The candidates for the upcoming 2026 elections that are being chosen by the Republicans and Democrats (aka MAGA and DSA) are repellent to say the least. Voters entering the voting booth must hold their nose and suppress their gag reflex before pulling the lever. In this commentary we look at how be optimistic about America even when confronted by this dismal reality.

Many of the early colonists came to North America so that they could practice their interpretation of the Christian faith for which they were being persecuted in their home countries. And those Christian principles played an essential role in creating what is now America. Movements to end slavery and expand women's suffrage began with Christian religious movements. In this commentary we discuss how Christianity shaped America and how newcomers need to better understand Christianity.

The Greatest Generation was made up of millions of ordinary Americans that rose to the challenges of the Great Depression and the Second World War. Past generations of American have had to meet the challenges of the Revolutionary War, the Civil War and others. Our generation, my generation, have reaped the benefits of past generations but are not passing a better world onto our children and grandchildren. In this commentary we discuss the challenges our offspring will face.

As the largest shareholder in the newly public company, SpaceX, Elon Musk is now the world's first trillionaire. And it is only a matter of time for calls to tax the hell out of him start coming in from the left. But why? In this commentary we look at the counterproductive policy of taxing wealth creation.

Nicholas Wade, in his most recent book the Origin of Politics, tries to use evolution to justify why a nation state based on ethnicity, language and religion is the best political structure for the United States and other nations around the world. He rejects the aspirational vision of the Enlightenment principles and values that were the basis for the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. In this commentary, we look at how Mr. Wade has deviated from the science of evolution into the ideology of national conservatism.

Peace talks with Iran are ongoing but, seemingly, going nowhere. As Condoleezza Rice stated in a recent op-ed, no deal is better than a bed deal. But any deal that does not change the behavior the Iranian regime is probably a bad deal. In this commentary, we look at how the parties to any peace deal have different motives and different objectives for these negotiations.

Americans love to root for the underdog. But rooting for an underdog doesn't mean we want to tilt the field in the underdog's favor. We want the underdog to win fair and square. But how does rooting for the underdog translate from sports to real life? In this commentary we look at how we should root for all the underdogs that exist in real life.

There is no big tent in the Republican Party. Only loyalty to President Trump and his agenda is acceptable. Everyone else must be purged and President Trump has been very successful during this primary season in achieving this goal. Democrats are also in the process of cancelling anyone with ideas outside their leftist agenda. In this commentary we ask how these trends will affect "the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity."

Watching a golf tournament on Sunday afternoon has become a non-stop barrage of adverts for betting, announcers discussing of the odds for each player and other incentives to gamble even more from the PGA tour's official sportsbook, FanDuel. People may have a right to gamble(although Jefferson did not include that right in his list of unalienable rights) but that does not mean they should gamble. In this commentary we look at the rights people have to engage in destructive behavior and what we need to do to limit the harm it is doing to our society.

The Supreme Court's decision to strike down minority-majority voting districts presumably required under the Voting Rights Act of 1965 has been denounced as attack by a right-wing Court dominated by Trump appointees on the civil rights of African Americans. But the Court correctly asserted that such racially gerrymandered districts were unconstitutional. In this commentary we look at how this decision gives us an opportunity to reform the practice of gerrymandering that has promoted the divisiveness that afflicts our country.