Here is what Mitt Romney should say without further delay: I hereby make public all hitherto unpublished information about my income taxes. It was a lapse of judgment on my part not to have done this sooner. I am proud to pay taxes. As the press will learn when it examines the records I have [...]

Not long ago, the emphasis was on encouraging voter turnout. Nowadays, it’s on shutting down access to the polls. The efforts have become so numerous that New York University’s Brennan Center for Justice has taken to keeping a running tally of the restrictions. A recent count: • “At least 180 restrictive bills introduced since the [...]

The New York Times reminded its readers recently of the enormous part played by guilty pleas in the criminal justice system – 97 percent of federal cases and 94 percent of state cases are decided by pleas rather than trials. The Times called the statistics “stunning.” The Times and its readers might be even more [...]

“Everyone needs an editor,”a veteran editor advised me. I count that among the most useful advice I encountered in a lengthy career. It is pertinent not only for journalists. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia could have benefited the other day from a fresh pair of eyes reviewing his written reaction to something President Obama said [...]

When Warren Buffett invests, investors pay attention. So when the Oracle of Omaha recently put his Berkshire Hathaway money into newspapers, it was bound to cause others to take a second look at this neglected financial sector. And a good thing, too. Newspapers are too important to the health of communities for them to be [...]

Republican lawmakers are fond of talking about voter fraud to justify measures to make it harder to vote. Wendy Weiser of New York University’s Brennan Center of Justice put her finger on the nation’s biggest source of voter fraud when she said, “Every year, election officials strike millions of names from the voting rolls using [...]

Colin Powell’s latest book, clumsily titled, It Worked For Me: In Life and Leadership, confesses to “one of my momentous failures.” The failure: his Feb. 5, 2003, speech to the United Nations urging war against Iraq. That speech, he belatedly admits, was heavily larded with falsehoods. Public opinion was divided about the advisability of war [...]

If Republicans are interested in starting to dig themselves out of the hole they dug for themselves with women, they might consider dedicating the coming GOP national convention, in Tampa, to the memory of Mary Louise Smith, the first female chairwoman of the Republican National Committee. She held the post from 1974 to 1977, and [...]

If you were worried that you wouldn’t be allowed firearms at the Republican national convention this year in Tampa, relax. Florida Gov. Rick Scott stepped in to assure that there would be no firearms-free zone on his watch in Florida. Tampa’s mayor had written to Scott to request an executive order that would temporarily waive [...]

Democrats are extremely fortunate that they did not fall for John Edwards’ good looks, charm and smooth talking populism and make him their party’s presidential nominee in 2004. If they had, and Edwards had won the race against George W. Bush, the party and the country would now be knee-deep in the seamy story of [...]