After spending 25 years as a columnist for the New York Times, Paul Krugman is finally retiring from that position—25 years too late, if one wishes to be honest. It is hard to measure the influence he had from that perch, but his columns surely were the deciding factor in his winning the Nobel in economics in 2008 after eight years of lambasting the George W. Bush administration.

“I wanted to save a half million boys on our side.... I never lost any sleep over my decision.”—Harry Truman, (quoted in Alfred Steinberg, The Man From Missouri (New York, 1962), p. 259)

There will never come a time when all human beings are in full ideological agreement, which is why free speech is of paramount importance to peaceful co-existence. Free speech is the only foundation on which men who disagree with each other can debate their opposing ideologies, or even hurl insults at each other if so inclined, but ultimately all the protagonists can do is try to persuade each other. All this changes when the state gets involved and decides to wield state force in backing one side or the other.

[Editor’s note: Trump’s nominee for Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, has faced some significant opposition to his nomination in the US Senate. His nomination is by no means assured, although his opponents have offered few specifics as to why they oppose Hegseth’s nomination. Much criticism has come in the form of Hegseth’s personal habits, but it is unlikely this is the real potential deal breaker. Given that Hegseth has extensive experience working with military institutions, one might think he is to be regarded as a good fit for the position.

According to today’s report from the federal government’s Bureau of Labor Statistics, the US economy added 227,000 payroll jobs during November, according to the establishment survey. The unemployment rate rose slightly to 4.2 percent. 

This follows October’s jobs report which was the weakest since 2020. In October, private-sector employment fell month-over-month by 2,000 jobs.

Following their overwhelming defeat in the July 2024 general election, Britain’s Conservative Party recently elected Kemi Badenoch as its newest leader, meaning that she would become Prime Minister if the Conservatives win the next general election.

After the Cold War ended, many people thought that communism was a dead issue, and fashionable pundits like Francis Fukuyama claimed that we were witnessing the global triumph of liberal capitalism. But communism, in fact, never went away, and in these days we have witnessed its revival with, for example, the Marxist policies advocated by Kamala Harris. It is essential in these circumstances to be reminded of communism’s grim record.