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Munitions crisis was foreseeable

Opinion

During the 1979-80 hostage crisis, a defiant Iran starkly demonstrated the limits of American power. Forty-five years later, it is doing the same thing, although in different circumstances. Back then, when the post-Vietnam military was at a low ebb, we didn’t strike Iran, and a long-shot rescue operation ended in abject failure. Now, with the U.S. military at its most proficient and professional in history, we have inflicted punishing blows against the regime but still haven’t been able to impose our will, in part because we are running low on the munitions necessary to ...

We must imagine a new way forward

Editorials

Before sunrise on an October morning in 1989, Ida Lee Delaney was making her long daily commute to her job as a custodian at the Houston Post. After the 50-year-old woman inadvertently cut in front of an unmarked car on the Gulf Freeway, the driver and his two companions responded by chasing her for 13 miles across Houston. What Delaney didn’t know was that the three men were off-duty Houston police officers coming home after an all-night drinking spree. Having no idea who they were, she pulled over and got out of her vehicle to seek help when she saw the flashing lights of a truck ...

The good and bad of common good

Opinion

For the second time in the Trump presidency, the Right is debating the concept of the common good and how that concept fits within the American political tradition. During Donald Trump’s first term, the “common good” debate raged because the president’s nationalist instincts and policy prescriptions on issues such as trade and immigration clashed with the more globalist preferences of the Republican Party establishment. The debate is now raging once again, it seems, because JD Vance, the odds-on favorite to become the 2028 GOP presidential nominee, is seen as sympathetic to ...

Talking ourselves into failure

Opinion

There are a couple of stories that seem unrelated but are very related. They show the story of a country that used to build things and has decided, without ever admitting it, that building is too hard. Start with the missiles. Rep. Mike Turner was on television last week talking about letting Ukraine license our Patriot technology and build the missiles themselves, because the threat is spreading and our defenses must spread with it. He is right. Think how strange that is. The most powerful country in history is handing another nation the recipe for our best defensive weapon because we ...

The Constitution belongs to all of us

Letters to the Editor

Most Americans don’t wake up thinking about constitutional law or the separation of powers. They worry about paying the mortgage, buying groceries, affording health care and putting gas in the car. They voted hoping life would become more affordable and secure. Instead, many are facing rising costs, growing uncertainty and a government increasingly focused on consolidating power rather than solving everyday problems. Throughout history, democracy has rarely disappeared overnight. It erodes when leaders weaken independent institutions, demand personal loyalty over constitutional duty, ...

Support for rape crisis centers can create change

Editorials

Rape crisis centers in Pennsylvania will see state funding double under the budget signed last month. These agencies provide services to victims of sexual assault. Pittsburgh Action Against Rape was one of the first in the state and one of the first in the country. It has been a refuge and a helping hand for victims for more than 50 years. It is one of 47 rape crisis centers in Pennsylvania. In 2025, the state budgeted $12 million for them. That can sound like a lot of money until you cut it into 47 pieces and expect it to stretch like a too-small blanket to cover women, men and ...