Editorial Roundup: United States

Excerpts from recent editorials in the United States and abroad:

___

Feb. 7

The Washington Post says ''The Swamp'' is the winner of Trump's tariff war

For decades, politicians have sold tariffs as a tonic for the working class. In reality, one particular group seems to benefit more than any other from trade wars: Washington influence peddlers.

The United States collected some $288.5 billion in tariff revenue last year, up from $98.3 billion in 2024, thanks to a barrage of new levies imposed by the Trump administration. These tariffs, designed by elite lawyers in D.C. and implemented with highly technical and specialized language, presented a unique opportunity for lobbyists to charge large corporations exorbitant rates to seek relief and other carveouts. And they did very well for themselves.

The 20 largest lobbying firms reported $824 million in revenue last year, up from $595 million during the final year of the Biden administration.

No wonder the plaintiffs in the Supreme Court case challenging President Donald Trump's tariffs are small businesses, not large ones. Big companies can afford to hire attorneys to understand the complex rules and lobbyists to try to minimize the pain. Small businesses get stuck with enormous tax bills.

While lobbyists cashed in, Americans felt the pain. Poorer people tend to spend more of their income on goods that are subject to tariffs than higher earners. Tariffs redistribute corporate profits from less politically connected industries to more politically connected industries, not from the rich to the poor.

Sometimes the tariffs are sold as a national security imperative, but that hasn't been the case over the past year. Taxing imports from Canada is not a way to reduce drug overdoses. Imposing tariffs on countries that already eliminated their trade barriers doesn't help to eliminate trade barriers.

Defenders of import taxes sometimes argue that lobbying is unfortunate but worthwhile given all the jobs that are saved or protected. Yet the government bailed out farmers because they were harmed by tariffs. And the number of total manufacturing jobs has fallen by 72,000 since last April. Car sales are down, and there are 19,000 fewer car manufacturing jobs in the country.

All this is why 6 in 10 Americans oppose Trump's tariffs, according to the latest polling, and approval for them has consistently lagged other parts of his agenda, even among Republican voters. The people's elected representatives in Congress wouldn't pass new tariffs, which is why the president is imposing them by executive order and claiming a nonexistent emergency.

ONLINE: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2026/02/07/tariffs-populism-ieepa-duties-trump/

___

Feb. 9

The New York Times says marijuana has been legalized, now it needs to be regulated

Thirteen years ago, no state allowed marijuana for recreational purposes. Today, most Americans live in a state that allows them to buy and smoke a joint. President Trump continued the trend toward legalization in December by loosening federal restrictions.

At the time, supporters of legalization predicted that it would bring few downsides. In our editorials, we described marijuana addiction and dependence as ''relatively minor problems.'' Many advocates went further and claimed that marijuana was a harmless drug that might even bring net health benefits. They also said that legalization might not lead to greater use.

It is now clear that many of these predictions were wrong. Legalization has led to much more use. Surveys suggest that about 18 million people in the United States have used marijuana almost daily (or about five times a week) in recent years. That was up from around 6 million in 2012 and less than 1 million in 1992. More Americans now use marijuana daily than alcohol.

This wider use has caused a rise in addiction and other problems. Each year, nearly 2.8 million people in the United States suffer from cannabinoid hyperemesis syndrome, which causes severe vomiting and stomach pain. More people have also ended up in hospitals with marijuana-linked paranoia and chronic psychotic disorders. Bystanders have also been hurt, including by people driving under the influence of pot.

America should not go back to prohibition to fix these problems. The war on marijuana brought its own costs. Every year, authorities arrested hundreds of thousands of Americans for marijuana possession. The people who suffered the legal and financial consequences were disproportionately Black, Latino and poor. A society that allows adults to use alcohol and tobacco cannot sensibly arrest people for marijuana use. We oppose the nascent efforts to re-criminalize the drug, such as a potential ballot initiative in Massachusetts this year that would ban recreational sales and home growing.

