As the federal government has become more autocratic and dismissive of citizen petitions, interest in the petition process has waned. The unprecedented levels of debt incurred by the federal government in recent years have triggered renewed interest in direct democracy. Citizen groups are now challenging the failure of Congress to record and count these state petitions.

We should expect our European allies in NATO to pursue their own interests and protect their sovereignty. They may decide that NATO is no longer in their interests and end the alliance. They will certainly not participate in a NATO alliance in which the United States launches war without warning or consultation. If the European countries decide to continue the alliance, it will require a fundamental change to the organization’s governing structure.

If current fiscal trends continue, the greatest threat to American prosperity won’t come from abroad; rather, it will come from Washington’s inability to control its own spending. For decades, federal outlays have grown faster than the incomes of the people who fund them. The result is a debt trajectory that compounds silently but relentlessly, shifting the burden of today’s decisions onto future generations. This is not just unsustainable, it is unjust. Economists have long understood the...