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	 <title><![CDATA[Just How Big Could Democrats Win In 2026?]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/democrats-blue-wave-2026-wisconsin/]]></link>
		<author>John Nichols</author>
	<date>Apr 10, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The results from an important race in Wisconsin this week suggest the Republicans could be in very big trouble.</p></div>
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	<![CDATA["The results from an important race in wisconsin this week suggest the republicans could be in very big trouble      wisconsin state supreme court justice elect chris taylor takes a picture with constituents after speaking on tuesday  april 7  2026  in madison  wisconsin       the republican party was founded in 1854 in a little white schoolhouse in ripon  wisconsin  a community that has remained republican for the vast majority of the ensuing 172 years  donald trump beat kamala harris in ripon in 2024 mdash even after harris campaigned there mdash by a comfortable 55 45 margin       but  as in a growing number of historically republican red areas that have begun turning purple or even blue since trump rsquo s disastrous second term began  ripon took a sharp turn last tuesday mdash as part of a now indisputable national shift toward progressive and democratic candidates  the city voted by around 58 percent to send chris taylor  a very progressive former democratic state legislator and jurist  to the state supreme court  the rest of wisconsin had a similar idea  taylor was elected tuesday in a landslide  flipping a previously conservative seat and giving progressives a 5 2 majority on a powerful state court that  less than a decade ago  was a bastion of right wing judicial activism  that matters for wisconsinites  of course  but it also has significance for the whole country     wisconsin is the ultimate presidential battleground state  having backed donald trump in 2016  joe biden in 2020  and trump once more in 2024  all by margins of under one percent  yet taylor  a former lawyer and policy director for planned parenthood of wisconsin who currently serves as a state appeals court judge  won the seat by a 20 point margin over fellow appeals court judge maria lazar  a prominent and well connected conservative who  as an assistant state attorney general  defended former republican governor scott walker rsquo s assaults on organized labor  public employees and fair elections     taylor ran a significantly smarter and better funded campaign than lazar  but this margin of victory was unprecedented in recent major elections in wisconsin  in an election where democrats voted enthusiastically while a lot of republicans apparently stayed home  taylor carried urban  suburban  and rural regions across the state     the scale of taylor rsquo s win drew national attention  as observers at the university of virginia rsquo s center for politics noted that she  ldquo became the first democratic aligned candidate since 2015 to carry a majority of the state rsquo s counties mdash 42 of 72  rdquo  twenty nine wisconsin counties that backed trump in the fall of 2024 backed taylor in the spring of 2026  historically republican strongholds in the suburbs of milwaukee and madison favored the progressive in the officially nonpartisan contest  as did rural counties across western wisconsin and into the north  where many regions saw shifts of twenty points or more from right to left     so  what does this tell us about the midterm elections this fall  when control of the republican led us house and senate chambers  as well as statehouses in places like wisconsin  will be up for grabs       a spring election for a technically nonpartisan supreme court seat is different from a partisan contest for a us house seat or a governorship  but just as the big wins for democrats in 2025 off year elections in new jersey and virginia were indicative  and just as the overwhelming pattern of democratic wins in special elections for state legislative seats nationwide revealed republican vulnerabilities  so the wisconsin results are relevant for the 2026 midterms mdash especially when it comes to us house races     currently  republicans have a razor thin 217 ndash 214 majority in the house  three seats are vacant   democrats need to flip just a handful of districts nationwide to take control of the chamber  while a great deal of attention has been paid to whether democrats can win additional seats in states such as california  new york  and virginia  their majority could also run through wisconsin and a handful of other midwestern states  like iowa     because of the radical gerrymandering of state congressional district lines that was initiated by walker and baked in by republican legislators and cautious courts  six of wisconsin rsquo s eight house seats are currently held by the gop     the votehub election mapping website determined that taylor won the most votes in seven of the eight districts mdash including those of republican representatives bryan steil  derrick van orden  tony weid  glenn grothman  and tom tiffany  the party rsquo s hapless candidate for governor        in van orden rsquo s western wisconsin 3rd district  taylor won by double digits mdash running up astronomical percentages of the vote in more urban counties such as la crosse  69 percent  and eau claire  68 percent  but also gaining roughly 60 percent in largely rural grant  crawford and vernon counties  as democratic us representative mark pocan  d town of vermont  a longtime van orden critic  noted  the 3rd  ldquo sure showed a beautiful shade of blue in tuesday rsquo s election  rdquo     that rsquo s bad news for the republican incumbent  who was already looking vulnerable in what rsquo s likely to be a repeat race this fall with democrat rebecca cooke         democrats also noted that steil rsquo s southeastern wisconsin first district gave overwhelming support to taylor  racine and kenosha counties  both of which backed trump in 2024  went big for the progressive on april 7     and what of republican glenn grothman rsquo s sixth district  where ripon is located  aaron wojciechowski  a former local elected official from the university town of oshkosh who is bidding for the democratic nomination to take on grothman  hailed taylor rsquo s win as a signal that  ldquo wisconsin voters are fired up  rejecting extremism and demanding a court that protects our rights  our votes  and our democracy  rdquo     pointing to  ldquo double digit blue swings across the board in grothman rsquo s home turf  rdquo  wojciechowski said   ldquo these are significant  district wide blue shifts in every county that makes up the 6th  this is proof that the entire sixth district mdash from sheboygan to ozaukee to fond du lac  manitowoc  green lake  and beyond mdash is moving our way  voters are done with the chaos  the divisive rhetoric  and a do nothing congress  the same energy that flipped the supreme court can flip this congressional seat in november  the momentum is here  and the data proves we can win  rdquo     that rsquo s an ambitious claim  grothman rsquo s district hasn rsquo t elected a democrat since 1964  when a union machinist from fond du lac named john abner race upset longtime republican incumbent william van pelt  an absurdly conservative republican mdash in a result that surprised race himself  of course  1964 was the ultimate  ldquo blue wave rdquo  year mdash as a ticket headed by president lyndon johnson won 61 percent of the national vote  carried 44 states and swept democrats into office even in historically republican districts     could 2026 really see a big enough blue wave to unseat not just vulnerable republican incumbents like van orden but entrenched ones like grothman  that rsquo s a very tall order  but  then again  chris taylor just carried the birthplace of the republican party  so  perhaps  everything is up for grabs<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/democrats-blue-wave-2026-wisconsin/">Just How Big Could Democrats Win In 2026?</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 10 Apr 2026 13:53:03 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/democrats-blue-wave-2026-wisconsin/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Dolores Huerta, a Lifetime of Leadership]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/dolores-huerta-a-lifetime-of-leadership/]]></link>
		<author>Sylvia Hernández</author>
	<date>Apr 10, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[April 10, 2026 marks the 96th birthday of the American labor leader and feminist activist.]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Check out all installments in the oppart series<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/dolores-huerta-a-lifetime-of-leadership/">Dolores Huerta, a Lifetime of Leadership</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 10 Apr 2026 12:30:25 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/dolores-huerta-a-lifetime-of-leadership/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The Enduring Lessons of the Jewish Bund ]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/molly-crabapple-qa/]]></link>
		<author>Ishan Desai-Geller</author>
	<date>Apr 10, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>A conversation with Molly Crabapple about <em>Here Where We Live Is Our Country</em>, her capacious history of Bundism and what we can learn from their socialist and anti-Zionist example. </p></div>
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	<![CDATA["A conversation with molly crabapple about here where we live is our country  her capacious history of bundism and what we can learn from their socialist and anti zionist example         early in here where we live is our country  the artist and writer molly crabapple rsquo s history of the jewish labor bund mdash a staunchly anti zionist  socialist movement founded by eastern european jews in 1897 mdash she describes in harrowing detail the waves of anti semitic pogroms that tore through the pale of settlement  during a brutal convulsion of violence in january 1905 in odessa in which pogromists murdered hundreds of jews  bundists reported to comrades abroad that  ldquo pogroms exist only where the government wants them  rdquo  drawing an apt comparison to the racialized terror of police backed lynchings in the american south  crabapple writes that bundists  and the jewish community at large  faced insurmountable odds precisely because  ldquo both police and soldiers helped their attackers  rdquo  today  in the name of zionism  the descendants of those ravaged by pogroms and genocide subject palestinians to the same crimes     according to the united nation rsquo s office for the coordination of humanitarian affairs  israeli settlers have displaced 1 700 palestinians from their homes in the occupied west bank since january of this year mdash a figure that exceeded in three months the entire total from 2025  what is obscured by the bloodless language of this un report is the horror  in all its visceral particularity  of such attacks  far right israeli settlers mdash often backed and even armed by the israeli state mdash have beaten  sexually assaulted  kidnapped  and murdered palestinians across the occupied west bank  leaving burnt homes  cars  and agricultural land in their wake  crabapple rsquo s archival reconstruction of the debates animating the bund rsquo s political world reveals the ethnonationalist through line linking european antisemitism and zionism from the late 19th century to the present     remarkably  she shows that bundists themselves foresaw the inevitable inversion of victim and perpetrator demanded by zionist ideology  in 1938  bundist leader henryk erlich wrote   ldquo zionism  in point of fact  has always been a siamese twin of antisemitism hellip   the zionists regard themselves as second class citizens in poland  their aim is to be first class citizens in palestine and to make the arabs second class citizens  rdquo  in the bund rsquo s political project mdash its emphasis on the practicalities of mutual aid  labor organizing  and armed self defense  its unwavering rejection of all ethnonationalism  including zionism  and its steadfast belief in intergroup solidarity mdash crabapple identifies  ldquo a guide for our moment  rdquo     the bund rsquo s revolutionaries  poets  and militants fought and died not just in the name of an emancipated socialist horizon  rather  they forged a capacious form of belonging  at home in diaspora and exile  reliant not on blood and soil but a shared struggle for freedom and dignity wherever they found themselves  they called their philosophy do rsquo ikayt  or  ldquo here ness  rdquo  we would do well to listen     the nation spoke with crabapple about socialist internationalism  yiddish cultural production  and the tedium of leftist infighting  the conversation has been edited for length and clarity      mdash ishan desai geller       ishan desai geller   your book is subtitled  ldquo the story  rdquo  not  ldquo the history  rdquo   ldquo of the jewish bund  rdquo  in the book rsquo s introduction  you write of the bund not as an ossified historical artifact but as a  ldquo guide for our moment  in all its horror and possibility  rdquo  what was the bund     molly crabapple  the bund was a secular  socialist  defiantly jewish  and uncompromisingly anti zionist revolutionary party that was born in 1897 in tsarist russia  tsarist russia during those years  where jews were subject to specific racialized laws  was probably the most miserable place to be a jew     jewish workers were living under dual oppression  they were oppressed as subjects of the tsar as workers  and also as jews  the bund was founded by young jewish marxists who wanted to overthrow the tsar and establish democratic socialism  but also to liberate their own people specifically     it was a movement that educated shtetls  created armed brigades to fight pogromists  and fought on the barricades of the 1905 and 1917 revolutions  after the bolsheviks booted them out of russia after the october revolution  the bund reconstituted in independent poland     there it became an organization that reminds me most of the black panther party  it was an organization of marxists  by and for an oppressed and racialized group that built these vast networks of communal care mdash soup kitchens  the medem sanatorium for slum kids  youth movements  women rsquo s movements  and popular sports clubs  but it was also devoted to the uplift of jewish culture  which was very much a subaltern culture     the bund threw itself into the promotion of yiddish literature  it had theater troupes  publishing houses  and newspapers that introduced the jewish working class of warsaw to international socialism  also like the panthers  it was a group committed to armed self defense     because of its commitment to communal self defense  and its construction of these cultural and mutual aid networks  it became the most popular jewish party in poland by 1939  in september of that year  the nazis invaded and the bund resisted from the first days to the last  they defended their city during the siege of warsaw and created an underground  eventually  bundist youth helped lead the warsaw ghetto revolt  and fought as partisans after the destruction of the ghetto     idg  how might the bund rsquo s example  ldquo illuminate the tumultuous present  rdquo  as you put it     mc   first  bundists were valiant  they lived in a brutal time with so much betrayal and racism  they fought against that from a position of profound ethics and a belief in human dignity  but also with toughness and courage  toughness and courage is what we need as we rsquo re facing fascism in america     on a more philosophical note  while the bund celebrated jews as a people  they were opposed to ethnonationalism  whether jewish  russian  or polish  they were opposed in their very deepest core to the idea that discrete peoples need discrete bits of land with an ethnically homogenous state where everyone speaks the same language  has the same culture  and worships the same god  they thought  this is bullshit  it rsquo s a recipe for ethnic cleansing and endless bloodshed  every time a group draws a border to create a homeland  there rsquo s always a minority that ends up with the boot on its face  that rsquo s a lesson we need to relearn  there is only one earth     idg  in a dialectical fashion befitting a group of revolutionary socialists  the bund rsquo s worldview negotiated two ostensibly irreducible principles  they were fiercely committed to their culture of secular  working class jewishness mdash elevating yiddish to a revered literary language and rejecting european demands for assimilation mdash but  even when it cost them dearly  were unwaveringly internationalist and coalitional in their commitment to solidarity across difference  the synthesis of these principles formed the backbone of their ideology  here ness  or do rsquo ikayt in yiddish  which you describe as a  ldquo diasporic nationalism  rdquo  what does here ness mean     mc   it begins with an acknowledgement that jews had lived in eastern europe for a thousand years and they had built homes  communities  and a language  yiddish  they had a right to live in freedom and dignity in eastern europe  even if the russian empire  and interwar poland  said they were harmful aliens who ought to be deported to palestine  they wanted to stay in their homes  not just stay  but flourish and thrive in their homes  that rsquo s what  ldquo here ness rdquo  was  it was the right to stay in your home  even if your existence ran contrary to the ideals of an ethnostate  in a way it echoes the palestinian concept of sumud     idg   how did their philosophy of here ness inform the bund rsquo s staunchly anti zionist relation to palestine     mc   even before the bund existed  the people who would create the bund were arguing with zionists at local synagogues  there were a few reasons that the bund hated zionism in the years before balfour  first  they thought it was absolutely ridiculous  you rsquo re going to take 9 million people and have them move to collective farms in the levant on land purchased from the sultan  what an idea     they also saw this as a harmful idea because jewish bosses were using it to distract from the terrible wages they paid jewish workers by saying   ldquo maybe i rsquo m not paying you a living wage  but i endowed a yeshiva in palestine  rdquo     secondly  they felt that it was collaboration with the same anti semites that wanted to drive jews from their homes  when  groups like the black hundreds in tsarist russia and the national democrats in poland were saying jews should be deported to palestine  the zionists agreed  thirdly  after the balfour declaration  when zionism got the backing of the british empire for its settler colonial project  the bund rejected it on anti imperialist grounds     the bund repeatedly refused to collaborate with zionists mdash even in the earlier days of the warsaw ghetto mdash because of a profound ideological gulf  they called vladimir jabotinsky rsquo s revisionist zionist group  betar   ldquo little jewish fascists  rdquo     idg   if the bund rsquo s revolutionary horizon mdash a new world devoid of racial hatred  capitalist exploitation  and the scourge of ethnonationalism mdash seemed grand and faraway  it never precluded practical action in the here and now  whether through mutual aid  labor organizing  or armed anti fascist defense squads  could you describe the political institutions and cultural programs bundists built and how such efforts fit into their broader project     mc   i rsquo ll focus on poland in the interwar period because that rsquo s when they had the most room to build  they built a counterculture  it rsquo s the only way to describe it     they built institutions for every stage and aspect of life  a movement for little kids  a boy scout type movement  a youth movement  summer camps  a women rsquo s movement that fought for childcare and birth control  they had schools  including night schools  for teenage jewish workers who worked 12 hours a day     they had clubhouses and all these labor unions  they had newspapers  publishing houses  and an amazing sports club  there are really cool pictures of bundist guys running foot races in their slums and sexy girls in their little booty shorts doing gymnastics together     many people in these communities were hungry and living in highly polluted neighborhoods  the bund rsquo s sports club taught kids how to ice skate and to swim  it took them to the countryside  jews in the cities often had no access to the countryside  or were scared they rsquo d be beaten up there  but the bund believed that all of the beauty of the polish countryside mdash its mountains and rivers mdash belonged to jews as well  so they organized hikes  summer retreats  and camps     they also had deep connections with socialist movements around the world  the bund sent athletes to the worker rsquo s olympiad  the socialist alternative to the olympics  in 1930s red vienna  they participated in the labor and socialist international  they sent fighters to spain to help defend the republic during the civil war     they built an entire world  this is a very practical part of their  ldquo here ness  rdquo  it rsquo s not just that we don rsquo t want to go to the  ldquo there rdquo  of palestine  it rsquo s also that we rsquo re not going to wait to live until the revolution happens     especially for these polish bundists  many of whom had participated in the russian revolution  and seen it turn against them  there was a real commitment both to fighting for a socialist  liberated europe and world in a larger sense but also to fighting for dignity and beauty on a practical  everyday level in their streets  their neighborhoods  and their daily lives     idg   whether in pale of settlement shtetls or the warsaw ghetto  the bund unfailingly circulated their ideas and calls to action through clandestine newspapers  could you talk about the bund rsquo s use of the written word to build political consciousness     mc   for them  the printing press was the party  before anything else  they had printing presses or hectographs mdash a more primitive method of reproduction that was good for being sneaky because it doesn rsquo t make noise  the handbill  the newspaper  the pamphlet  these were everything to them and were their means of communication  in the russian empire  their pamphlets were illegal  the penalty for distributing them was imprisonment  sophia dubnova  one of the heroines of the book  would smuggle pamphlets taped to her body  so that they resembled a pregnant belly     their pamphlets were multilingual  their primary language was yiddish because that was the language of the jewish working class  but  they always wrote in russian or polish mdash the vernacular of wherever they were  it was never  yiddish or death  it was more that yiddish is ours and deserves dignity     the bund had newspapers in every town it was active in  too  volkovysk  my great grandfather rsquo s hometown  had its own newspaper  the volkovsyk awakener  these papers were like doorways  they reported on local and national news  but they were also profoundly internationalist  they reported on the scottsboro boys  lynchings in america  palestine  and attacks on chinese socialists in china  they also translated contemporary and avant garde literature into yiddish     they opened up the entire world to the impoverished jewish working class of poland  to me  that rsquo s so beautiful  even when the newspapers were resurrected as illegal underground broadsheets in the ghetto  in addition to reporting on the war and the nazis  they wrote about tagore and freud  they believed that art  poetry  literature  and intellectualism were the birthright of the masses  they did not think of them as luxuries  but as vital as bread     idg   your point of entry into the story of the bund is your great grandfather  the artist and bundist sam rothbort  i was struck that  even under conditions of extreme deprivation and genocidal violence  art was essential to bundist life  how did artistic production fit into the bund rsquo s socialism     mc   it was there from the very start  when they were organizing little shtetls in the tsarist empire  they would use lending libraries as tools  offering not just marx but also contemporary yiddish writers like sholem aleichem  or translations of jules verne  they were deeply embedded in the yiddish literary world  the great playwright s  an sky wrote their anthems     in poland  they established publishing houses and theaters  at the medem sanatorium for tubercular slum kids  art was an essential part of these everyday life  looking through the sanitorium rsquo s archival books  you see the plays  handmade costumes  decorations  and newspapers that these kids made     the bund truly believed that creativity was a human birthright  that was reflected in how they did education  they just believed in beauty     bernard goldstein was the head of the warsaw self defense militia  he had no education  he couldn rsquo t speak even one language right  his job was to break the kneecaps of nationalists and had killed some people  but in his free time  he liked to go to the yiddish theaters and hang out at the yiddish writers club  in his memoir  goldstein recounts visiting his best friend  the bundist writer shlomo mendelsohn  after he rsquo d just been in a street brawl  he asks   ldquo why can rsquo t i be like you  why do i have to point guns at people  why do i have to have this brutish and violent life  i wish that i could sit at a desk and write beautiful words like you do  rdquo     idg   you rsquo ve remarked   ldquo this book is also about the ludicrousness of the left  it is not a pious book  rdquo  what did you mean by that     mc   i refuse to consider anyone  whether lenin  trotsky  or a warsaw ghetto fighter  as god  they rsquo re not gods  they rsquo re humans with all the flaws  idiocies  and pettiness of humans     there rsquo s a lot of pathological shit that we do on the left  and some of it plays out during the worst circumstances  in the warsaw ghetto  every single jewish leftist group published illegal newspapers at the risk of death to denounce other jewish leftist groups for having the wrong views  you rsquo d think surely there will be a situation that rsquo s so serious that people will stop doing this     in her memoir  zivia lubetkin  the only