Latest Articles

How Republicans can fix Obamacare now

August 1, 2017  •  The Washington Post

The failure of Senate Republicans to pass even their "skinny" repeal bill is a serious disappointment to critics of the Affordable Care Act. Despite campaign rhetoric suggesting otherwise, "repeal and replace" of the ACA is something Republicans are apparently unable and likely unwilling to do. The only silver lining for conservatives is that the failure has demonstrated what the political market will bear when it comes to changes to the law.

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It's Summer, Time to Catch Up on Your Reading

July 31, 2017  •  National Review Online

Looking for stories of strong presidential leadership, I recently read two worthy books on Dwight Eisenhower: David A. Nichols's Ike and McCarthy: Dwight Eisenhower's Secret Campaign against Joseph McCarthy and Michael Doran's Ike's Gamble: America's Rise to Dominance in the Middle East. Nichols looks at how Eisenhower worked behind the scenes to marginalize Wisconsin senator Joe McCarthy, even going to great lengths to avoid saying McCarthy's name. When it came to emasculating McCarthy, though, Ike wanted it to happen in as public a way as possible. Both Ike and Senate Democratic leader Lyndon Johnson pushed to have the Army–McCarthy hearings televised, understanding, as Nichols understatedly puts it, that "television was not kind to McCarthy." Indeed, it was not.

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Can Conservatives Find Their Way?

July 8, 2017  •  The New York Times

It is increasingly obvious these days that many of the people who call themselves conservative can't even agree on what the term means. Despite simultaneous Republican control of the White House and both houses of Congress, the conservative movement seems endlessly at odds.

Senator Mitch McConnell's recent troubles with the Republican health care bill have presented a window into these continuing disagreements for the world at large to peek through. But health care is hardly the only issue on which the movement is divided: looming debates on tax reform, trade, foreign policy and immigration imperil conservative progress.

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A Brief History of Presidents Firing People

July 3, 2017  •  Washingtonian

Before he was the President, Donald Trump was most famous for booting people on TV—a habit that has proved hard to quit. So far, acting attorney general Sally Yates, national-security adviser Michael Flynn, and FBI director James Comey (above) have all found themselves on the receiving end of the onetime TV host's catchphrase, "You're fired."

But while Trump might be the first reality star to become President, he's hardly the first President to do high-profile firing. We combed through the history of executive dismissals to see who really stood out.

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review of His Fathers Son: The Life of General Ted Roosevelt, Jr.

July 3, 2017  •  The Weekly Standard

In the 1962 D-Day ensemble The Longest Day, an aging Henry Fonda plays the small but important role of General Ted Roosevelt Jr. General Roosevelt, three decades older than the troops he is leading, hides his cane in order to persuade his superiors to allow his participation in the invasion, then uses the cane as he exhorts troops forward under withering fire on Utah Beach.

Roosevelt died a month after D-Day, age 56, not of any injuries but of a heart attack. And unless you have seen the movie, it's unlikely you know much about him. He seems to be a somewhat forgotten figure in American history, an oversight Tim Brady is trying to correct in this new biography.

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Books by Tevi Troy