The Footnote
When this little Israeli film was first shown, the producers expected a half-dozen people in the audience. This should not have been a popular film, but to everyone’s surprise, audiences loved it and it was Israel’s nomination for the Best Foreign Film at the 84th Academy Awards celebration.

The story follows the intense and painful competition between two scholars, father and son, who both teach in the Talmud Department of Hebrew University. Th more...

Several reporters have received the Pulitzer Prize for journalism for their investigation of the New York Police Department “spying” on Muslim communities. These reporters claim Muslims are being “unfairly profiled” and their privacy violated. Should we make the police stop their spying? Do we want no profiling at all, in the name of “fairness?”

The first duty of all government is to protect people from violence and criminal activity. Most of us, even those champions of gun righ more...

Americans are accustomed to thinking that our 1776 revolution was the model for all others. This may account for the wacky optimism of Western journalists cheering on the street demonstrations in Egypt, Tunisia, and Libya. They assumed these demonstrations would truly give rise to American style democracy. They now see that this is not so.

Those of us who were less enthusiastic can justify our pessimism by noting what’s going on in Libya (revenge and lawlessness) and in Syria, a more...