The Nation

Bernie Madoff, pictured here after being placed under house arrest in 2008, is not the only one in the business of building pyramids. (Reuters/Shannon Stapleton)

Last year I published an article in The Baffler called “The Long Con” that demonstrated how practices we associate with snake-oil salesmen saturate the American right—not just in its ideological appeals but in the way right-wing politics corrals a fleecable multitude all in one place, which conservative publications literally rent out as a source of handy marks for con men. A lot of folks found this to be a revelation, a bittersweet pleasure for me. On the one hand, it’s a blessing to me to be able to teach people new things about the world around us. But on the other hand, it’s frustrating; I wish people already knew about this stuff. It reinforces a fact: America truly does harbor two separate and nearly incommensurate tribes, “Red” and “Blue,” if you will; how many of us Blue folks know that getting roped into coughing up hard-earned money you’ll never see again to Republican-affiliated “multilevel marketing” (MLM) companies—in hustles formerly known as “pyramid schemes”—is as common in Evangelical and Mormon culture as going to yoga class in our own?

On June 3, 2011, when two undercover cops performed a stop-and-frisk in Harlem on a teenager named Alvin, the 16-year-old recorded the audio of the entire encounter. On the recording, the police berate Alvin with racially charged language and threaten to arrest him “for being a f**king mutt.”

Appearing on ABC Nightline, filmmakers Erin Schneider and Ross Tuttle talk about hearing the audio and helping Alvin eventually go public with it in a short documentary they produced for TheNation.com.

A drone flies above Kandahar, Afghanistan. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesorth, File.)

Few observers or writers are better qualified to discuss the impact of drone warfare not just on our policies but on our psyche than Robert Jay Lifton. Since the 1950s, the famed psychiatrist—and often, activist—has produced one landmark study after another on vital issues of our day, from nuclear weapons to Nazi doctors, from soldiers at war to policymakers who send them into battle. As it happens, I have written two books with Lifton, Hiroshima in America and Who Owns Death? (on capital punishment).

In recent years, straight athletes have been more outspoken in their support of LGBT equality. But never, until NBA center Jason Collins's announcement this week, has a current player come out as gay. "Homophobia has been a part of organized men's sports as long as there has been organized men's sports," says Dave Zirin, Nation sports editor and author, most recently, of Game Over. "There are no words for how historic this is." Appearing on CNN, Zirin puts the moment in context. 

—James Cersonsky