Yet there is a lot of space between heavy-handed criminal prohibition and hands-off commercial legalization. Much as the United States previously went too far in banning pot, it has recently gone too far in accepting and even promoting its use. Given the growing harms from marijuana use, American lawmakers should do more to regulate it. The most promising approach is one popularized by Mark Kleiman, a drug policy scholar who died in 2019. He described it as ''grudging toleration.'' Governments can enact policies that keep the drug legal and try to curb its biggest downsides. Culture and social norms can play an important role, too.

Over the past several decades, supporters of marijuana legalization often called for a strategy of ''legalize and regulate.'' It is a smart approach. Unfortunately, the country has pursued the first part of it while largely ignoring the second.

We want to emphasize that occasional marijuana use is no more a problem than drinking a glass of wine with dinner or smoking a celebratory cigar. Many Americans find it enjoyable to smoke a joint or eat an edible, with friends or alone. Some people with serious illnesses have found relief with marijuana. Adults should have the freedom to use it.

Still, any product that brings both pleasures and problems requires a balancing act, and marijuana falls into this category. Yes, it is safer than alcohol and tobacco in some ways, but it is not harmless. The biggest concern is excessive use. At least one in 10 people who use marijuana develops an addiction, a similar share as with alcohol. Even some who do not develop an addiction can still use it too much. People who are frequently stoned can struggle to hold a job or take care of their families. ''As marijuana legalization has accelerated across the country, doctors are contending with the effects of an explosion in the use of the drug and its intensity,'' a New York Times investigation concluded in 2024. ''The accumulating harm is broader and more severe than previously reported.''

Jennifer Macaluso, a hairdresser in Illinois, experienced these harms. She turned to marijuana to treat severe migraines, and the drug helped at first. After months of use, though, she started getting sick. Her nausea and vomiting became so bad that she had to stop working. Only after months of seeing doctors did one finally confirm marijuana was the problem. ''Why don't more doctors know about it?'' she told The Times. ''Why didn't anyone ever mention it to me?''

Part of the answer is the power of Big Weed. For-profit marijuana companies, made possible by legalization, have a financial incentive to mislead the public about what they are selling. Marijuana and CBD companies have made false claims that their products can treat cancer and Alzheimer's. Others have sold products, such as ''Trips Ahoy'' and ''Double Stuf Stoneo,'' in packages that mimic snacks for children. The companies' executives know they can increase profits by downplaying the harms of frequent use: More than half of industry sales come from the roughly 20 percent of customers known as heavy users.

A better approach would acknowledge that many people end up worse off when they start to use marijuana more frequently. The goal should not be elimination. It should be to slow the recent rise, and perhaps partly reverse it, while acknowledging that many people use marijuana safely and responsibly. Alcohol and tobacco offer a useful framework. Both are legal with limitations, including relatively high taxes, open-container laws and regulations on alcohol and nicotine levels. The goal is to balance personal freedom and public health.

Marijuana, however, is less regulated in several crucial ways. The federal government taxes alcohol and tobacco, for example, but not marijuana. And increases in tobacco taxes have been a major reason that its use has declined during the 21st century, with profound health benefits.

The first step in a strategy to reduce marijuana abuse should be a federal tax on pot. States should also raise taxes on pot; today, state taxes can be as low as a few additional cents on a joint. Taxes should be high enough to deter excessive use, on the scale of dollars per joint, not cents. (Federal alcohol taxes, which have failed to keep pace with inflation since the 1990s, should rise, too.)

An advantage of taxes is that they fall much more on heavy users than casual smokers. If a joint cost $10 instead of $5, it would mean a lot of extra money for someone now smoking multiple joints a day and may change that person's behavior. It would not be a big burden for someone who smokes occasionally.

A second step should be restrictions on the most harmful forms of marijuana, which would also be similar to regulations for alcohol and tobacco. Today's cannabis is far more potent than the pot that preceded legalization. In 1995, the marijuana seized by the Drug Enforcement Administration was around 4 percent THC, the primary psychoactive compound in pot. Today, you can buy marijuana products with THC levels of 90 percent or more. As the cliché goes, this is not your parents' weed. It is as if some beer brands were still sold as beer but contained as much alcohol per ounce as whiskey.

