How Trump Enables Democracy’s Decline

President Donald Trump’s unnerving failure to distinguish the free and democratic nation he leads from the autocratic and menacing Russia of strongman President Vladimir Putin has generated two notable sets of concerns – but the implications of Trump’s rhetorical excesses expand far beyond current story lines. “There are a lot of killers,” Trump replied when …

Trump’s Troubling Retreat

At this historical turning point, with the free world hungry for renewed American leadership, President Donald Trump’s foreboding inaugural address was as troubling for what it didn’t say as what it did. It was the mirror image of John Kennedy’s stirring address of 1961, which focused almost entirely on America’s struggle to defend freedom around …

Move the Embassy

President-elect Donald Trump’s promise to move the U.S. embassy in Israel to Jerusalem provides a timely opportunity for the new president to make a sharp break with President Barack Obama’s unwise, unjustified and ultimately ineffective hostility toward America’s closest ally in the turbulent Middle East. Especially after Obama’s recent decision to abstain from, rather than …

A Troubling Pick for Democratic Jews

After taking white working-class voters for granted in November, the Democratic Party seems poised to do the same for Jews – and that could have important implications for the already troubled U.S.-Israeli relationship. Sens. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, who lead the party’s progressive wing, are backing Rep. Keith Ellison, an …