“When a majority of Congress is finally made up of people with backbone, they will have the obligation to see that the current inhabitant of the White House is brought to justice,” Nathan L. Jaschik writes in a letter to The Times.

Trump’s proposed “compact” with nine major universities “is extortion, plain and simple,” Erwin Chemerinsky writes. “It is not hyperbole to say that the future of higher education in America requires that every university reject it.”

“I’m not exaggerating when I say it was a miracle that I left Urbana for college in my mom’s rusted Mustang, praying the whole way that its slippy clutch would not give out,” Beth Macy writes. But the world that allowed her to grow beyond her working-class upbringing in Ohio is no longer the same.

What does it mean that Taylor Swift “is now — or maybe has always been — a showgirl?” the author Lissa Townsend Rodgers writes in a guest essay. “Can Ms. Swift’s latest transformation be more than just another change on the costume rack?”

There’s no perfect parallel between the ongoing war in Gaza and the Northern Irish Troubles, Megan Stack writes, “but it’s worth recalling that Northern Ireland’s conflict was also dismissed as unresolvable.”

Trumpism “demolishes D.E.I. and replaces it with a degree of authoritarianism and incompetence that makes a mockery of the very idea of meritocracy,” our columnist David French writes.

America has “systematized this violence and we have normalized it,” Hasan Piker says to Ross Douthat on this episode of “Interesting Times.” “And inevitably that violence has also come back to the domestic front where there is unlimited bloodshed happening in schools.”

“Brussels, it seems, is nearing the end of its experiment in urban autonomy,” Anton Jäger writes. “The significance of this eclipse goes beyond Belgium.”

Autocrats in places like Russia, Hungary and Venezuela manipulate elections to their advantage, writes David Shimer, an expert on electoral interference. “But in other countries, the democratic opposition has overcome authoritarian rule and prevailed at the ballot box.”

“A new American from Congo whose grandmother wanted to kill her at birth and who was an elementary school dropout may be a better role model than our secretary of state,” our columnist @nickkristof.bsky.social writes.

“Turning the language of war inward is not unity; it’s division at its most dangerous,” Charlotte Neumann, a veteran and a spouse of a veteran, writes in a letter to The Times.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. “has been crusading against vaccines for decades, and his elevation to health and human services secretary brought forward the possibility of drastic change, even revolution. So where is it?” David Wallace-Wells asks.

The gender wage gap is widening, and women’s employment rates are down more than men’s. “This administration seems unconcerned about these statistics, and they’re certainly not shy about signaling how they see the American worker,” Jessica Grose writes.

“The threat that Venezuela’s drug trafficking networks are said to pose does not justify an American military mobilization this large,” Christopher Sabatini writes. “What some powerful members of the Trump administration want is regime change, and they want it as cheaply as possible.”

“The Trump administration has undermined the rule of law, protection of human rights and international justice, which all lie at the heart of a rules-based global order,” write the leaders of Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch.

“This objective fact about the 2024 election — that it was a narrow result in a closely divided nation — does not seem to matter, all that much, to the nation’s politics,” our columnist Jamelle Bouie writes.

“I’ve already been a baby, a 7-year-old, a teenager, 23 — I’ve done it all. Now I’m 54, and God willing, at some point I’ll be 84. I imagine it’ll feel roughly the same, just another stage of life,” Richard Osman says to Michelle Cottle on this episode of “The Opinions.”

“Trump is known for saying a lot of things that he can’t or won’t back up. This time, the threats are real,” our columnist Tressie McMillan Cottom writes.

“If there’s one person who can wrangle an alpha male, it’s Jane Goodall,” Kara Swisher said of the primatologist, who has died at 91. In 2020, the two talked on Swisher’s Times Opinion podcast “Sway” about Goodall’s work, celebrity status and influence on world leaders.

“It is easy to lose sight of the real stakes” in this government shutdown, the editorial board writes. “President Trump is seeking to deprive millions of Americans of their health insurance, and Senate Democrats are refusing to acquiesce.”

The growing embrace of James Talarico, a Texas Democratic lawmaker running for Senate, suggests that “things have gotten so bad in this country that even some of us who don’t have faith ourselves find comfort in listening to those who do,” our columnist Michelle Goldberg writes.

“Republicans have essentially stopped saying they want to repeal Obamacare, but quietly, they are doing exactly that,” Steven Rattner writes.

With Tuesday’s meeting of more than 800 U.S. admirals and generals, “the military was once again used as a backdrop for Mr. Trump’s ongoing clashes in America’s culture wars,” W.J. Hennigan writes.

From the editorial board: The war needs to end, for the sake of the Gazan people and for the sake of Israel and its security.

“This administration has shown in many of its actions that it is eager to figure out exactly what it can get away with,” William McClain writes in a letter to The Times. “Sadly, the answer is that it can and will get away with much.”

At the Supreme Court this year, “nonstop action, in particular on the shadow, or emergency, docket, that has often been shocking, in both volume and impact,” says Kate Shaw, in a discussion with William Baude and Stephen I. Vladeck.

