March 31, 2024
Can Local Journalism Be Saved?
American local journalism is withering away. Between 2004 and 2019, reports Northwestern’s Medill School of Journalism, the country lost more than 2,000 newspapers, with the total number falling by about one-fourth, from 9,000 to 6,700. The decline bodes ill for democracy. Americans rely on local governments to provide basic public services, on voters to hold…
February 7, 2024
To Save Local Journalism, Update The Public Broadcasting Act
During his time as the U.S. ambassador to France, Thomas Jefferson wrote that if he faced a choice between “a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter.” Jefferson would be disappointed with today’s trends. Increasingly, we are seeing government without newspapers, especially at the local level, where…
November 3, 2023
A Postcard from Ashkelon
Ashkelon, in the Hamas-targeted south of Israel, a few kilometers from Gaza, is the region’s largest Israeli city. It’s also the Israeli city that has been struck by more rockets than any other—more than a thousand. As I read about that, I think of my grandmother and the postcard she sent me from her trip…
November 2, 2023
How Churches Can Make a Difference in the Lives of Children Who Need Foster Care
Who is willing to foster a child? It’s a question that has vexed policymakers and civic leaders for decades. Most states have experienced a chronic shortage of foster families. Public service announcements tout the need, with the most recent theme being, “You don’t have to be perfect to be the perfect parent.” But fostering a…
October 24, 2023
Roanoke Atones for Urban Renewal—Artistically
Discussions of the ill effects of public housing, urban renewal, and urban freeways usually focus on big cities: the Chicago-lakefront hellhole called the Robert Taylor Homes, now-demolished; Robert Moses’s Cross-Bronx Expressway, which tore through the heart of that borough; the brutalist Boston Government Center, which replaced the vibrant Scollay Square. But a moving new exhibit…
August 17, 2023
The ‘Utah Family Miracle’ and Why It Matters
Utah ranks at the top of many rankings of state performance across America. But perhaps the Beehive State is best known for its top rankings on the economic front. The “Utah economic miracle” — marked by exceptional economic growth, a favorable business climate and high rates of economic mobility — has garnered attention across the…
August 7, 2023
The Right Way to Fix Public Broadcasting
The kabuki theater of Washington budgeting has again featured the lightning-rod issue of public broadcasting. Last month, a House Commerce subcommittee voted to zero-out funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), whose funds go to NPR and PBS; just six days later, its Senate counterpart voted to maintain the funding. Both critics and defenders of the system will…
August 3, 2023
Philanthropists Discover the Value of “Sunsetting”
This year, the William E. Simon Foundation is closing its doors, or “sunsetting,” in the parlance of modern philanthropy. Since it was founded in 1967 by former Treasury Secretary William E. Simon and his wife Carol, the foundation has given away almost $300 million to the causes that mattered to them—faith, family and education. It…
August 3, 2023
Fight Crime, and Poverty, with Civil Society
Maryland’s new Democratic governor, Wes Moore, has to play to his party’s increasingly left-wing base, but he also knows that problem No. 1 in much of the state is rising crime. Prince George’s County, in particular, has a much higher crime rate than the national average, and crime has been rising since the COVID lockdowns, which were extraordinarily…
July 25, 2023
Not Just Tulsa
Earlier this month, an Oklahoma judge ruled that the City of Tulsa cannot be held legally or financially responsible for the actions of the violent mob that burned down the city’s Greenwood section, known as the Black Wall Street, in 1921. Three survivors of that murderous riot will not, it appears, receive compensation. Despite their disappointment, the…