woman to lead the warsaw ghetto fighters  describes hiding in a bunker as the nazis bomb the ghetto  what were they doing in the bunkers  they rsquo re arguing about yiddish versus hebrew     idg  one of the most chilling passages in the book details a path not taken  on the eve of hitler rsquo s ascension to chancellor in january 1933  german social democratic parties decided  ldquo that since hitler had been appointed fair and square  they rsquo d suck it up and wait till the next election  in the name of democracy  rdquo  the resonance with our own blood and soil conjuncture is unmissable  how might the bund rsquo s example lead us beyond liberal capitulation to the far right and toward the culture of direct action  resistance  and intergroup solidarity we rsquo ve seen  most recently  in the movements for palestinian liberation and against ice     mc  the german social democrats deserve so much of the blame for their inaction and foolishness  we also need to lay some blame on the german communists who mdash utterly subservient to every shimmy of soviet foreign policy mdash took the comintern rsquo s brilliant position that the real fascists were not actual fascists like mussolini  but rather social democratic parties who they called  ldquo social fascists  rdquo  you have two big parties that are colluding in this nightmare  which is also like today     it would be wrong to say that the german social democrats are like our own democratic party because the political compass is different  but  they occupied that role in their inaction  their refusal to use the tool of the general strike  and by sucking it up until the next election  they insisted on their faith in the german people  after hitler came to power  a german social democrat famously said   ldquo well  berlin is not rome  rdquo  this reminds me so much of  ldquo it rsquo s america  we would never  rdquo     at a meeting of the labor and socialist international around 1931  henryk erlich  the leader of the bund  was very upset at what he saw as the mistakes of the german social democratic party  he was especially upset that they were making deals with german industrialists and aristocrats  if the social democrats gave up their independence and militancy and didn rsquo t provide a better life for workers  the workers would choose the fascists  the head of the german social democratic party  otto wels  looked at him and burst out laughing   ldquo who the fuck are you to tell us about the german social democrats  we got everything under control  rdquo     idg  what can we take away from that story     mc   the first thing is about organizing across difference and speaking to people where they are  one of the worst tendencies of the left mdash both annoyingly minor and devastating to our effectiveness mdash is that we sometimes talk like we rsquo re hr professionals  things are too grave and deadly right now to be using vocabulary that alienates people     the bundists were working class people  and they spoke like the working class  they created a subculture that was profoundly desirable which people wanted to be part of  they were also coalitional  they worked with the polish socialist party  they knew that if you are a minority  you have to fight alongside members of the majority  there rsquo s just no other way     and unlike many other leftist groups  the bund didn rsquo t have a lot of splits  i think this was because they had a huge amount of love and loyalty to each other     idg  despite the bund rsquo s ardent secularism  belief appears as a potent theme throughout their story and your book  particularly the uncertain terrain between quixotic delusion and righteous  even prophetic  political conviction  how has this project impacted your thinking about belief and conviction mdash and their corollary  hope mdash in  ldquo our age of blood soaked mass displacement rdquo   what does it mean to feel hopeful  or to believe  in the bund rsquo s time and in ours     mc  these people were marxists  and we think of marxism as profoundly atheistic  but it rsquo s also a religion in its own right  it has a belief in a preordained history and a preordained better tomorrow  the bundists truly believed that they were aligned with history and were participants in a historical process that was going to bring about a better world     when i read these party texts in which bundists facing execution gave their last testimony  they always said   ldquo i die knowing that i am a socialist  and i die knowing that i was right  rdquo  they had complete conviction that they were right     their core of morality  their belief in human dignity and human solidarity is correct  that solidarity between people mdash no matter how hard it is  how easily betrayed  how fraught  how challenged by the forces of tribalism mdash is the only thing that can save us  that solidarity is what was on display in the streets of minneapolis   solidarity across difference  that to me was the core of their faith  the core of their belief  it is what i hold on to  solidarity between humans       ensp<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/molly-crabapple-qa/">The Enduring Lessons of the Jewish Bund </a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 10 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/molly-crabapple-qa/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Yale’s Summer Storage Wars]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/yale-storage-first-gen-low-income-reimbursement/]]></link>
		<author>Zachary Clifton</author>
	<date>Apr 10, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Yale just cut summer storage reimbursements for first-gen and low-income students. The university has a $44 billion endowment. What it chooses to budget for says everything.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Yale just cut summer storage reimbursements for first gen and low income students  the university has a  44 billion endowment  what it chooses to budget for says everything      an unfurnished dorm room at yale in new haven         early on monday morning  someone from the yale college dean rsquo s office sent me a message on whatsapp  a link led to a letter by professor glenda elizabeth gilmore published in the yale daily news  it was a letter written about a word  the word was  ldquo stuff  rdquo       in 1967  gilmore finished her first year at wake forest  when school let out  she had nowhere to go  so she found a friend with a room on campus where she could stay for a few weeks  she also found a place in the dormitory rsquo s basement where her belongings mdash presumably  a suitcase and the accumulations of her first year mdash could wait for her sophomore year     a dean eventually found her and what she had stashed in the basement  he told her to leave it exactly where it was     gilmore is now the peter v  and c  vann woodward professor emerita at yale  where she holds appointments in history  black studies  and american studies  but she did not write her letter to the yale daily news about any scholarship or expertise in the many fields for which she is considered an authority  she wrote it to describe that dormitory basement at wake forest  and she wrote it because the dean of yale college  pericles lewis  defending his administration rsquo s decision to eliminate its summer storage reimbursement program for first generation and low income students  suggested that those students simply  ldquo should not buy too much stuff  rdquo  dean lewis had used  ldquo stuff  rdquo  so gilmore did too  she put quotation marks around it  she was  after dealing with universities for 60 years  precise     a week before it ran her letter  the yale daily news published a story about the cuts to the summer storage reimbursement program  when the news posted the story on instagram  it received nearly a thousand likes and more than a hundred comments from current students and alumni  jake thrasher  a phd candidate at yale  wrote the most liked comment   ldquo if i made  450k year  according to public info   i personally think it would be tacky as hell to tell the poorest students here  lsquo not to buy too much stuff rsquo  but what do i know  rdquo  lizzie conklin  who graduated last year  commented   ldquo this is genuinely absurd  rdquo  elizabeth shvarts  who will graduate next month  wrote   ldquo let rsquo s just store it in his mansion  rdquo  another commenter compared dean lewis to marie antoinette  several others called the situation absurd     alex william chen was not one of those who commented on the instagram post  but chen is the yale college council rsquo s speaker and has helped allocate the council rsquo s remaining budget mdash almost  13 000 mdash toward supporting students who need financial help with summer storage costs       chen texted me a message he rsquo d like to send yale rsquo s administrators   ldquo please come down from your offices and meet with students on campus  explain to us how the utility of financial support for yale rsquo s most financially vulnerable students is somehow less than the utility of preserving an exponentially bloated administrative apparatus  rdquo     chen told me that he knew several yale students from new haven who were offering up their own homes to store boxes for friends who will lose reimbursement for summer storage  he asked   ldquo would these yale administrators be willing to do the same  rdquo     the reimbursement program had covered summer storage costs for first generation  low income students and had provided relief for qualifying students whose socioeconomic backgrounds do not provide a financially feasible option for summer storage  its elimination upended the relief that had become expected     a week after the announcement  and a day after gilmore rsquo s letter  a new announcement came mdash this one from a student who  like chen  wanted to figure out a way for students to fix this on their own       topher allen  the student equity coordinator at dwight hall  a center for public service at yale  held emergency meetings with storage vendors  container brokers  and colleagues on the student executive committee  between meetings  he was on calls with alumni and leaders of the yale college council  within a week  they had reallocated their entire spring budget for community building  social justice  and outreach  everything allocated to those programs was folded into creating solutions for students who still needed the summer storage reimbursement     what they built  a flat rate of  50 for full summer storage  available to any student eligible for the full pell grant  living on campus with a home address more than 150 miles away     in an e mail to the student body  they compared their rate to that offered by local vendors mdash between  400 and  700  allen  however  called the solution a band aid  he said it was born of necessity  not abundance  he also noted that some students  before the dwight hall intervention  had planned to hide belongings around campus  or to throw items away and try to replace them in the fall       gilmore rsquo s letter  about halfway through  finishes her story about the dean who let her keep her  ldquo stuff rdquo  in a dormitory basement all those years ago  when she finishes that story  she begins another mdash one in which yale holds a  44 billion endowment  in that story  she asserts that the administration might make itself more useful by eliminating two administrator positions than by ending a summer storage reimbursement program that has benefited thousands of students       gilmore rsquo s second story  alluding to what chen called a bloated administrative apparatus  had not arrived at its conclusion arbitrarily     in 2025  more than a hundred yale faculty  drawn from dozens of academic departments across nearly every discipline  including yale law school and yale school of medicine  signed a letter calling for a freeze on new administrative hires  professors were watching their own salary increases slowly while the ratio of administrators to undergraduates crept toward parity     the endowment that pays those administrators has accumulated  at least in part  from generations of alumni who wanted to give back to the school that had given them so much  among what yale had given them were programs like summer storage  it seems  from chen rsquo s text messages  and a lot of angry instagram comments  that such programs give yale the chance to show students that it sees them as more than their good grades  sat scores  and isef awards     this is the argument gilmore made in her letter  which began  she told us  in a dormitory basement in winston salem in 1967  she remembered it 60 years later  she put the word in quotation marks  she took a word a dean had used carelessly and precisely demarcated it in the oldest college daily newspaper in the united states  but gilmore was not calling any of it absurd   ldquo yale college dean pericles lewis perhaps attempting to be humorous hellip when he suggested that low income students should simply not  lsquo buy too much stuff  rsquo  rdquo  gilmore wrote   ldquo instead seemed arrogant  rdquo<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/yale-storage-first-gen-low-income-reimbursement/">Yale’s Summer Storage Wars</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 10 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/yale-storage-first-gen-low-income-reimbursement/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[In Princeton, a Housing Plan Sparks a Neighborhood War]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/princeton-housing-crisis/]]></link>
		<author>Sophie Mann-Shafir</author>
	<date>Apr 10, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>What a battle over a mixed-use development in a historic town reveals about liberal America.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["What a battle over a mixed use development in a historic town reveals about liberal america      signage reading  ldquo defend historic princeton rdquo  across the street from albert einstein rsquo s house in princeton  new jersey  on march 9  2026       princeton  new jersey mdash at a community forum in 2023  jim kyle  a municipal planner  approached the dais and spoke about focusing  ldquo more density in town and near public transit  rdquo  kyle was working with the city to redevelop land in the town rsquo s western section  a wealthy  tree lined neighborhood of tudor and colonial homes near downtown     the municipality hadn rsquo t yet settled on its final proposal to build 238 apartment units  48 of which would be designated affordable  on that 4 8 acre tract  but the resistance to it was already mounting       over the course of that morning  homeowners overwhelmingly balked at the prospect of increased density mdash what one town consultant would call the  ldquo the d word  rdquo  one resident of princeton rsquo s western section told the room   ldquo those of us who own historic homes are subsidizing the community rdquo  mdash and was met with applause  another pointed out that when it comes to historic preservation mdash i e   maintaining the homes they own and live in mdash the  ldquo weight is borne by individuals in this community  rdquo  then a resident took the mic to  ldquo take on the role of the lorax and speak for the trees  rdquo   the project rsquo s lead architect  dean marchetto  says the plan would prioritize maintaining trees along the streets      in the three years since  the conflict has grown fiercer  locals make the dispute sound like the second battle of princeton  the housing proposal has pit pro preservation residents against their pro housing neighbors  it rsquo s prompted a lawn sign war  public insults  private threats  and at least one assault  and in this way  experts say  princeton is like a lot of other towns  in upper class suburbs  a group of organized residents will almost always fight to maintain the single family status quo     matt mleczko earned his phd from princeton in 2024 and founded princeton grows  a local housing advocacy group  he rsquo s now a political science professor at marquette university  and he told me   ldquo if you replicate this same scenario thousands of times over in all the other places like princeton that have a lot of resistance to building multi family housing  i would imagine it starts to become a little bit clearer why we rsquo re in such a housing crisis  rdquo     neighbors campaigning against the development point to the illustrious parts of town history  einstein rsquo s house  revolutionary war sites  and nassau hall  which served as the us capitol for four months in 1783  but they usually leave out princeton rsquo s less glorious history of discrimination       in 1696  princeton rsquo s first known black residents arrived  seven enslaved people belonging to declaration of independence signatory richard stockton   ldquo the enslaved stocktons not only worked the land but also cleared and built the stocktons rsquo  stately home  as well as their own slave quarters in the back  rdquo  kathryn watterson writes in i hear my people singing  a book on princeton rsquo s african american history     the address of the proposed housing is 108 stockton street mdash part of stockton rsquo s initial 400 acre tract     what affordable housing princeton did have was rendered that way by segregation  according to the princeton affordable housing project  beginning in the late 1800s  12 concentrated blocks were home to most of the town rsquo s black population  a fence separated that area from higher income housing to the west  black entrepreneurs opened businesses  including grocery stores  beauty salons  and the state rsquo s only black run newspaper  businesses along princeton rsquo s main drag largely did not allow black clientele  so the neighborhood rsquo s residents created an affordable micro economy  with the black ymca as its social hub     then  in 1929  a rich princeton alum bankrolled the construction of what would become the town rsquo s economic center  to make way for these plans  ldquo to enhance the student experience  rdquo  those 12 blocks were demolished and the black residents displaced     now anti development signs have sprouted up across town  demanding  ldquo defend historic princeton  rdquo  the eponymous group behind the signs says its organizers  ldquo oppose town wide overdevelopment at the expense of princeton rsquo s multifaceted historic character  rdquo     adam gordon  the executive director of fair share housing  a statewide advocacy group that has settled housing related cases with more than 340 towns across new jersey  looks to the rhetoric of safeguarding princeton rsquo s history and sees an echo with another movement   ldquo defend historic princeton  hellip  it rsquo s make america great again  rdquo  he told me   ldquo it rsquo s this romantic vision of a past that didn rsquo t really exist  rdquo     because of its long history of discrimination  princeton rsquo s metro area is the sixth most segregated in the country  according to a 2023 study out of berkeley  and lacking affordable housing  many poor and working class residents have been pushed out  in 2024  princeton rsquo s household median income was  192 079  nearly twice the statewide median income of  103 556 and close to four times that of neighboring trenton     in a paid advertisement printed last april in princeton packet  a group of prominent academics mdash including liberal historian sean wilentz and topped by filmmaker ken burns  who does not live in princeton but is a friend of wilentz rsquo s mdash wrote   ldquo few if any american towns are as distinguished as princeton  rdquo  they call the proposed development  ldquo aggressive high density urbanism  rdquo      ldquo this is not just any town  any municipality  just like this is not just any university  rdquo  wilentz told princeton university rsquo s student newspaper last fall     princeton professor sean wilentz poses for a portrait in his home in princeton  new jersey  march 9  2026     his organization  defend historic princeton  and another  princeton coalition for responsible development  separately filed legal challenges against the town to halt the development plans from becoming part of the planned affordable housing stock  those lawsuits have so far been dismissed  in february  the us supreme court sided with the state of new jersey in upholding towns rsquo  obligation to implement affordable housing mdash a requirement that several of the state rsquo s wealthiest municipalities were trying to shirk     new jersey has mandated affordable housing since the 1970s  when an influx of wealthy white families to the south jersey suburb of mount laurel priced out longtime black residents  a lawsuit between the township and the local chapter of the naacp resulted in the mount laurel doctrine in 1975  which banned exclusionary zoning and stipulated that towns had to offer their  ldquo fair share rdquo  of affordable housing  in the following decades  updates to the legislation and the formation of the council on affordable housing strengthened state oversight and enforcement capacity     still  for decades  towns did not build affordable units at scale  regional contribution agreements allowed wealthier towns to offload their fair share obligations onto poorer towns with compensation until 2008 when the state eliminated these deals  and in 2015  the new jersey supreme court ruled that compliance with mount laurel was within the judicial system rsquo s purview  making it possible for the courts to compel towns to follow the law  since then  fair share housing has settled cases with hundreds of towns mdash including princeton  in the past 11 years  some 25 000 designated affordable homes have been built statewide mdash a testament to  ldquo how successful and influential the mount laurel framework has been  rdquo  jag davies  fair share housing rsquo s director of communications  told me  several other states enacted housing laws similar to new jersey rsquo s  still  it hasn rsquo t been enough  new jersey has a 150 000 unit shortage of low  and moderate income homes     critics of the proposed housing have downplayed the affordable housing in the project and lambasted it as  ldquo a massive luxury apartment development  rdquo  not in keeping with neighborhood architecture and character   ldquo it rsquo s as lopsided to its context as the trump white house ballroom is  rdquo  wilentz told me     mleczko  the marquette professor  pointed out that the housing deficit exists across class brackets  with affordability meaning different things to different people   ldquo if everything that rsquo s new is luxury  the term starts to not mean much of anything  rdquo     the 48 designated affordable units would be split into three income restricted tiers  the lowest being for families making 30 percent or less of area median income  building these units requires funding   ldquo affordable housing cannot pay for itself  rdquo  patrick mcananey  a dc area housing developer  wrote   ldquo government subsidies exist  but they can rarely finance entirely affordable developments  developers often account for the funding shortfall by  ldquo utilizing market rate housing to cross subsidize affordable units  rdquo     responding to the initial ad signed by wilentz  burns  and four other historians  councilman leighton newlin published a letter in town topics titled   ldquo  lsquo defending rsquo  historic princeton  from whom  and from what  rdquo  newlin extols the possibility of inclusionary multi family affordable units in town  and describes anxieties related to traffic  aesthetics  and stormwater as  ldquo a plantation mentality in progressive clothing  rdquo     in his response to the response  wilentz decried newlin rsquo s  ldquo predictably rdquo  pro forma portrayal of the housing opponents  ldquo as elite racists out to exclude blacks and hispanics from princeton  rdquo  wilentz stands by his claim that the development only replicates the town rsquo s racial inequities       some of the houses in princeton are centuries old  but the town has also seen hyper modern mansions get built without raising any alarms  a 2017 princeton magazine feature called  ldquo evolving neighborhood rdquo  describes how a gabled  cape cottage ndash style home in the western section was  ldquo deconstructed rdquo  to make room for  ldquo a modernist rsquo s dream  rdquo  the magazine says such residents have risen  ldquo to the challenge of modern living in an historic neighborhood  rdquo  in 2012  an effort to designate this same area historic mdash and limit teardowns mdash caused some inhabitants to express feeling  ldquo disenfranchised rdquo  by losing property rights  one resident described the historic designation as  ldquo a creeping cancer  rdquo     the much debated housing proposal is for a vacant  previously developed site and wouldn rsquo t involve any further demolition   in 2022  three historic princeton theological seminary buildings were leveled on the property  to neighbors rsquo  chagrin      for jessica vieira  the historical significance of western section drew her to the neighborhood  even if it comes with an added price  vieira lives down the street from the proposed development  which she described as  ldquo a massive structure in what is a colonial village  rdquo  she worried that the construction would tower over the barracks  a 17th century estate where james madison and alexander hamilton slept during the 1783 continental congress   ldquo we feel like we rsquo re sitting here in our little historic homes  and they rsquo re basically building huge developments around us  rdquo  vieira told me   ldquo i recognize that we need to be able to build housing  but this is insane  rdquo     some neighbors argue the area is better simply better suited to single family homes  one new family next door is more  ldquo in keeping rdquo  than dozens  it boils down to  ldquo the idea that some element of the big city is coming to take a place in their town  rdquo  said tapinto princeton editor richard rein   ldquo and people find that very frightening  rdquo     at the end of one community forum in march  rein  78  was shoved and cursed at   ldquo fortunately  i had myself braced in such a way that i didn rsquo t go down  rdquo  said rein   ldquo what was more shocking to me was the dropping of an f bomb from two different women of retirement age living in the western section of princeton  rdquo  rein rsquo s coverage leans in favor of the proposed development     rein is not the