As a recent viral video from a Starbucks shows, “baristas, often coded by the right as ‘woke,’ can end up pinned between hostile customers intent on humiliating us and a company intent on insulating itself.” Cassie Pritchard, a Starbucks barista, writes.

The Pentagon’s secrecy pledge for reporters “won’t safeguard our national security,” writes Ned Price. “It will only further erode our democracy.”

“In a world that feels increasingly uncertain and unsafe for children, it’s no wonder that parents generally and mothers, in particular, have embraced the ethos that they know best,” writes Jennifer Reich, a vaccine hesitancy researcher.

“By many accounts, Democrats are poised to shut down the government in order to look like they’re willing to ‘do something’ — anything — to thwart President Trump,” Newt Gingrich writes. “That might be what their base wants, but it’s not how you go about trying to win back the House majority.”

Mark Zuckerberg has a vision for how A.I. could be used in Meta's universe. But the actor and filmmaker Joseph Gordon-Levitt is here to point out a flaw in the technology: an apparent lack of guardrails around how the company's chatbot interacts with underage users. nyti.ms/3ILwCNo

“Long before concerns surfaced about the ‘woke right,’ long before the campaigns to cancel Mr. Kirk’s critics, it was clear that the right’s vision of power involved sharp limits on its opponents and on their free expression,” Nicole Hemmer writes.

“The Comey indictment will be an indelible stain on the Trump administration,” Marc Chafetz, a lawyer, writes in a letter to The Times.

“‘One Battle After Another’ has complicated things to say about left-wing political violence and self-serving radicalism, but it takes a clear side in the broader fight between authoritarianism and resistance,” our columnist Michelle Goldberg writes.

“Rather than punt the future of our monetary system to Silicon Valley, our lawmakers need to start building public infrastructure again,” writes Amit Seru.

“A strategy for remaking the Democratic Party is coming together — a coalition of moderates and progressives leaning into economic populism while leaving room to maneuver in the culture war,” writes Tim Shenk.

“If you’ve flown recently, perhaps you’ve had some extra time on the tarmac to wonder what went wrong,” writes Binyamin Appelbaum. “A big part of the answer: Government shutdowns.”

“If we don’t want A.I. to become our unelected supreme leader, we must recognize that we have options and refuse to passively allow Big Tech to grow gargantuan and shape society without guardrails or consequences,” writes Andrea Bartz.

“Our job now, to land the plane, is repair, restoration, reconciliation,” Ken Burns tells David Leonhardt on The Opinions. Together, they explore what America’s next story should be, why the American Revolution has never really ended — and the greatest existential threat facing the country today.

“History shows that the virulent fury uncorked by a communal outrage incident can set off a cascade of unpredictable and dreadful consequences,” Steven Pinker writes about the aftermath of Charlie Kirk’s killing.

In the days after Charlie Kirk’s murder, Ta-Nehisi Coates published a piece in Vanity Fair that was “harshly critical” of Ezra Klein’s column on Kirk’s legacy. On this episode of “The Ezra Klein Show,” the two men discuss Klein’s column, Kirk’s death and the work of politics on the left.

“There’s a reason that Trump leans into culture war rhetoric so much. He knows how divisive it can be for his opponents,” Ryan Burge tells the Times Opinion editor John Guida on religion and the left.

“There are times when I miss practicing law, because — right now — there are few more important posts for defending the rule of law and the integrity of the American system of justice than on James Comey’s defense team,” our columnist David French writes.

Many MAHA activists believe that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. “has abandoned his principles to appease Mr. Trump’s agricultural donors, and that the Roundup crisis will only get worse,” Michael Grunwald writes. They may be right on the first point — “but they’re also wrong: There is no Roundup crisis.”

“I find a glimmer of hope when my neighbor with his flag at half-staff (pro-Charlie Kirk) and I with my yard signs (anti-Trump) can warmly shake hands,” Michael Rooke-Ley writes in a letter to The Times.

Nearly 20 years after the death of Roger Rosenblatt’s daughter, “the past, miraculously and mercifully, does not feel painful,” he writes. “I am peaceful with the memory of my child, experiencing my life with her as if for the first time.”

“The most eloquent case against indicting Comey — against using the Department of Justice as an instrument of personal revenge — comes courtesy of Trump himself,” our columnist Carlos Lozada writes.

“I don’t fully understand how my laptop works, but I know who made it and why, and I have a pretty good sense of its capacities and limits,” our columnist Ross Douthat writes. “That’s not the case with technologies that are in the process of remaking our world.”

“Mr. Trump’s effort to stifle dissent is blatantly illegal,” Harvey M. Berman writes in a letter to The Times. “Republicans in Congress have abdicated their responsibility to rein him in, essentially granting him license to do whatever he wants.”

“President Trump’s cuts to humanitarian assistance abroad have hurt all kinds of people. But from what I see on the ground, those suffering the most are women and girls — and that will leave all of us, including men and boys, worse off,” our columnist Nicholas Kristof writes.