People tend to judge presidents on how the economy performs, and yet we don't expect them to have the power to do much about it. Or we don't want them to exercise that power, if they were to have it.

It is the marketplace that calls most clearly for men to be softer, more narcissistic and receptive, and the new man is the result.

I realize that after decades of positive thinking the notion of realism, of things as they are, may seem a little quaint. ... When the stakes are high enough and the risks obvious, we still turn to people who can be counted on to understand those risks and prepare for worst-case scenarios. A chief of state does not want to hear a general in the field say that he 'hopes' to win tomorrow's battle or that he's 'visualizing victory'.

You still don't like the idea of gay marriage? Then, as my friend, the economist Julianne Malveaux, says: Don't marry a gay person. Case closed, problem solved.

If God cares about our puny species, then disasters prove that he is not all-powerful; and if he is all-powerful, then clearly he doesn't give a damn.

To be homeless in America is to live like a fugitive. The destitute are our own native-born "illegals."

A lot of what we experience as strength comes from knowing what to do with weakness. Nickel and Dimed On (Not) Getting By in America