only one feeling the heat of social tensions   ldquo we have experienced constant animosity  threats that are personal  political and professional  rdquo  said councilwoman mia sacks  chair of the affordable housing committee     the attention blitz has also bred a kind of meme ification  after the orange  ldquo defend historic princeton rdquo  signs cropped up  blue ones imploring  ldquo princeton for all rdquo  started populating dissenting yards  the sign skirmish was waged by university neuroscientists jonathan pillow and sam wang  who told me they thought the orange ones sent an  ldquo unwelcoming message  keeping people out to preserve the town as it is  rdquo       then suddenly there were lime green signs too  stating simply   ldquo princeton  rdquo  an e mail address at the bottom reads mysignisbetterthanyours gmail com  someone calling themself  ldquo princeton yard sign syndicate rdquo  said via e mail   ldquo we can neither confirm nor deny that our sign is our official entry into the ongoing battle of the yard signs  rdquo  and at local pub trivia  graduate students studying housing policy have competed under the name  ldquo destroy historic princeton  rdquo     sacks grew up in princeton and returned in 2008 after more than 20 years away  arriving  ldquo felt like i was moving to a stage set of a town that had been frozen in time  rdquo  sacks said   ldquo it felt like the town was basically preserved in formaldehyde  and that it was not evolving  rdquo     mleczko sees the development question as part of a social contract  in which housing is both a need and a right  he said these debates require us to ask ourselves   ldquo are we going to provide for neighbors  are we going to provide for the people who want to be our neighbors but can rsquo t because there rsquo s not enough housing to go around  rdquo  as for balancing housing and environmental priorities  mleczko takes issue with the heady philosophizing   ldquo it rsquo d be one thing if this were a debate in a vacuum  what rsquo s more important  housing affordability or historic preservation  but we rsquo re not in a vacuum  we rsquo re in the backdrop of an unrelenting housing crisis  rdquo     princeton is not alone among blue towns in having a chasm between its purported values and real time stance  this is especially true at municipal meetings  which disproportionately draw people opposed to housing proposals  a study by data for progress analyzing massachusetts voters rsquo  attitudes toward affordable housing found respondents much more likely to support hypothetical affordable housing than actual projects in their neighborhoods  fifty six percent of voters supported affordable housing abstractly in a ballot referendum  but 63 percent of municipal meeting attendees opposed development projects     by the time later community forums rolled around in princeton  housing advocates were showing up in larger numbers  diluting the density panic and showing that a smattering of housing apprehensive voices had been disproportionately loud      ldquo there rsquo s general agreement that affordable housing serves an important role in the community  rdquo  liz lempert  princeton rsquo s mayor from 2013 to 2020  told me   ldquo the debate is more on where it should be  and oftentimes it rsquo s   lsquo not here  it should be there  rsquo  rdquo     princeton has a reputation as a liberal  intellectual bastion mdash but like many towns  its progressivism  for many residents  crumbles at the prospect of lower property values or a changing view across the street<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/princeton-housing-crisis/">In Princeton, a Housing Plan Sparks a Neighborhood War</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 10 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/princeton-housing-crisis/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The United States Is Now an Apocalyptic Terror State]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/iran-trump-terrorist/]]></link>
		<author>Sasha Abramsky</author>
	<date>Apr 10, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>With his genocidal threats against Iran, Trump has shown the world that he is a terrorist—one with a nuclear arsenal.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["With his genocidal threats against iran  trump has shown the world that he is a terrorist mdash one with a nuclear arsenal      an explosion lights up the sky following us israeli strikes near azadi tower close to mehrabad international airport in tehran on march 7  2026       iwas living in new york city when al qaeda terrorists flew jet planes into the world trade center  and i will never forget the panic that i felt as the certainties of the architecture around me went up in flames     i remember  too  that shortly afterward  anthrax attacks were launched against seemingly random targets  suddenly  the air we breathed seemed suspect mdash our environments turned against us by faceless enemies  terrorists  intent on inflicting maximum physical and psychological damage       webster rsquo s dictionary defines  ldquo terrorism rdquo  as  ldquo the systematic use of terror  especially as a means of coercion  rdquo  it defines  ldquo terrorist rdquo  as  ldquo an advocate or practitioner of terrorism as a means of coercion  rdquo      ldquo terrorists rdquo  are reviled  because of their willingness to impose indiscriminate terror  fear  and violence on civilian populations to get their way politically or economically  if you want to gin up a populace against a particular group of people  label them  ldquo terrorists  rdquo  it rsquo s shorthand for  ldquo despicable  bloodthirsty  murderous thugs  people with no moral limits  rdquo  such was the contempt that the george w  bush administration had for al qaeda terrorists that they secured legal opinions saying that al qaeda captives did not have to be accorded the respect that the geneva convention grants other prisoners of war  and then they waterboarded them and sent them to guantanamo bay  in 2015  candidate trump said the only way to effectively fight terrorist groups such as isis was to kill the family members of known terrorists       i mention this because over the past week donald trump  the senescent man whose word can unleash the most fearsome weapons known to humankind  revealed himself to be simply a common terrorist  albeit one with a potentially world destroying arsenal backing him up  if the united states rsquo  dwindling list of allies had any illusions about the man  they were surely cast to the winds this week     first  after days of threatening massive attacks on iran rsquo s infrastructure and to bomb the iranians  ldquo back to the stone age  where they belong  rdquo  trump spewed out a profanity filled truth social post on easter sunday that reveled in his ability to obliterate the infrastructure upon which iranian civil society mdash and the lives of its 90 million residents mdash depend   ldquo tuesday will be power plant day  and bridge day  all wrapped up in one  in iran  there will be nothing like it    open the fuckin rsquo  strait  you crazy bastards  or you rsquo ll be living in hell  ndash  just watch  praise be to allah  president donald j  trump  rdquo  not wanting to be left out of the fun   ldquo secretary of war rdquo  pete hegseth also cryptically posted on x   ldquo back to the stone age  rdquo   although to be fair  in his case it wasn rsquo t clear if this was a threat to iran or simply a status update of hegseth rsquo s own all too visible reversion to primitive man status      two days after his tirade  trump announced that at 8 pm eastern time on tuesday   ldquo a whole civilization will die tonight  never to be brought back again  rdquo  he added  almost as if he had no control over his own actions   ldquo i don rsquo t want that to happen  but it probably will  rdquo  i have scoured my historical memory  and i cannot think of another major international figure since hitler who has made such explicitly genocidal threats  so devoid of euphemism mdash and even hitler and his henchmen generally couched their apocalyptic visions in just enough euphemism to give them the cover of plausible deniability  so much for trump rsquo s efforts to secure the nobel peace prize next year     since even the us president does not possess magical powers by which he can wave a wand and magically disappear a 6 000 year old civilization  the only plausible explanation behind the specificity of trump rsquo s words was that he was threatening to unleash a nuclear apocalypse on the iranians mdash which would  indeed  destroy a civilization  killing tens of millions of people in the process     what i am struggling to even begin to fathom is what it must have felt like to be an iranian trapped in that bombed out country in the hours between trump rsquo s pledge that at 8 pm their civilization would be erased and the announcement of a pakistan brokered ceasefire 90 minutes before trump rsquo s deadline  i can rsquo t imagine how slowly time must have ticked by  each second bringing the country closer to destruction  for those 12 hours  90 million iranians must have felt like the condemned on death row as the time of their electrocution neared     i can rsquo t imagine what husbands and wives thought as they realized their partners might soon be atomized by trump rsquo s bombs  i can rsquo t imagine what parents felt looking at their children and knowing that a few hours from now their bodies might be obliterated  i can rsquo t imagine what children thought knowing their power to protect their aging mothers and fathers was gone mdash that they were all at the mercy of a madman rsquo s diktats       and i can rsquo t even begin to fathom the rage that those millions of iranians must have felt at the us soldiers and sailors and airmen blithely going about their business in loading up weapons and pretending that this was just another day at the office  or  rather  i can  just ever so slightly  get a glimpse of that rage  that powerless fury  because in september 2001  that rsquo s the rage  fear  and horror that i felt in new york when i realized that men i had never met  from places i had never been to  had tried to kill me and my fellow new yorkers mdash and had done so in a way deliberately calculated to inflict maximum enduring trauma on those who survived the attacks     even if the us iran ceasefire holds  which as i write this seems by no means certain  tens of millions of iranians will be left with that sense of panic  that stomach churning  vertiginous sense of the fragility of hellip  everything       and here rsquo s the thing  that act of terror was carried out in our name  by a man whom 80 million plus americans voted into office and whom the gop led congress has repeatedly failed to rein in  had he ordered the military to carry out what would surely constitute crimes against humanity  there rsquo s precious little evidence the military would have balked  though there is some reporting that military lawyers were unwilling to sign off on trump rsquo s actions  or that the majority in congress would have significantly pushed back against him  unless i rsquo m missing something  not a single general has resigned from the military in the past week in protest at trump rsquo s war crimes rhetoric  not a single battalion has laid down its weapons  not a single figure in the national security hierarchy  the state department  or the pentagon has called it quits and gone public with their opposition to trump rsquo s hitlerian threats  not a single cabinet member has quit in horror  not a single gop member of congress has switched parties as a way to bring trump under some form of congressional control     even after pope leo denounced trump rsquo s genocidal language  even as previous maga enthusiasts such as marjorie taylor greene  tucker carlson  and alex jones mustered the moral clarity to condemn trump  americans in positions of power within the government and military chose to bury their heads in the sand rather than confront this evil  it is the starkest abnegation of moral authority in modern us history     that could be because all the honorable officials have already been purged mdash either by doge or by more localized departmental purges initiated by hegseth  marco rubio  and tulsi gabbard  it could also be because those who haven rsquo t been purged have been cowed into silence  and it could be  quite simply  that  as a society  we have grown  unfortunately  used to following orders  no matter how mad those orders may be     whatever the reasons  i do know this  when the supposed  ldquo leader of the free world rdquo  embraces the methods and rhetoric of apocalyptic terrorism  the international order as we have long known it is no more  trump launched this war without thinking through the consequences  with his bloodthirsty rhetoric  he has compounded the damage by showing the world that the united states is  under its current leadership  truly a rogue nation<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/iran-trump-terrorist/">The United States Is Now an Apocalyptic Terror State</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 10 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/iran-trump-terrorist/</guid>
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  <item>
	 <title><![CDATA[The Pastor With a Fascist Agenda]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/the-pastor-with-a-fascist-agenda/]]></link>
		<author>Richard Kreitner</author>
	<date>Apr 9, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Early on, <em>The Nation </em>evinced a prescient skepticism toward Father Coughlin’s populism. Turns out we were right to do so.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Early on  the nation evinced a prescient skepticism toward father coughlin rsquo s populism  turns out we were right to do so      roman catholic priest and broadcaster charles coughlin  1891  ndash  1979   circa 1935       chris lehmann writes this month about tucker carlson  he quotes an acquaintance calling the podcaster  ldquo the father coughlin of the twenty first century rdquo  mdash a peddler of ugly bigotries dressed up as the pseudo populist vindication of the forgotten man  rdquo       the nation started sounding the alarm about coughlin soon after he burst onto the national scene in the early 1930s  denouncing bankers and corporations for preying on ordinary people  an ontario born catholic priest in suburban detroit  coughlin began broadcasting his sunday sermons over the radio and found a massive audience  he initially claimed to support the new deal  but soon turned against it as insufficiently opposed to high finance      early on  the nation evinced a prescient skepticism toward coughlin rsquo s populism  in 1934  raymond gram swing published a two part profile  warning that the pastor rsquo s program  though vague  bore a clear resemblance to fascism  swing rsquo s portrait calls to mind none other than carlson   ldquo in type he is an actor  with an advanced sense of stage management  he plays several roles hellip   few visitors get to know the real father coughlin  perhaps because there is no real father coughlin  the reality may be just this succession of parts  rdquo      columnist heywood broun observed in 1936 that coughlin  ldquo has a certain contempt for his own fuzzy followers and sees them as so much fascist fodder hellip   he is solely a fascist faker using whatever means come to his hand to lend dignity and cover to his effort to achieve literal dictatorship in the united states  rdquo  nbsp     and then  in 1939  the journalist james wechsler published  ldquo the coughlin terror  rdquo  which showed how the coughlin aligned  ldquo christian front rdquo  organization was behind a sharp rise in anti semitic street violence in new york  in response  coughlin repeatedly attacked  ldquo the bolshevik nation  rdquo  the editors responded   ldquo well  we are used to verbal rocks from both right and left  but our readers know  even if coughlin does not  that for nearly seventy five years the nation has been not a bolshevik but a liberal magazine which has fought hard for the civil liberties of all groups without distinction of race or creed  rdquo     american entry into world war ii eroded support for coughlin rsquo s pro fascist message  in 1942  his catholic superiors ordered him to give up broadcasting  he continued ministering to his michigan church until the late 1960s and died in 1979       in 1965  the nation reviewed a book about coughlin  the reviewer  harvey bresler  asked whether  ldquo some new coughlin like mass movement rdquo  might rise in the future   ldquo in the eventuality of a prolonged economic collapse like that of the 1930s  almost anything could happen  but that is not likely  today we have too many built in precautionary mechanisms hellip   furthermore  american society is not as polarized as it was thirty years ago  rdquo      well  today it seems about as polarized as in the 1930s  and those built in precautionary mechanisms don rsquo t appear to be quite as sturdy as they used to be  only time will tell how far our own  ldquo fascist faker rdquo  chooses to take his hateful grift  and what it will take to stop him<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/the-pastor-with-a-fascist-agenda/">The Pastor With a Fascist Agenda</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 09 Apr 2026 21:40:38 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/the-pastor-with-a-fascist-agenda/</guid>
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  <item>
	 <title><![CDATA[How Trump’s Incompetence and Looming Global Catastrophes May Intersect]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/how-trumps-incompetence-and-looming-global-catastrophes-may-intersect/]]></link>
		<author>Michael T. Klare</author>
	<date>Apr 9, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The leadership team from hell on a hell of a planet.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["The leadership team from hell on a hell of a planet      president donald trump pumps his fist as he walks to board marine one at joint base andrews in maryland on january 11  2026     this article originally appeared at tomdispatch com  to stay on top of important articles like these  sign up to receive the latest updates from tomdispatch com       on march 13  buried in the new york times rsquo  coverage of the us israel iran conflict was a headline that would have been easy to miss amid the din of war coverage   ldquo as el nino simmers  scientists warn of weather extremes starting in late summer  rdquo  many readers may not even have noticed it  but that article noted that scientists at the climate prediction center  a part of the national oceanic and atmospheric administration  had raised their estimate for an el nino event this summer from 60 percent to about 80 percent       admittedly  in this strange world of ours  that hardly seemed like an earth shattering revelation  but if you had read the piece more closely  your alarm bells should instantly have gone off  forecasters now predict that the coming el nino mdash a warming of the pacific ocean that deeply affects global weather patterns mdash is likely to be as severe as the one in 2023 ndash 24  which triggered severe flooding and prolonged heatwaves around the world  as the article noted  however  average world temperatures are now actually higher than they were at the height of that previous el nino  thanks to global warming  and so it rsquo s likely that we will face even more intense heatwaves and flooding this time around     consider that news alarming enough  unfortunately  the bad news didn rsquo t end there  the times article went on to report that  since early last year  the trump administration has laid off thousands of federal emergency management agency workers  greatly diminishing the agency rsquo s ability to respond to such impending weather disasters  and then there rsquo s the dismal fact that trump has overseen the dismantling of the us agency for international development  which once sent humanitarian aid to disaster struck countries     and  sadly enough  it only gets worse from there  after all  we know that the trump administration is doing everything it can to boost the production of fossil fuels mdash the consumption of which is the main driver of global warming mdash even as it also works to impede global action to slow the warming process  on january 7  for example  the president announced that the united states would withdraw from the un framework convention on climate change  the bedrock treaty upon which most international efforts to rein in that onrushing nightmare are based     likewise  on february 12  the administration repealed the scientific determination  called the  ldquo endangerment finding rdquo   that gives the government the legal authority to combat climate change  and that rsquo s not all  on march 15  the times also reported that the administration was preparing to dismantle the national center for atmospheric research  the nation rsquo s premier institution for studying global weather patterns mdash including the severe climate disturbances we can expect from the coming el nino and higher world temperatures  in other words  the rest of us will not only be deprived of emergency assistance during future climate disasters  but also lack timely information about oncoming hazardous weather patterns     as i consumed all of that mdash in the midst  of course  of president trump rsquo s ill conceived war on iran mdash it struck me that we need to brace ourselves for ever more calamitous outcomes from donald trump rsquo s extreme leadership incompetence  in fact  his incompetence is likely to produce one mega disaster after another  culminating perhaps in global political economic collapse     trump rsquo s profound incompetence      donald trump rsquo s leadership incompetence has already been demonstrated in one bad move after another  his capricious imposition of ever fluctuating tariffs on us imports  for example  has caused prolonged misery for farmers and many small and medium businesses that depend on predictable trade patterns  likewise  his heavy handed deployment of armed ice and other federal agents to minneapolis achieved little in the way of apprehending dangerous immigrants but caused widespread disorder and violence  while killing two nonviolent protesters  but the most severe example of his governing incompetence to date has been his handling of operation epic fury  the war with iran     while devising an elaborate plan to destroy iran rsquo s conventional military capabilities and shatter the regime  the trump team appears to have made no preparations to eliminate the iranians rsquo  extensive drone capabilities or their ability to disrupt oil production and transit in the persian gulf area  with far reaching global consequences  as of this reporting  the critical strait of hormuz through which one fifth of the world rsquo s oil supply passes every day  along with a substantial share of its liquified natural gas  and chemical fertilizers  remains largely closed to commercial traffic  this has produced energy shortages in many countries that are heavily reliant on imported oil and or lng and  because oil is a globally traded commodity  it has boosted gasoline prices in the united states  despite the fact that this country doesn rsquo t import much middle eastern oil     none of this should have been unexpected  the iranians have  on numerous occasions  threatened to block the strait of hormuz in response to a us attack on their country  while their efforts to build up a vast stockpile of drones and missiles  and to hide them in remote underground sites  were well publicized     any intelligent war planner mdash of which there are many in the us military establishment mdash would have known of these realities and planned for them  indeed  us planning to secure the strait goes back to 1980  when president jimmy carter rsquo s white house issued what became known as the  ldquo carter doctrine rdquo  mdash an assertion that any move by a hostile force to impede the oil flow in the persian gulf  ldquo will be repelled by any means necessary  including military force  rdquo  to enforce that edict  the pentagon established the us central command  centcom  and established a network of military bases throughout the gulf region  since its inception  centcom has repeatedly stressed its ability to keep the strait open in the face of any iranian drive to block it       trump obviously ignored all such intelligence mdash collected over many years by top american officials mdash and started his war without the slightest apparent plan for keeping the strait safe for energy shipping  not only were us naval forces unprepared to escort oil tankers through it  but trump failed to enlist us allies in such efforts mdash a glaring fault that only became obvious after the war began when he suddenly called upon them to do so  and chided them when they proved reluctant      and consider all of this sheer  unadulterated incompetence  on a massive scale     the blows to come    we have yet to witness all the consequences of trump rsquo s incompetence in undertaking the war against iran  the shutdown of fertilizer exports from the gulf is already causing the price of that critical commodity to rise around the world  in doing so  it threatens agricultural production as farmers balk at the higher costs mdash a trend likely to result in higher food costs everywhere  including the united states  that will  of course  result in increased hunger for those least able to afford the higher prices of food and rising inflation  the rise in food and energy prices could also diminish consumer spending and investor confidence  possibly leading to a global economic slowdown  or worse      and don rsquo t imagine that those are the only major shocks to the global system we can expect in the months ahead mdash shocks the trump team is unlikely to address with competent leadership  at the january convocation of business and political elites in davos  switzerland  the world economic forum released its  ldquo global risks report 2026  rdquo  identifying what experts believe are the greatest future threats to global stability and prosperity  according to those experts  the top risks include extreme weather events  state based armed conflict  and a global economic downturn mdash real time threats that trump has already encountered and failed to address successfully  as those perils gain