If you tramp through the woods of New England and upstate New York, you will see stone walls marking the borders of farms that have been abandoned for a century or two. You may see the foundation of a small house, the entrance to a mine or the crumbling walls …
Read More »Opinion | Yahya Sinwar’s Death Is a Tricky Opportunity
Reading the news that Yahya Sinwar, Hamas’s pitiless leader, had been killed on Wednesday by Israeli forces in southern Gaza, I had the same sense of elation so many people felt when Osama bin Laden was killed. To take satisfaction in the violent end of another human being, even an …
Read More »Opinion | When the Top General in the U.S. Says You’re ‘Fascist to the Core’
Toward the end of his tenure, Gen. Mark Milley, who was the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from 2019 to 2023, told Bob Woodward of The Washington Post that Donald Trump was a fundamental threat to the safety and integrity of the United States. “No one has ever …
Read More »Opinion | I Grew Up in Bucks County, Pa. I Went Back to Try to Make Sense of the Election.
One day last month I stepped out of my car in Riegelsville, Pa., and onto a sidewalk in front of the town’s post office, where residents come to pick up their mail and often spend a few minutes talking with neighbors. The first person I encountered was a young man …
Read More »Opinion | What China’s Leaders Grasp About Another Trump Term
At the beginning of the Biden presidency, many of us serving in the National Security Council gathered to read the intelligence and reached a key conclusion: The 2020s would be what we called the “decisive decade” in U.S. competition with China. Beijing seeks to displace the United States from its …
Read More »Opinion | America Is on the Brink of a Great Political Realignment. It’s Already Visible in Arizona.
One day each month, Charlie Kirk, one of the country’s most influential Republican activists, holds an event called Freedom Night in America at Dream City Church, a Pentecostal megachurch on the outskirts of Phoenix. “I truly believe that God has voted early in this election,” he said on a Wednesday …
Read More »Opinion | Trump Has Become Unmoored in Time
This is the second in an occasional series about Donald Trump’s statements and language and what’s at stake in the election. Do you remember the California electricity crisis of 2000 and ’01? I do, because I wrote about it a lot at the time and stuck my neck out by …
Read More »Opinion | Three Weeks to Go, and That’s All Anyone Is Sure Of
Gail Collins: Bret, Kamala Harris sure seems proud of her gun ownership, doesn’t she? Bret Stephens: Think of Aretha Franklin singing, “G-L-O-C-K (E), find out what it means to me.” Gail: Hadn’t thought about it until she told Oprah Winfrey that if someone breaks into her house, “they’re getting shot.” …
Read More »Opinion | Food Is What We Have In Common. Why Don’t We Hear More From the Candidates About It?
In a surprising turn of events, the presidential candidates have been talking about food. Food can be a winning topic, but we need to hear much more. Donald Trump (seemingly influenced by his new ally, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.), is talking about making “America Healthy Again.” How? “We’re going to …
Read More »Opinion | I Froze My Eggs to Reclaim My Right to Rest
I watched the ultrasound screen as my OB-GYN counted my follicles, the egg-producing sacs in my ovaries. They looked like the black holes in NASA images. I had more than 30 inside me. The sight unnerved me. My doctor seemed excited. “Those are some juicy-looking ovaries!” she said. Her comment …
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