Columns

A young woman reacts as she looks at her damaged home after Russia's night missile attack in Kyiv, Ukraine, on Oct. 14, 2026. (Efrem Lukatsky/AP)

Elizabeth Shackelford: Trump’s abhorrent Russian diesel deal defies US laws and won’t lower gas prices

By Elizabeth Shackelford

October 16, 2026 at 5:00 a.m.

Donald Trump has illegally undone sanctions efforts against Russia. For all of this, Americans won’t...

Saturday Night Live Host Shane Gillis during the monologue on Saturday, Oct. 10, 2026. (Will Heath/NBC/TNS)

Heidi Stevens: Shane Gillis ‘SNL’ opener misses the mark — and the moment

By Heidi Stevens

October 16, 2026 at 4:00 a.m.

The most disappointing thing about Shane Gillis’ shopworn, hackneyed, tone-deaf, retrograde, unfunny “Saturday Night Live”...

Former Indiana U,S. Rep. Lee Hamilton, who was co-chair of the Iraq Study Group, in his office at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington on Nov. 24, 2006. (Pete Souza/baiduhai)

John T. Shaw: We need Congress to ponder the long term with a new future-focused group

By John T. Shaw

October 14, 2026 at 5:00 a.m.

Half a century ago, many lawmakers viewed their responsibilities differently and created a forum to...

Toni Watkins, from foreground left, her partner and state Rep. Park Cannon, Martin Luther King III, and others march silently along Mitchell Street in front of the Capitol building in Atlanta on March 29, 2021. Cannon returned to the statehouse for the first time since she was arrested after knocking on Gov. Brian Kemp's private office while he was delivering remarks about the state's new elections restrictions.

Column: Sports and politics don’t mix, yet they keep colliding

By Clarence Page

April 7, 2021 at 3:13 p.m.

If the late Martin Luther King Jr. were to hold the Montgomery bus boycott today,...

Chicago police investigate the scene near East Monroe and Lake Shore drives following a shooting in which a child was wounded on April 6, 2021.

Column: A 1-year-old boy in Chicago and a mother of 6 from Pennsylvania are both victims of road rage and America’s unique scourge — gun violence

By Heidi Stevens

April 7, 2021 at 12:28 p.m.

A 1-year-old boy in Chicago and a mother of six from Manheim, Pennsylvania, are forever...

A linden tree honors Paul LeBreton, a 25-year-old who died in a car accident, near the Sydney R. Marovitz Golf Course in Chicago, April 6, 2021.

Column: Paul’s linden. Scott’s ginkgo. Two families hope to save their memorial trees from being axed for a putting green

By Mary Schmich

April 6, 2021 at 4:17 p.m.

A few months after Scott Henriquez died unexpectedly, at the age of 50, several of...

Shigeyo Henriquez, left, and her daughter, Akane Henriquez, hang a sign on a ginkgo tree April 6, 2021, near the Sydney R. Marovitz Golf Course in Chicago honoring their husband and father, Scott Henriquez, who died in 1998. Last week two families who planted the trees learned that the trees would be cut down to make way for a kids putting course.

Families trying to save memorial trees

By Contributed Content

April 6, 2021 at 4:15 p.m.

Memorial trees planted in in Lincoln Park as part of Chicago Park District's Green Deed...

The sun rises to the east on March 29, 2021, as police investigate the scene where a Chicago police officer fatally shot a person near the corner of 2400 South Sawyer Avenue, behind Farragut Career Academy High School.

Column: Let’s wait before turning slain 13-year-old Adam Toledo into a martyr

By Eric Zorn

April 6, 2021 at 5:02 p.m.

It's too early to say with confidence just what happened in a Little Village neighborhood...

Thoughts and prayers for those who pass up the chance to take this super-sized Tweet of the Week poll

By Eric Zorn

April 9, 2021 at 12:16 p.m.

Instructions: Click the box next to each tweet that amuses you -- no limit to...

Nash Ismael, 20, puts his arms around his sisters Nadeen, 18, left, and Nancy, 13, as they visit the gravesite of their parents on Father's Day at White Chapel Memorial Park Cemetery on June 21, 2020, in Troy, Michigan. The Ismael children lost both their parents within weeks to COVID-19.

Column: About 40,000 kids have lost a parent to COVID-19. Schools need to step in and help.

By Heidi Stevens

April 6, 2021 at 12:03 p.m.

About 40,000 kids in America have lost at least one parent to COVID-19. That's a...

Chicago police pick up evidence as they investigate the shooting where eight people were shot, one fatally, in the 2500 block of West 79th Street in Chicago on March 26, 2021.

Column: Why aren’t Chicago’s mass shootings included in the outcry over recent violence in Atlanta, Colorado and California?

By Heidi Stevens

April 5, 2021 at 2:56 p.m.

When a gunman killed four people and wounded a fifth at a Southern California office...

President Joe Biden departs the White House on March 16, 2021, for a trip to Philadelphia.

Column: Fan Mail: ‘Miserable, Evil’ columnist loves ‘PooPoo Pants Biden’ like typical ‘Democrat Elite Scum!’

By Rex W. Huppke

April 5, 2021 at 10:54 a.m.

I got home from this weekend's meeting of the Antifa board of directors and was...

Pedestrians pass a social distancing reminder March 29, 2021, along the Riverwalk.

Column: Why I’m still in pandemic mode, four weeks after my second vaccine dose

By Dahleen Glanton

April 5, 2021 at 12:17 p.m.

It's been four weeks since I received my second dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, but...

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