momentum in the months ahead  trump rsquo s incompetence will result in ever greater hardship and suffering       the adverse effects of ai    that davos risk report also identified another category of threats for which the trump administration is woefully unprepared   ldquo adverse outcomes of ai technologies  rdquo     beginning with ai rsquo s impending impact on employment  the report cites one study suggesting that  ldquo ai could eliminate up to 50  of entry level  white collar jobs within the next five years in the united states  potentially driving unemployment to 10 ndash 20  rdquo  mdash an enormous threat to social and political cohesion  at the same time  a massive buildup of computing data centers is putting extreme stress on local energy and water supplies across the us  introducing an added layer of popular unease and conflict     hovering in the background of all this is the threat of  ldquo rogue ai rdquo  mdash the possibility that computer scientists at openai  anthropic  or one of the other leading ai firms will create a  ldquo superintelligent rdquo  version of ai capable of outperforming humans in most cognitive tasks and selecting its own objectives  independent of human wishes or instructions  think of  ldquo skynet  rdquo  the superintelligent ai in the terminator movie series that chooses to eliminate humans by inciting a global nuclear war  while the davos risk report doesn rsquo t address the risk of advanced ai development directly  there is growing talk in the scientific community of just such an outcome  as vividly suggested  for example  by the 2025 book if anyone builds it  everyone dies  why superhuman ai would kill us all  by eliezer yudkowsky and nate soares of the machine intelligence research institute       and i rsquo m sure you won rsquo t be surprised to learn that president trump and his entourage are wholly unprepared to address the very idea of such a possibility  rather than emphasize safety in the development of advanced ai models  trump has called for their untrammeled evolution  in his major policy statement on ai   ldquo winning the race  america rsquo s ai action plan  rdquo  he made his top objective overridingly clear   ldquo it is a national security imperative for the united states to achieve and maintain unquestioned and unchallenged global technological dominance  rdquo     that means  as his plan explains  eliminating all barriers to the development of advanced ai models  including any legislative restrictions on their release and any local environmental impediments to the construction of mammoth ai driven data centers nationwide  nowhere does trump rsquo s plan acknowledge the potential for catastrophic job losses from widespread ai utilization or the risk of ai going rogue and threatening the survival of humanity  rather than offering americans the slightest protection from such potential calamities  he is ensuring that they will become more likely and that the rest of us will suffer the consequences     convergent catastrophes    until recently  the shocks to global stability and safety mdash war  economic disorder  climate disaster  and ai driven calamities mdash seemed relatively distinct  the crisis in the persian gulf  however  has offered us a first glimpse  however limited  of how they might become a conjoined mega catastrophe     in the future  there is no reason to assume that such earth shaking calamities will remain discrete events  allowing world leaders adequate time to respond to them individually  it is likely  in fact  that they will arise ever more frequently in unison  in a 2013 study conducted for the us intelligence community  the national research council described just such  ldquo clusters of extreme events  rdquo  warning that they are a concern from a national security perspective  ldquo because u s  government resources and those of other international actors deployed to deal with a security or humanitarian concern related to the first event in a cluster might be unavailable or less available to deal with a second or subsequent event  rdquo  the potential result of such a future reality could  of course  prove to be almost unimaginable social disorder  economic chaos  and even state collapse     overcoming one extreme event  let alone two or more  would always pose a remarkable challenge to even the most competent of governments  sadly  we face an increasingly hazardous future with a demonstrably incompetent leadership team running what still passes for the most powerful country on earth  for the united states to survive  no less prosper  americans will need to unite around a demand for a humane and deeply competent national leadership team  if there rsquo s anything we can agree on  it should be a need for leaders who can successfully steer us through severe national calamities mdash but don rsquo t hold your breath for such an outcome in the next three years<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/how-trumps-incompetence-and-looming-global-catastrophes-may-intersect/">How Trump’s Incompetence and Looming Global Catastrophes May Intersect</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 09 Apr 2026 15:50:35 +0000</pubDate>
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	 <title><![CDATA[We Have 2 Weeks to Stop Trump From Committing New Atrocities]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/impeach-protest-trump-iran-war/]]></link>
		<author>Elie Mystal</author>
	<date>Apr 9, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>It is up to the American people, and our elected representatives, to use every legal means available—from impeachment to protest.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["It is up to the american people  and our elected representatives  to use every legal means available mdash from impeachment to protest      five years after the january 6  2021  violent insurrection in washington  dc  seeking to overthrow the election results  members of the activist group rise and resist gathered at the steps of the new york public library holding signs and banners for a public reading of the new list of impeachable offenses attributed to donald trump in his second term and to demand the release of the epstein files       ninety minutes before his self imposed deadline for commencing a genocide against an entire  ldquo civilization  rdquo  donald trump announced a temporary ceasefire in the war he started for no reason against iran  the particulars of the  ldquo deal rdquo  do not concern me mdash although i understand ships will have to pay to pass through a strait they could once traverse for free  what does concern me is  we now have two weeks to remove the homicidal maniac running the country before he threatens the peace of the world again  the responsibility lies entirely with the american people  and their representatives in congress  to prevent further catastrophe  if we fail to do so  whatever happens next will be our fault       rarely has a people been given such an opportunity to stop the madness of their government  in most evil regimes  the ruler is so far removed from accountability that he cannot be touched or legitimately restrained  usually  this ruler fully oppresses his own people before attempting to commit atrocities around the world  in those situations  only illegal regime change can remove a leader willing to commit war crimes to accomplish his goals     but we are lucky  we have several legal ways to remove our despot before he is allowed to commit additional horrors  we must use these methods now  if we do not  we are in every way complicit in the atrocities to come  this is our moment  and if we fail  history will not just blame trump and his maga acolytes for terrorizing the world  it will also blame us  the ineffectual opposition  and it will be right to do so     given the immediacy of the problem  a number of commentators and congresspeople have looked to the 25th amendment  the amendment  in theory  allows for the immediate removal of the president based on a declaration by the vice president and a majority of the president rsquo s cabinet that the president is  ldquo unfit rdquo  to continue holding office     i  too  would like to think the 25th amendment would solve all our problems  it would be fast  it would be direct  but as much as the amendment might sound like a silver bullet  it rsquo s really not  first  you rsquo d have to get jd vance on board  which hellip  is not going to happen  vance was apparently against the war  yet fell in line behind the president  and then went to hungary to lick a different authoritarian rsquo s boots  vance has less dignity than mike pence  and pence stuck with trump until trump tried to have him killed  there is simply no way vance invokes the 25th amendment     and don rsquo t even get me started on trump rsquo s handpicked cabinet  not a single one of them can be counted on to say that trump is unfit to lead mdash not secretary of war crimes pete hegseth  not the trump defense attorney now running the department of justice  not the reality tv show dude leading the department of transportation  no one       but even if vance and the cabinet were visited by the ghost of nuclear holocaust future and did invoke the 25th amendment  the president can simply say  ldquo wrong rdquo  mdash and then immediately resume power  the vp and the cabinet then have to vote to remove the president again  for a second time  in the face of the president rsquo s open opposition  and then the question is kicked to congress  where both chambers are required to vote to remove the president and install the vp in his place     but there rsquo s a second option mdash which is the original  constitutionally speaking   and to my mind easiest  way to remove trump  impeachment  since trump has been impeached twice before  everybody should know the drill  impeachment is a charge that is brought by a simple majority vote in the house  the trial on those charges takes place in the senate  where a two thirds majority is required to convict and then remove the president from office     given the fact that trump has been through this twice mdash and survived  it might sound pointless to try this all again  but here rsquo s why i think the most common arguments against trying to impeach trump again are wrong     what rsquo s going to be different the third time     i rsquo d like to think the reality of an illegal  unpopolar  and flagrantly criminal war of choice will make this time different  but i am not  that  naive  i know that most republican senators would rather see iran nuked  and risk dirty bombs exploding in penn station  than risk losing a primary to a more maga challenger  you don rsquo t get to be a gop senator without an overwhelming disregard for the well being of others     but two things have changed since trump rsquo s last two impeachments  one legal and the other political  the legal change is significant  when trump escaped conviction over january 6  then ndash senate majority leader mitch mcconnell said   ldquo president trump is still liable for everything he did while he was in office  rdquo  i do think mcconnell believed that when he said it  and it was true  when he said it  but it rsquo s not true anymore  the supreme court has since declared that trump is immune from prosecutions for criminal actions he takes while in office  if trump is impeached again  the senate will know that conviction in the senate is the only form of accountability trump will ever face     the political change is that trump is now a lame duck president  granted  during the second impeachment  trump was functionally out of office and most people didn rsquo t think he rsquo d ever run again  but this time  he can rsquo t run  impeachment and removal would end the trump era with more finality than anything we rsquo ve seen before  there might be some senators interested in that     is that enough to get us 67 votes for conviction on an impeachment charge  probably not  again  i rsquo m not stupid  but conviction isn rsquo t the only way to accomplish the most essential goal     trump will not be restrained by the long process of impeachment  so why bother     oh  i beg to differ  if your goal is to  ldquo make trump behave like a normal president  rdquo  that battle is lost  my goal is not to make trump  ldquo behave rdquo   my goal is to prevent him from unleashing america rsquo s nuclear arsenal in an attempt to obliterate iran  or whichever non white nation pisses trump off next  i think impeachment can go a great way towards restraining that behavior  i do not think a president seriously under threat of impeachment will want to start dropping nukes  i do not think trump would want to turn his trial into a senate referendum on the illegal war he started  even in the face of a likely acquittal  impeachment  and the credible threat of impeachment  might be the only thing that keeps trump rsquo s war crimes  ldquo conventional  rdquo  i don rsquo t necessarily think impeachment alone stops trump rsquo s illegal war  for that  we have to get all the way to  ldquo conviction rdquo  and removal  but i do think impeachment keeps the irradiation of an entire people off the table       your theories are intriguing  and i would like to subscribe to your newsletter  but perhaps we should revisit them in eight months should democrats assume control of the house    no  the time to try to impeach is now  again  charges in the house only require a simple majority and there might be right now the few republican votes necessary to get this process rolling  remember  trump rsquo s war is unpopular  even with many of his usual racist supplicants  trump wants to play brinksmanship with world war three every fortnight  the world cannot be held hostage by a nuke rattling madman every time new information leaks from the epstein files  impeachment and removal  or at least the possibility of removal  is the only political action left to elected representatives of conscience     the democrats should be leading that charge  the current posture of the party can be summed up as   ldquo this dangerous psychopath will kill us all  sadly  there rsquo s nothing we can do until november  but you know who could show real courage right now  jd vance  he would be greeted as a liberator  rdquo       how is this leadership  how is it that democrats are scrambling around calling on their enemy rsquo s pool boy to put country over party  and his own political career   while they refuse to put their careers  or bodies  on the line to stop a global atrocity     for democrats  impeachment should be the floor  it should be the least they rsquo re willing to do   ldquo i will support articles of impeachment rdquo  should be the secret phrase democrats have to say before being allowed access to the cloakroom     on the upper end  democrats should be trying to bring the government to a grinding halt until the genocidal maniac is removed from office  elected representatives throughout history have literally walked out and refused to participate in governments as evil as ours is right now  at some point  you have to decide to be charles de gaulle or you become philippe petain     our representatives wouldn rsquo t even have to go into freaking exile the way de gaulle did  they just have to use every legal means available to remove trump from office  and use every shred of political power to stop a mass murder from happening     you know what rsquo s even better than a filibuster  a human wall of elected officials preventing the house and the senate chambers from opening their doors  preventing the government from doing business  until trump is impeached and removed     and politicians aren rsquo t the only ones who have an obligation to act  it rsquo s easy to focus on elected officials because they are the ones who have political power and platform  they are the ones who literally asked to lead  but the moral imperative of the moment also extends to the rest of us  the burden of democracy is that we are all collectively responsible for the actions of our government  we cannot simply say that the actions of a powerful few have nothing to do with the rest of us  not in our system of government     i don rsquo t know what it is that you do  i write  i argue  those are my skills  right now  i rsquo m trying to use those skills to write and argue against a president intent on committing war crimes  whatever it is that you do  whatever your skills are  i would implore you to use them to fight against our evil government  all skills are needed  and any skill can have value against this man  perhaps your skill is raising money  spend some time raising money to support anti war efforts  perhaps your skill is organizing documents  spend some time helping activists organize their resistance  perhaps your skill is playing video games  spend some time arguing in the forums that atrocities should only be inflicted in game and cannot be allowed in real life     earlier this week  i despaired on social media that the country was just waiting around to see if a global calamity would be prosecuted  ldquo in our name  rdquo  so many people responded  ldquo not in my name  rdquo  the response seemed to me to miss the point  it rsquo s not enough to say   ldquo i didn rsquo t vote for this  rdquo  not when the threat of mass atrocity is on the line  it rsquo s not enough to go out like homer simpson and content ourselves by saying   ldquo don rsquo t blame me  i voted for kodos  rdquo     there may be no way we can stop the madman in the white house  but if the worst comes to pass  it won rsquo t matter if it was somebody else rsquo s fault  the iranian people won rsquo t be huddled in a fallout shelter thinking   ldquo it rsquo s a shame jd vance didn rsquo t have more courage  rdquo  they rsquo ll be thinking that americans  all of us  are to blame for our country rsquo s crimes  we will have no answer for the charge  and our only response must be that we did everything we could think of to prevent the evil     trump cannot destroy  ldquo a whole civilization  quot  even if he tries  what he can do is kill an incalculable number of innocent people  he must be stopped  we must impeach and remove trump from office  we must  at least  try<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/impeach-protest-trump-iran-war/">We Have 2 Weeks to Stop Trump From Committing New Atrocities</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 09 Apr 2026 14:32:51 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/impeach-protest-trump-iran-war/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Public Health Needs to Get Off the Laptop and Into the Streets]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/public-health-community-outreach/]]></link>
		<author>Gregg Gonsalves</author>
	<date>Apr 9, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Too often, we reduce our outreach to distant communication. We have to embed ourselves in communities to make a real difference.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<description>
	<![CDATA["Too often  we reduce our outreach to distant communication  we have to embed ourselves in communities to make a real difference      hiv educators in south africa in 2002       in the early 2000s  i spent time in south africa with the treatment action campaign and other organizations  working to educate communities about hiv  the immune system  and what medicines could be used to beat back the virus and deal with opportunistic infections       these experiences were transformational for me  i learned more from my comrades in tac about how to use scientific information to both inform and inspire than i have gathered in any formal education i had then or since     the work tac did wasn rsquo t just basic health education  it was deep  often door to door  engagement  with time spent in clinic waiting rooms and other venues where tac could reach people affected by aids   in south africa  a country with 6 million people living with the disease  you could make the case that nobody was spared completely from the virus   tac members didn rsquo t only teach people about why  for instance  fluconazole was critical for treating fungal infections associated with aids  they emphasized why it was important for people to ask why their local health facility did not stock the drug  whom to talk to about this  and their rights under the south african constitution to make these demands     this history has been on my mind recently  because of the ongoing debates within my field about how we handled the covid pandemic  many in public health are convinced that the biggest problem during the height of the pandemic was a lack of good communication  the answer  that those of us in public health need to learn to be better  ldquo storytellers  rdquo     coming from the aids movement  no one has to convince me that health information needs to be translated in ways that non experts can grasp  i spent time in the mountains of lesotho working with comrades from tac to help rural communities understand hiv rsquo s lifecycle and the way the immune system works  largely through acting the biology out in real time in goofy role plays  i was a macrophage   and helping to demystify what was happening in their bodies mdash why understanding this information gave them power and agency over their own lives and the disease they were living with  this information became life saving for many  helping them to advocate for themselves even in the most difficult of circumstances  e g   a president who didn rsquo t think hiv was the cause of aids      but here in the united states  the push to communicate has often been reduced to something else mdash a savvy substack  an engaging podcast  a witty social media campaign  this stuff is so  so far from the tangible  hands on work i experienced and played a small part in in southern africa  maybe people think americans don rsquo t need the same kind of deep commitment that south africans did  but those people are wrong  if we want to address the real health crises in the us  better stories and storytellers are only a part of the solution  without embedding ourselves within communities and working with them  stories from afar  as well crafted as they can be  are inert  they are all potential energy  not kinetic in any sense       what would it mean to communicate to residents of a holler in the mountains of west virginia  or in a once thriving rural community in new england  where all the jobs left long ago and many people rely on medicaid  food assistance  and other social programs to get by  or in a city where the zip code you live in determines your life expectancy and you live in one that does not portend well for your health  i would suggest it would look more like the work of the treatment action campaign and others around the world who go beyond the simple transmission of health advice to give people a sense the health of their communities is a shared purpose mdash and that the more information they have  the more power they possess     stories are part of this work  but  ldquo being there  rdquo  listening  and understanding people rsquo s struggles are really the first step in a long process  it means sitting down at kitchen tables and talking together  building trust that only comes with commitment for the long haul  and it means talking about health in ways that matter to them  giving them a sense that a decision they make can make their lives better     this isn rsquo t so far fetched  it rsquo s a combination of a community health worker model with a bit of community organizing thrown in  while tac in south africa showed me how it can be done  there are models around the world to draw from  and there are 60 community health worker networks  in 38 us states  for domestic inspiration  it means building a cadre of chws to meet the moment mdash a scale up of significant proportions  my yale colleague amy kapczynski and i proposed the establishment of a community health corps in the first months of the covid pandemic  and i think the need for something like this is greater than ever     yes  we should be better communicators  but if we stop there  we are playing to the smallest of audiences and should expect the smallest of impact   ldquo better stories rdquo  is a marketing strategy  not a recipe for true human contact and engagement  we can rsquo t just sit at our laptops and pump out information  we have to go to the people at the other end of our efforts  if we are looking to transform public health  it rsquo s going to be in the work we do together  side by side  and face to face  we need to learn from communities  as we craft stories together with them and envision a healthier future for all of us<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/public-health-community-outreach/">Public Health Needs to Get Off the Laptop and Into the Streets</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 09 Apr 2026 14:16:08 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/public-health-community-outreach/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The Threads That Bind Us All]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/the-threads-that-binds-us-all/]]></link>
		<author>Hector Manuel Rodriguez</author>
	<date>Apr 9, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[The artist deconstructs prison outfits.]]></teaser> 
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	<description>
	<![CDATA["Check out all installments in the oppart series<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/the-threads-that-binds-us-all/">The Threads That Bind Us All</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 09 Apr 2026 12:30:44 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/the-threads-that-binds-us-all/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Selma Still Matters]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/selma-march-anniversary-relevance/]]></link>
		<author>Keith Ellison,Yusef D. Jackson</author>
