OPINION

Press briefings provide a vivid, daily accounting to the public of the president’s actions, and, more critically, his and the White House’s competence and credibility.

OPINION

Americans have always been fond of guns, but as an index on our current interest, try to count the number of gunshots you hear during the trailers for coming attractions the next time you go to the movies.

OPINION

We have the strongest military in the world. What is rarely considered, however, is what the successful application of that military power is intended to accomplish.

OPINION

I owe it to the people in my community, God help me, to try to stop a threat to their safety, should it ever occur because of my presence.

OPINION

The sacrifice of caregivers is too often overlooked. For Donna Joyner and Jason Courneen, it's more like they were bypassed.

OPINION

The gulag of the Soviet Union, the concentration camps of Nazi Germany — they have been roughly replicated in North Korea. The whole world knows this — the U.N. report is a public document — and yet the regime lives on. How can that be?

OPINION

While some steps are obviously prudent, we become a different country if every backbench legislator is accompanied by a security detail on trips to the grocery story or the Little League field.

OPINION

U.S. legislators' zeal in trying to punish Russia shouldn’t be served at the expense of the Western alliance’s already diminished cohesion.

OPINION

Against real news of real tragedy, the manufactured outrage of the day just doesn’t impress.

OPINION

Trump’s instinct was to side with the Saudis and Emiratis. But over the subsequent 10 days, Trump decided to give Tillerson responsibility for negotiating a solution.

OPINION

Some of the theories about the fire may prove to be overblown. But that such ideas are even being aired tells you a lot about the problems festering in British society.

OPINION

Maybe we ourselves are the problem, we are the infection, we with our harsh and brutal words scattered across the internet miles with impunity.

OPINION

Trump’s go-to move when he feels under attack is to respond in a way that exacerbates the situation.

OPINION

Even rough-and-tumble rhetoric, even stupid, vulgar demagoguery, does not necessarily incite violence. Yet in times of polarization, the constant barrage of such words can, and does, deplete reservoirs of trust that society must draw upon in response to violence.

OPINION

We must stand together. And serve together. And work toward solutions together.

OPINION

It was the kind of empty spectacle Americans are used to from Washington, entertaining perhaps in a gossipy sort of way, but signifying and changing nothing.

OPINION

The trouble is that when one is daily immersed in clouds of distraction, it’s difficult to recall what “normal” looks like.

OPINION

Congress should either exempt websites and their related content from the requirements of the ADA, or enact detailed guidelines for the accommodations required by the law.

OPINION

The president’s friends are now pressing the argument that Mueller must go. If so, this crippling scandal could veer into a much more dangerous phase of presidential lawlessness.

OPINION

It’s easy to howl about Paris. It’s much harder to accept the reality that our current standards of living would have to drastically change to make any kind of significant difference in carbon emissions.

OPINION

In 1994, I founded the Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors to support all those grieving the death of a loved one in the military. Since that time, TAPS has supported more than 70,000 surviving family members.

OPINION

The public debate about free speech relies on useless cliches, not on accurate information about the law.

OPINION

There may be method in such apparent madness.

OPINION

We all have experienced frustration when someone denies having said what we know they meant.

OPINION

No doubt the Chinese and Saudis are shrewd enough to know their current luck may not last.

OPINION

Trump’s defenders are arguing that Comey acted unlawfully and in violation of executive privilege. Neither claim is correct.

OPINION

The former FBI director’s testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee on Thursday was a feast of contradiction and self-serving showmanship.

OPINION

We hardly invented leaking, but millennials are especially well-suited to the tactic. It’s a squirt gun we can use on our leaders when they’ve stepped out of line.

OPINION

Never heard of Harry Styles? No reason that you should. But Twitter functions equally as a news service for our president and for a British pop star of considerable talent but no particular relevance to grown-ups.

OPINION

They tried to score points by emphasizing Comey’s testimony about conversations in which he told Trump that he wasn’t personally a subject of an intelligence investigation. The argument fell flat.

