Bret Stephens

I am not sorry the CIA went to the edge of the law in the aftermath of 9/11 to prevent further mass-casualty attacks on the U.S.

I don't read 'Vanity Fair,' whose millionaire-fashionista-liberal shtick I find repellent.

Among the events of John McCain's five-and-a-half years of imprisonment and torture in North Vietnam, probably the most heroic, and surely the most celebrated, was his refusal to accept an early release from his captors.

The Arab world's problems are a problem of the Arab mind, and the name for that problem is anti-Semitism.

I will never vote for Donald Trump.

It's easy to deprecate some of the puffery and jingoism that often go with affirmations of 'American greatness.' It's also easy to confuse greatness with perfection, as if evidence of our shortcomings is proof of our mediocrity.

My wife is German, so I know something about German energy policy.

Free trade was once a Republican conviction.

Before the word 'resignation' became a euphemism for being fired, it connoted a sense of public integrity and personal honor.

Demanding abrupt and expensive changes in public policy raises fair questions about ideological intentions.

The supposedly petty sexual harassment that so many women have to endure, from Hollywood studios to the factory floor at Ford, is a national outrage that needs to end. Period.

Every president inherits a mixed bag when he comes to office, and Obama's was hardly the worst.

Do I think police chiefs, many of which are African-American or Hispanic, wake up and say, 'Let's systemically oppress African-American communities?' No, I don't. Are there instances in which that happens? I'm sure there are.

What too many of Mr. Trump's supporters want is an American strongman, a president who will make the proverbial trains run on time.

Democrats should have learned in 2016 that what counts in American politics is location, not turnout.

I am sorry that Mr. Cheney, and every other supporter of enhanced interrogation techniques, has to defend the practices as if they were torture. They are not.

The people we need to hear from most are the ones who make themselves heard least - except, of course, on Election Day.

We elected Donald J. Trump to keep us jittery and entertained. He's delivered.

Did you loathe and detest the Bush administration? If so, you'd probably say its ideas were horrible and their execution worse. Did you not loathe and detest the Bush administration? In that case, you might say its ideas were pretty good - only the execution often left something to be desired.

'Character Doesn't Count' has become a de facto G.O.P. motto. 'Virtue Doesn't Matter' might be another. But character does count, and virtue does matter, and Trump's shortcomings prove it daily.