In a sense, President Donald Trump threaded a rhetorical needle last week explaining why he will prolong the war in Afghanistan that he had opposed as a candidate. America will no longer fight for girls’ schools and democracy. Instead, it will fight to destroy terrorists. “We will not dictate to the Afghan people how to live, or how to govern …

Most academic models of international trade are pretty simplistic. Some of these models are surprisingly effective for making certain types of predictions—for example, economists are very good at predicting how much different countries will trade with each other. But they’re not so good at predicting what kind of things the countries will specialize in, which country will have a trade …

Democrats are in terrible shape. Republicans control all three branches of government in Washington, 34 of 50 governorships, and 68 of the 99 state legislatures. As they plot a comeback, Democrats have one obvious asset: the reckless presidency of Donald Trump. That’s not enough to close such a huge gap. And the battles that have started to rage inside the …