Since his return to office, President Donald Trump has missed few chances to flex the power he wields over the nation’s most formidable institutions and its wealthiest people. So when the White House announced that Trump would host the latest in a series of dinners with top business executives, …

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The bulletins come every few days now. On Tuesday, a U.S. strike in the …

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Late in Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick, one character wonders to another “whether the world is anchored anywhere.” It was a fair question in November 1851, when Moby-Dick …

The window President Donald Trump opened in the Middle East is narrow, but it is real. His intervention helped bring about a cease-fire that many thought impossible. In a region exhausted by endless war, that act alone deserves recognition. But ahead lies a task even more difficult than halting …

Updated with new questions at 1:45 p.m. ET on November 13, 2025.

The famed 18th-century lexicographer Samuel Johnson was a lover of learning. As the dictionary maker once wrote, he dedicated his life “wholly to curiosity,” with the intent “to wander over the boundless regions of general knowledge.” (He was …

Delayed two hours, hunched over my laptop in the Dallas Fort Worth C-terminal Admirals Club, I was frantically rearranging my plans. The government shutdown, still ongoing at the time, had caused major disruptions at U.S. airports. If my flight were canceled, the airline would refund me for my ticket. But …

Animal-rights groups have long been at odds with the U.S. government, which subsidizes meat and dairy production and spends billions of dollars on animal research every year. But in some ways, they’ve found themselves seeing eye to eye with the Trump administration. This year, the White House has broadcast its …

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In September, I published a column that laid out the design of my morning protocol, which uses the best available research to manage my mood—especially my natural negativity—and optimize …