Steve Bannon and the Struggle for America’s Post-Pandemic Soul

Why populist-nationalist movements detest international cooperation

But however grave Bannon’s crimes, to write him off back then—to assume he would never again be a significant force within Trumpism—would have been to underestimate his resourcefulness and determination. A pandemic is a time of opportunity as well as tragedy, and Bannon is seizing the moment. And the way ...
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Steve Bannon and the Struggle for America’s Post-Pandemic Soul

Lies Are Back in Power

The history and troublesome present of fascist ideology

Today we’re seeing an emergent wave of new right-wing populist leaders throughout the world. And much like fascist leaders of the past, a great deal of their political power is derived from questioning reality; endorsing myth, rage, and paranoia; and promoting lies. In my new book, A Brief History of Fascist ...
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Lies Are Back in Power

#Orbanistan

Democracy in lockdown

A month later, a subsequent “Enabling Act” allowed the new German government led by Adolf Hitler to issue decrees independently of both Parliament and the President. In effect, it turned Hitler into a dictator. On 23 March 2020, the Hungarian Parliament debated a piece of legislation so similarly sweeping that some Hungarians informally now call it ...
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#Orbanistan

In Praise of Bureaucracy

How our patrimonial presidency endangers us all

But we’ve mostly disregarded one danger and it’s the one I believe is the most significant: Trump’s attack on the administrative state.  The novel coronavirus bug revealed the American state, so impressive on the global stage with its ability to project unparalleled military force anywhere in the world, as shockingly unable ...
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In Praise of Bureaucracy

Social Programs Are Not Socialism

Conservatives have been gunning for New Deal programs for decades

One of the reasons the nation’s deficit and debt is soaring is that Trump’s 2017 tax cut slashed tax revenues. And rather than helping regular Americans, “the plumbers, the carpenters, the cops, the teachers, the truck drivers, the pipe-fitters, the people that like me best,” as Trump put it, 60% ...
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Social Programs Are Not Socialism

Why I Want Nothing to do with the Green New Deal 

Conservatism, Environmentalism and Socialism

I was frequently humbled living in the small, oil-rich kingdom. Humbled by the clash between two of nature’s most inhospitable terrains: a great sandy desert meeting a great salty ocean. At the boundary where these two titans collide sits a different kind of marvel: a Starbucks. I would frequent the ...
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Why I Want Nothing to do with the Green New Deal 

How I Knew the #CovingtonBoys Video Was Clickbait

And why you should care that it is

I watched it through, aware of the retweet widget turning over rapidly. It was going viral. Because I did not really understand what the video meant to the thousands sharing it, I clicked on the response widget on the far left to look at comments. I learned Sandmann and Phillips’ names; ...
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How I Knew the #CovingtonBoys Video Was Clickbait

How An Anti-LGBT Agenda Helped Secure Bolsonaro’s Election Victory

What does the election of a right-wing president mean for Brazilian democracy?

This October, Brazilians went to the polls to choose a new president in the most polarized election since the end of military rule in 1985. In a highly fragmented election between 13 candidates, Jair Bolsonaro of the Social Liberal Party (PSL), a right-wing retired captain known for his homophobic, racist ...
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How An Anti-LGBT Agenda Helped Secure Bolsonaro’s Election Victory

Chief Justice Roberts to the Rescue?

Or, how the relationships between conservative idealism and realism may serve the public good

I wrote this last week, but almost as soon as I did, I had second thoughts. I read an early draft of Peter Dreier comprehensive, “What Should American Progressives Learn From the Mid-terms?” in which he thoroughly demonstrated the depth and breadth of the Democrats’ victory in the elections. Perhaps given the dimensions of ...
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Upstaging the Trump Reality Show

How Montana’s socialist ‘Plaid Shirt Guy’ hacked a Trump rally

It isn’t easy to upstage Donald Trump, but Tyler Linfesty -- a 17-year old high school student from Billings, Montana -- managed to divert attention away from the president at a recent Trump rally in his hometown. Linfesty became an immediate internet sensation on September 6 as he stood on the ...
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Upstaging the Trump Reality Show

BREAKING: DeVos Appointee Says Foreign Spies Are in the Classroom

Programs that refuse to report on international students at government request may face cuts

On Saturday, October 27th, Diane Auer Jones, Assistant Secretary for Postsecondary Education at the Department of Education, gave a public address at the conference International Education at the Crossroads, organized in Bloomington by Indiana University. An audience of around 100, many of us migrants and persons of color, and most ...
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BREAKING: DeVos Appointee Says Foreign Spies Are in the Classroom