Visiting assistant professor of public policy and liberal studies at Wesleyan University, and editor and publisher of the Editorial Board

Politics

We have now entered the “Hunger Games”-era of American history. Does Joe Manchin care?

Monique Judge: “This is some weird power play.”

December 21, 2021 • by John Stoehr

Monique Judge and John Stoehr discuss Joe Manchin and the fate of the Build Back Better bill....

We have now entered the “Hunger Games”-era of American history. Does Joe Manchin care?

Politics

In America, Political Violence Is Normal. So Normal It’s Invisible.

The right to petition for redress for grievances enshrined in the First Amendment runs against the grain of the right to bear arms in the Second Amendment

November 29, 2021 • by John Stoehr

It should always be on people's minds. Political violence is on people’s minds now that Kyle Rittenhouse has been acquitted. According to USA Today, far-right groups celebrated last week’s unsurprising verdict. “Kyle Rittenhouse is the hero we’ve been waiting for” was posted on the Gab profile for VDare, a self-consciously fascist organization headquartered ...

In America, Political Violence Is Normal. So Normal It’s Invisible.

Politics

How the Right Profanes Valor

The problem of “fallen heroes.”

November 22, 2021 • by John Stoehr

As they say, nothing ever dies on the Internet. That’s how I came across an old clip recently of Ron Colburn on Fox. He’s the president of something called the Border Patrol Foundation. He was explaining why border agents terrorizing asylum seekers with pepper spray was appropriate. “The deterrent they used is OC pepper spray—it’s ...

Media

Has the Press Corps Learned Nothing?

Journalism, when done right, should change a person

November 9, 2021 • by John Stoehr

Members of the Washington press corps like to tell a story about the heroes of the Washington press corps “holding power to account.” This seems noble, and it can be, but more often than not, it’s not noble. In practice, what “holding power to account” means is countering the dominance over ...

Politics

The Moderates Have to Catch Up

In the fight over his agenda, Biden is making liberals the center

October 6, 2021 • by John Stoehr

I continue to think regime change is a useful way of understanding politics. That’s the idea that American political history turns in cycles. For 40 or 50 years, one party and its ideas prevails over the other with a majority of voters. From the 1930s to the 1970s, it was ...

Politics

Democrats and the Conservative Supreme Court

Is there incentive to attack the court’s legitimacy?

September 28, 2021 • by John Stoehr

Last week, opinion columnist Jennifer Rubin wrote about the sinking reputation of the United States Supreme Court. With respect to a new abortion law in Texas, which invalidates Roe v. Wade, the Post columnist said that, “The nub of the problem is not that (or not only that) voters are angry that the court allowed ...

Democrats and the Conservative Supreme Court

Media

The Biggest Media Bias That No One Is Talking About

How newspapers are obscuring a violent Republican crime wave

September 22, 2021 • by John Stoehr

When most people think about “bias” in news coverage, they usually think of some kind of ideological bent, as if the Washington Post, say, is trying to advance some kind of political agenda with its journalism. While this does apply to right-wing outlets, like the Washington Examiner, most of the rest of ...

The Biggest Media Bias That No One Is Talking About

Politics

We Do Not Have a Public Health Crisis. We Have a Crisis of Law and Order

Let’s not mince words about “freedoms”

September 15, 2021 • by John Stoehr

_____ So, again, with feeling: Anti-vaccine GOP leaders are lawless. Their followers are often criminal. (I mean this literally.) I’m going to keep repeating myself no matter how many times they claim to be “fighting for their freedom.” I’m going to keep calling on the government to put an end to ...

We Do Not Have a Public Health Crisis. We Have a Crisis of Law and Order

Politics

By Turning Law Enforcement Over to ‘Abortion Vigilantes,’ Texas Uses Lawlessness to Destabilize Equal Treatment Under Law

So far, it has the Supreme Court’s blessing

September 8, 2021 • by John Stoehr

_____ The United States Supreme Court finally spoke about a new Texas law that, in effect, creates a market for abortion vigilantism, according to the Editorial Board’s Mia Brett. While the law stands, it invalidates Roe. The high court should have said any law that invalidates a 50-year-old court precedent recognizing ...

By Turning Law Enforcement Over to ‘Abortion Vigilantes,’ Texas Uses Lawlessness to Destabilize Equal Treatment Under Law

Politics

Will GOP Voters Go to War with Corporations Over New Vaccine Mandates?

And what are Republican leaders going to do when the civil society moves in the direction of good public health?

August 30, 2021 • by John Stoehr

_____ Now that the Food and Drug Administration has finally given its full blessing to the Pfizer BioNTech shot, the president is jawboning corporate leaders into establishing mandates requiring employees to be vaccinated. This is not a reversal, as some reporters have said. Joe Biden is not ordering firms to do ...

Will GOP Voters Go to War with Corporations Over New Vaccine Mandates?

Columnists

Is Bad Faith Sabotaging the Fight Against Covid?

To our country’s elites, it makes perfect sense that if the CDC wants the public’s trust, it has to do better

August 25, 2021 • by John Stoehr

_____ Nicole Carroll is the editor-in-chief of USA Today. Earlier this month, her newspaper ran an interview between her and her brother. Chris Carroll refuses to get vaccinated. He’s educated, conservative, religious, and Texas-proud. He’s a Trump supporter, too. Nicole ran the piece to explain why some Americans refuse to do ...

Is Bad Faith Sabotaging the Fight Against Covid?

Politics

The 20-Year Militarization of Our Borders Has Failed like the 20-Year Military Occupation of Afghanistan. Let’s End Both

They cause more harm than good

August 20, 2021 • by John Stoehr

_____ The conventional wisdom in Washington already appears to be that the president made a huge mistake by failing to evacuate Americans and Afghans before that government’s collapse and the Taliban took over. I suppose that’s the result of a video from Kabul in which desperate people are witnessed doing desperate ...