Get ready for a little deja vu from Washington. The federal government is about to hit the debt ceiling, now set at a whopping $16.8 trillion. Yes, again. It’s like the Bill Murray movie “Groundhog Day” — only this time, unfortunately, no one is laughing. Time and again, Congress bumps up against the debt ceiling amid talk of finally getting spending under control. Time…

If the Senate has its way, online sales taxes are coming to a computer near you. The so-called Marketplace Fairness Act sailed through the Senate on Monday by a 69-27 margin. If approved in the House, the act won't just cost you money. It will also put the United States on the road to adopting a European-style national sales tax. When politicians say something's about…

Critics of a study the Heritage Foundation released yesterday looking at the costs of amnesty for illegal immigrants have done something strange — they’ve attacked us for not doing the study they wanted us to do. It is odd that so many politicians and outsiders feel that they should decide what an educational institution such as Heritage should and shouldn’t…

In the aftermath of the Boston bombings, many are asking how someone who came to America at the age of 9, attended some of our best schools, captained the wrestling team, went to the prom and became a citizen could have inflicted such a devastating attack on our society. The emerging evidence suggests that part of the answer is that no one in the past decade taught…

As a general rule, whenever one hears members of Congress talking about "fairness," you should hold on tight to your wallet. That's certainly the case with the proposed "Marketplace Fairness Act," which has been under consideration in the Senate. The bill is aimed at leveling the sales-tax playing field between Internet merchants and so-called brick-and-mortar…

It’s not amnesty, we’re told. Oh, no. Yet the immigration bill that was recently introduced in the U.S. Senate would give legal residency to the estimated 11 million people who are here illegally. News flash: That’s amnesty. The bill’s supporters may be motivated by a desire to create a clean slate. Just accept those who have already made their way here, they’re saying…

The United States has always been a nation of immigrants, at our best when welcoming to our shores those who "yearn to breathe free." Indeed, immigration has had many positive effects on our economy and society. We have successfully, if not perfectly, lived out our motto of "out of many, one." We have had a culture and limited government that encouraged individual…

Let's get real on the "sequester." One month in, not much has changed. Nor is it likely to. Rather than devastating the federal government, the sequester is necessary to rein in the unbridled growth of federal spending. The sequester is certainly flawed. It's a blunt instrument leaving the biggest spending drivers, entitlements, virtually untouched. It means that over…

Say you’re running a business, and you find yourself awash in red ink. You realize it’s time to retool your approach, and fast. So you ask two different employees each to come up with a budget. You’ll go with whoever writes the best plan. What are the chances that one of them will submit a budget that never puts you in the black? One that suggests you raise prices and…

In case you haven’t heard, we’re in the midst of a massive spending crisis. Yup. It’s a real bummer. Unless we have some real action out of Washington — and quick — the tsunami of red ink coming our way will mean massive debt or crippling levels of taxes. So what is Washington doing about it? First up, the president. He had a statutory responsibility to present a budget…

Like snow during a long stretch of miserable winter weather, the U.S. has been piling up debt year after year. Being “snowed under” in this way is profoundly depressing, fiscally as well as mentally. Economists have a term for this: “debt drag.” It occurs when national debt piles up so high that it becomes a drag on the economy, slowing long-term growth of GDP and…

“Sequester.” It’s a word that used to come up rarely. It nearly always referred to a jury being locked away to deliberate a verdict. Now it’s all over the news, a stand-in for the automatic spending cuts scheduled to hit the federal budget Friday. The only jury is an American public that has grown all too accustomed to seeing politicians dodge the tough choices necessary…

Anyone hoping to hear a more conciliatory speech than the inaugural address must have been disappointed to hear an equally argumentative President deliver this year’s State of the Union Address. Oblivious to a Republican-controlled House of Representatives, the president ticked off a laundry list of lofty progressive goals that are sure to placate his liberal base, but…

Are tax hikes on the way? Some federal lawmakers hope so. “It’s a great opportunity to get us some more revenue,” Sen. Charles E. Schumer, New York Democrat, recently said of the upcoming debate over the federal budget. You know what that means: calls to raise taxes on the rich. Lawmakers can’t seem to refrain from eyeing the golden goose. It seems fair to most…

I have just read a staggering report written by my colleagues Patrick D. Tyrell and William W. Beach for the Heritage Foundation's Center for Data Analysis (I direct the Margaret Thatcher Centre for Freedom at Heritage.) It is a real eye-opener for anyone who cares about America’s future as the world’s superpower, on either side of the Atlantic. Ironically, Britain,…