Third, the federal government should take action on medical marijuana. Decades of studies on the drug have proved disappointing to its boosters, finding little medical benefit. Yet many dispensaries claim, without evidence, that marijuana treats a host of medical conditions. The government should crack down on these outlandish claims. It should issue a clear warning to dispensaries that falsely promise cures and then close those that do not comply.

The federal government needs to be part of these solutions. Leaving taxes and regulations to the states threatens to create a race to the bottom in which people can cross state lines to buy their pot. Congress can set a floor, as it has done, however inadequately, with alcohol and tobacco, and states can build on it as they choose.

The unfortunate truth is that the loosening of marijuana policies — especially the decision to legalize pot without adequately regulating it — has led to worse outcomes than many Americans expected. It is time to acknowledge reality and change course.

ONLINE: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/09/opinion/regulate-legalized-marijuana.html

___

The Dallas Morning News says Trump's sharing of Obama meme shows how far the right has fallen

Just a few days ago, we wrote that the right has walked away from identity politics.

We should have written that too many so-called conservatives have openly embraced racism.

We've seen it in our own backyard, with a protest at the Frisco City Council about an ''Indian takeover.''

And we've seen it, not for the first time but perhaps now in its worst form, from our president.

This nation has struggled for too long and with too much pain inflicted upon Black Americans to be silent in the face of this kind of garbage.

The White House put out a statement that only the willfully blind can accept as a defense.

''This is from an internet meme video depicting President Trump as the King of the Jungle and Democrats as characters from the Lion King,'' White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement to CNN. ''Please stop the fake outrage and report on something today that actually matters to the American public.''

As backlash mounted, the White House reversed itself and blamed a staffer for erroneously making the post.

Trust us, our outrage isn't staged. Tim Scott, a deeply conservative Black senator, was sickened too.

We're sorry, senator, but it's not fake. It's all too real, and it's all too in character, or lack thereof, for a president who long ago rejected the bounds of decent political discourse.

Trump has long set the parameters of acceptable behavior for the right, and more and more candidates at every level are following him into open expressions of racism.

The pretense that this is all just a joke or whatever excuse is used in each instance is too threadbare now for anyone to accept.

Voters will have to teach the right what is and is not acceptable in this country. And this is not acceptable for our nation.

ONLINE: https://www.dallasnews.com/opinion/editorials/2026/02/06/trumps-racist-obama-meme-shows-how-far-the-right-has-fallen/

Feb. 6

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch says Trump will try to sabotage the midterms

Maya Angelou's often-quoted advice — When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time — is quoted so often because it's so obviously true.

On Jan. 6, 2021, President Donald Trump showed the world who he is: someone willing to undermine, interfere with and ultimately attempt to overthrow any election result that doesn't go his way. And he's been showing us that, again and again, ever since.

Trump's escalating power-grabs will continue until a Congress is seated that's willing to rein him in. This year's midterm voters can make that happen, but only if they start — now — organizing, mobilizing and educating friends and fence-sitters about just how dangerous to democracy this president truly is.

''The Republicans should say, ‘We want to take over,''' Trump said in a podcast released Monday. ''We should take over the voting, the voting in at least many — 15 places. The Republicans ought to nationalize the voting.''

It's unlikely Trump will or can follow through. Like his 2022 call for ''termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution'' in support of his phony election-fraud claims, this one would run headlong into the plain language of that document, which puts the states in charge of the ballot.

But there are other ways to ''take over'' elections. And Trump is testing them all.

That's the whole point of his unprecedented campaign to get Missouri, Texas and other red states to redraw their congressional districts when there's no new census to base it on. We know his goal with this '' re-gerrymandering '' campaign is to skew the midterms for the GOP, because he says it publicly.

That scheme may yet backfire. Missouri's re-gerrymandering stunt is facing a voter referendum that could well scuttle it. California's redrawn map — an understandable Democratic response to the map wars that Trump started — was just upheld by the Supreme Court.

While many Americans have taken to the streets to protest, many more undoubtedly are cowering indoors, unnerved by the sight of masked agents with paramilitary weaponry and attire stalking their streets. And anyone who suggests that only illegal immigrants have anything to be afraid of should ask the families of Renee Good and Alex Pretti.

