Democrats have some advantages going into the runoff. In November their presidential candidate carried Georgia for the first time since 1992. Their defeated gubernatorial candidate from 2018, Stacey Abrams, has built a formidable get-out-the-vote operation. And the state’s demographic changes favor Democrats.

While Democrats are still licking their wounds from the Nov. 3 Election Day, experts say the party will need to make changes and resist making some of the same errors in hopes of claiming victory in the state. Flipping the seats held by incumbent Republicans David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler will be an uphill battle…

…the early polls suggest both contests will be quite competitive, and while the GOP has historically done better in Georgia runoffs than in the preceding general election, there’s never been a runoff like this before — one that will decide not only who will be Georgia’s next two senators, but also which party will control the entire Senate.

Trump’s stolen election conspiracy is so dangerous because it plays to people’s deep-rooted need for order and control and is impervious to arguments based on evidence. The result of all this? Trump’s supporters can feel safe investing in this narrative — and may well continue fighting zealously for it long after Biden takes office.

[The voter-fraud narrative is] being used to push aside the more compelling narrative that the Republican Party could take away from 2020, which is that Trump’s presidency demonstrated that populism can provide a foundation for conservatism, but to build on it the right needs a very different leader than the man Joe Biden just defeated.

It’s time for Democrats to drop their dangerous rhetoric and obstructionism and allow the process of ensuring the fairness and legality of our election to play out so that ultimately all Americans can be confident of the results.

Not surprisingly, this grouping of intellectuals is infuriated that the very positions they promote — that Israel is a racist undertaking, that Jews are an invented nation, that Israeli policies towards the Palestinians are a reincarnation of the Nazi persecution of the Jews — are defined as antisemitic, and therefore as morally and politically tainted, by a growing segment of international opinion.

…their critique of the IHRA definition’s overreach cannot be ignored, especially with regard to the clause about “denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination.” The matter is far less straightforward than it seems, for there is no consensus in international law what the term “self-determination” means.

The radical Left and Muslim extremists have formed a dangerous alliance to spread their antisemitism. They cloak Jew-hatred under the guise of social justice by attempting to delegitimize the right of the Jewish State of Israel to exist… Historically, Jews were hated for their religion. In the 19th century we were hated for our race. Now, we are hated for having our own homeland. Anti-Zionism is a contemporary form of antisemitism.

It largely depends on whether he actually wants the job badly enough, or in his case, believes the personal sacrifices he will inevitably have to make are worth it to try and replace Netanyahu. He might just be the right general – but then, we’ve seen so many of them crash and burn.

Of the country’s 21 former chiefs-of-staff, only four of them – including Eisenkot – have not gone or tried to go into politics, many of them entering the arena amid bells and whistles and great expectation. And the results have been spotty at best, with only Yitzhak Rabin and Ehud Barak having gone on to become prime minister.

Ironically, if Eisenkot does join politics and is elected, he could be among four former IDF chiefs of staff serving in the Knesset at the same time, alongside Ya’alon, current Foreign Minister Gadi Ashkenazi and current Alternate Prime Minister Benny Gantz. This in contrast to the years 2016-2019 when there was not a single former IDF chief of staff serving in the parliament.

Biden’s inability to rein in an increasingly belligerent China starts with his naïve confidence in the United Nations, which has done exactly nothing to punish Beijing for its military aggressions, its widespread theft of Western know-how or its illegal crackdown in Hong Kong.

The Biden team will never be hawkish enough on China to satisfy some Republicans, but the emerging team should appeal to Asian allies who liked Trump’s enthusiasm but not his style. A competition-based approach is not a panacea — it’s simply the prerequisite to meeting the generational challenge of managing China’s rise.

Joe Biden’s view of China’s rulers has conformed to that of the foreign policy establishment. You may recall him saying they are “not bad folks” and certainly “not competition for us.” On the campaign trail last year, he scoffed: “China is going to eat our lunch? Come on, man.” However, his announcement that he plans to appoint Antony Blinken as secretary of state suggests his views may be evolving.

In the dying moments of a brutal year, a shape has become a celebrity. More than that: Because of the simplicity of its form, its sci-fi symbolism, and the way it has sparked people’s wonder against all odds, the Utah monolith is perhaps the breakout artwork of this horrible, unending year.

Whatever its origins, this brief monolith mania couldn’t have struck at a better time. A lesser consequence of quarantine is that many people the world over have been starved for visual art, since most public museums are closed… It’s not public because we can all visit; it’s public because we’re sharing in the experience, gawking and wondering together. We’re having a dialogue about art, like a conversation in a museum.

Regardless of who created and installed the monoliths and why, they matter now. They’ve reiterated themselves across our landscape like a living meme. They are all over the internet. They are a myth. They are maybe, no matter who made them, art.