A Presidency That Will Live in Infamy
The House Judiciary Committee convened on Tuesday without its star witness. Don McGahn, the former White House counsel and a key witness in the Mueller report, refused to appear after President Trump...
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Gregor Von Rezzori’s Vast Postwar Masterpiece
If you put a gun to my head and asked me to describe Gregor von Rezzori’s Abel and Cain in three sentences, this is what I would answer: Murder. Murder. Murder. First-, second-, and third-degree:...
View ArticleCory Booker Was Once a Foot Soldier for Betsy DeVos
Cory Booker had expected 10,000 people to turn out for the rally in downtown Newark that launched his presidential campaign, but on April 13, against a huge American flag draped across a building high...
View ArticleDear Millennial-Haters: Let’s Talk
The center-right commentators of this world are few, but they have made a big fuss about hating this country’s youth. The young people, they say, see “privilege” wherever there is individual merit....
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Will the Radical Right Break the EU?
On June 24, 2016, at the headquarters of the National Front in Nanterre, France, Marine Le Pen hosted an impromptu press conference to celebrate the result of Britain’s referendum on EU membership....
View ArticleWhat It’s Like to Live Under an Abortion Ban
The passage of last week’s highly restrictive bill banning almost all abortions in Alabama sparked strong reactions in the United States. It also, however, resonated abroad, and particularly in the...
View ArticleTrump v. The “I” Word
There is a theory—one bordering, in some circles, on conventional wisdom—that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and President Donald Trump are in complete agreement about impeachment. “It seems that Trump and...
View ArticleThe Planet Is Not on “Fucking Fire”
Bill Nye has reached the end of his rope. He’s been trying to explain complex scientific concepts to a general audience in a joyous, digestible way for more than a quarter century. But there’s one...
View ArticleThe Radicalization of Fiona Scott Morton
If you attend enough conferences about antitrust policy, and I’ll impress you by saying that I have, you will inevitably hear two familiar words: “chilling” and “humble.” Any effort to prosecute...
View ArticleMake the IRS Great Again
The story of human government is largely the story of tax collection. One of the oldest written records, a 6,000-year-old clay tablet found in the Mesopotamian city of Lagash, captures a citizen’s...
View ArticleBrexit’s Lowest Moment Yet
Britain’s industries are facing insolvencies, its jobs are being sent overseas, and its pound is being driven down. In addition, there has been a cabinet coup, a high-profile resignation, and rumors...
View ArticleA Demoralizing Debate About Liberalism
Liberalism is under dire threat. On one hand, far-right parties are rising in Europe and a menacing American president is playing footsy with fascists and eager to pardon convicted war criminals. On...
View ArticleThe Do-Nothing President
Faced with escalating investigations—and mounting calls for impeachment—President Donald Trump has settled on a simple message: Democrats have chosen politically motivated investigations over their...
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A Novelist’s Life in America’s Underbelly
The writer Nelson Algren was an American original who, when he died in 1981, left behind a single work of literature that continues to haunt the American imagination. That work is the 1949 novel The...
View ArticleHow Can Every Democrat Be a “Progressive”?
Defining the word “progressive” is a lot like defining pornography—you just know it when you see it. Or so Walter Mondale suggested while stumping for Jimmy Carter at a rally in Syracuse in 1980. At a...
View ArticleThe Democrats Are Overthinking Trump’s Impeachment. Naturally.
It’s ironic that one of the clearest explanations for why President Donald Trump should be impeached is coming from a member of his own party. Michigan Representative Justin Amash, a devout libertarian...
View ArticleHow Should We Feel About Theresa May?
On Friday, Prime Minister Theresa May announced that she will be resigning in two weeks. It came as little surprise. After nearly three years in office, the Brexit Prime Minister failed to deliver...
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Finding Stonewall
Twenty years after the Stonewall Riots, I was graduating from Wesleyan University as a young activist. I had come out in college in 1985—first as bi, which was something of a first draft of the truth,...
View ArticleThe Democrats’ Neglect of Transgender Rights
To most political observers, President Donald Trump was never expected to champion transgender rights, but since taking office, Trump-Pence administration attacks on the trans community have been...
View ArticleBernie Sanders Is Rich
When he discusses his personal finances—specifically the fact that he became a millionaire three years ago—you could almost mistake Bernie Sanders for a pitchman for capitalism. “I wrote a best-selling...
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