OPINION

Liberals but they must be disappointed that their silver bullet seems to be melting.

OPINION

His critics should be careful about closing off all avenues of communication with an administration that is still feeling its way.

OPINION

Comey’s personal ethical dilemmas are now interwoven with the nation’s political history. It’s the stuff of high drama — the temporizing ethicist meets the amoral bulldozer.

OPINION

Trump supporters have lost faith in many institutions but scoff at the mountain of evidence that Trump so far has been a disaster.

OPINION

I’m still astounded that our brief endorsement of Trump garnered such attention.

OPINION

A series of normally dry budget hearings on Capitol Hill this week will draw out the yawning gap between lawmakers and the White House on how much to spend on defense, and where that money should go.

OPINION

To Russian eyes, all information is potential disinformation, and secrets are hidden from the public.

OPINION

American voters don’t always pay attention to politics. There’s so much other news of little consequence to consume. But when they do, they can smell insincerity through a TV screen.

OPINION

If he’s impulsive enough to toss off a gratuitous insult to a mayor grappling with catastrophe, what else might he be willing to say — and to whom?

OPINION

The White House often seems on the side of the oppressors, not the oppressed.

OPINION

The occupation has a hold on us — by which I mean we Israelis. It is the addiction that Israel cannot shake.

OPINION

We may be seeing the limits at which a defense secretary can take positions at variance with the actions of the president and still reassure allies. Because virtually every question asked him was a variant of "How can that be true?"

OPINION

After Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin delivered his "State of VA" speech, his problem-plagued department was, unexpectedly, connected to two highly contentious political issues — climate change and medical marijuana.

OPINION

As members of Congress consider the White House budget proposal, they should keep in mind the lessons of both Strolling Thunder and Rolling Thunder.

OPINION

Due to the change in policy, I now wear my turban and beard with pride and I no longer have to choose between my country and my faith.

OPINION

Putin’s appearance at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum was meant to showcase Russia’s role in the global economy. And in Putin’s prepared remarks, he was a smooth, genial salesman for his country. But then came a session with Megyn Kelly.

OPINION

America, which is entertaining itself to inanition, has never experienced a scarcity of entertainment. Or a need for government-subsidized journalism that reports on the government.

OPINION

Even before Trump weighed in against it, the cause of sensible Medicare reform had almost been demagogued to death.

Opinion

Jared Kushner is not the first member of a presidential family to try to open a back channel with the Kremlin. John F. Kennedy's brother Robert met secretly with a Soviet intelligence agent named Georgi Bolshakov many times during the Kennedy administration. Their dealings illustrate the shortcomings and dangers of informal high-level diplomacy - but also the potential for breakthrough in a crisis.

OPINION

Congress is in recess, and members have returned to their districts to hold town hall meetings, fundraisers and, in a few cases, don military uniforms to serve in the National Guard or Reserve. They shouldn't.

OPINION

His international efforts — like his key domestic policy initiatives on taxes and health care — are being overshadowed by the Russia probe and by his heavy-handed attempts to cope with it.

OPINION

Protecting our nation, our children and our American heritage should not be optional for an elected leader. Nor should preserving America’s singular standing in the world.

OPINION

Before the daily deluge of Washington political news re-mires us in short-term minutiae, let’s examine President Donald Trump’s first foreign trip and behavior in his debut on the world stage.

OPINION

Our aspirations for the VA go well beyond reducing wait times. We refuse to settle when the well-being of our veterans is at stake.

Opinion

It could be said that Israel's very short war with the Arabs in 1967 gave way to a much longer war among Israelis themselves over one of the territories they captured - and that 50 years later, the expansionists could convincingly claim victory.

OPINION

Unbelievable is one of those words Trump uses when he wants you to think he is saying something is better than just wonderful. He sure doesn’t want you to take him literally. Believe me.

OPINION

One of the secrets of the presidency Trump has been slow to embrace is that the office confers a certain majesty on its occupants.