	<date>Apr 9, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>What was born there was a new definition of who gets to be an American. And that legacy is under threat.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["What was born there was a new definition of who gets to be an american  and that legacy is under threat      a march in solidarity with selma  in harlem  on march 15  1965       we went back to selma  alabama  this year mdash not as dignitaries or guests at a ceremony  but as inheritors of an unfinished revolution  and we did not go alone  we brought a new generation  organizers from latino  somali  hmong  cambodian  and laotian communities  many of them had just watched armed  masked ice agents surge through their neighborhoods in illinois and minnesota  just like the students of 1965  they came to selma to stand up  to speak out  and to demand that america finally become what it has always promised to be       it was a reminder that this is not just history  this is now     in 1965  ordinary people walked out of brown chapel ame church and onto the edmund pettus bridge  asking for one fundamental thing  to be seen  to be counted  to be treated as full citizens in their own country  they carried no weapons  they stormed no capitol  they carried faith  dignity  and a demand as old as the republic itself  the right to vote  for this  they were met with tear gas  whips  and clubs  john lewis rsquo s skull was fractured not because he broke the law  but because he dared to insist that the law finally apply to black people     out of the blood on that bridge came two of the most transformative laws in american history  the voting rights act and the immigration and nationality act of 1965  the vra didn rsquo t just change rules mdash it changed who could have power  it forced states with long histories of racist voter suppression to get federal approval before changing their election laws  it gave communities real tools to fight racial gerrymanders  at large schemes  and the thousand quiet tricks designed to make sure black and brown voters could be counted but never truly count  voter registration soared  new voices  new leaders  new possibilities emerged     simultaneously  the immigration and nationality act dismantled the racial hierarchy baked into american immigration law  ending the national origin quota system that favored immigrants from northern europe     what was born on that bridge was a new definition of who gets to be an american  but the forces that tried to stop those marchers in 1965 never disappeared  they adapted  they learned to wield paperwork instead of nightsticks  and today  they are back       the trump administration has surged unprecedented numbers of immigration agents into democratic states and communities of color  the justice department executed a sweeping raid on fulton county  georgia mdash seizing 2020 ballots and voter rolls mdash to relitigate a settled election and chill every future one  attorney general pam bondi sent a letter to minnesota governor tim walz that amounted to a ransom note  hand over the complete  unredacted voter rolls or your communities will keep living under siege     this is not law enforcement  it is intimidation  power dressed up as process     the supreme court rsquo s shelby county decision had already gutted the voting rights act rsquo s preclearance system  tearing out its spine and letting states with racist histories rewrite election rules without federal review  voter id requirements  slashed voting hours  and gerrymandered maps drawn to dilute black and brown political power have sprung up all over the country  now trump is pushing the save act  a  ldquo show your papers rdquo  law designed to block millions of eligible citizens who simply lack the right government issued documents  all to solve a noncitizen voting problem that does not exist  pending supreme court cases threaten to gut the vra even further  together  these tactics form a coordinated assault on the very idea of multiracial democracy  we recognize it because we have seen it before  although the methods are different  the intent is identical       and as we reflect on selma  we recognize that we are not mere observers of this history  we are products of it  one of us is the first muslim elected to congress and to statewide office  a reality made possible by selma  the other grew up as the son of the late rev  jesse jackson  who marched from selma to montgomery and would become an aide to dr  martin luther king jr  the bridge we crossed this year runs through our very lives  and the new generation crossing it mdash dreamers and daughters of refugees  community organizers and first time voters mdash are the continuation of selma rsquo s legacy     every tactic being deployed today is designed to do what bull connor rsquo s clubs could not  to make people afraid to participate  to make democracy feel dangerous  but selma teaches us something bull connor never understood  when you crack the skull of someone marching peacefully toward justice  you do not stop the movement  you become its fuel     the students who marched in 1965 were fighting to be recognized as citizens with the right to vote  we are fighting to expand that recognition to everyone who calls this country home  the struggle is not behind us  it is right now  right here  unfolding in real time mdash and we are now the ones who must answer the call to action<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/selma-march-anniversary-relevance/">Selma Still Matters</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 09 Apr 2026 09:00:01 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/selma-march-anniversary-relevance/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Americans Are Being Bled Dry by Hidden Taxes]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/economy/natural-gas-electricity-bills-ai-tax-war/]]></link>
		<author>Zephyr Teachout</author>
	<date>Apr 9, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Three private taxes are pushing electricity costs far above what ordinary people can afford.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Three private taxes are pushing electricity costs far above what ordinary people can afford      notice that your utility bills are way higher       americans rsquo  electricity costs  which were already high  are going up again  in response  every state and local government with the muscle to do so should be investing in its own decentralized solar  wind  and water systems to create greater resilience and more democratic local control       electricity bills today are at the mercy of three distinct  simultaneous private taxes that have pushed natural gas and electricity costs far above what people can afford  first  there rsquo s the  ldquo ai tax rdquo   the stratospheric rising cost built into the utility grid to support artificial intelligence  in high demand areas  such as those in the mid atlantic and midwestern states where data centers are being built  wholesale prices for energy are up well over 250 percent  goldman sachs  noting the spikes  predicts that 40 percent of future electricity costs will come from the increased demand contributed by data centers     then there rsquo s the  ldquo utility tax  rdquo  which has also been spiking in recent years  states grant private corporations monopoly rights to sell electricity in defined regions  while also allowing them to issue stock  maximize returns  and lobby for unreasonable rate hikes  these investor owned utilities have overcharged americans  5 billion per year over the past 30 years     finally  there rsquo s the bloody  ldquo war tax rdquo  caused by donald trump rsquo s attack on iran  the president rsquo s war led  predictably  to the closing of the strait of hormuz  through which one fifth of the world rsquo s supply of natural gas passes  the price of natural gas on the world market has gone haywire since the strait closed and drones attacked qatar rsquo s largest liquefied natural gas facility  shutting it down  the us gas that generates much of our electricity doesn rsquo t travel through the strait  but global buyers are bidding up the price of american supplies as they seek to replace the lost qatari shipments  creating a  ldquo tax rdquo  on domestic consumption  when local gas stations use a market shock to increase profits without a concomitant increase in costs  it rsquo s considered illegal price gouging  but big natural gas companies get away with it when they sell to utilities  no single american state can police all the steps in the supply chain where gouging takes place on its own     we saw this awful scenario play out in 2022 when russia invaded ukraine  domestic price gougers used the war to get rich while old people froze at home  unable to pay their bills  the war did not change the cost of taking gas out of the ground in the united states  but it dramatically changed the price of electricity  the inflationary shock that beggared millions of americans was arguably the single biggest factor in the reelection of an unpopular former president in 2024  that president has now decided to launch an incoherent and illegal war  which is leading to more price gouging     these converging influences on electricity prices should lead us to a wholesale reconsideration of energy policy in the united states  let rsquo s start by making sure there rsquo s genuine competition and regulation in a natural gas industry that rsquo s currently dominated by an increasingly small club of companies that profit from volatility       two years ago  for example  federal officials allowed exxon to buy pioneer in a  60 billion deal to become the dominant shale producer in the permian basin of the southwestern united states  but assuming that exxon will give americans a hometown discount would be as foolish as it would be costly  at the state and local levels  our elected officials and appointed regulators should stop allowing utilities to merge into monopoly franchises that can then use their market power to hike prices and earn excessive rates of return  states should seize opportunities to permanently protect their residents by making a muscular commitment to build distributed  renewable energy infrastructure as quickly as possible  they should do this not just to protect the climate but also to make our energy supply more reliable and to reap the social benefits that decentralization makes possible  every community solar installation is a small act of building the kind of resilience we need for a democratic government     the cost of batteries has been plummeting and will continue to do so  making solar power more feasible than ever  improved storage capacity can help with the coordination problems that big  dumb grids are used to resolving with brute force  there is no war that can make the sun stop shining  no conflict that can make the wind stop blowing     the technology needed to significantly diminish the role of natural gas exists today  and it can be deployed in months or  in challenging circumstances  a few short years mdash not decades  these energy sources are abundant and are much less vulnerable to distribution bottlenecks than    shale gas is  and they aren rsquo t subject to the sort of international volatility we are now experiencing     it will  of course  cost money to build solar infrastructure  but it is much cheaper than the alternative mdash and the costs will be shared fairly by all of us  as opposed to the private taxes that burden poor americans the most  to say  ldquo we don rsquo t have the money rdquo  is to say that people must keep paying unfairly high prices so that wealthy investors don rsquo t have to pony up     a more decentralized  networked grid also enables people to make their own decisions about which forms of energy are best for their communities  that rsquo s a political question  not just a market one  the fights over data centers prove that people want to be part of that conversation     the powerful clubs that profit from war  volatility  and monopoly will not stop taxing us if we don rsquo t put up a fight  with this in mind  we shouldn rsquo t try to persuade them  we should build a new future despite them<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/economy/natural-gas-electricity-bills-ai-tax-war/">Americans Are Being Bled Dry by Hidden Taxes</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 09 Apr 2026 09:00:01 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/economy/natural-gas-electricity-bills-ai-tax-war/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[How Mamdani Presides Over a Fix-Everything Agenda]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/zohran-mamdani-new-york-politics-inequality/]]></link>
		<author>D.D. Guttenplan</author>
	<date>Apr 9, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The New York mayor wants to tackle everything from potholes to systemic racism. </p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["The new york mayor wants to tackle everything from potholes to systemic racism               on the morning of his 96th day as mayor of new york  zohran mamdani filled the city rsquo s 100 000th pothole  the ceremonial shoveling  on olympia boulevard in staten island  was emblematic of mamdani rsquo s do everything  be everywhere  all at once approach to the challenge of governing the nation rsquo s largest city      ldquo there is no pothole too far  no trash pile too high  and no problem too big or too small for city government to address  rdquo  he said in a statement that went on to celebrate such accomplishments as  ldquo brought rat sightings down 30 percent rdquo  and  ldquo melted 783 million pounds of snow  rdquo       a few hours later however  in a sparsely attended event at cuny rsquo s medgar evers college in brooklyn  the mayor acknowledged two challenges that weren rsquo t going to be amenable to quick fixes  the first was healing the deep scars from centuries of racism  as julie su  the deputy mayor for economic justice  explained in releasing the preliminary citywide racial equity plan   ldquo this country once embraced public investment  the gi bill  affordable public college   housing hellip   but when black americans fought for access to those programs  backlash politics taught people to resent government programs instead of expanding them  and the result was a worse deal for everyone  rdquo     her summary may have lacked concrete details like the drained swimming pools in heather mcghee rsquo s the sum of us  what racism costs everyone and how we can prosper together mdash a 2021 bestseller published in the aftermath of the  blacklivesmatter protests sparked by the police killing of george floyd  but su rsquo s account of how  ldquo the same forces that drive racial inequity  exclusion  and economic security also helped produce a city that has become harder for new yorkers of every background to afford  rdquo  was refreshingly direct  as was her declaration that  ldquo my job is to make sure hellip this story ends differently  rdquo     getting to that happier ending is a herculean challenge mdash a point driven home by the other item on that morning rsquo s program  the release of new york rsquo s first true cost of living  tcol  measure  like the 375 page equity plan  the tcol was the result of the november 2022 charter revision referendum  approved by 81 percent of voters  the proposal mandated that the city report annually on the actual cost of meeting new yorkers rsquo  essential needs such as housing  food  childcare  and transportation mdash costs not accurately reflected in federal poverty measures  while the federal government puts any single individual earning more than  15 960 annually above the poverty line  the figure is  33 000 for a family of four   according to the tcol a single adult would need  70 334 to meet the cost of living in new york  while a family of four would need a combined income of  166 279     according to the robin hood foundation and columbia university rsquo s center on poverty and social policy  some 2 2 million new yorkers mdash including nearly 450 000 children mdash live below the federal poverty line  the city rsquo s tcol identifies an additional 3 58 million residents living above the poverty line  but who mdash even after accounting for tax credits and government programs such as housing subsidies and snap benefits mdash still cannot meet the true cost of living an economically secure life  to get by  this group mdash about 38 percent of the city rsquo s population mdash  must rely on support from extended families or ballooning personal debt       mayor eric adams failed to release either of the two mandated reports issued this week  even though his administration oversaw the research  that may well have been because their findings wouldn rsquo t have been welcomed by his patrons in the trump administration  according to city and state  the adams administration also scrubbed all references to diversity  equity  and inclusion  dei  from its racial equity plan  with most of those omissions remaining unremedied in the draft version mamdani released on monday     the tcol headline figures are shocking enough mdash though  sadly  generating few actual headlines  but a deeper dive discloses the many ways in which new york rsquo s affordability crisis and its history of racial inequality are bound together  a majority of all new yorkers  61 8 percent  fall short of the resources required to live here  however  more than 77 percent of the city rsquo s hispanic population lives below the tcol levels mdash the highest such level among any ethnic group in the city  but black new yorkers  65 6 percent of whom have incomes below the tcol  and asian and pacific islanders  63 3 percent  are not much better off  the only group with a majority earning an annual income above the tcol are white new yorkers  at 56 3 percent      ldquo these reports make one thing clear  rdquo  said the mayor   ldquo we cannot tackle systemic racial inequity without confronting the affordability crisis head on  and we cannot solve the cost of living crisis without dismantling systemic racial inequity  rdquo  mamdani isn rsquo t going to achieve either of these ambitious goals by the end of his first 100 days  of course  as he noted  providing free childcare would lift one of the heaviest burdens off the backs of new york rsquo s working families  yet even his much ballyhooed  1 2 billion commitment from governor kathy hochul includes only  73 million in new funding this year mdash enough to pay for just 2 000 places       still  if the mayor rsquo s accomplishments so far seem more symbolic than substantial  he has shown no signs of slackening his pace mdash or of losing his gift for making the multifarious elements of his coalition feel both seen and valued  he named rebecca jones gaston  a black woman who was herself adopted from foster care as a child  as the city rsquo s child welfare commissioner  like deputy mayor su  who was acting secretary of labor under president joe biden  gaston has national experience  she served as biden rsquo s head of the administration on children  youth and families   the new york post immediately condemned her appointment as a ploy that  ldquo puts  lsquo racial equity rsquo  above keeping nyc kids safe and alive  rdquo      the mayor ended his monday whirlwind with a visit to union square  where he celebrated at yet another passover seder mdash the  ldquo seder in the streets rdquo  held by jews for racial and economic justice  candidate mamdani had attended this event  which was first held in 2008  last year   ldquo but this is the first time we rsquo ve ever invited the mayor  rdquo  sophie ellman golan  a spokeswoman for the group  told me     calling on participants to  ldquo melt pharaoh rsquo s ice y heart  rdquo  this year rsquo s theme focused on the need to protect immigrants   ldquo we can rsquo t really celebrate a liberation holiday when so many of our neighbors are trapped in captivity  either in ice custody or hiding in their homes  rdquo  said ellman golan       warming up for the mayor  former city comptroller brad lander  alluding to the news from iran  and the continuing  though mostly neglected by the media  horrors in gaza  asked   ldquo isn rsquo t it wrong to kill other people rsquo s children  rdquo  mamdani took a lighter tone  thanking the group for its long record as one of the city rsquo s most reliable progressive allies and urging  ldquo new yorkers at large to celebrate the lessons passover leaves all of us across these five boroughs  rdquo       after the matzos were broken and distributed  and four cups of wine were blessed mdash one of them by lander mdash a portion of the crowd marched to the sixth avenue office of palantir  the ai company that supplies ice with software to identify and track migrants  fifteen of the protesters were arrested     but by then the mayor was long gone<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/zohran-mamdani-new-york-politics-inequality/">How Mamdani Presides Over a Fix-Everything Agenda</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 09 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/zohran-mamdani-new-york-politics-inequality/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Democrats Are Badly Failing to Hold Trump Accountable Over Iran]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/democrats-iran-war-trump-response/]]></link>
		<author>Aída Chávez</author>
	<date>Apr 9, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Party leaders have been doing everything in their power to avoid confronting the US-Israeli war in any meaningful way.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<description>
	<![CDATA["Party leaders have been doing everything in their power to avoid confronting the us israeli war in any meaningful way      chuck schumer at the capitol on thursday  march 26  2026       as the world watches to see whether the two week ceasefire between the united states and iran ever gets off the ground  president donald trump rsquo s genocidal threats against the iranian people risk fading from our attention  but we cannot move on so quickly from the gravity of trump rsquo s declaration that  ldquo a whole civilization will die tonight  never to be brought back again  rdquo       there are two reasons for this  the first is that the ceasefire is already at risk of total collapse  on wednesday  israel killed over 250 people in lebanon  despite explicit assurances from international mediators that the ceasefire agreement covered that country  in response  iran said it had closed the strait of hormuz  if war does fully resume  trump could once again vow to exterminate an entire country of 90 million people      the second reason is that  even if the ceasefire holds  trump rsquo s flirtation with genocide is horrifying enough to demand a response all on its own     within the us political system  republicans are too subservient to trump to mount this opposition  that leaves the democratic party mdash which  despite what many of its defenders say  still has many potential ways to influence the direction of events  so it rsquo s worth assessing how top democrats are handling this crisis  unfortunately  the party rsquo s response has mostly been woeful and inadequate     democratic leaders have been doing everything in their power to avoid confronting the us israeli war against iran in any meaningful way  when military escalation was still preventable  democrats refused to act with any urgency  their most powerful tool would have been a resolution under the war powers act  a war powers resolution is privileged  so any member of congress can force a vote without having to rely on leadership to schedule it  but as i previously reported  top democrats worked behind the scenes to dampen momentum for representative ro khanna rsquo s iran war powers resolution  deliberately slow walking a vote  they publicly committed to forcing another vote on an alternate war powers measure  but failed to schedule it and then went on recess mdash pushing any action off until mid april at the earliest     after the war began  many democratic lawmakers defaulted to vague concerns with the conflict  criticizing trump rsquo s war in the language of procedure mdash briefings  plans  and oversight mdash rather than in terms of whether it should be happening at all  this approach points to democrats rsquo  broader calculation  if it were up to them  trump would carry out the war  weaken iran  and absorb the political fallout mdash leaving democrats free to campaign against it in the midterms       rather than act immediately  top democrats waited until we were on the precipice of a potential nuclear war to fire off tweets calling trump a  ldquo madman rdquo  and  ldquo unhinged  rdquo  rather than force floor fights and recorded vote after recorded vote on war powers resolutions  it wasn rsquo t until trump threatened to wipe out iran that so called opposition party leaders called for congress to reconvene and  ldquo immediately end this reckless war of choice in iran before donald trump plunges us into world war iii  rdquo     individual democrats began issuing statements  tweets  and videos  many recorded in their suburban backyards  since congress is on vacation   ldquo there exists a moral order and a moral law in this world  and what trump is proposing to do is fundamentally evil  rdquo  democratic senator chris murphy said in a typical post  dozens of congressional democrats  along with a smattering of republicans  including former gop representative marjorie taylor greene  also called for the 25th amendment to be used to remove the president over the threats mdash a politically implausible process that would require the cooperation of the trump administration and two thirds of both chambers mdash or for trump to be impeached      but congressional leaders like senate minority leader chuck schumer wouldn rsquo t even call for those obvious actions  instead  schumer and other top senators issued a statement meekly asking trump to  ldquo not follow through on this threat  rdquo  meanwhile  conservative democrats like new jersey rsquo s josh gottheimer sought to make clear that they were mostly on board with trump rsquo s war   ldquo the ultimate goal is to crush the iranian regime  rdquo  gottheimer tweeted  before vaguely calling on the white house to  ldquo come before congress and present clear objectives  and brief on our progress  rdquo       even this mild brand of opposition didn rsquo t last long  as soon as trump announced that he had agreed to a  quot double sided ceasefire quot  with iran  many democrats went back to antagonizing trump for backing away from his threat   ldquo it appears trump just agreed to give iran control of the strait of hormuz  a history changing win for iran  rdquo  murphy tweeted   ldquo the level of incompetence is both stunning and heartbreaking  rdquo     schumer himself played a role in the pressure campaign pushing trump to act militarily  in june 2025  ahead of the us strikes on iran  schumer mocked the president as  ldquo taco trump rdquo  for being soft on iran  cautioning the trump administration against making any  ldquo side deals rdquo  without israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu rsquo s approval   taco is short for trump always chickens out mdash coined last year by a financial times journalist      at least one democrat  representative yassamin ansari  currently the only iranian american in congress  pointed out the danger of lawmakers goading trump into returning to the war that nearly led to the use of nuclear weapons   ldquo i do not appreciate anyone   democrat or republican   taking this moment to make taco jokes to say trump  lsquo chickened out  rsquo  rdquo  ansari said in a tweet   ldquo the president was threatening genocide against 90 million iranians  i rsquo m grateful there rsquo s a ceasefire   scores of innocent people didn rsquo t die tonight         democrats appear to have the votes for an alternate war powers resolution  backed by many of the same lawmakers who voted to defeat the initial khanna massie effort  but that bill  introduced by gottheimer and others  is already a watered down measure  as it includes carve outs for continued troop presence and intelligence sharing     trump rsquo s war is deeply unpopular  he is losing it badly  its continuation would be a catastrophe  in this climate  democrats have no real excuse left  even if a strong war powers measure were to fail  forcing the vote would still put members on the record and impose political costs on those willing to go along with the war  democrats must go all in<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/democrats-iran-war-trump-response/">Democrats Are Badly Failing to Hold Trump Accountable Over Iran</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 09 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/democrats-iran-war-trump-response/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[In Hungary’s Steel City, Layoffs Hurt Orbán’s Appeal]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/world/hungary-election-layoffs-jobs/]]></link>
