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Columns/Opinion

Can Biden hold off the left in 2020 race?

Joe Biden is old. He hugs people. He thinks China is and isn’t a challenge for America. He is for and against taxpayers financing abortion. He was once against busing for desegregation of blacks and whites. Anita Hill says he did not give her a fair chance to destroy Clarence Thomas. He hasn’t shown much oomph as a candidate for president. He came out with an upside-down climate change plan. The polls like him. The polls may quit liking him, of course, and commentators discuss that as much as his character or policy ideas. They all agree he has name recognition working for him ...

Shanahan’s short and sad career

It’s hard not to feel some sympathy for Patrick Shanahan. The acting U.S. secretary of defense said Tuesday he’s leaving government because of “a painful and deeply personal family situation” from a decade ago he had hoped to keep private. Now the details have become public, and the FBI’s lingering questions are the ostensible reason Shanahan has withdrawn from consideration to replace James Mattis, who resigned as the Pentagon’s chief in December. At the same time, as difficult as it is for Shanahan, the change may be for the best — for him, his family and the ...

Headline all gun violence just like this

It’s unknown what exactly was in the man’s mind as he approached the Earle Cabell Federal Building in downtown Dallas on Monday, but his intent was easy to read. Clad in tactical gear and carrying an assault-style rifle and at least five 30-round magazines, the man — whom police identified as Brian Isaack Clyde — started shooting as he neared the entrance, then cut and ran when security officers returned fire. He collapsed, mortally wounded, in a parking lot across the street. Police have yet to offer a motive, but social media posts before the attack offer some ...

Foreign election meddling still wrong, Mr. President

It was extraordinary to hear a U.S. president declare that the FBI director is “wrong” for saying that candidates should report to the FBI — as the law clearly intends — any effort by foreign agents to aid a political candidate by passing along opposition research. President Donald Trump does not understand the value of the law prohibiting campaigns from such aid, nor does he appear to have any intention of following it. For all the interpretations of the Mueller report, there is one aspect of it where there should be no debate: The threat of foreign meddling in U.S. ...

Burnout real crisis among physicians in training

Stephen Russell, Sanjay Desai and Brian Garibaldi The Baltimore Sun This month, the American Medical Association invested $15 million in eight ambitious programs to address the workplace needs of our health system. Among the goals of this grant was to address the crisis of burnout among training physicians by investing in wellness innovations. In many ways, it is an issue as important and consequential as President John F. Kennedy’s moonshot program that became fully realized 50 years ago this summer. In September 1962, when Kennedy stood beneath the brow-swabbing heat of ...

Billionaires aren’t the problem

Bernie Sanders can’t decide what socialism is. At times he frames it as nothing more than New Deal-style capitalism, not so different from the Scandinavian economies of Norway, Sweden or Denmark. Other times he defines it in the language of class struggle, vowing to smash “the oligarchy” and “restore power to the many, not the few.” In a speech this month at George Washington University, Sanders attempted to merge the two definitions: He aimed to finish the New Deal, he said, precisely because a failure to do so would threaten an oligarchic takeover of the U.S. He ...