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August 28, 2006 Issue

Cover art by: Cover by Gene Case & Stephen Kling/Avenging Angels

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  • Feature

    Librarians at the Gates

    At a time when free expression and the right to privacy are under attack, librarians are on the front lines protecting our constitutional rights every day. Here are five who are making a difference.

    Joseph Huff-Hannon

  • Ground Zero for Immigration

    A recent rally at the World Trade Center site displayed anti-immigration activists’ latest tactics: distorting the truth and exploiting national security concerns.

    Ali Winston

  • The Strange Silence of Günter Grass

    By concealing for a near-lifetime that he had served in the Waffen SS, literary giant Günter Grass treated himself with an indulgence he did not hesitate to deem a moral defect in others. And for that, we are all losers.

    Norman Birnbaum

  • Congress Poised to Unravel the Internet

    Senator Ted Stevens has no idea how the Internet works, but he’s asking Congress to remake it to suit the interests of the telecommunications industry. Can progressives apply the pressure to kill this bill?

    Jeffrey Chester

  • Troops and Hoops

    There’s something unnerving about USA Basketball’s motivational tactics for the 2006 world championship–encouraging players to spend time with wounded Iraq veterans, in hopes of enhancing teamwork and patriotism.

    Dave Zirin

  • Groundhog Day

    From all official statements so far, the August 10 terror plot uncovered in Britain was the biggest thing since 9/11. But then again, perhaps it wasn’t. It’s not too early to ask the questions on which a final judgment must depend.

    James K. Galbraith

  • From the Streets to the Polls

    Young, US-born Hispanics who took to the streets to push for immigrant rights are hoping to become a potent political force in the midterm elections and beyond.

    Paloma Esquivel

  • The Hard Edge of Hatred

    American white supremacist groups have a long and ugly history of using anxieties over immigration as a recruitment tool. It’s happening again, with a vengeance.

    Chip Berlet

  • Life in a Post-Carbon World

    If we are to survive and prosper in an oil-short world, we must not only think outside the box–we must get rid of the box. We must abandon the long-held idea that growth is the path to achieve every national goal.

    Nicholas von Hoffman

  • Cease-Fire and Frustration

    After thirty-one days of war between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon, and more than 1,000 dead, the United Nations has finally passed a cease-fire. Now what?

    Ian Williams

  • The Semantics of Terror

    The easy invocation of “terrorism”–whether by pundits or political leaders–is not just sloppy use of language. It is precisely targeted phrasing intended to terrorize dissent.

    Ian Williams

  • The Problem with Pundits

    Pro-Lieberman Beltway pundits who whined about progressive bloggers and sounded noisy alarms about the disastrous impact of a Lamont win will have a lot of explaining to do come November.

    Eric Boehlert

  • Locked and Loaded

    The Minutemen have been transformed from an extremist “citizen border patrol” to part of the neocon establishment. Has their leader sold out, or bought in?

    Susy Buchanan and David Holthouse

  • Same Old Song

    American history is marked by waves of immigrants–from Germans in the eighteenth century to Mexicans in the twenty-first–and by nativist backlashes against them.

    Daniel Tichenor

  • Nightly Nativism

    CNN pundit Lou Dobbs has made himself a “specialist” in channeling nativist, nationalist and even white supremacist rhetoric.

    Daphne Eviatar

  • White Heat

    Welcome to Nashville, Tennessee, the unlikely symbol of the biggest American immigrant resettlement since the Industrial Revolution. It’s also the white-hot nexus of the new American nativism.

    Bob Moser

  • Editorial

    Lessons Learned

    As a tentative ceasefire takes hold between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon, the world–and the United States in particular–should ponder lessons learned and the price we will pay for our role in the conflict.

    Saree Makdisi

  • Dorothy Healey

    An appreciation of one of the last members of the left’s “greatest generation,” known for her physical courage, warmth and intelligence, who spent a lifetime arguing eloquently for socialism, feminism and peace.

    Mike Davis

  • Murray Bookchin

    Murray Bookchin, who died on July 30 at 85, was a protean son of the left whose intellectual hegira took him from Communism through Trotskyism, anarchism and social ecology.

    The Editors

  • A Bankrupt Cuba Policy

    As Iraq burns and Castro recovers, the Bush Administration’s schemes to further “Cuba’s transition to democracy” ring more hollow than ever.

    Wayne S. Smith

  • The New Nativism

    The nation must address the working-class anxieties underlying the anti-Hispanic sentiments now rising in Middle America–and Congress must pass an enlightened immigration bill that is both sensible and humane.

    The Editors

  • Crisis in Lebanon

    The inactivity of the Bush Administration on the Israel-Hezbollah conflict is armchair warfare against the interests of all. For peace, we must press for an immediate cease-fire.

    The Editors

  • Lamont Wins

    As the Democratic Party embraces Ned Lamont, it must also embrace his antiwar message: It proved a winning strategy for Connecticut, and will be for the midterm elections.

    The Editors

  • Mercenary Jackpot

    As the United States decries the private militias of Lebanon and Iraq, GOP-connected, privately owned global mercenary firms receive blank checks and little oversight.

    Jeremy Scahill
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  • Books & the Arts

    Inside the Alleged Mind of Bill O’Reilly

    Looking for a blast of hot air? Two intrepid literary critics venture deep into the steaming, muddy jungles of the Fox News pundit’s award-losing prose.

    Joseph Minton Amann and Tom Breuer

  • The Strange Silence of Günter Grass

    By concealing for a near-lifetime that he had served in the Waffen SS, literary giant Günter Grass treated himself with an indulgence he did not hesitate to deem a moral defect in others. And for that, we are all losers.

    Norman Birnbaum

  • Fierce Convictions

    Every other week, in the pages of this magazine, Katha Pollitt collects her thoughts in her column, “Subject to Debate.” To say that Pollitt’s column is a hotbed of feminist polemic is only par

    Sarah Goldstein

  • The Magic Bus

    Reviews of Little Miss Sunshine, Quinceañera, My Country, My Country, The Pusher Trilogy and The Bridesmaid.

    Stuart Klawans

  • A Letter from 18 Writers

    Noam Chomsky, Gore Vidal, Toni Morrison and other luminaries call to resist Israel’s undeclared political aim: the liquidation of the Palestinian state.

    The Nation

  • The Prison Notebooks

    Nikolai Bukharin’s Philosophical Arabesques is more than a cul-de-sac on the road from Marx to Stalin; the book defines a political path still not taken.

    Ronald Grigor Suny

  • Journals of the Purge Years

    Revolution on My Mind is a new analysis of personal diaries written in the shadow of Stalin.

    Sheila Fitzpatrick

  • Same Old Song

    American history is marked by waves of immigrants–from Germans in the eighteenth century to Mexicans in the twenty-first–and by nativist backlashes against them.

    Daniel Tichenor
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