doesn't want to be remembered for a riot," the Rev. Al Sharpton said at the shooting victim's funeral. "He wants to be remembered as the one who made America deal with how we police in...
View ArticleHelping Children in Hidden Rural Poverty
When many people hear child poverty in America, the first stereotype is an inner-city child and discussions about solutions to poverty often focus on concentrated poverty in urban areas. But in a...
View ArticleA Bill to Regulate Oil Refineries Also Threatens Public Access Rights
All legislators support government transparency in the abstract. But when it comes to the specifics of lawmaking, public access rights are the first casualty of the political process. Case in point: SB...
View ArticleCheney's Iraq Facts Are Still All Wrong
Former Vice President Dick Cheney's September 10, 2014 speech at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) was particularly bad from both a timing and protocol perspective given that the President was...
View ArticleSeven Reasons Congress Must Reauthorize America COMPETES
Throughout my career in public service -- first as president of West Virginia Wesleyan College, then as governor of West Virginia, and now in the U.S. Senate as Chairman of the Committee on Commerce,...
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Ah, Yes. Another Sanitized Air War
I wrote a draft of this post four months ago, before the 70th Anniversary of D-Day and the Battle of Normandy. Then it fell through the cracks. Given our commander in chief's recent announcement of "a...
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The Middle East: From Saddam to ISIL to Nation Building
As the world becomes more outraged about the atrocities that ISIL is committing, the US and its Western allies continue to scramble for an effective strategy to stem the spread of this well organized...
View ArticleStanding Strong for Free Speech: A Response to Geoffrey Stone
In a recent post, Geoffrey Stone, a law professor from Chicago, claims that there is a rift between the current ACLU and the ACLU of several decades ago over whether campaign finance restrictions...
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