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Jerry Garcia's nameless grace
Steve Chapman
Published: Tue, May 21, 2013
I was sitting in a classroom in McCosh Hall at Princeton University one spring day in the late 1970s, when I learned something that helped me understand the artistic genius of Jerry Garcia. No music played in that room that day -- only the amiable voice of professor Henry Miller. I don't...
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Steve Chapman: Let the market set the price of natural gas
Steve Chapman
Published: Wed, May 8, 2013
For decades, Americans have been told of the evils of importing energy. It sends our money abroad, the argument goes, makes us vulnerable to supply disruptions, strengthens our enemies and weakens the economy. Now, though, the tide is turning. Domestic natural gas production is booming. Not...
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Steve Chapman: Put not your trust in surveillance cameras
Steve Chapman
Updated: Fri, May 3, 2013
Video surveillance cameras have been growing in popularity for years, but in recent weeks their advance has gotten a turbo boost. After helping to identify two suspects in the Boston Marathon bombings, they went from occasionally desirable to universally vital. Mayor Rahm Emanuel of Chicago,...
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Steve Chapman: Stay out of Syria
Steve Chapman
Published: Wed, May 1, 2013
With the Iraq war behind us and our departure from Afghanistan underway, the United States could be entering a well-earned respite from fighting. But even before peace can take hold, hawks are singing the old country song: "I've enjoyed as much of this as I can stand." They see a way to escape...
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Steve Chapman: TSA repents of making a good decision
Steve Chapman
Published: Sat, Apr 27, 2013
Once in a while, a government agency adopts a policy that is logical, hardheaded, based on experience and unswayed by cheap sentiment. This may be surprising enough to make you reconsider your view of bureaucrats. But not to worry: It usually doesn't last. In March the federal Transportation...
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Steve Chapman: Don't trade freedom for security
Steve Chapman
Published: Wed, Apr 24, 2013
According to a 19th-century composer named Francis Scott Key, the United States is the "land of the free and the home of the brave." If he were writing those lyrics today, he might add an asterisk with the notation: "Void in the aftermath of terrorism." In the wake of the Boston Marathon...
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Steve Chapman: Terrorism is on the decline
Steve Chapman
Published: Wed, Apr 17, 2013
Our era is known as the Age of Terror, and no wonder. Twelve years ago, the United States suffered its worst terrorist attack ever, and since then, we have lived under the shadow of atrocities designed to frighten as well as kill. The bombs that went off in Boston put to rest the hope that with...
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Steve Chapman: On Plan B, Democrats are the anti-science party
Steve Chapman
Published: Wed, Apr 10, 2013
Democrats claim we have one party that upholds science and one that rejects it. When it comes to climate change, presidential polling, evolution and other topics, we are told, Republicans have no use for actual experts. They'd rather listen to Rep. Michele Bachmann, who claimed the HPV vaccine...
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Steve Chapman: The no-fly list is terrible
Steve Chapman
Published: Sat, Mar 30, 2013
Flying commercial can be a terrible hassle these days, but not for Steven Washburn. The people in charge of airport security have decided to spare him all the inconveniences. No taking off his shoes and belt, no putting his liquids in a plastic bag, no enduring a naked body scan. Oh, and one...
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Steve Chapman: Supreme Court issued troubling privacy ruling this week
Steve Chapman
Updated: Wed, Mar 27, 2013
The New Yorker magazine once had a cartoon showing a storefront office with the company name on the window: "None of Your Damn Business Inc." If it were publicly traded, the corporation's stock would be down this morning. That's because of Tuesday's ruling by the Supreme Court in a case barely...
