Today’s questions look back to a quarter century ago, as well as to what feels like a quarter century ago: 2024. Good luck!
And by the way, did you know that in addition to Democrats and Republicans (as well as their Federalist, Whig, and other predecessors), the Senate has held members of at least a dozen smaller parties throughout its history? These members generally caucused with the big dogs, but they retained their boutique identities.
Sidar Can Eren / Anadolu / Getty
A stork perches on its nest atop a power pole after returning for spring, in the Mazgirt district of Tunceli, Turkey, on March 18, 2026.Patrick Pleul / DPA / Getty
A robin, seen in Brandenburg, Germany, on March 8, 2026Patrick Pleul / DPA / Reuters
A goldeneye takes flight near Kersdorf, Germany.Chi Shiyong / VCG / Getty
Ring-necked pheasants play in the snow at Longfeng wetland nature reserve on March 8, 2026, in Daqing, Heilongjiang province, China.
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On this week’s episode of The David Frum Show, The Atlantic’s David Frum opens with his thoughts on President Trump’s dangerous disregarding of Congress’s powers of war-making and peacemaking. David argues that though Republicans have enabled the president’s dark impulses, Democrats in congress also seem happy to turn a blind eye to the Trump administration’s actions in Iran.
The Trump administration is escalating threats against news organizations, with President Trump suggesting outlets should face “treason” charges for disseminating false information. Brendan Carr, the chair of the Federal Communications Commission, has also threatened to revoke broadcasters’ licenses over their coverage of the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran. This all comes as allies of President Trump consolidate their control over several major media outlets.
A top national security official resigned from the Trump administration Tuesday in response to the war on Iran. “Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation, and it is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby,” Joe Kent, who served as director of the National Counterterrorism Center, wrote in his resignation letter.
As the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran continues, we look at how the Pentagon is using artificial intelligence in its operations. The system, known as Project Maven, relies on technology by Palantir and also incorporates the AI model Claude built by Anthropic. Israel has used similar AI targeting programs in Iran, as well as in Gaza and Lebanon.
Live Nation’s settlement with the Justice Department is a big step toward accountability—and cheaper ticket prices.
The McDonald’s CEO took the tiniest bite of their biggest burger—and the internet went wild.
As a result of the ruling, HHS has postponed a planned meeting of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices this week.
More states are giving tax breaks to businesses that help employees sign up for Obamacare using an authority Trump created.
Current grants run out on April 1.
A conference in Washington this week showcases mainstream and alternative health practices, a teen beauty queen and scientists.
Clinics are pleading with Congress and HHS for answers amid “radio silence” about the imminent expiration of Title X funding.
Outward’s hosts sit down with the host and co-creator of When We All Get to Heaven.
The neighborhood changes, the church moves, people forget and remember “the AIDS years,” but AIDS isn’t over.
The AIDS cocktail opens new possibilities. And MCC San Francisco tries to use the experience of AIDS to make bigger social change.
The church’s minister gets sick and everyone knows it.
The church’s “it couple” faces AIDS, caregiving, and loss as part of a pair, part of families, and part of a community.
President Donald Trump has taken one risk after another that could have destabilized the American economy. Iran is the latest crisis to test U.S. economic resilience.
The president stopped in Marjorie Taylor Greene’s old district to defend his economic record.
A brief swing through the farm state underscored administration fears about the midterms.
It was supposed to be easy. In the weeks after President Trump authorized the military raid to snatch Nicolás Maduro from Venezuela, he would tell pretty much any audience about how flawlessly the operation had gone. During a late-January phone call with Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, who was seething after federal immigration agents killed two of his residents, the president dominated the conversation by going into great detail about the Caracas incursion.
Joe Kent, the U.S. government’s top counterterrorism official and a self-identified “America First” Republican, is not the only Donald Trump ally to disagree with the president’s decision to attack Iran. But today he became the first senior government official to do so publicly, quitting his job and offering an explanation that undercut Trump’s rationale for starting the war.
Tornadoes did not hit the nation’s capital yesterday, and many meteorologists on the internet are extremely sorry. “What a HORRIBLE forecast by meteorologists—especially myself,” Matthew Cappucci, of the weather app MyRadar, posted on X yesterday after the tornado warnings that prompted schools, businesses, and museums to close across the Washington region had fizzled into your average rainy day.
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When Joe Kent, the director of the National Counterterrorism Center, resigned today in protest of the Iran war, he blamed everyone except the person who launched it.
Updated at 6:54 p.m. ET on March 17, 2026
In February 2025, Donald Trump nominated Joe Kent, a 2020-election conspiracy theorist with links to the Proud Boys and white supremacists, as head of the National Counterterrorism Center. What could possibly go wrong?
Kent’s beliefs did not complicate his tenure, during which Trump continued smearing minorities and insisting the 2020 presidential election had been stolen. The sticking point, rather, became the war in Iran.
It’s quietly reshaping Main Street medicine. Your wallet—and health—might suffer as a result.
A jury in Texas has convicted eight people in the first federal anti-terror case since the Trump administration declared “antifa” a terror group. Nine defendants alleged to be members of an “antifa terror cell” stood trial on federal and state charges including rioting, using explosives and attempted murder. The charges stemmed from their attendance at an anti-ICE protest outside the Prairieland ICE jail on July 4, during which fireworks were set off and a police officer was shot and wounded.
Cuba’s electrical grid has collapsed. The island-wide blackout comes amid a harsh U.S. oil blockade and recent comments from President Donald Trump that he wants to “take” Cuba. No oil shipments have reached the country, located just south of Florida, in three months, compounding a humanitarian crisis caused by decades of severe U.S. sanctions. “Sanctions are literally killing people right now,” says Cuban journalist Daniel Montero with Belly of the Beast, speaking from Havana.
