We are still waiting for final results from Tuesday’s election, as President Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden both have pathways to the White House. As states continue to count votes, legal challenges related to the election loom as well. While we wait, I’d like to address a question many people are asking: Why were the polls so wrong again? Prior to the election, one poll gave Joe Biden a seventeen-point lead in Wisconsin; yesterday, his lead was 0.6... Read more

As of this writing, the 2020 presidential election is undecided. Four key battleground states—Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, and Georgia—are counting tens of thousands of absentee ballots today.  Democrats expanded their majority in the House of Representatives by at least five seats. Control of the Senate will come down to races in Maine, North Carolina, Michigan, and Georgia.  While we wait for further results, here’s what we do know: the health of our democracy depends on how we relate to each other... Read more

One World Trade Center officially opened on this day in 2014. With a spire that rises to 1,776 feet, the tower and the rest of the complex replaced the Twin Towers destroyed by terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001. It stands as an inspiring and powerful reminder that our nation’s worst enemies have not been able to destroy us. America’s commitment to our bedrock principle that “all men are created equal” has built the largest and strongest democracy in human... Read more

Sean Connery passed away Saturday at the age of ninety. If you are my age and you think of the Scottish actor, James Bond comes first to mind. If you are the age of my children, you may think of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade or The Untouchables, a role for which he won an Academy Award. If you are in high school, you may not know who he was.  History works that way. Since the present moment is... Read more

Crystal Conover decorates her front yard in Layton, Utah, every Halloween. Life-size skeletons and creepy clowns are on display while zombies climb out of grassy holes. She does this because Halloween was her son Jayden’s favorite holiday. He was thirteen years old when he was hit by a car while trick-or-treating in 2011 and died. She hands out glow sticks each year to help children light their way in the dark and stay safe from cars.  However, 2020 has been... Read more

“Everybody talks about the weather, but nobody does anything about it.” This maxim has certainly been true in Dallas, where our temperatures this week were thirty degrees below normal. And in the Southern Plains, where Winter Storm Billy (I didn’t know we are now naming storms) has brought snow and ice into New Mexico and parts of Oklahoma and Texas.  It has been especially true on the US Gulf Coast, where Louisiana has already been hit by two hurricanes and... Read more

As we approach what the Associated Press calls “the most consequential US presidential election in living memory,” it may seem strange to write an article on Bulgaria. However, a recent Pew Research Center survey that includes this Eastern European nation points us to a remarkable basis for hope in these divisive days. In 2002, only 33 percent of Bulgarians said it is necessary to believe in God in order to be moral and have good values. By 2019, that number... Read more

There’s good news in what seems like bad news in today’s news. Just when you thought 2020 couldn’t get any stranger, a two-headed snake was discovered in Florida. This after we learned that the first nest of murder hornets was found in the US.  The Asian giant hornet nest was discovered in Blaine, Washington, last Friday. The insects are known for their sting, which has been described as feeling like a hot nail driven into flesh. They also spray venom... Read more

If you and someone with whom you disagree politically are willing to discuss your disputes over a cup of coffee, you’re in luck. The owners of Pax & Beneficia Coffee in Irving, Texas, are concerned that in our politically divisive days, “we are quick to demonize and dehumanize the other side.” So they have a solution: anyone who buys a cup of coffee with someone of an opposing view will get a free cup.  One of the owners notes, “Regardless... Read more

“We don’t see them as Democrats. They’re the Mitchells. We know they are good people who live next door. We love them.” In a country where 93 percent of us say civility is a problem, this story in the Wall Street Journal is welcome news. We meet the Gates family, who are lifelong Republicans, and the Mitchells, who are lifelong Democrats. The two families are next-door neighbors in suburban Pittsburgh. The Gates home displays a Trump yard sign; the Mitchell... Read more