"The humanitarian crisis at the border is not a political problem. It is not even an immigration problem. It is merely the latest instance of a global refugee crisis."

"I’m glad that Stephanopoulos feels better, but why did he feel bad in the first place?"

"No more optics, guys. Not until you demonstrate an ability to use the word like adults."

"The American health care system is excellent - if you can figure out how to work it, and if you don't mind waiting, and if you aren't scared that you might get an enormous bill after the work is done."

"Is it worth sleeping in a mansion if it means living as a ghost?"

"That’s how I found myself, one dreary day when my Honda wouldn’t start, in my husband’s Mercedes at the WIC office."

"We had an immense housing bubble, and, when the bubble burst, it left a huge hold in spending. Everything else is footnotes."

"Once upon a time, the appellation 'queer' named an opposition to identity politics, a commitment to coalition, a vision of alternative worlds. Now it has become a weak umbrella term for a confederation of identitarian concerns."

"If this word allowed us to talk about something that goes on all the time, then I'm really glad it exists and slightly amazed that not only have I contributed about a million published words to the conversation but maybe, indirectly, one new word."

Steve Thorngate

The Century managing editor is also a church musician and songwriter.

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