Latest Articles

Secure the border? That's what the US has done

May 12, 2013  •  The Boston Globe

In the clamor over immigration, the demand for more border security has been unrelenting.

Immigration restrictionists have dug in their heels, insisting that stronger border controls must come before any other change. The Senate's bipartisan Gang of Eight, bowing to political reality, is proposing an immigration overhaul that creates a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants living in the United States, but makes it contingent on a series of border-focused security "triggers."

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Dzokhar Tsarnaev and the death penalty

May 8, 2013  •  The Boston Globe

ACCORDING TO a Washington Post-ABC poll released last week, 70 percent of Americans want Dzhokhar Tsarnaev put to death if he is convicted of the Boston Marathon bombing. Support for execution was higher among some respondents (conservatives, the elderly, whites) and lower among others (liberals, young adults, blacks). But no matter how the results were sorted, within every demographic subgroup there was majority support for the death penalty in this case.

That is no anomaly. It is a reminder that despite the well-funded efforts of death-penalty abolitionists, the true level of approval for the death penalty in America remains very high.

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Can Gabriel Gomez crack the code?

May 5, 2013  •  The Boston Globe

IT'S THE HOLY GRAIL that Massachusetts Republicans have been seeking for years: the blueprint for getting candidates with an "R" after their names get elected to statewide office. There were those who thought Scott Brown had solved the riddle after his electrifying special-election victory in 2010 — only to see him lose decisively to Elizabeth Warren less than three years later. Now comes another special Senate election, and Republicans have another intriguing standard-bearer. Can Gabriel Gomez crack the code?

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There's nothing fair about the Marketplace Fairness Act

April 24, 2013  •  The Boston Globe

IF TRUTH-IN-LABELING rules applied to Congress, the proposed law giving states the power to collect sales tax from out-of-state online retailers would be named the Marketplace Unfairness Act.

Sponsored by Senator Mike Enzi, a Wyoming Republican, and fast-tracked to the Senate floor this week, the legislation would strip away protections that have been in place for decades, unleashing tax-hungry states on merchants they aren't answerable to and tilting the playing field against small Internet retailers.

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On North Korea, Kerry muddles the message

April 21, 2013  •  The Boston Globe

IF KIM JONG UN thinks he can shake down Washington by threatening nuclear apocalypse, President Obama says, the belligerent North Korean dictator has another think coming.

"Since I came into office, the one thing I was clear about was: We're not going to reward this provocative behavior," Obama told NBC's Savannah Guthrie in an interview last week. "You don't get to bang your spoon on the table and somehow you get your way."

No rewards for Pyongyang's criminal regime or its bloody-minded young tyrant. Everyone clear on that?

Well, maybe not everyone.

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