RealClearPolicy Articles

U.S. tech executives seem to like to compare the race for global AI dominance to the nuclear arms race – it’s huge, it’s terrifying, but we have to win it. Like they said in Oppenheimer, “I don't know if we can be trusted with such a weapon. But I know the Nazis can't.” Because America got the bomb first, we won World War II. Because we continued to make better bombs than the Soviets, we won the Cold War. If we win the Artificial Intelligence (AI) race, then we inure ourselves against cyberattacks from terrorists, the CCP, the Russians,...

The South Korean government has not been friendly to American businesses – specifically in the technology space. While the United States has a trade deficit with most nations, if you only analyze the service industry, dominated by tech service exports, there is more than a $300 billion trade surplus. Not a coincidence that many nations have created protectionism against American tech service imports. Recently, a number of US investors decided to pursue litigation against the South Korean government for losses due to attacks on American business – joining the ranks of Altimeter...

The California high-speed rail debacle has become Exhibit A for why it is increasingly difficult for policymakers anywhere in America to bring large-scale infrastructure projects online, with the public suffering as a result. In 2008, California voters approved “a $9.95 billion bond measure for an 800-mile High-Speed Train network” that was to connect San Francisco to Los Angeles, with trains running up to 220 miles per hour. The work was scheduled for completion in 2020. It was to emulate similar projects in Europe and Asia and be a game changer for American...

Americans living and working abroad are unofficial ambassadors for our country. They bring a spirit of pride, ingenuity, and optimism to the work that they do. They come from all walks of life and every industry in America. They are small business owners, teachers, students, retirees, and entrepreneurs whose contributions benefit both their host countries and the United States. Unfortunately, Americans abroad are some of the only foreign nationals in the world who are subject to double taxation on their income, a distinction the U.S. shares with Eritrea, one of the least developed nations on...

Many Americans support Donald Trump's presidency because they see him as a bulwark against a world bent on implementing socialism, wokeness, and the abandonment of traditional American values. Despite a media hellbent on his destruction, impeachment, and multiple assassination attempts, he has stood firm defending American jobs, American sovereignty, and American capitalism in a world where his political opponents are embracing globalist agendas that prioritize international institutions over national interests. To his supporters, Trump embodies resistance to a cultural and economic...

Governor Wes Moore says he is "excited." Practically giddy. Excited to sign legislation that makes it harder—no, illegal—for local law enforcement in Maryland to cooperate with federal law enforcement. Excited to help the criminal class. Excited to put ideology ahead of public safety. That’s not my characterization. That’s the governor’s own enthusiasm, on full display last week, as Democrats in Annapolis rushed through a bill designed to block cooperation between local jails, correctional facilities, and federal authorities—specifically when it comes to...

Over the past year, Minnesota has become a national symbol in political rhetoric about government waste and fraud. Republican lawmakers and allied commentators have repeatedly pointed to the state as evidence that public benefit programs—especially Medicaid and child-care subsidies—are riddled with abuse. Headlines and hearing soundbites now regularly invoke figures in the “billions,” suggesting a system so compromised that ordinary oversight has failed. Yet when one steps back from the rhetoric and examines what has actually been confirmed in court over the past two...

After years of confusion and regulatory hostility to crypto assets, Washington is finally waking up to what President Trump understood on the campaign trail: cryptocurrency is the next frontier to economic freedom. It’s not a fad, but rather true innovation that rethinks how we can navigate free markets in the digital age. On Monday, February 2, 2026, the White House convened executives from America’s largest banks and cryptocurrency companies as landmark legislation stalls in the U.S. Senate. Debate between these two powerful sectors has hinged on how regulation should...

Netflix faced a tough grilling in a Congressional hearing this week about their effort to merge with Warner Brothers and was given the opportunity to make their case that the merger will benefit consumers of streaming services. Politicians like to give CEOs a hard time, yet the big take-away from the hearing was that there should be little concern about too much control by one company over streaming services. There is plenty of competition today in the streaming service space and, when this deal is approved by regulators, there will remain strong competition for customers in the streaming...