		<author>David Broder</author>
	<date>Apr 8, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Why didn’t Orbán’s government, once a critic of what it called a “bad privatization,” save jobs?</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Why didn rsquo t orban rsquo s government  once a critic of what it called a  ldquo bad privatization  rdquo  save jobs      hungarian prime minister viktor orban appears during a rally ahead of the general election in budapest  hungary  on march 15  2026        ldquo icannot imagine a society without people with grease on their hands  rdquo  hungarian premier viktor orban has long called creating a  ldquo work based society rdquo  the key to his country rsquo s future  it rsquo s underpinned his distinctive brand of right wing politics  and inspired the  ldquo pro worker rdquo  conservatism touted by figures like tucker carlson  endorsing orban ahead of sunday rsquo s election  donald trump likewise stressed his record of job creation       this story has some truth to it  in the decade after orban returned to power in 2010  hungary rsquo s working population expanded by around 20 percent  not only did german auto giants build up production here  but a construction boom  plus  ldquo workfare rdquo  programs  pushed employment rates above the eu average  if stories about  ldquo pro family rdquo  policies often cast hungary as a nation of stay at home moms  more hungarian women are in work than their eu counterparts  it rsquo s also key to orban rsquo s support among roma people     orban has himself claimed that his hopes of re election on april 12 depend on workers turning out to vote  his fidesz party has not just consolidated power by extending its reach over the media and the state apparatus but built real support among wide swathes of the population  yet  for many hungarians this rhetoric about a  ldquo work based society rdquo  is today losing its luster  it rsquo s a major reason why after sunday rsquo s election  orban  too  may be out of a job       the end of an era    to understand this weakness  it rsquo s important to recognize different phases in orban rsquo s rule     analyst david karas tells me that in the first years after the 2008 financial crash fidesz promised to win back hungary rsquo s  ldquo economic sovereignty  rdquo  while basing living standards on wages  not borrowing or benefits  yet reindustrialization remained reliant on foreign direct investment  and preparing a low cost workforce for multinationals  orban rsquo s talk of  ldquo greasy hands  rdquo  karas says  was also a retort to opposition claims that the government wasn rsquo t investing in higher education  blue collar work offered a way to a  ldquo more dignified and stable society than producing jobless and socially useless graduates  rdquo     this low wage model has  however  stopped earning good grades  as sociologist abel csatho tells me  while hungarian employment rates rose strongly throughout the 2010s  this progress tapered off since the pandemic  in fact  hungarian living standards have dropped to the lowest in the european union  faced with the current war in iran  shocks like rising gas prices may further threaten hungary rsquo s future as a global industrial hub       some weaknesses of this model were visible even earlier  as shown by events in dunaujvaros  long one of hungary rsquo s main industrial centers  the story of its historic steelworks  which closed in 2024  shows how the orban government allowed multinational owners to wreck a major strategic industry  letting it go to the wall even as it pledged to save jobs     steel city    iheaded to dunaujvaros on a saturday  three weeks before the election  a postwar new town  its streets follow a grid pattern  reaching a sudden  steep halt above the danube  when it began construction in 1950  it was called sztalinvaros  in tribute to the soviet leader  but the nationwide revolt in 1956 also shook this socialist model town  five years later  it took its current name  meaning new danube city  today  its lenin statue is banished to the local museum rsquo s back courtyard  but the steelworks created back then still shape local identity     csatho introduces me to former steelworker isztan nagy  he remembers exactly when he started work   ldquo september 2  1971  rdquo  soon after he began as a production worker  the steelworks enrolled him on a college economics course  nagy tells me that it had a  ldquo highly liberal  rdquo  us inspired program  with the kind of pro market ideas spread by economists like janos kornai  talk of profitability reshaped hungarian socialism long before it met its end in 1989     nagy stresses that the vast steel complex  from 1984 titled dunaferr  was always the heart of this town  local sports teams took its name  and in 2000 dunaferr soccer club won the hungarian premiership  today  the club  too  has gone bust  dive bars lined up outside the old steelworks gates now pine for lost battalions of worker drinkers       it rsquo s not all orban rsquo s fault  and for some  job losses came well before the final 2024 shutdown  even in the late communist era  the plant introduced profitability measures that cut jobs  albeit without heading for full privatization  nagy speaks of redundancies as a process negotiated with strong unions  also counting on a fund to cushion layoffs  from 1996  longtime employee nagy mdash by then a local social democrat leader mdash sat on the company board  he says orban rsquo s first term from 1998 to 2002 meant political interference  changing the plant rsquo s management and pressuring it to use dolomite supplies from mines controlled by orban rsquo s father     if this stirred resentment  the plant rsquo s fate also helps explain why local workers didn rsquo t stick with the political left  it was a social democrat ndash led government  in alliance with neoliberal hawks  that finalized the privatization of the plant in 2003 mdash despite  nagy says  the local party rsquo s attitude  the new owners were  he explains  ukrainian  but also bound up with a russian bank  and the conflict between the two caused problems which exploded when war broke out in 2022     but why didn rsquo t orban rsquo s government  once a critic of what it called a  ldquo bad privatization  rdquo  save jobs       orban visit    the thursday night before i visited  orban held a national rally in dunaujvaros  haranguing the plaza in front of the local cinema  he tried to outdo an earlier event here by the main opposition leader peter magyar  countless fidesz posters here show a grim faced magyar alongside eu commission president ursula von der leyen and ukrainian president volodymyr zelenskyy  the ruling party rsquo s message  magyar won rsquo t put hungary first       asked  ahead of his visit to dunaujvaros  why the steel plant went bust  orban reportedly told one local paper that  ldquo the decisive reason is the russian ukrainian war  the sanctions policy and the eu rsquo s poorly designed green industry concept  rdquo  yet  in his town square rally orban avoided all reference to the dunaferr job losses  if this past fall  the government promised to revive production  the prime minister rsquo s silence was hardly a vote of confidence  the crowd for this dunaujvaros rally  several locals pointed out  owed less to pro orban residents than to fidesz supporters bussed in from surrounding villages     so  is orban rsquo s election campaign distracting from local economic woes by turning attention to geopolitics  according to former dunaferr employee erika kaiser  the issues sound more intertwined  though not in a way that does orban much credit  the ukrainian owners from 2003 were the donbas industrial union  based in donetsk mdash another steel city formerly named after stalin  yet  hit by the financial crisis  in 2010 this owner entered a partnership with a russian bank  veb  kaiser tells me that it was hard for locals to tell who was really in charge  and in its final years it didn rsquo t file proper financial statements  this was  she says  a  ldquo chaotic legal situation rdquo  but government failed to step in     one member of the veb supervisory board was vladimir putin  who reportedly discussed the plant rsquo s future with orban in 2014  in the first years after the buyout  kaiser explains  the donbas based company could produce a semi finished product cheaply on home soil  before final processing in this hungarian  thus eu based facility  the civil war in eastern ukraine from 2014  and the destruction of the owners rsquo  property there  probably made the firm more reliant on its hungarian operations  yet  investment was also lacking  the two furnaces needed routine replacement  but only one was replaced  after repeated delay     when russia invaded ukraine in 2022  there were still 4 500 steelworks jobs at dunaferr  but the firm was building up legal problems  later reports claim that the subsidiary in charge of the plant failed to cover  euro 655 million in eu level carbon credits and fines  before dunaferr part halted production in september 2022  initiating liquidation proceedings that december  orban rsquo s government pledged to step in and preserve the industry  it offered not to nationalize the plant but to ensure the workers rsquo  future under another owner     this was a promise it couldn rsquo t keep     liberty    in summer 2023  the government chose british indian liberty steel  one of four bidders  as the buyer  official media boasted that the government had  ldquo saved rdquo  the steelworks  a  ldquo top priority rdquo  in this  ldquo strategic sector  rdquo  but liberty was a puzzling choice  deputy mayor zsolt szabo tells me  given its already  ldquo existing financial problems  it was known across europe that they rsquo d bought multiple companies but didn rsquo t have enough money to operate them  rdquo  kaiser concurs that liberty had a track record of buying industries that could benefit from state subsidies but had not fulfilled its commitments on investment     the buyout promised to save jobs at dunaujvaros  perhaps by converting production  liberty pledged to renew the plant by building two electric arc furnaces  so that steel from dunaferr could be adapted to auto manufacture  and mdash a field of investment now rising in europe mdash military industries  in september 2023  liberty announced that it had chinese backing to carry through a major decarbonization of the plant  yet concrete measures were lacking  and the government again turned toward bankruptcy proceedings     what is the political fallout  kaiser suggests that local employees may credit the government for ensuring that their wages were paid for months after production halted  but ultimately blame it for choosing liberty steel as the buyer  this compounded its failure to control irregularities under the previous owners  and made eventual recovery even more expensive  szabo stresses that city hall mdash headed by an opposition  anti orban coalition since 2019 mdash tried to give the steelworks leeway on tax payments  and that this also helped ensure that wages got paid  but in june 2024 the coke ovens were turned off for the last time     szabo insists that the ruling party rsquo s promises were far from reality   ldquo when the steel plant was still operating in 2022  the current  representative  holding a shovel at the factory  said he would save it  then  two years later  people were standing in line in the scorching heat waiting for their termination notices  rdquo  he suggests that although the government had the opportunity to seek financial support from the european union to save a plant of this scale  it failed to do so  which led the dunaujvaros municipality to take matters into its own hands and begin participating directly in eu funding applications     szabo was initially a local candidate in the april 12 general election  before withdrawing in favor of main opposition force tisza  his campaign literature refers to steel as part of dunaujvaros rsquo s  ldquo way of life  rdquo  yet  in our conversation  even talk of potential eu aid now seems aimed at adaptation for a post steelworks reality  and retraining schemes for local employees  highlighting the mental health effect of the layoffs  szabo explains that for many workers in their 40s and 50s  this may be tougher     dunaujvaros doesn rsquo t rely on steel alone  it has a major site for south korean tire firm hankook  and serves as a base for employees commuting to budapest  but even further afield  there are many clouds over hungarian industry  the government jobs strategy has in recent years counted heavily on making batteries for electric vehicles  but as karas explains  this has heightened its dependence on foreign capital  there are even reports of chinese electric carmaker byd bringing in lower paid mdash and ill treated mdash migrant labor rather than employing hungarians at its new site in szeged     in dunaujvaros  the contradictions are obvious  orban rsquo s brand of state interventionism has not uplifted workers rsquo  position through labor rights or a stronger safety net  but counted on deals with multinational capital to employ hungarian workers  in the post crisis years  this paid off electorally  even if talk of winning economic sovereignty remained a mirage  yet today  with the war in ukraine and the ever escalating conflict in the middle east  this balancing act is harder to maintain  ahead of sunday rsquo s vote  working class hungarians may be less convinced to turn out for orban<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/world/hungary-election-layoffs-jobs/">In Hungary’s Steel City, Layoffs Hurt Orbán’s Appeal</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Wed, 08 Apr 2026 15:12:47 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/world/hungary-election-layoffs-jobs/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The Ceasefire Just Showed the World That US Military Power Is Obsolete]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/world/iran-ceasefire-us-military/]]></link>
		<author>James K. Galbraith</author>
	<date>Apr 8, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>With the illusion shattered, now is the chance for the US to liberate itself from a broken imperial model.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<description>
	<![CDATA["With the illusion shattered  now is the chance for the us to liberate itself from a broken imperial model      secretary of war pete hegseth speaks during a press briefing on the temporary ceasefire with iran at the pentagon on april 8  2026 in arlington  virginia       as of 10 pm washington time on april 7  2026  the war may be ending on the basis of iran rsquo s 10 points     these include  iran rsquo s control  with oman  of the strait of hormuz   ldquo agreement on uranium enrichment  rdquo  the lifting of all sanctions  withdrawal of american forces  and an end to all military attacks on iran  as well as on  ldquo lebanon and elsewhere  rdquo  according to the prime minister of pakistan  in return  iran agrees to cease defensive actions  by implication  it reserves the right to retaliate against ceasefire violations  including in  ldquo lebanon and elsewhere  rdquo       if the ceasefire holds  the vicious attack launched by the united states and israel on february 28  2026  will have exposed  for all to see  the obsolescence of us military power  that power consisted mostly of surface ships and bases  both of them impossible to protect from missiles and drones  the entire model  built up in world war ii and the cold war  is finished     acknowledgment of this reality around the world will have vast effects  it may hasten settlement of the other major conflict and tension zones  ukraine on terms agreed with russia  and taiwan on terms agreed with the prc  if so  a course should be set to avoid the worst for food and fuel and other resources in the near term and for a general economic improvements worldwide over a year or two and perhaps sooner     two weeks of uncertainty lie ahead  forces within the united states and in israel could destroy the tentative settlement  resume the war  and deepen the damage  they will certainly try  israel is still savagely bombing beirut  inviting retaliation from tehran  a deep and irreversible economic disaster  based on the final ruin of the persian gulf states  remains possible  it may be in israel rsquo s perceived interest to provoke that calamity  the military and ultimate political outcome will not be different if it happens     perfidy is also possible  a crime under the geneva conventions  perfidy is standard practice for american rulers  whom no one trusts any more  but the depletion of offensive and air defense weapons makes an early resumption of the war unlikely  therefore  the political effects of this deal may play out before military stockpiles could be rebuilt  and iran also can replenish its arsenals  so a renewed attack would not mean a different result  israeli media headlines calling the ceasefire a  ldquo huge victory rdquo  for iran appear to be correct       within the united states  a reckoning is overdue  at least since clinton rsquo s attack on serbia in 1999  the us has been trapped in a web of delusions about its own power  in afghanistan  iraq  ukraine  and the south china sea  the us has come up against forces it could not  in the end  defeat  none of these have  so far  dented the psychological carapace of the american elite  iran rsquo s 10 points should  finally  force reality down their throats  it is a defeat at the very core of the oil dollar system  on which american power has rested for 50 years     can america adapt  the present political class can hardly do anything except bluster on  they may just deny reality  or they may try to foster  as in france after 1870 or germany in the 1930s  a spirit of revanche and another round of extreme militarization  this course would lead to further humiliations and defeats  and to the final physical and moral decay of the country  but the people are tired of their so called elites  and in the force of circumstances  perhaps a new political class will emerge     in my dreams  this defeat could liberate the us from a broken imperial model  the us could demilitarize  mothball its nuclear weapons  decommission its aircraft carriers  and close bases  even beyond those now abandoned in the middle east  it could shrink its financial sector and devote its real resources to domestic physical  social and industrial renewal  it could revive  retrain and reenergize its worn down population  with useful jobs doing worthwhile tasks  it could join the concert of great powers on equal terms  accepting the fact that none of the other powers mdash not china  not russia  and not iran mdash has any interest in taking over the world  and that therefore  for effective management of the world commonwealth  cooperative solutions must be found     and the markets  from the news on april 7  as oil prices tumbled  the stock market was happy  is this the first time stocks boomed to the tune of a colossal defeat  that would speak well of the markets  which i do rarely  but don rsquo t count on it over the longer term  from the american perspective  the foundations of world power just shifted mdash an astonishing result  what we make of it remains ahead<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/world/iran-ceasefire-us-military/">The Ceasefire Just Showed the World That US Military Power Is Obsolete</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Wed, 08 Apr 2026 14:52:54 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/world/iran-ceasefire-us-military/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Waging a Culture War by Promoting Comedic Mediocrity]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/ellison-family-skydance-cbs-byron-allen/]]></link>
		<author>Ben Schwartz</author>
	<date>Apr 8, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The Ellison family, poised to continue dominating the media landscape with its Warner deal, signs on an infomercial-grade comic to replace Stephen Colbert.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
	<thumb_image>https://www.thenation.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/ByronAllen-275x173.jpg</thumb_image>
	<middle_image>https://www.thenation.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/ByronAllen-680x430.jpg</middle_image>
	<description>
	<![CDATA["The ellison family  poised to continue dominating the media landscape with its warner deal  signs on an infomercial grade comic to replace stephen colbert      byron allen speaks at an upfront presentation for his eponymous media company at a 2023 conference in new york       while our president makes genocidal threats on social media  and wages his chaotic war in iran  the first world leader to see the  ldquo fog of war rdquo  as a feature  not a bug   you can be forgiven for overlooking the ongoing news that the war donald trump is winning is the culture war  a glance through recent entertainment coverage readily confirms that the brutality and ugliness trump has sought to normalize over the past decade is now just the standard by which the culture industry operates       this weekend  trump oval office fanboy and sometimes nazi kanye west sold out inglewood  california rsquo s sofi center and took in a reported  33 million less than a year since he released a song called  ldquo heil hitler  rdquo  west even introduced trump to fellow nazi enthusiast nick fuentes at mar a lago  still  west rsquo s apology for his antisemitism in the wall street journal was evidently enough for his la fans  and no doubt some went because of the antisemitism  but the uk  which has a slightly more critical view of nazis than the united states does these days  saw things differently  the home office banned west from entering the country on the basis of his antisemitic views  he was booked to headline the wireless fest  which began hemorrhaging corporate sponsors like pepsi and rockstar energy drinks as soon as west rsquo s appearance was announced  the festival has since been cancelled  even if its headliner has not     a few days before west rsquo s la shows  netflix announced that louis ck would headline the hollywood bowl as part of its  ldquo netflix is a joke rdquo  comedy festival  nine years after ck admitted that he had masturbated in front of several women without their consent  netflix rsquo s corporate leaders have evidently determined that he had completed his penance mdash even though ck rsquo s nominal cancellation included a wildly successful interim live tour and the release of his first novel  if ck got a pass from the riyadh comedy festival  the thinking seems to go in la  why should the united states be any different      it rsquo s true that you can rsquo t ban a man from working for the rest of his life for trash behavior mdash but you also don rsquo t need to partner with him  unless  of course  you rsquo ve determined that there won rsquo t be any consequences  that people just do not care  the west and ck news also followed a series of interviews with actor john lithgow where he shakily fended off questions about why he has agreed to take the central role of dumbledore in the new harry potter television series  which will further enrich the author behind the potter franchise  the transphobic jk rowling     accommodating nazis  sexual abuse  and transphobia were once the maga brand  but it rsquo s very much mainstream culture now  central in the long term culture offensive is the planned skydance paramount buyout of warner bros  discovery  that takeover would seal the trump aligned ellison family rsquo s status as anointed maga culture barons mdash something defense secretary pete hegseth openly longed for as he derided press coverage of the iran war  paramount skydance has already agreed to distribute disgraced director brett ratner rsquo s rush hour 4 at the request of ratner rsquo s friend  president trump     this weekend  the wall street journal reported that roughly 20 percent of the funding behind skydance rsquo s  111 billion deal mdash some  24 billion mdash is coming from three sovereign wealth funds in the middle east   qatar   abu dhabi  and saudi arabia  trump and hegseth no doubt welcomed that news  since saudi crown prince mohammed bin salman is reportedly pushing trump to stay the course in iran       if the warner deal goes through  the skydance paramount corporation will own both cnn and cbs  and it rsquo s certain that this foreign buy in will come with a