After what we've all seen these past months, can anyone seriously dismiss the likelihood that the whole point of this deeply un-American deployment is to intimidate blue-state voters into staying home?

Is that an alarmist suggestion? Tell it to Steve Bannon, the former White House adviser who still holds sway with Trump. He said on his podcast Tuesday: ''You're damn right we're gonna have ICE (U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement) surround the polls come November.''

The administration is pursuing other schemes as well. Trump continues attacking the concept of mail-in voting, arguing (baselessly, as always) that it's rife with fraud.

The U.S. Supreme Court recently offered an assist in a Metro East case, ruling that candidates can challenge the validity of late-arriving mail-in ballots, even those sent on time and held up only because of slow mail service. Ponder that — and then ponder Trump's continuing project to gut the U.S. Postal Service of resources.

History shows that the party in the White House generally loses ground in the midterms. Polling and early elections indicate that pattern will likely hold this year.

History also predicts that if and when Republicans lose one or both chambers of Congress in November, our sitting president won't accept those results. Trump will do whatever he can, legal or otherwise, peaceful or otherwise, to overturn them. He will falsely cry ''fraud'' with zero evidence, or he will concoct some phony national emergency to justify halting the peaceful transfer of power.

Anyone who had made such a prediction prior to Jan. 6 could reasonably have been dismissed as an alarmist. But anyone today who dismisses this possibility is simply being naive.

On that day and in the five years since, Donald Trump has repeatedly shown us exactly who he is. For the sake of our democracy, it's urgent that we believe him.

ONLINE: https://www.stltoday.com/opinion/editorial/article_8d987b11-140b-4004-91db-d7aba0b9f372.html

Feb. 4

The Guardian says survivors deserve full transparency in Epstein case

''The more Epstein documents get released, the more we see how he had so many powerful friends, and that's ultimately what helped him,'' commented the US lawyer Lisa Bloom in an interview with the Guardian this week. As Ms Bloom, who represents 11 of Jeffrey Epstein's dogged and brave victims, drily notes: ''That's not the way the justice system is supposed to work.''

From the outset, the Epstein affair has offered a textbook example of the ability of the influential and well-connected to avoid scrutiny and intimidate those who would exert it. A ruthless pursuit of transparency, both institutional and personal, is the only way to combat such tactics and hold power to account. In the extraordinary days following the release of further Epstein files last week, the wheels of justice in Britain are belatedly beginning to turn on that basis.

Allegations that Peter Mandelson leaked Downing Street emails and market-sensitive information to Epstein, a convicted sex offender, following the financial crash, have now led to a criminal investigation. Wednesday's events in the House of Commons showed that they have also unleashed a Westminster scandal which threatens to engulf Sir Keir Starmer's premiership. The prime minister's political future may rest on his ability to convince MPs that he is being transparent over the fateful decision to make Peter Mandelson the UK's ambassador in Washington.

The billionaire venture capitalist Peter Thiel, for example, was in contact with Epstein, and reportedly an investment firm he co-founded accepted $40m from him. Howard Lutnick, the US secretary of state for commerce, visited Epstein's private island with his wife and children in 2012. In a friendly email exchange in 2013, Richard Branson wrote in execrable taste: ''Any time you're in the area, would love to see you. As long as you bring your harem!'' In Silicon Valley, the financier's money funded salon-style dinners with the likes of Larry Page and Sergey Brin. The leftwing philosopher Noam Chomsky emerges in the emails as a sympathetic counsellor, advising Epstein on how to deal with ''hysteria'' over the abuse of women and his ''horrible'' treatment in the press.

Such ties have been minimised, and publicly regretted, following Epstein's arrest and death in prison. But the gilded circles that gave him a free pass into networks of influence conferred, by doing so, an aura of untouchability, even as survivors battled to expose Epstein's depravity. They owe it to those victims to account more fully for their actions.

Bill and Hillary Clinton, who will testify in the congressional investigation into Epstein this month, have expressed the hope that their appearance will set a precedent. His victims, who are demanding that the department of justice fully release the heavily redacted files, will not hold their breath. Immensely powerful people have had an interest in closing the book on the Epstein scandal. After a week that has felt like a potential tipping point, the moral imperative is for full disclosure.