Last week, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) marked the one-year anniversary of the fatal midair collision at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport by announcing the crash’s probable causes and contributing factors. Among the findings, the NTSB made one unmistakable point: this crash was avoidable. Had the aviation sector heeded a longstanding NTSB recommendation that all aircraft in a congested airspace integrate ADS-B — a faster and more accurate location technology than traditional radar — 67 lives could have been saved. There are two ways ADS-B works:...

A milestone in the treatment of Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) passed recently with remarkably little public notice. That silence is a sign of progress.  For years, advances in DMD arrived with fanfare because they were rare and precarious: the first exon-skipping drug, the first gene therapy, the first approval of anything beyond steroids and supportive care. Each was treated as a singular wager—scientific, regulatory, and moral—on whether modern medicine could alter a devastating childhood disease.  A recent study shows that the availability...

For much of history, nations that possessed a technological advantage were often more successful economically and geopolitically. Looking forward, it appears that the development and deployment of artificial intelligence, or AI, will determine where those advantages manifest in the 21st century. The Trump Administration’s AI Action Plan addresses the role of AI in this global game and creates a necessary framework for the U.S. to establish and protect its advantage. I believe it provides a solid foundation of policy, security, and incentives, but its ultimate success is incumbent on the...

For many decades now a federal policy called the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) has raised gas prices and transferred billions of dollars from consumers to politically-connected special interests. The RFS is a policy requiring that gas at the pump contains corn-based ethanol and other bio-fuels. The mandate can raise gas prices by as much as 30 cents a gallon. Its intention was to reduce air pollution and reduce America’s reliance on foreign oil. But its political goal was to help farm states by increasing demand for corn and other ag products mixed into every gallon of gas...

Only in America, with the army of lawyers looking for opportunities to make money, could an industry crop up to promote litigation. There is something called “Third Party Litigation Funding (TPLF) that allows financiers, including hedge funds, to invest in lawsuits for a percentage of the judgement or settlement. This effort is marketed by trial lawyers as “access to justice,” yet it gives access to the wealthy to fund lawsuits to make a profit. Our legal system was not designed to be an investment opportunity for the wealthy. Not enough is known about who funds specific...

Family farmers are among the great guardians of the sovereignty of the United States. By putting American grown and produced food on American tables, they ensure our nation remains independent, secure, and beholden to no one. But right now, the American Dream is slipping away from those very people who helped build it. We are at risk of losing the heart of rural America for good. Across the heartland, the cost of doing business skyrocketed, leading to anxiety for farming operations coast to coast. In 2025, farm production costs...

Conservatives have long stood for a simple but powerful idea: prosperity is achieved through freedom, competition, and growth. That principle has powered America’s economic dynamism and provided hard-working families with the opportunity to live out the American Dream. It’s no coincidence that our economy has been and continues to be the envy of the world, while other countries stifle their own growth with heavy-handed regulations and misguided policies like price controls. Unfortunately, many left-wing politicians in the United States look to these failed economies abroad as...

For far too long, terrorist groups such as ISIS, ISWAP and Boko Haram have carried out violent crimes against innocent Nigerian civilians. These attacks have included religious persecution and indiscriminate kidnappings for ransom, affecting both Christians and Muslims alike. When terrorists strike, Nigerians suffer regardless of their faith. President Tinubu’s administration, in which I am honoured to serve, is fully committed to defeating these criminals and restoring peace and stability across Nigeria. This commitment is already producing tangible results. It is true that many...

Welfare fraud scandals in Minnesota have focused the nation’s attention on benefit abuse, and the US Department of Labor recently detailed a team there to investigate whether unemployment insurance (UI) benefits have been ripped off. There’s a good chance the answer is yes, and that some of the blame resides with how we pay for administering UI benefits. While that sounds like a boring topic, two facts might alter that opinion: during the pandemic, flaws in today’s administrative financing system contributed to delays in paying benefits to millions of claimants along with...

One of the core missions of my WBAL radio show—and my work more broadly—is simple: commentary based on facts. That shouldn’t be controversial. But in today’s debate over immigration enforcement and ICE, facts are either ignored, distorted, or deliberately buried under ideology. Nowhere is that clearer than in what’s unfolding in Minnesota. We’re told—by politicians, activists, and too many media outlets—that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is running wild, scooping people off the streets, terrorizing communities, arresting citizens,...