That Andrew Hacker would advocate ending the requirement to study algebra to get a four-year college degree is mildly surprising. There has been no hint of such anti-intellectualism in his many fine essays on demographics, race and the education system…

The public argument over whether the NCAA was too harsh, too lenient or just right in punishing Penn State has replaced the argument over whether Penn State should have taken down or left up the statue of Joe Paterno. What…

Facing the facts on guns in American society completely demoralizes me, and no more so than when I have to view those facts through the prism of yet another mass murder committed by someone who legally purchased his weapons and…

To say it’s a dog’s life once described a dreary, harsh and probably impoverished condition. Nowadays we would probably use the term “dog’s life” to symbolize living in the lap(dog) of luxury. Spending on dogs and other pets has tripled…

Let’s go back in time to 1998 or whenever it was that Joe Paterno and some high-ranking Penn State officials first learned that an assistant football coach was sexually abusing young boys. What if, instead of engaging in an illegal…

Mitt Romney continues to refuse to release his past tax returns, while insisting that there’s “nothing hidden in them.” It’s an untenable position, since it begs the obvious question, “If there’s nothing hidden, why not release them?” The answer, of…

We start with the fact that we have both a weak economy and a heavy debt burden.  It would be great to reduce the debt, but… If we let the temporary tax cuts of the Bush II Administration taxes end,…

One measure of celebrity hotness is the increase in the sales of magazines that bear their faces on the cover. Putting some celebs on the cover can increase newsstand sales by tens of thousands. That explains why hot celebrities end…

Secular humanist that I am, I couldn’t contain a squeaky chortle of glee when reading that the Creation Museum in a Kentucky suburb of Cincinnati is in financial distress. Attendance is down more than 30% from its opening year of 2007.…

These past few days, I’ve been thinking a lot about my brother’s death at the age of 49.  When he fell from a ladder and smashed his brains on the concrete below, he was worth about $100.  Yet he got…