We lived freely among the stars. Now we roam like ghosts around our homes.

On this Memorial Day, we remember every soldier, every civilian, every mother and child whose life was taken by war — American, Afghan, and all those whose names history forgets. We honor the fallen most truly when we refuse to let their sacrifice be in vain...

I could not sleep last night, and I will not pretend otherwise. This morning The Times of London printed a sentence that should have stopped the world: "Taliban legalise child marriage for girls as young as nine." The decree — thirty-one articles signed by the Taliban supreme leader and published in the official gazette this month — removes any minimum age for the marriage of girls and declares that the silence of a virgin girl is to be treated as her consent...

My father, Lal Zereh, came to California twice in his life. The first time, he was a teenage exchange student from Afghanistan — full of curiosity, living with an American family, learning what the world looked like from the outside. The second time, he came as a refugee. The Soviets had taken his homeland. He packed up our family and started over at 43 — from nothing. But here is what the newspaper didn't say: He chose California specifically. Not by accident. Not just