price  when foreign powers like china control a substantial slice of the revenue stream of major media companies  they expect american corporations to censor themselves  china rsquo s control of the chinese film market has silenced any and all criticism of china in american film and tv  and it rsquo s not hard to see saudi arabia rsquo s normalization campaign with the west getting new life in such a deal     meanwhile  the ellisons had more cleanup work to do on the trump culture front   after securing the cancellation of trump critic stephen colbert and his late show on the eve of skydance rsquo s final acquisition of cbs  the network announced monday it found his replacement  colbert rsquo s 11 30 pm slot and the hour after it will be filled by media investor and stand up comic byron allen rsquo s comics unleashed  the show initially starred allen in syndication from 2006 2016  and then he brought it back when cbs needed to fill in some late night programming gaps  the show will debut in may     the good news for trump rsquo s culture allies is that allen doesn rsquo t fit the broader template of recent maga culture war winners  he can rsquo t be lumped in with louis ck  kanye west  or jk rowling  he has not alienated millions of people worldwide with stupid  morally bankrupt behavior  he rsquo s always been a likable public personality who has never ruffled a feather  and that rsquo s likely why cbs wants him in that spot     allen rsquo s media company has been in business with sinclair broadcasting mdash the powerful right wing local broadcasting empire that lobbied so hard to get abc late night host jimmy kimmel fired last year for a monologue about trump rsquo s reaction to charlie kirk rsquo s assassination  allen is perfectly aligned with their goals   in the past  he has told comedians on comics unleashed   ldquo i don t want to hear any political humor  just be funny  family friendly and advertiser friendly  quot       if allen isn rsquo t leashing the comics  he rsquo s certainly muzzling them   in the trump 2 0 era  allen is the ideal host for cbs  he may not be a bad person  but the people who hired him are mdash or rather  the person calling the culture war shots in the white house is   allen got the gig in what rsquo s known as a  ldquo time buy  rdquo  his production company puts up the money to lease the time slot from cbs for his show mdash which will then be followed by a game show he also owns  it rsquo s a common marketing strategy for 3 am infomercials and religious broadcasters  the company leasing the airtime makes money up front with little or no investment  and buyers like allen make their money on the commercials and products they sell   in the past  allen has split the commercial sales revenue with cbs     allen rsquo s hire is the equivalent of bringing bari weiss into run cbs news or what the washington post and la times have become after killing off their planned endorsements of kamala harris in 2024  allen rsquo s show likewise represents a scaled down  cheaper  far less ambitious media product  it rsquo s designed not to cost much and not to offend  and if past history is much if a guide  it won rsquo t attract much of an audience         allen rsquo s time buying arrangement also furnishes a window on the ellisons rsquo  underwater business model at paramount cbs  when skydance bought paramount  it took on an enormous debt load  which will only get worse after the prospective warner deal goes through   ballooning debt was also a factor the decision to ditch colbert mdash together with the animus of his hater in chief  trump  one hundred and eleven billion dollars is a mountain of money to anyone  and it rsquo s clear that if paramount skydance is going to absorb warner bros  rsquo  many media properties without going under  the newly merged media leviathan will be airing the kind of filler product that byron allen provides     if colbert rsquo s show cost too much  and if the late night talk show model is dying  that still does not excuse cbs for its sad lack of creativity in replacing that model  like the comebacks of west  ck  and rowling  handing colbert rsquo s time slot over to the affable allen is peak enshittification  it rsquo s another step back into the degraded culture and values that normalize trump rsquo s own garbage behavior<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/ellison-family-skydance-cbs-byron-allen/">Waging a Culture War by Promoting Comedic Mediocrity</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Wed, 08 Apr 2026 12:49:37 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/ellison-family-skydance-cbs-byron-allen/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The “Piggy” Warmonger]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/the-piggy-war-monger/]]></link>
		<author>Judy Polstra</author>
	<date>Apr 8, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[Trump swaps “America First” for Middle East strikes.]]></teaser> 
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	<description>
	<![CDATA["Check out all installments in the oppart series<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/the-piggy-war-monger/">The “Piggy” Warmonger</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Wed, 08 Apr 2026 12:30:25 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/the-piggy-war-monger/</guid>
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  <item>
	 <title><![CDATA[The Great AI Grift]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/economy/ai-crony-capitalism-grift/]]></link>
		<author>Susannah Glickman,Amba Kak,Sarah Myers West</author>
	<date>Apr 8, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Tech leaders want you to believe that AI is the key to a new golden age. The reality looks more like a bold, government-backed heist.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Tech leaders want you to believe that ai is the key to a new golden age  the reality looks more like a bold  government backed heist      illustration by adria fruitos       late in the afternoon of july 23  2025  donald trump stood on a stage at the andrew w  mellon auditorium in washington  dc  to announce one of the hallmark initiatives of his second term as president  his ai action plan  immediately after he took office  trump had declared his administration rsquo s intention  ldquo to sustain and enhance america rsquo s global ai dominance in order to promote human flourishing  economic competitiveness  and national security  rdquo  now  after weeks of consultation with stakeholders  he was ready to unveil his plan to a room filled with corporate leaders eager to see whether he would deliver for them        ldquo from this day forward  it rsquo ll be a policy of the united states to do whatever it takes to lead the world in artificial intelligence  rdquo  trump promised  flanked by a pair of large signs reading  ldquo winning the ai race  rdquo     the choice of venue was fitting  andrew mellon was a powerful industrialist and banker who served as secretary of the treasury during the economic boom of the 1920s and through the wall street crash of 1929  his fiercely pro business  anti tax policies are widely blamed for creating the conditions that led to the great depression  whether ai will have the same effect on the economy is the central question for policymakers encountering the heady excitement and anxiety swirling around this new technology     trump  however  didn rsquo t seem to harbor such concerns  indeed  the three  ldquo pillars rdquo  of his ai action plan make clear that his administration intends to tip the scales in favor of the industry rsquo s interests in a manner unprecedented in us policymaking  these pillars are  a push to mobilize  ldquo every tool at our disposal to ensure that the united states can build and maintain the largest  most powerful  and most advanced ai infrastructure anywhere on the planet rdquo   a commitment to  ldquo get the entire world running on the backbone of american technology rdquo  by mobilizing government resources behind a global sales pitch on behalf of ai companies  and a determination that the government would divest itself of any use of  ldquo woke rdquo  ai models     the industry reps in the audience were thrilled  but if any members of the general american public had been in the room  they might have wondered  what about us  as our resources mdash our land  tax dollars  jobs  and future mdash are handed to an industry that is far more interested in amassing money and hoarding control than democratizing them  what can we expect in return  are we really witnessing the dawn of a new  ldquo golden age  rdquo  as trump promised  or  rather  a brazen daylight heist     semi con  a semiconductor industry worker in a fabrication plant in santa ana  california  1981     the billionaires selling us ai technologies would have us believe that they are self made innovators who rsquo ve built the most promising industry of our time based solely on their brilliance and entrepreneurial spirit  but the reality is far less valiant  for one thing  the paradigm of large scale ai is characterized much more by brute force resource consumption  of data  energy  and the capital that powers these infrastructures  than by scientific advancement  as meredith whittaker  the president of signal  and a cofounder of ai now   has observed   ldquo it was not the algorithm that was a breakthrough  it was what the algorithm could do when matched with large scale data and computational resources  rdquo       at the same time  the choice to orient around the notion that  ldquo bigger is better rdquo  means that the ai industry is trapped in a business paradigm that depends on access to unfathomably large amounts of capital to build out its infrastructure at a scale far removed from the actual indicators of demand  let alone any convincing signals of business viability  and enduring such stratospheric levels of uncertainty and risk requires nothing short of a cult like belief that the industry will eventually prove economically transformative enough to justify these bets by a guarantor that can persuasively underwrite the market  it requires  in other words  underwriting at a scale that only the us government could meaningfully provide     the trump administration has stepped up to the challenge  it has not been shy about its use of the power of the pen to back the industry rsquo s interests  from brokering sales deals with other countries on behalf of nvidia  to backing a  1 billion loan to bring the three mile island nuclear plant back online to power microsoft rsquo s ai data centers  and it has done all this despite the swelling opposition within both its maga base and the general public  who are growing uncomfortable with a technology that is being used to endanger people rsquo s livelihoods     the trump administration rsquo s ai policy is being led by its artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency czar  david sacks  who is a prolific investor in the ai industry  and michael kratsios  a former executive at scale ai who now heads the office of science and technology policy  sacks and kratsios have championed a multipronged approach that includes the  1 billion in ai funding provided by the one big beautiful bill act and an aggressive export agenda that turns the government into the top level salesman for ai firms as they enter foreign markets  at the india ai impact summit in february  kratsios announced the formation of a new tech corps  which will leverage the infrastructure of the peace corps to send technologists around the world on behalf of us tech firms to assist governments in integrating the companies rsquo  software into their public service systems  a few months earlier  the department of energy announced its  ldquo genesis mission  rdquo  a set of  ldquo private public partnerships rdquo  through which the doe will give companies access to its highly prized genomic and other datasets to enable them to develop products for commercial use  this is all on top of the already heavy subsidies that data centers receive  including significant state and local tax breaks and federal subsidies for factory construction     according to the big ai companies  this kind of ambitious and unconditional government support is just what rsquo s needed to achieve their aim of limitless ai infrastructure expansion mdash which they assert will be necessary to reach the holy grail of artificial general intelligence  and to do so before china does  under this arms race logic  any restraint on corporate power is recast as an impediment to national security interests and plainly unpatriotic mdash like blocking the apollo program or the manhattan project  both of which  ai boosters insist  are worthy historical analogies      but if there rsquo s one thing we should have learned from past eras of technological transformation  it rsquo s that the promotion of national monopolies does not necessarily lead to national competitiveness  nor does it lead  seamlessly  to sustainable jobs  enduring employment  wage growth  and innovation  while it can lead to great wealth for some  it rarely guarantees the kind of mass national renewal that the tech elite and their friends in government promise     who actually wins  donald trump touts his administration rsquo s ai action plan during a speech at the andrew mellon auditorium last july     given the headiness of the moment we rsquo re in  it rsquo s easy to forget the lessons of history  those technological paradigms that upended the economic status quo before ai       take semiconductors  originally a small part of the larger defense industry mdash semiconductor manufacturing was initially funded and planned in close coordination with the military  and semiconductors were purchased almost exclusively by the military industrial complex mdash they did not significantly penetrate the civilian market until the late 1970s  around that time  however  japan rsquo s production of high tech goods began to eclipse the united states rsquo  productive capacity  offering superior quality at cheaper prices  leading us semiconductor executives to realize that this threatened their own industry  producers like intel and fairchild semiconductor flooded washington with lobbyists  begging the new reagan administration for assistance and warning that if they didn rsquo t get it  the effects on the us economy and national security would be dire     what made these requests especially notable wasn rsquo t just the ask for help mdash the aerospace and electronics industries also received government support mdash but the scale of the aid sought by these famously libertarian  ldquo semiconductor cowboys  rdquo  what also made their requests    notable was that the white house listened     from ronald reagan to george h w  bush to bill clinton  successive administrations offered significant assistance to semiconductor companies  ranging from facilitating opportunities for us firms to learn the superior japanese production processes  to providing subsidies for new factory construction and antitrust exemptions  to forging coercive trade deals that favored us firms and processes  in 1986  for example  the reagan administration used the threat of economic sanctions to secure 20 percent of the japanese market for us producers  in the mid 1990s  the clinton administration negotiated new international trade deals that made these us subsidies legal while outlawing those favored by europe and japan     the level and the one sidedness of the support that the industry received was precedent setting in ways that we should pay close attention to for what they might portend with ai  the economist laura tyson has pointed out that these trade deals forever changed us trade policy by prioritizing market access for companies over the protection of domestic jobs  it was  as tyson and david b  yoffie wrote in  ldquo semiconductors  from manipulated to managed trade  rdquo   ldquo the first major u s  trade agreement in a high technology  strategic industry and the first motivated by concerns about the loss of high tech competitiveness rather than concerns about employment  it was the first u s  trade agreement dedicated to improving market access abroad rather than restricting market access at home  rdquo     the reason that three consecutive administrations  across both parties  made these moves was that they aligned with the elite belief that access to leading edge semiconductors figured at the heart of us military and economic primacy  but these forms of extreme subsidy and favoritism also had significant costs  both for the public good and for american security at large  coupled with a lack of oversight  the government rsquo s permissiveness toward antitrust violations allowed companies like intel to monopolize the field  this led ultimately to stagnation  which degraded rather than enhanced innovation and competitiveness on the global stage  while also bearing costs to the public     today  semiconductor firms continue to require massive capital investment and provide low profit margins mdash all while receiving significant government support  semiconductor plants  called  ldquo fabs  rdquo  are increasingly automated  the industry rsquo s poor workplace conditions  including exposing workers to toxic chemicals   high turnover rates  and aging workforce have led to a worker shortage  intel has failed to invest adequately in r d and has previously spent its government subsidies poorly     notably  intel is the same firm that the trump administration took a 10 percent equity stake in last year in an effort to shore up the company rsquo s finances and further bind it to the government  because it failed to keep pace with the rest of the industry  intel became vulnerable to such novel state measures  perpetuating the cycle of government intervention and neglect     co conspirators  donald trump stands alongside david sacks  white house artificial intelligence and crypto czar  at the signing of a bill related to stablecoins     if the history of semiconductors offers a warning  so far we don rsquo t appear to be listening  ai firms are receiving even less oversight than the semiconductor companies did  making them less likely to be accountable even as these firms create technologies that play a more central role in our lives as core infrastructure  if anything  the government has worked aggressively to deregulate a tech industry already enjoying laissez faire treatment  the white house is currently pushing for the preemption of state regulations of ai mdash an effort that effectively revives the reviled  ldquo ai moratorium  rdquo  which would have banned for a decade the ability of states to enforce their own laws on ai firms   that bill was shut down in the senate last year by a vote of 99 to 1      the ai industry is also at a much more nascent stage in terms of its ability to deliver on its proof of concept  the strategic importance of semiconductors to the nation rsquo s economic and military strength was already well proven before the reagan administration weighed in  while the transformative potential of ai tools is clear  it is much farther away by comparison  the leaders of ai firms have described their tools as not yet reliable enough for military use and are struggling to establish their enterprise business lines       the core justification for why ai is a national strategic priority mdash the potential development of artificial general intelligence mdash also remains speculative  a recent survey by the association for the advancement of artificial intelligence found that 76 percent of ai experts said they are dubious that agi will be achieved under the current paradigm  which posits that ai technologies improve with increased data and computing power  if this scaling law fails to hold  it will strike at the heart of the industry rsquo s case for ever increasing capacity and sow real doubts concerning the fantastical levels of projected demand undergirding the current push for infrastructure expansion     it rsquo s worth reminding ourselves of what will happen for americans if this technology does succeed  if the vision for ai ends in mass job displacement  which is certainly what the explosive revenue projections of these firms are banking on  then the administration would be inviting a new crisis onto its doorstep  beyond job loss  the potential harms of ai are legion  including higher energy costs  negative effects on education  increased social isolation  environmental degradation  and more  all will likely require substantial and costly government intervention     already  according to the latest report on us manufacturing  the construction of data centers is crowding out the development of other industrial sectors   ldquo global logistics remains sensitive to geopolitical shifts  rdquo  warned the institute for supply management rsquo s december 2025 manufacturing pmi report  which also noted the negative effects of trump rsquo s tariffs   ldquo large scale data center programs are absorbing and reducing availability of resources for other sectors  rdquo     the opportunity costs of prioritizing the needs of this sector above all others are massive and will have ripple effects on the economy for decades  delaying the development of other sectors as well as national development as a whole  even worse  all this sacrifice may be for very little payoff  we are trading the health of other manufacturing sectors for a bet on a speculative promise that ai will be worth the economic pain     given the clear harms incurred by such a haphazard  speculative strategy  it rsquo s worth asking why we are betting everything on this particular technology  these movements may not be reflective of an industrial policy moon shot so much as old school patronage and crony capitalism  witness david sacks rsquo s brokering of access to the white house for his industry colleagues  recommending policies that benefit them  and retaining stakes in nearly 450 companies that would be aided by his policies     it isn rsquo t hard to see how sacks and the tech ceos he considers colleagues will benefit from these moves  but it rsquo s less clear what american taxpayers will get in return  and this is roiling trump rsquo s maga base   ldquo it feels like millions of votes across the country just got traded for thousands of  and tech rich votes in regions republicans will never win  rdquo  a conservative supporter of the administration told the washington post recently     to make such a huge and risky bet on a technology that promises mdash even according to its greatest prophets mdash to fundamentally reshape the economy in ways that could put millions of people out of work and further centralize power and wealth in silicon valley certainly reads like a betrayal of that original vision  we should hope that any american government would support the conditions for beneficial innovation  but not wildly gamble away our future for so little in return<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/economy/ai-crony-capitalism-grift/">The Great AI Grift</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Wed, 08 Apr 2026 09:00:02 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/economy/ai-crony-capitalism-grift/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[AI for the People]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ro-khanna-ai-democracy-blueprint/]]></link>
		<author>Rep. Ro Khanna</author>
	<date>Apr 8, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>A manifesto for an AI revolution that works for the many, not just the billionaires.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<middle_image>https://www.thenation.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/STAUFFER-Khanna-AI-ftr-680x430.jpg</middle_image>
	<description>
