States are preparing to spend a share of a $50 billion federal rural health fund on artificial intelligence tools, and the peer-reviewed evidence that these tools improve access to care or patient health in rural communities is so thin it could fit in a short bibliography. A recent academic review found only 26 peer-reviewed studies…
For the past six weeks or so I’ve been having a recurring fight with my friends. The dispute is over whether or not it’s ethical to support the U.S. national team in the World Cup. To the vast majority of people reading this article, this is an absurd question: of course you can and should…
Like many of my fellow Americans, I have spent much of this year contemplating the meaning of America’s 250th birthday. I have participated in fantastic events to mark this momentous occasion, and I have read dozens of reflections on America that range from passionately patriotic to sharply critical and everything in between. Yet, out of…
The United States is turning 250. As I write this, sprawled out in a shallow inflatable pool in my yard, a gull-winged WWII-era Corsair has just thundered low over the trees. The rumble of warbirds has been rolling across the sky all day. It stirs a feeling deep inside me, not of sentiment but of…
Our Back Pages / June 26, 2026 How did anniversary events become so politically charged? Ad Policy An American flag flies during a rally. (Dedan Photography / Shutterstock) By 1973, three years before the United States was set to celebrate its 200th birthday, the American Revolution Bicentennial Commission (ARBC), an official government body tasked with…
