George Bush and Bill Clinton both wanted to be an education president and both wanted to make U.S. public schools the best in the world. Neither succeeded, although in his various farewells Mr. Clinton talked as though he thought he had. Two immovable obstacles blocked their way.In the first place,

One might hope that 10 years after the end of the cold war, a policy of mutual assured destruction would have been relegated to the dustbin of history. But cold war mental habits die hard. The United States and Russia still square off against each other with tons of chemical weapons and thousands of

One might think that last year’s particularly strong economy would have led to a reduction in the number of requests for emergency food and shelter. In fact, however, the year 2000 actually saw a rise in both areas. This was among the sad findings of the United States Conference of Mayors&rsqu

On election night last November, PBS-TV’s NewsHour With Jim Lehrer asked three veteran journalists to size up the media’s coverage of the presidential race. Marvin Kalb, who directs a center at Harvard University for the study of the press and politics, complained that foreign policy had

In his gracious concession speech, Vice President Al Gore showed himself to be a better loser than a campaigner. [W]hat remains of partisan rancor now must be put aside, he told the nation. Now, the political struggle is over and we turn again to the unending struggle for the common good of all Amer

In a sermon preached at Oxford around 1825, when he was still an Anglican, John Henry Newman began by saying that in every part of Scripture it is told us again and again, that to make sinful creatures holy was the great end which our Lord had in view in taking upon Him our nature, and thus none but

The percentage of Americans living in poverty is the lowest it has been in over 20 years. Nevertheless, over against this positive news is the fact that a sixth of the nation’s children remain poor. Indeed, the Census Bureau has reported that poverty among children has actually deepened—

Envision, if you will, the perfect Catholic church building. For some this would be an exercise of the imagination, one that takes into account the person’s idea of the sacred, of beauty, of practicality. For others it may be an exercise of the memory, recalling the space, sight-lines, colors

According to the Book of Genesis, the confluence of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in modern-day Iraq is the site of the legendary Tree of Life. Today the waters of these rivers bring death, according to UNICEF estimates, to some five thousand to six thousand Iraqi children each monthbecause the se

Nearly a half century ago, an anthropologist named Cora Du Bois analyzed the values of U.S. society and concluded that Americans are optimistic activists. They expect that they and their institutions will succeed and succeed quickly. When they run up against a hard question, they want the answer tod