The Great Lie of the Right-Wing Populists
This was not a good week for democratic institutions in the Anglosphere. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson took the extraordinary step of suspending Parliament next month, undermining efforts to...
View ArticleIndian Country Is Finally Getting the Political Attention It Deserves
It took 243 years, but the path to the United States presidency, or at least the Democratic nomination, will run through Indian Country.On August 19 and 20, eight presidential candidates will descend...
View ArticleCalifornia’s Forgotten Confederate History
Earlier this month, the last major Confederate monument in California came down. It was a curious one: a nine-foot granite pillar in an Orange County cemetery, bearing the names of several Southern...
View ArticleThe Scourge of Worker Wellness Programs
When teachers and other school staff in West Virginia walked off the job in 2018, news coverage of the historic strike focused on bread-and-butter issues like their rising health-care premiums and low...
View ArticleAbolish ICE’s Union
The labor movement now finds itself at a crossroads on a host of issues, from surviving the climate crisis to navigating the looming specter of automation to out-maneuvering the most anti-labor...
View ArticleLeave Elizabeth Warren Alone
In less than two weeks, the ten leading Democratic candidates will all appear on the same debate stage for the first time. Outlets priming the pump for what will likely be the most important day of the...
View ArticleCold Case Hammarskjöld’s Artful Paranoia
I have always thought of conspiracy theories—whether spawned by the assassination of JFK, the death of Marilyn Monroe, or more recently, the suicide of Jeffrey Epstein in his Manhattan jail cell—as an...
View ArticleRight Brain
On my desk sit four containers of brain pills. Though they are made by four separate companies, they are similar enough in appearance and content to be almost interchangeable. The ingredients mention...
View ArticleMake Democratic Leaders Pay for Their Climate Cowardice
Climate coverage in the 2020 election is set to reach unprecedented levels this week, with CNN’s seven-hour “Climate Crisis Town Hall” slated for September 4. It will be the most attention ever devoted...
View ArticleDemocrats Need to Decide Whether They Care About Muslim Voters
The year was 2000. Hillary Clinton was running for one of New York’s two Senate seats, and she had a choice to make. On the final weekend of October, with the general vote less than two weeks away, the...
View ArticleWhen the State Enforces “Straight Pride”
The few hundred marchers and supporters who turned out for the Straight Pride Parade in Boston on Saturday were vastly outnumbered by thousands of counterprotesters—that was the main takeaway from the...
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The Fog of Intervention
Let’s say it’s January 2021, and President Bernie Sanders has just assumed office. On his second day as commander-in-chief of the most powerful military in world history, Bernie and his foreign policy...
View ArticleThe Boundless Grift of Right-Wing Media Watchdogs
Over the past week, a number of journalists and politicians have expressed indignation as details of a new conservative media venture, which aims to personally attack journalists by unearthing their...
View ArticleA Seven-Hour Case for a Real Climate Debate
There is no good reason that any normal person should have to sit through seven hours of any televised event. Nor is there a good reason that such a time-suck should be thrust upon American voters as...
View ArticleThe Historical Amnesia of Joe Biden’s Candidacy
Recently, two Baby Boomers born in the mid-’50s said things that worried me. One expressed surprise when I alluded to Richard Nixon’s underhanded dealings at the Paris peace talks in 1968; he didn’t...
View ArticleConservatives: We’ll Spill Blood to Keep Our Guns
Last month, Democratic presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke proposed a modest solution to the relentless tide of mass shootings: a mandatory buyback program for every AR-15 in the country. The View...
View ArticleThe Best Way to Fight Fires in the Amazon
G-7 summits, gathering the world’s most powerful men and women around a table, have previously dealt with issues like North Korea, nuclear proliferation, Iran, Russia, trade deals, terrorism. At last...
View ArticleIs Joker Just a Movie?
Joker won’t come out in America until October 4, but after its Venice premiere this week, a critical maelstrom is already aswirl. Joaquin Phoenix plays Arthur Fleck—the Joker before he was the Joker—a...
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The Fall of the Meritocracy
In 1958, sociologist Michael Young wrote a dark satire called The Rise of the Meritocracy. The term “meritocracy” was Young’s own coining, and he chose it to denote a new aristocracy based on expertise...
View ArticleThe Grassroots Battle to Save Democracy
In the wake of another mass shooting at the hands of another AR-15-armed gunman and a powerful hurricane heralding the beginning of a dangerous storm season, the policy conversation in the Democratic...
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