Jay Evensen - Opinions

Don't shed tears for Iran's rulers

6/23/2025

The world should not shed tears for Iran’s ruling regime.
It should, however, be concerned about keeping the repercussions from Saturday’s bombing raid by the United States contained.
Iran’s nuclear ambitions have long been a worry for Israel and the United States, as well as for other Arab states that are friendly to the United States but wary of Iran’s regional ambitions. The 1979 Iranian revolution brought power to the current regime, whose foreign policy includes a call for Israel to be destroyed. Beyond that, its sponsorship of terrorism is a threat to its own region and beyond.
The nation’s rulers deserve little sympathy. Its people, however, deserve a lot of it.

The dangers our imaginary friends pose

6/23/2025

When I asked an AI “companion,” who came with a popular app on my phone, what he thought about the military parade in Washington last weekend, he replied, “I don’t have feelings.”
OK, I get that. He’s a bot. So, as an experiment, I told him the parade bothered me. He then went on to say he could understand why people might be troubled by it.
A while later, I re-engaged with him and took the opposite view, telling him I was excited by the parade. What did he think?
He said, “Military parades … can be impressive displays of national pride and military strength.” Then he added that they also might raise debates about military spending and the message they send to the world.

Why the Antiquities Act should go away

6/23/2025

If only the people who write laws would be more specific.
For instance, did those who drafted the Antiquities Act of 1906 mean for it to allow presidents to “undeclare” national monuments a predecessor had declared?
I mean, they didn’t say so, but … they also didn’t say a president couldn’t do such a thing.
You knew this was coming, right?

Republican lawmakers have no sense of irony

6/5/2025

I’m old enough to remember when Republican President Ronald Reagan, during his 1988 state of the union address, dropped a heavy stack of papers, comprising that year’s budgeting megabill, next to the podium. He declared that “Congress shouldn’t send another one,” otherwise he would not sign it.
He got a rare bipartisan standing ovation for that.
Many of you are old enough to remember when former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said of the Affordable Care Act, "We have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it."
Her next sentence clarified that she meant the bill could be understood best “away from the fog of the controversy." But that first sentence soon became a political rallying cry for some Republicans upset with the passage of a bill so large no one could properly digest it.
Times change. This is a much more hyper-partisan period in history. It’s apparently so partisan that party faithful don’t get the irony.

Are we ready for an autonomous drone war?

6/5/2025

Are U.S. military leaders preparing to fight the last war, or a modern one with drones, deception and surprise attacks?
If nothing else, Ukraine’s effective attack on Russia last weekend has shown a flashlight on how the world is changing. Wars of the future could come down to which nation has the sneakiest, smallest and most AI-ready lethal drones.
Kateryna Bondar, a fellow with the Wadhwani AI Center at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and a former advisor to Ukraine, wrote recently that Ukraine’s “objective is to remove warfighters from direct combat and replace them with autonomous unmanned systems.”

Do juries still work in today's world?

5/22/2025

As I looked at the faces populating my computer screen and listened to a judge and two attorneys ask them the sorts of questions you might encounter at one of those awkward mixers — what sort of books do you read? What are your hobbies? — one question kept popping into my head.
If I were on trial, would I want these people to decide my guilt or innocence?
To my surprise, I now have an answer to that question because, against all odds, I was chosen for a jury that heard a criminal case.

A budget that just adds to the nation's debt

5/22/2025

A thin majority (52%) of Americans believe it is possible to both balance the federal budget and cut taxes at the same time, while slightly less (48%) believe the budget could be fixed simply by reducing the growth of spending in Washington.
An optimist would take courage that at least a good portion of the public believes fiscal sanity is within reach. Without at least a belief, the nation doesn’t stand a chance.
But others may say those figures, part of a poll conducted by RMG Research for Napolitan News, demonstrate how few people grasp the challenge of closing an annual deficit that hovers around $2 trillion, let alone what it would take to chip away at a national debt that is nearing $37 trillion.

America's sport gambling experiment has failed

5/12/2025

Seven years ago this May 14, when the Supreme Court issued a ruling that allowed states to legalize sports betting, a New York Times news story speculated that, “The decision seems certain to result in profound changes to the nation’s relationship with sports wagering.”
And how.
Today, in 38 states, every fractional piece of a sporting event is subject to wagering, from whether a football team’s current drive will result in a touchdown or a punt, to whether a basketball player will score less than or above his or her seasonal average per game. And it all can be done with the convenience of a smartphone, utilizing legalized betting companies whose commercials seem to saturate many nationwide telecasts.

How the tariffs stole Christmas

5/12/2025

The plot is like any of a dozen or more Christmas movies you may have seen. A villain either steals all the presents or gets in the way of Santa’s routine, and suddenly it appears there will be no gifts under the tree.
Only, this time it’s not clear whether any hero can swoop in and save the day. No hastily organized singing of Christmas songs in Central Park can make the reindeer fly higher than the 145% tariffs the White House has imposed on the largest supplier of Christmas in the United States — China.

Why monument designation process must change

5/12/2025

Back near the turn of the 20th century, the United States faced a crisis of disappearing Native American artifacts. So-called “pot hunters” were ravaging ancient sites across the West.
On July 29, 1903, the New York Times recounted a disturbing observation from the Chicago World’s Fair that had taken place 10 years earlier.

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