OPINION

I’m tired of repeating myself to people in disbelief of my service in the line of fire or having to kindly explain to a fellow veteran at VA facilities that I’m not a nurse, but a patient.

OPINION

What’s really up here is judges having their own animus against Trump, and, well, they have that right. But they do not have a right to misuse their positions to hold him in check.

OPINION

We always talk of the need to not sit silent in the face of racist or sexist or homophobic attacks. But these men put their bodies between the victims and the abuser and paid with their lives.

A new report makes the Department of Veteran Affairs (VA) hospital in Hines, Illinois, sound like it was a place where the bugs were well fed, much to the disgust of patients who didn't want to eat after creepy critters.

OPINION

To disenfranchise a person who has been invited to present ideas simply because those ideas are disagreeable to some, or even to a majority, has no place in the college agenda as long as hate or the promotion of illegal activity are not the speaker’s object.

OPINION

Sheriffs hold an understudied office in political science but one with broad, expansive powers. Those powers may grow.

OPINION

Even more than a willingness to use force in defense of an ally, Article 5 has come to embody the political commitment that undergirds the alliance of the West.

OPINION

None of this means athletes are more or less sensitive than the average talk show host. But if they say something patently offensive, their teams or leagues are going to do something about it.

OPINION

Serious questions will now be asked across Britain about its Muslim communities and whether Muslim leaders and role models are saying and doing enough to counter the poisonous narratives emanating from Islamic terrorist groups.

OPINION

Iraq and Syria need to be reimagined as looser, better governed, more inclusive confederal states that give minorities room to breathe.

OPINION

We shouldn’t honor the dishonorable Confederate cause, but we shouldn’t try to erase it, either.

OPINION

If recent news reports are any indication, the pricing strategies that colleges have utilized for several decades to attract students seem to be coming to an end.

OPINION

As a sociologist, I teach college students about the power of groups on individual behavior, and the role of authority figures in silencing individual dissent. As a parent, I see it firsthand.

OPINION

One hundred years ago this month, a University of Pennsylvania professor enlisted in the American Expeditionary Forces to serve during the First World War. He would not return.

OPINION

Manchester was, in some ways, like Newtown. Because children raise the stakes and deepen the horror.

OPINION

A 350-ship fleet is key for both national security and international stability.

OPINION

Trump should want to enlist Muslim Americans in a fight many of them have already joined, and affirm that he values their citizenship.

OPINION

One of the things Kennedy asked of Americans was to break with their protectionist past once and for all.

OPINION

Mueller can take as long as he wants. In fact, he may now be the most powerful person in D.C.

OPINION

The real collision point ahead is the 2018 midterm election.

OPINION

Perhaps the most important political legacy of Vietnam has been the growing segregation of our all-volunteer military from wider society.

OPINION

I am on a mission to unite Americans on Memorial Day and make sure we know how to honor our fallen.

OPINION

This movement doesn’t simply have animal welfare as its goal; it has an ideological component: the idea that human beings have no special moral standing in the universe and cannot claim dominion over other living creatures, no matter how they treat them.

OPINION

Two footnotes in the case radically rework the court’s thinking about the relationship between racial and political party discrimination in a way that should greatly expand the ability to bring gerrymandering claims in states where race and party overlap significantly.

OPINION

Over the past week or so, the world has glimpsed some of the president’s private conversations about the Russia probe, and what we’ve seen has one common theme: a president appearing to veer across the double-yellow DO NOT CROSS lines that separate the investigative section of the federal government and his White House.

OPINION

They, not Trump, are the ones who cannot be trusted with sensitive intelligence.

OPINION

Nearly 60,000 Haitians who have been legally living in the United States for more than a decade could be deported if the Department of Homeland Security chooses not to extend what is known as Temporary Protected Status, or TPS, for them.

OPINION

The battle for Syria’s south is on, and the Trump team must decide if the United States will play a decisive role.

OPINION

The more deliberate the inquiry, the better chance that the American people will have confidence in it.

OPINION

He brings such credibility that if and when he says “there is no ‘there’ there,” responsible media will accept it.