Columnists Archives - Page 2 of 5

Columnists

Remembering Gay Activist Vito Russo

Long before LGBT Pride was all rainbows, sunshine, and corporate dollars, this film critic and journalist typified what it meant to be a radical queer intellectual

June 30, 2021 • by Claire Potter

_____ It is June 28, the actual anniversary of New York City’s Stonewall Rebellion, and we are (thank the goddess) nearing the end of Pride Month. June is a pseudo-sacred time of year for queers and those who make money from us. Major cities and resort towns worldwide have been mounting parades, hanging colorful flags, ...

Columnists

Does Being a Billionaire Mean Being a Liar?

ProPublica has tax returns suggesting an answer

June 30, 2021 • by John Stoehr

_____ ProPublica is doing the Lord’s work. Specifically, investigative reporters Jesse Eisinger, Jeff Ernsthausen, and Paul Kiel are doing it. Two weeks ago, the nonprofit news group published the first in a planned series of pieces revealing, in exquisite detail, the moral character of the very obscenely rich. The series will ...

Does Being a Billionaire Mean Being a Liar?

Columnists

‘There Was Nothing There’

Barr calls BS as the ground gives way under the Big Lie

June 28, 2021 • by Heather Cox Richardson

_____ The big news this week was a series of interviews that former attorney general William Barr did with Jonathan D. Karl of The Atlantic: Barr emphasized that former president Donald Trump’s claims that he had won the 2020 election were “bullshit.” What is interesting about this is not the idea that ...

Columnists

Ethel Rosenberg’s Story

Anne Sebba’s new biography liberates this radical woman from a concocted Cold War narrative that concealed her courage

June 23, 2021 • by Claire Potter

_____ Ethel and Julius Rosenberg, the young married couple executed for treason as Soviet atom spies 68 years ago this week, are seldom discussed as separate people. I had never noticed this before reading Anne Sebba’s new biography, Ethel Rosenberg: An American Tragedy (St. Martin’s Press, 2021), but it isn’t an ...

Columnists

Not One Senate Republican Is For the People

The right to vote is under assault as the GOP defends a government by white men, for white men

June 23, 2021 • by Heather Cox Richardson

_____ There were three important takeaways from this week’s Senate vote on whether to begin debate on S1, the For the People Act, the bill that would protect voting rights, end partisan gerrymandering, establish new ethics rules for federal officials, and curb big money in politics. The first is that Senator Joe ...

Not One Senate Republican Is For the People

Columnists

Michigan’s Midwestern Pact

A bipartisan compact bill with lots of sponsors!

June 23, 2021 • by Pat Garofalo

_____ A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about how a bipartisan coalition helped sink Texas’ Chapter 313 program, once of the worst corporate subsidy programs in the nation. At the opposite end of the country, more evidence that strange political marriages can result in positive change was provided last week ...

Columnists

Big Tech’s Affordable Housing Hustle

Take what you can, give a little bit back

June 23, 2021 • by Pat Garofalo

_____ Amazon announced last week that it’s going to spend $125 million on loans and grants to developers to build affordable housing near mass transit stations around its “HQ2” in Northern Virginia. It also announced similar programs in Nashville, Tennessee and its original home of Washington State. These payouts are part ...

Columnists

Conservative Democrats are Telling Stories About Republicans that Republicans Keep Blowing Up

Will being made a fool change Joe Manchin’s mind? Probably

June 22, 2021 • by John Stoehr

_____ The Democrats in the United States Senate will take up a procedural vote later today to debate of a handful of measures to overhaul the country’s voting laws. All eyes are on Joe Manchin, the conservative Democrat from West Virginia, who has offered his own voting proposal in addition to ...

Conservative Democrats are Telling Stories About Republicans that Republicans Keep Blowing Up

Columnists

Amazon’s Top to Bottom Subsidy Scam

Amazon doesn’t need your money. The company’s executives just want it, ask for it, and too often get it

June 21, 2021 • by Pat Garofalo

_____ In 2017, Amazon launched a much-hyped search for a new office, which it dubbed “HQ2,” setting off an unprecedented wave of city and state officials crafting incentive packages to win the corporation’s favor. More than 200 cities ultimately submitted bids, promising Amazon hundreds of millions, and in some cases billions, ...

Columnists

In Defense of Democracy

From Israel to Peru, there are lots of moving pieces in the world right now

June 14, 2021 • by Heather Cox Richardson

_____ President Joe Biden is currently in England, participating in a meeting of the G7, an informal group of wealthy democracies including Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The participants have issued a statement reinforcing their shared commitment to “democracy, freedom, equality, the rule of ...

Columnists

How the Press Corps Severs Public Debate from the Constraints of History, Creating Space for Real Harm

To illustrate, let me draw your attention to a local story

June 14, 2021 • by John Stoehr

_____ It’s a pain in the ass, but if you dig down deep enough and for long enough, you’ll probably find at the root of any mainstream debate over “culture war” issues some kind of misrepresentation, distortion, falsehood, or lie. So much of what counts as “debate” begins and ends with ...

How the Press Corps Severs Public Debate from the Constraints of History, Creating Space for Real Harm

Columnists

A Shocking Win in Texas

One of the worst corporate boondoggle programs in the country met its end

June 14, 2021 • by Pat Garofalo

_____ The Texas legislature earned a lot of pixels in the political press recently for the quick rise and sudden demise of a bill full of voting restrictions, which was only defeated thanks to Democrats in the statehouse literally walking out in order to run out the clock on the state’s ...