There’s a bizarrely opaque, oddly modern question hovering over the legacy of Jane Austen. And despite centuries of debate, scholars still haven’t been able to figure out how to answer it. Jane Austen lived under the rule of a slave-trading empire. What did she think about that? And if we could figure out what someone […]

Tariffs. United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids. National Guard deployments. The Epstein Files. Strikes on Iran. Gaza and Ukraine. Sticky inflation. The first year of President Donald Trump’s second time in office has been a firehose of unpopular policies, confrontational tactics, and frequent clashes with his perceived enemies. Each of these developments has tended […]

On Tuesday, the Supreme Court broke from its increasingly common practice of deciding important cases without holding an oral argument or even explaining the reasoning of its decision, to hear a case about whether states may ban a practice known as “conversion therapy” — therapy sessions which seek to change someone’s sexual orientation or gender […]

Standing next to Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla in the Oval Office last week, President Donald Trump announced that the pharma giant had made a startling concession: It would voluntarily lower the prices it charges Americans for its medicines. At the same time, the White House announced plans for TrumpRx, a new government website that would […]

Benjamin Netanyahu has now served as prime minister of Israel longer than anyone in history — three nonconsecutive stints over 18 years, or almost a quarter of the time Israel has been an independent country.  And from the beginning, his power has been on the verge of collapse.  About a year into his first term […]