Rich Lowry

President Barack Obama styles himself a wit, and some of his best material lately has to do with his abuse of his powers. “As long as they’re doing nothing, I’m not going to apologize for doing something,” Obama riffed to a crowd at the Georgetown Waterfront Park in Washington,...

It’s hard to imagine a more apt summation of the lunatic state of the nation’s immigration debate than the split screen over the past week. In Washington, most respectable opinion lined up, yet again, to condemn Republicans for not passing an amnesty under the guise of defunct-for-now...

The seeds of House Majority Leader Eric Cantor’s shocking primary loss may have been sown in January. That’s when House Republican leaders insisted on floating a set of immigration principles at the party’s retreat as a gesture toward acting on the Senate Gang of Eight immigration...

To paraphrase the line often attributed to Mark Twain, there are lies, damn lies and the “equal pay” statistic. The factoid that women earn only 77 cents of every dollar earned by men is the focal point of a feminist cargo cult. It has its own movement and its own quasi-holiday,...

Secretary of State John Kerry is reporting for duty in the war against climate change. In a speech in Jakarta, Indonesia, he declared climate change “another weapon of mass destruction.” Indeed, in what might be news to the 50-megaton hydrogen bomb, he declared it “perhaps the...

What a waste of pomp and circumstance. The State of the Union had all the customary dignitaries, ritualistic applause, prime-time pre-emptions on broadcast TV — and even less interest than usual. The checklist of the Obama presidency is clear enough: We’ve got the august trappings...

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio gave a St. Crispin’s Day speech for progressives at his New Year’s Day inauguration ceremony. He evoked a city ravaged by a crisis of inequality. What Rudy Giuliani was to out-of-control crime, de Blasio wants to be to rampant inequality —...

President Barack Obama just admitted that the “settled law of the land” isn’t the least bit settled, and it hasn’t been sabotaged by Republicans so much as by the ignorance and incompetence of his own administration. Presidents have had worse press conferences than President...

Henry Waxman made a plea Wednesday at the end of a House hearing grilling Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. The California Democrat asked Republicans to reach across the aisle to work with Democrats to improve Obamacare. Yes, Henry Waxman, who has made a career...

Refusing to negotiate is the new reasonableness. After years of agonized media commentary about the failure of key players in Washington to sit down and work out their differences, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid plans to win the fight over the government shutdown by rejecting...

Anyone who doubts that Hillary Clinton is already in fine fighting trim for a presidential run should consider her speech to the American Bar Association in San Francisco. She assailed an alleged "assault on voting rights." She took aim at the Supreme Court's recent decision striking...

Prison is one of the most important institutions in American life. About a quarter of all the world's prisoners are behind bars in the United States, a total of roughly 2 million people. It costs about $60 billion a year to imprison them. This vast prison-industrial complex has succeeded...

Washington is riven by conflict and deep-seated division. It is rare indeed when both sides can agree on anything consequential. Therefore it is incredibly heartening that there is now bipartisan agreement that the implementation of Obamacare is a mess. Republicans have long maintained...