What a Terror Attack in Israel Might Reveal About Psychedelics and Trauma
One Israeli said that being high on LSD during the Hamas-led attack on Oct. 7 prompted a spiritual revelation that helped him escape the carnage at a desert rave. Another…
‘Save Democracy’ Democrats Look to Win Primaries on Anti-Trump Sentiment
Harry Dunn, a former Capitol Police officer whose pitched battles with former President Donald J. Trump’s supporters on and after Jan. 6, 2021, vaulted him to political stardom, was greeted…
Biden Aims to Project United Front Against China at White House Summit
President Biden intends to use a first-ever joint meeting with the leaders of Japan and the Philippines on Thursday to send a blunt diplomatic message to an increasingly aggressive China:…
Biden Administration Approves Expansion of Background Checks on Gun Sales
The Biden administration has approved the broadest expansion of federal background checks in decades in an attempt to regulate a fast-growing shadow market of weapons sold online that has contributed…
Soft Landing or No Landing? Fed’s Economic Picture Gets Complicated.
America seemed headed for an economic fairy-tale ending in late 2023. The painfully rapid inflation that had kicked off in 2021 appeared to be cooling in earnest, and economic growth…
Opinion | The Very High Stakes of Failing to Help Ukraine
Since Russia’s first invasion of Ukraine in 2014, a rare consensus has formed in Washington around this conviction: America must provide military support to Ukraine’s resistance. Three administrations and large…
24 Hours at a Makeshift Refuge for Migrants in the California Wilderness
It was 1:53 a.m., and Peter Fink was on a barren mountain plateau near Campo, Calif., passing out blankets to people from four continents who had arrived there under the…
Opinion | 2024, I’d Like You to Meet 1892
You could be forgiven — when browsing the Smithsonian’s political history collections, where I work as a curator — for assuming that the chief battle in American political history was…
Is the Boom-and-Bust Business Cycle Dead?
For much of modern history, even the richest nations have been subject to big perennial upswings and crashes in commercial activity almost as fixed as the four seasons. Periods of…
Opinion | Many Patients Don’t Survive End-Stage Poverty
He has an easy smile, blue eyes and a life-threatening bone infection in one arm. Grateful for treatment, he jokes with the medical intern each morning. A friend, a fellow…