THE UNITED States and the European Union continue moving toward a free-trade pact known as the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP). Last week, E.U. trade ministers agreed on a common opening position for negotiations, enabling President Obama and British Prime Minister David Cameron to say, on the sidelines of the Group of Eight Summit on Monday, that talks would begin next month in Washington. Touting the deal, Mr. Cameron said it could add $415 billion per year to the global economy, divided roughly evenly among the United States, Europe and everyone else. Mr. Obama pledged the deal is “going to be a priority of mine and my administration.”

PAST ATTEMPTS by the Obama administration to start peace talks with the Afghan Taliban foundered in part because the process was not, as U.S. officials frequently claimed, “Afghan-owned and Afghan-led.” In fact, the Taliban refused to negotiate with the government of Hamid Karzai, insisting its only purpose was to arrange the complete withdrawal from the country of all U.S. and allied forces. Mr. Karzai himself strenuously objected to a plan to open a Taliban office in Qatar in late 2011, claiming he had been excluded from talks about it, and the initiative soon collapsed.

MUCH OF the excellence in American medicine dates to a groundbreaking 1910 study that stimulated medical schools to reshape how doctors were trained. Teacher preparation today needs a similar push; the weakness of education schools is one of the reasons that many schools are struggling and why America lost its preeminent spot in the world for education.