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An ode to Robert L. Heilbroner, who died on January 4.

In red states in 2001, there were 572,000 divorces … Blue states recorded 340,000 … In the same year, 11 red states had higher rates of divorce than any blue state … In each of the red states of Louisiana, Mississippi, and New Mexico, 46.3 percent of all births were to unwed mothers … In […]

Just over the next horizon are even bolder reforms. They include: Instant-Runoff Voting. With instant-runoff voting, you designate more than one choice. If your candidate isn’t in the top two, your vote automatically goes to your second choice. With this system, now used for local elections in San Francisco, supporters of insurgent candidates can vote […]

Whatever pundits say, this election was not a wholesale repudiation of liberalism.

Whatever pundits say, this election was not a wholesale repudiation of liberalism.

What has the past half-century of our history achieved if not a moral transformation? Equal rights and respect for black people have been a moral cause. So, too, have equality for women and open acceptance of gays. Liberals have advocated each of these causes, often turning to the courts when elected leaders were slow to […]

George W. Bush and John Kerry could agree on one point in the first presidential debate: Nuclear proliferation — specially the risk of terrorists obtaining nuclear weapons — represents the most serious threat we face. But the difference in how the two candidates approach the problem illustrates a more fundamental political divide that will stretch […]

George Washington set a standard that our current president disregards.

It would have been a catastrophe for democracy itself if liberal leadership during the past century had been unequal to the challenges of national defense. But under Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the United States and its allies prevailed in both world wars. FDR and Harry Truman, advised by such “wise men” as George […]

Think back to last summer. George W. Bush’s approval ratings stood near 60 percent. Iraq, a “mission” the president had famously declared “accomplished” aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln that May, was no paradise, but it was also not yet the political disaster it later became. Democratic candidates, portrayed by the media as knock-kneed Barney Fifes, […]