I am reaching out from the 6th Congressional District of Georgia with a warning for all Democratic voters in America. About a week ago I attended a Town Hall meeting with Congresswoman Lucy McBath. I discovered that the Georgia 6th is Ground Zero for the 2020 election and what goes on here is likely a... Continue Reading →
Let me get this straight: the most openly racist president since Andrew Johnson is running for re-election in 2020 and suddenly- in the middle of 2019- a debate about slavery reparations breaks out? Let's add a little bit more spice to this stew: the most racist president in the last 150 years is also the... Continue Reading →
Barack Obama was fond of reminding his talented, young and idealistic staff members that "Better is good." He made a habit of doing so because quite often the incremental solutions that the administration was able to get through the broken machinery of D.C. politics seemed far too mild to slay the beasts they were battling. ... Continue Reading →
It is time for another check-up from the neck-up on MSNBC's Morning Joe. Let's get the big take-away out of the way up front: Democratic politicians, pundits, candidates, and operatives should take NO counsel from Joe Scarborough or Mika Brzenski. If they do, they deserve to lose. Anyone inclined to take advice or gain valuable... Continue Reading →
Its hard to believe but Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was sworn in less than a year ago. But already, she is by far the most famous member of Congress elected in my lifetime- and I go back a while. I crashed this party way back when Richard Nixon was wandering around the White House at night in... Continue Reading →
The Hope Hicks subpoena story was big news last week but it has already evaporated into the ether of the 24 hour news cycle. But if she was sitting her narrow hips in a D.C. jail it would be the lead story on every newscast in the world. Or, in the alternative, she would have... Continue Reading →
You can never win a fight until you hit your opponent where it really hurts. Right-wing nuts in Alabama are clearly unchained right now, evidenced by their passage of a cartoonishly sinister anti-abortion law. How can women punish them for it and at the same time turn the tide? I can assure you that marching,... Continue Reading →
Joe Biden has made pardoning Trump voters a core tenet of his campaign and I hate it. But I also hated it when my father made me rewrite my homework all night long and then get up to run my wind-sprints in the morning. The lesson was that although I hated doing what I had... Continue Reading →
I intend to debunk the mythology of the Obama-Trump voter we hear about so much on MSNBC, Fox and CNN discussion panels. The oft-repeated claim that there is some significant number of people in America that fit this description is a giant hoax. The fact that all media outlets are synchronized in their perceived importance... Continue Reading →
We all know that Mark Zuckerberg is a self-made multi-billionaire tech-entrepreneur but I am not sure that we really understand what that means to the rest of us. Because Mark owns and operates Facebook, he owns and operates the platform that serves as the primary source of news information for American citizens. To quote Joe... Continue Reading →
Anybody who consumes large quantities of cable news, political podcasts or current-events comedy knows it is en vogue to make fun of the large field of Democrats running for president. It seems like no news anchor- whether they are a real one or a comedian posing as one- can mention the 2020 election without cracking... Continue Reading →
The Democratic Party leadership needs a check-up from the neck-up. I will gladly do the honors. Madame Speaker, Mr. Hoyer, Mr. Nadler and Mr. Clyburne, the following message is especially for you. There are times in life when you just have to fight; when the fight itself actually carries just as much weight as the... Continue Reading →
Now that Joe Biden is in and the number of declared Democratic candidates has reached 20, it is safe to close the class. We've got all the candidates we need to makes sure that every segment of our voting body is well represented. In the event that every single one of those candidates drives home... Continue Reading →
This is beyond frustrating. The only major political party in America where rationale allegedly rules is coming up woefully short. I know it's early but if the voters who routinely support the Democratic Party were what we say we are our undisputed front-runner would be Senator Elizabeth Warren. Yet, the rank and file political actors... Continue Reading →
Coming out and saying something unpopular cannot be nearly as hard as coming out of the closet as homosexual- but they both have their risks and benefits. In both cases, the "coming out" provides a relief of not having to pretend anymore- of just being authentic and letting the chips fall where they may. That... Continue Reading →
The incredible story of Theranos has been all over the media lately. And with good reason. The 10 billion dollar fraud that was Theranos is the best microcosm of American culture since the O.J. Simpson trials. Both of these irresistible flashpoints in contemporary American life exposed design defects in our culture that we love to... Continue Reading →
You really can’t blame us for getting something so big so wrong the first time out. This whole thing started in the mid-20th century when black folks decided they really didn't like being called "nigger" 17 times a day- at work, at school, or just trying to buy a carton of milk at the grocery... Continue Reading →
I've said it in this space many times before but it bears repeating for purposes of this discussion: I listen to a great deal of right-wing talk radio. Because I am actively engaged in political discourse I have to know what is being said by the opposition opinion makers in the media. And fuck what... Continue Reading →
MSNBC's Morning Joe occupies an important space in political-news-talk television. That is why so many rational people with an insatiable appetite for political discourse watch it almost daily. The alternative is to watch Fox & Friends but then the likelihood of a rational person choosing to watch that shameless, brainless propaganda-fest is pretty slim. In... Continue Reading →
In a year chock-full of crazy stories the one that has been gnawing at my mind since it broke late last fall was a short-lived little item about race, greed and graft in a Louisiana charter school. In an odd way, I am actually glad that the egregious case of fraud and abuse at T.M.... Continue Reading →
Americans have every reason in the world to be clear-eyed about what is happening to us right now. We know how this “world domination” thing usually turns out- and we’ve been riding it hard since the end of World War II. Eventually, it always comes to an end. We know this because we have institutions... Continue Reading →
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