The barbarians have done it, finally infiltrated a remaining bastion of order in a linguistic wasteland. They had already taken the Oxford English Dictionary; they had stormed the gates of Webster’s New World College Dictionary, Fourth Edition. They had pummeled American Heritage into submission, though she fought valiantly — she continues to fight! — by including a cautionary italics phrase, “usage problem,” next to the heretical definition.

Then, on Tuesday morning, the venerated AP Stylebook publicly affirmed (via tweet, no less) what it had already told the American Copy Editors Society: It, too, had succumbed. “We now support the modern usage of hopefully,” the tweet said. “It is hoped, we hope.”...

In making the legal case against Obamacare’s individual mandate, challengers have argued that the framers of our Constitution would certainly have found such a measure to be unconstitutional. Nevermind that nothing in the text or history of the Constitution’s Commerce Clause indicates that Congress cannot mandate commercial purchases. The framers, challengers have claimed, thought a constitutional ban on purchase mandates was too “obvious” to mention. Their core basis for this claim is that purchase mandates are unprecedented, which they say would not be the case if it was understood this power existed. But there’s a major problem with this line of argument: It just isn’t true. The founding fathers, it turns out, passed several mandates of their own...

When we last looked in on Ai Weiwei, the feisty, plus-sized Chinese artist was suing the Beijing tax authorities over their charges against him. The Public Security folks had pulled the plug on Weiweicam, his project that was streaming live video feeds from inside his house to the Internet. And he has kept breaking the rules of his release from prison, blaming his lack of self-discipline, telling The Economist, “C’mon, I can’t even lose weight!”...

There are plenty of reasons to worry about fracking—groundwater contamination, methane leaks, that flaming tapwater thing. But can it really cause earthquakes? That's the question the US Geological Survey set out to answer after a spate of tremors in the Midwest—an area not usually known for earthquakes—alerted scientists to the possibility that some of them might be manmade...

A spate of insurgent attacks across Afghanistan on Sunday left four civilians and 11 members of the security forces dead, the government said Monday. Three dozen assailants, including some suicide bombers, were killed by Afghan security forces who — after many hours — succeeded in halting the attacks.

The rare coordinated attacks spanned some of the country’s most important population centers but resulted in relatively few deaths — illustrating the insurgents’ ability to penetrate well-fortified sites but raising questions about the potency of their attacks...

Instead of visiting the zoo, spend some time in the native habitat of your local symphony orchestra. You will meet the badgering bass player, whose disparaging wisecracks you cannot quite hear; the flustered, quivering flutist who just wishes the oboist would play in tune (the feeling is mutual); and many other creatures, docile and gruff. Bernie Krause’s new book, “The Great Animal Orchestra,” is not about this beastly symphony; it is about the symphony of beasts that surrounds us, a vast orchestra in the process of being silenced, perhaps even more endangered than our human animal orchestras.

So focused are the Taliban on securing this year’s opium poppy crop — and the support of the farmers tending it — that in the early days of their spring offensive in the south, they are targeting not only the officials trying to eradicate the plants, but also the tractors they use...

A Georgian billionaire has taken Washington by storm, hiring more than half a dozen lobbying and public relations firms over the past three months.

Bidzina Ivanishvili wants to become an official candidate in the country’s first prime minister race and he hopes that U.S. pressure for free and fair elections will help, since that could be a step toward Georgia’s long-held goal of being recognized by NATO...

Can a wall of trees stop the Sahara from spreading?...