POLITICS

The April 15 tax deadline provides taxpayers the opportunity to examine how their elected officials will spend their hard-earned tax dollars. Washington will spend $22,039 per household in 2005 — the highest inflation-adjusted total since World War II, and...

For most of my professional life, I’ve traveled frequently — sometimes boarding a commercial flight two, three or four times a month for lucrative speaking engagements. Over the past three years, the frequency has fallen to an average of once or twice a...

Wal-Mart is the world’s largest business. Its $250 billion in annual sales makes it bigger than legendary giants like Exxon, General Motors, and IBM. How did Wal-Mart get so big? In a market economy, success goes to those businesses that best serve consumer...

Religious conservatives are calling the death of Terri Schiavo a betrayal of “the sanctity of human life.” We must, they say, replace our existing culture with a new “culture of life.” “It should be our goal as a nation,” proclaims...

Here’s my question to you: Should we be governed by good ideas? You say, “Williams, what do you mean?” Here’s an example: I regularly bike for fun, cardiovascular fitness and, hopefully, for a longer, healthier life. In my opinion, that’s...

Federal Election Commissioner Ellen Weintraub says the FEC has no interest in regulating political speech on the Internet. She opened a recent hearing by saying no one at the FEC has sought to manipulate it “as a vehicle for shutting down the right of any...

Throughout the West, Muslims are making new and assertive demands, and in some cases challenging the very premises of European and North American life . How to respond? Here is a general rule: Offer full rights — but turn down demands for special privileges. By...

Dr. Larry Summers, Harvard’s president, remains under siege for remarks (www.president.harvard.edu/speeches/2005/nber.html) made in his Jan. 14 address to the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER). Dr. Summers suggested that there might be three major...

This past Tuesday, President Bush gave an important, and generally excellent, speech on our foreign policy re the middle east. He reiterated, and further explained, his Forward Strategy of Freedom. The highlight of the speech was this remarkable passage, strategically...

For a free people in the age of terrorism, what is the proper balance between civil liberties and national security? This debate wracks every Western country. Looking at America, the “united we stand” solidarity that followed September 11, 2001, lasted...

Those of us following the development of Islam in America have for years worried about the unhealthy influence of Saudi money and ideas on American Muslims. We watched apprehensively as the Saudi government boasted of funding mosques and research centers; as it...