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Sports betting can, should be controlled

It wasn’t that long ago when sports betting was illegal. Then suddenly it was as though profit, rather than controlling this vice, became paramount. It was inevitable, given human nature, that bad things would follow legalization. Recently, The Wall Street Journal carried a front-page story that reported “one of the most sprawling gambling cases in the history of American sports: a national and international conspiracy to allegedly rig dozens of games that reached from U.S. college basketball to the top professional league in China.” There was a time in America when laws ...

Cutting state income tax helps dying states

Across the nation, states are fiercely competing for companies and population by slashing taxes. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul is dooming her state to be the loser. In 2026, eight states are cutting their income taxes, and four others are reducing corporate tax rates. South Carolina is pushing ahead on legislation to phase out its income tax entirely over the next few years, joining nine other income-tax-free states. That’s bad news for New York. Saddled with a spendaholic governor and state legislature, New York is becoming increasingly unattractive to newcomers and businesses ...

Children should be banned from social media

The debate over children and social media is often framed as a question of parental control or technological inevitability. It should not be. At its core, this is a moral question about what kind of society we are shaping, what we choose to protect, and what we are willing to sacrifice in the name of convenience, profit and false notions of freedom. Children under the age of 13 should not be on social media. Not because technology is evil, but because childhood is fragile and social media is not built for moral development. At this stage of life, children are still forming their ...

There comes time to choose sides

Sunday night I went to the local cinema to catch the 83-year-old film “Casablanca” starring screen legends Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman. I’ve seen it many times, but on this occasion, it seemed to be sending me a message across the decades. The movie opens with a random roundup of the “usual suspects” in Casablanca, Morocco. Someone runs. The armed authorities shoot him in the back. It’s as though what happens in an African city in 1941 foreshadows moments we are seeing in American cities today: armed authority, fear and the casual use of violence. The film’s ...

Five takeaways from college football championship game

Hoo, hoo, hoo, Hoosiers! Seeing the Indiana University Hoosiers win the College Football Playoff National Championship Monday night was the culmination of a season filled with notable lessons. Here are a few from my perspective: 1. In sports — as in many other matters — the experts are often wrong. The same people who tried to justify the exclusion of Notre Dame from the college football playoffs dissed Indiana all season long, including leading up to and throughout the playoffs and even just before the national championship game. They were wrong about the talent, toughness and ...

Most powerful weapon is truth, principles

Recently, Michael Reagan, the eldest son of President Ronald Reagan, passed away at age 80. His passing was duly eulogized by the Reagan Foundation and the Young America’s Foundation at the Reagan Ranch. Both noted that Michael, whom I had the privilege to know, devoted his life to writing and speaking about the American principles that so defined his father. No death is ever timely. But there seems something fitting that President Reagan’s legacy would be closed out with the passing of his oldest son in the year of the 250th birthday of our nation. At this time of such ...