Opinion: Does America need more meritocracy?
One potential lesson of the woke era is that meritocracy’s critics were wrong to focus so much on its faults, and instead should actually be doubling down on its rigors and expectations.
The debate over H-1B visas and skilled immigration that flared up while this newsletter was on Christmas holiday was, in one sense, a foretaste of the likely policy conflicts between the populist and Silicon Valley wings of Donald Trump’s coalition, the challenges of uniting the impulses of JD Vance and Elon Musk, writes Ross Douthat. (Alain Pilon/The New York Times)