CELEBRATING INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY. Thursday marked the one hundred and first year of International Women’s Day (IWD). Inspired by the activism of Clara Zetkin, IWD celebrates the political, economic and social achievements of women, as my colleague Peter Rothberg explains in “101 Years of International Women’s Day.” At a time when women find themselves on the defensive against a right-wing-led war on women, our timely cover story this week, “The Genius of Cecile Richards,” by political journalist Elizabeth Mitchell explores how Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards turned this right-wing assault into a source of renewed political power for Planned Parenthood. I joined MSNBC’s The ED Show on Thursday to defend Title X, the bulwark of women’s access to healthcare, and explain that we’re witnessing not only an antiquated debate over women’s health in this country but GOP overreach that is particularly detrimental to low-income women. We’re also proud to feature an interview with Representative Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), who is now running for the US Senate. She dropped by The Nation’s offices to discuss healthcare reform, Citizens United and Wisconsin’s progressive activism.
Programming Note: I’ll be appearing on MSNBC’s UP with Chris Hayes, Saturday, March 10 between 8 and 10 am ET with Mike Daisey, monologist and creator of “The Agony & the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs”; Bart Chilton, commissioner of the US Commodity Futures Trade Commission; and Salon senior writer Rebecca Traister.
SUPER TUESDAY’S BIG WINNERS. So far, the GOP primary contest has seen its share of twists, turns and electoral surprises. A common theme of this year’s primary races has been increasingly nasty campaigns with a flood of negative attack ads. As Super PACs and “advocacy groups” continue to pour unprecedented amounts of money into the election, it’s only going to get worse. As I argued in the Washington Post this week, Super Tuesday’s big winner was settled before the polls had closed. “Independent expenditures” by Super PACs exceeded spending of candidates’ campaigns. The result is a corrupted electoral playground that will disgust and turn away voters come November.
Another winner on Super Tuesday: Republican gerrymandering. Ohio Congressman and two-time presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich was defeated Tuesday in a Democratic primary, reports Washington correspondent John Nichols. Kucinich—a consistent critic of America’s military entanglements—fell victim to the current round of redistricting in which a Republican governor and legislature carved up Ohio’s northern districts and eliminated one Democratic seat. Kucinich was forced to compete and lost to fellow progressive Marcy Kaptur. As Nichols explains, losing Kucinich will be hard at a time when we need more outspoken anti-war legislators in Congress.
WELCOME: ANNIE SHIELDS. We’re delighted to welcome The Nation’s first-ever community editor. A graduate of the University of Missouri at St. Louis, Annie was most recently the New Media Coordinator at Ms. magazine, where she established the publication’s social media presence and helped turn the Ms. blog into a widely-known must-read. In addition to her tenure at Ms., she was the social media manager for the National Women’s Political Caucus of California, the online coordinator for an Independent Expenditure campaign to reelect Senator Barbara Boxer and a community organizer with the St. Louis chapter of Jobs With Justice. At The Nation, Annie will be working on the interlocking areas of audience engagement, community-building and social media, and working to elevate the informed, intelligent voices of our readers. Be sure to follow her on Twitter—@anastasiakeeley.
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THE NATION EN ESPAÑOL. We’re proud to announce the launch of The Nation En Español! Each week, we’ll be translating a timely article from print into Spanish and publishing it at thenation.com, where we’ll make it widely available to both the Spanish-speaking US audience as well as to numerous daily newspapers in Latin American cities like Buenos Aires, Caracas, Montevideo, Mexico City, Santiago, Quito, Lima and Bogota. With the help of Claudio Iván Remeseira, an Argentinian journalist and founder of the blog Hispanic New York, we hope to expand this program, perhaps eventually even publishing a Spanish-language edition of the magazine. Be sure to check out our very first translation, of this week’s editorial, “The NYPD’s Spies,” available here.
TNR’S NEWEST OWNER. Congratulations to Facebook’s co-founder Chris Hughes, who, as the New York Times reported Friday, has purchased a majority stake in The New Republic. Hughes, who headed Barack Obama’s 2008 online organizing campaign, will become publisher and editor-in-chief of the magazine. In a tumultuous time for print media, the continuing importance of magazines of news and opinion that provide intelligent ideas that help shape debate remains critical. We’re thrilled to see Chris enter the world of magazine publishing and have high hopes for the future of the magazine of news and opinion under his leadership.
COMMENTS OF THE WEEK. We remain grateful to our intelligent and engaged readership for the lively and substantive comments each week. To help elevate some of these conversations, every Friday we post the top comments of the week over at The Nation’s community page. Be sure to check them out here.
As always, thanks for reading. I’m on Twitter—@KatrinaNation. Please leave your comments below.
