Democracy Archives - Page 35 of 97

Blue Monday

Why a Green New Deal is a Great Idea

It links public responsibility, ecological sanity, and economic justice at a moment of manifest political irresponsibility

January 14, 2019 • by Jeffrey C. Isaac

We are now entering the fourth week of Donald Trump’s most recent historic achievement in the ongoing horror show that is his presidency: the federal government has for all intents and purposes ceased to function. Damon Linker summarized it well in a recent column: In a little under three weeks, the shutdown has ...

Feature

Good for Grassroots, Bad for Business

How long can the business community in the United States tolerate Donald Trump as president?

January 13, 2019 • by John Lawrence

Back in the mid-1990s, the Clinton Administration embraced a so-called “royalty holiday” for oil companies that developed leases in the deeper waters of the Gulf of Mexico. The idea was pretty simple: rather than impose royalties of 12 1/2% to 16 2/3% for developing publicly-owned resources (already paltry by international ...

Feature

Why We Need to Listen to Rashida Tlaib

Defending liberal democracy from Trumpism is not a distraction for the Left

January 10, 2019 • by Jeffrey C. Isaac

Last week saw the swearing in of the new, Democratic-controlled Congress, the fruit of the “blue wave” that swept across the country last November. The 116th Congress has been rightly hailed as “historic” for its demographic diversity. The country’s first female speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, was re-elected, and ...

Feature

President as Prisoner

Trump has walled himself into a losing position

January 9, 2019 • by Sanford Schram

Back in 1989 Bill Grover published a great book, The President as Prisoner. In that book, Grover argued that, regardless of who occupied the position of President, that person was likely to be seriously constrained by political pressures and institutional constraints. Politically, the president is constrained by powerful interest groups, especially ...

Blue Monday

On Calls to Impeach the Motherfucker

The Democratic Party needs a “dialectic” between the words of Tlaib and the words of Pelosi

January 7, 2019 • by Jeffrey C. Isaac

“We’re gonna impeach the motherfucker.” Thus declared Rashida Tlaib last Thursday night while speaking at a MoveOn event just hours after being sworn in as a new Congresswoman. A shitstorm of controversy ensued. Across the political spectrum Tlaib was denounced for her “vulgarity.” The New York Times headline reporting on her statement neatly summed up the response of ...

Feature

When Tribalism Trumps Originalism

The Insane Jurisprudence of the Win-at-All-Costs Republican Party

January 2, 2019 • by Sanford Schram

A Republican-appointed federal district court judge from Texas, named Reed O’Connor, issued a less than timely ruling just before Christmas stating in absolute terms that there is no question that Obamacare (the Affordable Care Act -- ACA) is nothing less than unconstitutional. In other words, the judge was firm in his decision, ...

Democracy

When Is a Lie a Lie?

Trump, Journalism, and Objectivity

January 1, 2019 • by Ian Olasov

Public Seminar is pleased to announce that Ian Olosov's essay, originally printed at Public Seminar on March 13 2017, was one of four essays to win of the American Philosophical Association 2018 Public Philosophy Op-Ed contest. Congratulations Ian! It is neither fake news, nor really even new news, that the press is struggling ...

Feature

Can There Be Dignity In A Vast Majority?

Democrats have the votes. Now we need to listen to each other.

December 27, 2018 • by Geoffrey Kurtz

What if the Democratic Party now has the support of the majority of American citizens? Certainly Democrats did well in the 2018 elections. More revealing than the tally of races won is the fact that Democrats received majorities of the overall votes cast for Senate candidates, for House candidates, and for gubernatorial candidates. In the House elections, Democrats ...

Can There Be Dignity In A Vast Majority?

Feature

My Arrest in Poland

Reflections on the significance of an apparently trivial event

December 21, 2018 • by Jeffrey C. Goldfarb

“At the time the circumstances of my arrest in Poland seemed trivial. I hardly thought about them afterward. But now, when I consider the fall of 1989, and the fall of communism, my little run in with the Polish authorities seems highly suggestive of how things were then and what ...

Blue Monday

John Kelly Is a Present Danger to the Republic

With all due respect

December 10, 2018 • by Jeffrey C. Isaac

The White House has finally announced that Chief of Staff John Kelly will be stepping down by the end of the year. Kelly has arguably been fairly feckless in his discharge of his White House duties. But he has nonetheless often been regarded by pundits as “an adult in the ...

John Kelly Is a Present Danger to the Republic

Feature

Racism, Thomas Farr, and the Legacies of George H. W. Bush

Bush was no Trump, but he helped pave the way for Trump

December 5, 2018 • by Jeffrey C. Isaac

Late last week Republican Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina declared that he will vote against President Trump’s nomination of Thomas Farr to serve on the U.S. Court of Appeals, effectively killing the nomination in the Senate. Scott is the first African-American from South Carolina to ever serve in the ...

Racism, Thomas Farr, and the Legacies of George H. W. Bush

Feature

Bush Without Tears

Never attempt to define a person’s legacy based on a few incidents

December 3, 2018 • by John Lawrence

The presidency of George H.W. Bush is enjoying a nostalgic portrayal following the death of “41” on November 30. His is being called “the most successful one term presidency in history,” and that description may well endure given the obvious fact that, by definition, one term presidencies have invariably ended ...