	<![CDATA["A manifesto for an ai revolution that works for the many  not just the billionaires      illustration by brian stauffer       the ai revolution is destined to transform human society in ways that most of us cannot begin to fathom  the changes to come will be every bit as daunting as what the world saw in the industrial and digital revolutions  yet our policymakers are ill prepared mdash and  in the case of our president  dramatically unwilling mdash to ensure that these changes benefit everyone rather than a tiny cabal of hyper wealthy tech oligarchs       to meet this challenge  we must develop a new social contract that begins with the basic premise that artificial intelligence must serve humanity  not the bottom line of a billionaire class that seeks to become a trillionaire class at our expense  we cannot allow technological overlords to build a society where ai  ldquo progress rdquo  is defined by their wealth rather than by our democracy     i make this argument as a member of congress who represents silicon valley  the home of companies with more than  18 trillion in market capitalization mdash more than one quarter of the entire us stock market mdash and five that are worth more than  1 trillion each  i know tech billionaires  i know the people who are benefiting from the ai revolution rsquo s massive upward redistribution of wealth  and i know that more than a few of them believe they have a divine right to lead and rule  but that cannot be our future     we need to tax extreme wealth in order to meet human needs  which is why i support the proposed onetime 5 percent wealth tax on california billionaires  while not taxing voting shares or illiquid gains  and have proposed federal legislation to raise  4 7 trillion in revenue by taxing billionaires and another  2 trillion by making corporations pay their fair share  i have challenged my fellow members of congress to support this legislation with the argument that if the representative from silicon valley can stand up for billionaire taxes  it shouldn rsquo t be that hard for other house members and senators to do the same     just as important  i know mdash as a former deputy secretary in the obama administration rsquo s commerce department who has spent the past decade focusing on the economic and social disruptions caused by ai mdash that politicians  unions  civil rights groups  faith communities  and grassroots activists must act urgently and aggressively to create laws  regulations  and incentives that prioritize humans over machines  protect the mental health of our children from social media slop  stop algorithmic rent increases and predatory pricing  and prevent american jobs from being sacrificed in order to enrich oligarchs     ai is evolving so rapidly that even its intellectual pioneers are unsettled  geoffrey hinton  the nobel laureate in physics who rsquo s known as the  ldquo godfather of ai  rdquo  quit his position at google several years ago and warned that ai generated programs could overwhelm the public discourse with misinformation and  ultimately  pose an existential threat to humanity  stuart russell  the british computer scientist who literally cowrote a textbook on ai  now worries that ai development is  ldquo intrinsically unsafe  rdquo       some of the people behind the most sophisticated ai technologies are also scared  after the department of defense asked to use anthropic rsquo s claude chatbot for domestic mass surveillance and autonomous warfare  the company rsquo s ceo  dario amodei  said that he will not allow the technology to be used for either purpose  but what about all the other ai companies and tech leaders lining up for defense contracts and letting their products be used to kill people mdash as has already happened in gaza     clearly  we all must start asking some fundamental questions about ai  as senator bernie sanders  i vt  did when we held our  ldquo who controls the future of ai  the oligarchs or the people  rdquo  town hall at stanford university in february   ldquo if ai is going to replace a lot of the work that human beings do  what becomes of human beings  rdquo  the senator said   ldquo are we superfluous in the process  what happens to our ability to relate to each other  rdquo     we also have to acknowledge  in the words of sanders mdash who  after 35 years in the us house and senate  knows capitol hill better than anyone mdash that  ldquo congress and the american people are very unprepared for the tsunami that is coming  rdquo       wrestling with these questions  and preparing for the tsunami  is far too important to be left in a few private hands  unfortunately  donald trump and too many republicans in congress don rsquo t see it that way  they want to hand the tech industry elites a blank check to develop ai in ways that give them more wealth  more power  and more control over our future  in december  after congress rejected the administration rsquo s repeated attempts to slip anti regulation language into federal legislation  trump issued an executive order that authorizes us attorney general pam bondi and the department of justice to sue states  overturn ai safety regulations  and put consumer protection laws at risk  if states succeed in keeping their laws on the books  trump has ordered federal regulators to withhold federal funds that have been allocated for building out broadband infrastructure     state attorneys general will defend state level regulations  and they rsquo ll win their share of court battles  but merely saying no to trump rsquo s executive overreach is insufficient  democrats must provide an alternative vision that connects with independents and responsible republicans by speaking to the practical concerns that the american people have about ai     so how do we answer those questions  how do we prepare for mdash and hopefully avert mdash the tsunami that sanders referred to  i believe that we have more of the answers than commentators imagine mdash and that we can find additional answers by making ai debates central to our politics     we must frame the progressive alternative to trump rsquo s dangerously naive and irresponsible  ldquo blank check rdquo  agenda  to that end  both at stanford with senator sanders and in conversations and meetings with academics  union leaders  and grassroots activists across the country  i rsquo ve been making the argument for a new social contract to address the defining issues of our time  inequality and ai     the wrong path  donald trump  seen here signing an order trying to limit ai regulation  wants to keep this technology in the hands of the billionaires     let rsquo s begin by acknowledging that we live in a new gilded age  tech billionaires  who believe that in a different era they would have been heroic conquerors  are wresting control of our economy  our media  and our politics from the american people  and despite the growing popular concerns over ai  they are tightening their grip on the control of our future     most americans feel they have little say in shaping that future for themselves  let alone for their kids  this has contributed to anger  resentment  and a hopeless cynicism about these issues  in a january economist yougov poll  more than half of the americans surveyed said that the gap between rich and poor in america was  ldquo a very big problem rdquo   while only 6 percent said it wasn rsquo t a concern   an april 2025 pew survey found that  by a nearly two to one margin  people expect ai to harm rather than benefit them  why would they think that  perhaps because they rsquo ve seen the headlines generated by amodei rsquo s prediction that half of entry level white collar jobs could be eliminated by ai in five years     no nation can survive like this mdash with islands of prosperity amid seas of despair     the economist gabriel zucman has shown that today rsquo s concentration of wealth is the highest it has been since the 1920s  about 19 billionaires have amassed  3 3 trillion mdash the equivalent of 10 percent of all the goods and services that are produced in the us in a year  this is nearly three times more than the wealthiest americans were worth relative to the size of the economy at the peak of the gilded age  extreme wealth forms an unholy alliance with power  leading to two tiers of justice and stripping ordinary citizens of an equal voice in our democratic experiment     stanford university  where i once taught economics  is the epicenter of this wealth concentration and  not coincidentally  ai innovation  the 15 mile radius around the campus is home to apple  google  nvidia  broadcom  and meta  one third of the s p 500 rsquo s value originates in this place     this is one of the reasons why  when senator sanders and i appeared at stanford  i reminded the students and faculty   ldquo we see the future from here  we know what rsquo s coming in a way that many politicians and dc bureaucrats simply can rsquo t see  what kind of future are we going to build  will this future be only for the tech lords or for all of us  rdquo     the new tech social contract that i propose begins with an understanding that to whom much is given  at least a little is expected in return     none of this makes us anti technology  let alone anti innovation     we can acknowledge that tech entrepreneurs have taken risks and shown skill and imagination in scaling and adopting ai technology  but  as with every successful generation of american entrepreneurs over the past two centuries  their progress stands on a foundation of public investment  for instance  taxpayer dollars  as well as philanthropic donations  funded the development of ai at stanford  where imagenet and the digital library project helped give birth to google     that is why we must ask not what america can do for silicon valley  but what silicon valley must do for america     the ai revolution could help cure cancer and rare diseases  slash housing costs  make it easier to start businesses and open factories  address our energy needs  and lower medical and educational costs for the working class     but if we leave it in the hands of a few billionaires  their priority will be to eliminate jobs  extract profits  and addict us to outrageous content that turns us from citizens into combatants     that rsquo s not the future i want  i am not an ai accelerationist  but nor am i an ai doomer     i am an ai democratist     bernie brings it   ldquo if ai is going to replace a lot of the work that human beings do  what becomes of human beings  rdquo  sanders asked in this appearance with khanna at stanford     the future must not be written by ai agents that serve only san francisco billionaires  it must be written by all of us  together  in a way that heals our national divides  spreads prosperity through every community in this country  from rural towns to big cities  allows the middle class to grow and thrive  and keeps the oligarchs from dominating our society     to that end  i have laid out seven principles for what a democratic ai should look like     first  we must keep humans in the loop  we need real protections against mass job displacement  beginning with the 3 6 million truck drivers who face the loss of their livelihoods as autonomous vehicles hit the road  even as self driving trucks improve safety and efficiency  human drivers must remain in charge  just as pilots must still fly our planes  this will allow us to develop ai that augments human capability instead of eliminating jobs     second  every large company must bargain with its workers  unions and elected representatives should ensure that displaced workers move into new value creating roles and can benefit from ai rsquo s productivity gains through higher wages  profit sharing  and shorter workweeks     third  we have to fix the tax code rsquo s anti human bias  robots get accelerated tax depreciation  but hiring humans comes with payroll taxes  the economist daron acemoglu estimates that companies typically pay 5 percent or less in taxes on digital tools  while paying as much as 30 percent in taxes when hiring humans  this makes no sense  we must make it easier to hire workers  not robots     we also need to create an annual data dividend so that every american gets a check from the data they generate  both for private businesses and for government activities like public health  traffic management  and    policy research     fourth  we must launch a future workforce administration  just as president franklin d  roosevelt did during the great depression  we must seize this moment of anxiety among white collar and blue collar families alike and answer it with the boldest  most patriotic jobs agenda in generations     funded by a modest wealth tax on the trillions created here and by a token tax on ai used by businesses that displace labor  this program will put americans to work in public service  the initiative will drive moon shot projects that expand the frontiers of science  clean energy  and biotech  it will also mobilize young people to rebuild towns  teach our children  provide childcare and eldercare  and strengthen small businesses in every community     and we will launch 1 000 new trade schools and tech institutes mdash so the next generations are prepared for careers that ai can rsquo t replace     fifth  data centers must serve the communities that power them  right now  the wealth generated from data centers flows directly to mega corporations without benefiting working people  that must end     tech companies need to invest deeply in the areas providing them with such riches  rather than merely lining their pockets  they must provide computer resources for schools and libraries  create local tech jobs and fund startups  and use renewable energy and dry cooling technology to lessen the enormous toll that data centers exact on the environment and the water supply  we should look to what singapore has done with its data centers and invest in massively increasing the supply of clean energy  most importantly  tech companies must pay their full electricity bills instead of shifting those costs onto our communities       sixth  we must prevent ai from weaponizing public discourse  we must unite across party lines to stop engagement driven algorithms from spreading hate  we should eliminate section 230 of the communications decency act of 1996 so that we can regulate amplified violent content  and we should require platforms to open up so americans can connect freely across them     seventh  we must regulate ai so it is used to improve humanity  not damage it  we need clear  enforceable guardrails with mandatory third party verification of advanced ai models to ensure that this powerful technology does not cause serious societal harm  this needs to be more than the voluntary collaboration taking place at the federal center for ai standards and innovation  we need a robust federal agency to regulate ai like we do with nuclear energy or aviation     along with fair taxation of corporations and billionaires  these principles provide a framework to help ensure that ai does not usher in a level of wealth and power concentration that further rips apart our democracy  if we continue with the status quo or adopt poll tested incrementalism  we will leave ordinary americans out in the cold  and prosperity will be only for the privileged  i will not sit by and watch that happen  we need a program with the boldness and scale of fdr rsquo s new deal  a democratic project for our time  the point is not to slow innovation  but to see that its benefits reach every american     this is a program that says by its very substance  there will be no surrender to the tech lords  none     what there will be is a claiming of ai  and the future  for the american people<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ro-khanna-ai-democracy-blueprint/">AI for the People</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Wed, 08 Apr 2026 09:00:02 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ro-khanna-ai-democracy-blueprint/</guid>
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  <item>
	 <title><![CDATA[San Diego’s AI Battlefield Heats Up]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ai-surveillance-san-diego/]]></link>
		<author>Sasha Abramsky</author>
	<date>Apr 8, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The city is at the forefront of the fight against using big tech to surveill residents. But AI poses new threats.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["The city is at the forefront of the fight against using big tech to surveill residents  but ai poses new threats      illustration by melinda beck       last may  local progress  an organization whose membership includes almost 2 000 locally elected progressive officials from around the country  issued a report warning of the rapidly growing dangers faced by communities due to the spread of ai based surveillance systems  it cited as an example networks of automated license plate readers  alprs  and smart streetlights  which enable police departments to identify specific suspects by combining crime witnesses rsquo  descriptions of individuals and vehicles with the massive amounts of data on residents rsquo  movements collected by these systems  because ai excels in pattern recognition  it potentially allows police to find needles in an urban haystack  locating people and then tracking their movements in real time with pinpoint accuracy  companies such as flock safety  founded in 2017 and based in atlanta  and ubicquia  based in fort lauderdale  have made fortunes providing such systems to federal  state  local  and private entities  flock safety alone operates 80 000 ai powered cameras in 6 000 communities  and it is currently launching a new  ldquo surveillance drone rdquo  product to hoover up still more data       while city governments and police departments portray the technology as inherently benign mdash simply a souped up   ldquo smart rdquo  crime fighting tool that increases the efficiency of law enforcement activity by orders of magnitude and comes with no downsides for law abiding residents mdash critics argue that the growing use of these products represents a serious threat to civil liberties  privacy advocates worry that in an era of mass surveillance  such systems could be exploited by bad actors and used to monitor political protesters  women seeking reproductive care  immigrants just trying to go about their business  and others      ldquo there has thus far not been an automated license plate reader system able to adequately protect the technology from being co opted by authoritarianism  rdquo  says lijia gong  the legal and policy director at local progress   ldquo these tech corporations oftentimes use cities and local governments as testing grounds to normalize surveillance and automation tools  rdquo  many of the contracts for alpr systems and smart camera facial  and vehicle recognition networks allow companies to update the underlying software without seeking approval from local authorities mdash meaning that when these systems are installed  it rsquo s almost impossible to know how their tracking capabilities will develop as advancements in ai lead to improvements in its ability to recognize patterns and make predictions     as the trump administration carries out an unprecedented crackdown on    immigrants  the ability of customs and border protection to access such data has raised alarms  and there have been a number of reports alleging that federal agents may have found backdoor entry points into alrp and smart streetlight systems  even in states that prohibit their police departments from cooperating with these agencies  there have also been allegations that a texas woman was tracked after self administering an abortion  in october  the university of washington rsquo s center for human rights reported that the us border patrol had backdoor access to the surveillance networks of at least 10 police departments in the state  none of which had authorized such use of their data mdash though police analysts argue that since flock safety has disabled its software rsquo s ability to share information with federal agencies in states that prohibit such data sharing  the  ldquo back door rdquo  was likely rogue cops illegally passing along information to the feds     flock denies that there is a back door to its technology or that it shares locally or state owned data with ice  josh thomas  the company rsquo s chief communications officer  tells me   ldquo we don rsquo t work with ice  we rsquo ve never worked with ice  we have no contract with ice  there rsquo s no back door into the flock safety system  all of our customers 100 percent own and control their own data  flock doesn rsquo t share it at all or sell it to any third parties  rdquo     what the flock  demonstrators call for the removal of flock safety rsquo s surveillance cameras in bloomington  indiana  in january     few cities in the country have been as consumed by debates over the use of ai powered surveillance systems as san diego  which has a small police force for a city its size mdash less than 1 900 officers for roughly 1 4 million people mdash and has long relied on high tech crime fighting tools to fill the gaps in its personnel and funding  over a decade ago  san diego rsquo s district attorney used surveillance data to link nearly three dozen young african american men to local gang violence and to charge them with offenses connected to several shootings  despite the fact that they weren rsquo t near the scenes of the crimes at the time  many took plea bargains  and the charges against those who didn rsquo t were eventually dismissed  if their cases had proceeded  each of those young men would have faced many decades behind bars        ldquo far before trump  we rsquo ve been concerned with federal    overreach and data sharing  rdquo  says homayra yusufi  a senior policy strategist at the partnership for the advancement of new americans  pana  in san diego  districts that are mainly populated by people of color and immigrants are  ldquo over policed and over surveilled  rdquo  she says  and cameras and alprs mdash with their telltale bug like antennae mdash speckle virtually every intersection in these neighborhoods     the san diego police department has a contract with ubicquia to provide alpr and smart streetlight systems  ubicquia  in turn  has subcontracted out the implementation of the project to flock  the two companies and the sdpd say the technology is designed to leave a digital trail of who has asked for information and how the information has been shared   ldquo so if there is abuse or if somebody lies about it  they can be held accountable by the appropriate governing bodies  rdquo  thomas says  capt  charles lara  who oversees the sdpd rsquo s research  analysis  and planning unit  says that the department regularly conducts audits of how its surveillance systems are being used and who is accessing the information  and claims that the systems are less invasive than the phones everyone carries around with them   ldquo no one wants to live in a police state  rdquo  lara says   ldquo but at the end of the day  people are misunderstanding the fourth amendment in public places  rdquo   while the fourth amendment guarantees a right to privacy in private spaces  courts have found that it generally doesn rsquo t guarantee such a right in public areas   moreover  all officers are given guidance specifically stating that per california law  they cannot share surveillance data with the feds or other out of state agencies  and if they do  they will be reported to internal affairs and disciplined  lara says     despite such reassurances  immigrants rsquo  rights organizations and privacy advocates are increasingly alarmed by the federal government rsquo s use of every available tool to clamp down on perceived enemies and fear that  despite laws that limit information sharing  the sdpd rsquo s surveillance tools could at some point be put to use by the feds     notwithstanding the california values act passed in october 2017  which limits local and state law enforcement cooperation with ice and other immigration enforcement agencies  some more conservative cities in the san diego metropolitan region have reportedly shared surveillance data with the feds  one of them  el cajon  is being sued by the state rsquo s attorney general  rob bonta   ldquo despite clear guidance and multiple warnings  the city of el cajon police department continues to share this data with numerous out of state law enforcement agencies throughout the country  rdquo  bonta rsquo s office claimed in the october 2025 press release announcing the lawsuit  which was filed after a local pbs station reported that el cajon rsquo s surveillance data was used in immigration related searches at least 550 times in the first nine months of 2025     eye in the sky  automated license plate readers allow police to track residents rsquo  movements through cities    in 2016  san diego signed contracts to install more than 3 000 smart streetlights and alprs  although  perhaps fearing a backlash  the city neglected to tell the public about the new devices until three years later  by then  lilly irani  a professor of communication and science studies at the university of california san diego and a former google engineer  was warning of  ldquo data creep rdquo  and mdash like activists in the san francisco bay area  new york city  portland  oregon  and elsewhere mdash was decrying big tech rsquo s use of massive datasets on residents rsquo  movements to create the building blocks of a total surveillance society       in the local press  irani warned that her neighbors were being used as  ldquo lab rats rdquo  for big tech social engineering experiments  khalid alexander  an activist with pillars of the community  an organization that works with young black men who have long been targets of police surveillance and whose names appear in gang membership databases  teamed up with other privacy advocates to organize a series of community meetings to discuss the dangers of a surveillance state     those meetings gave rise to the transparent and responsible use of surveillance technology san diego  trust sd  coalition  made up of dozens of racial  and community justice groups  civil liberties advocates  and labor organizations  it pushed not for the elimination of surveillance technology but for the creation of a citywide ordinance that would place restrictions on the use of the technology and ensure that the public had a right to know when it was being deployed     over the coming years  trust sd rsquo s activists were joined in their opposition to runaway  unregulated ai by sean elo rivera  a member of the san diego city council  as well as of local progress  with a background in community organizing  a tall  lean man with short salt and pepper hair and a trim goatee  elo rivera dresses casually mdash black jeans  scuffed black dr  martens  a green jacket emblazoned with his name over a white vest  and a button shirt open at the neck  his city hall office is adorned with civil rights and organizing posters  and his bookshelf displays a hefty edition of the works of che guevara   ldquo there rsquo s no disputing rdquo  that ai driven technology helps fight crime  elo rivera acknowledges  but it comes  ldquo at a cost to people rsquo s rights and civil liberties  rdquo     ever since he was elected to represent an immigrant heavy district in the heart of the city  elo rivera and his onetime city council colleague monica montgomery steppe  now a county supervisor  have led the fight against renewing san diego rsquo s contracts for the smart technology  in 2022  with municipalities around the country rethinking their approach to law enforcement in the wake of george floyd rsquo s murder and the resulting racial justice protests  they scored a major victory when the contract with ubicquia for smart streetlights wasn rsquo t renewed mdash only to butt up against what they claim was the company rsquo s initial refusal to actually turn off the cameras and kill the data streams   ldquo san diego rsquo s not the only place where that rsquo s happened mdash where a municipality has said  lsquo shut  rsquo em down rsquo  and they rsquo ve continued to let them run  rdquo  elo rivera says  similar stories have been reported in eugene  oregon  in verona  wisconsin  in evanston  illinois  and in cambridge  massachusetts  in evanston  the city attorney sent flock a cease and desist letter accusing the company of  ldquo an intentional and unauthorized disclosure of protected data rdquo  after it allegedly reinstalled cameras without the city rsquo s permission  flock safety denies the claim  saying that when a city cancels its contract  the cameras no longer upload to the cloud even if they are still capturing images     during that same period  as san diego was rethinking its embrace of surveillance technology  elo rivera helped push the landmark transparent and responsible use of surveillance technology  trust  ordinance through the city council  which was passed in 2022  trust mandated that the city rsquo s decisions about installing ai driven surveillance technology be carried out in public and go through a formal approval process  that the police specify how the technology would be used  and that an  ldquo impact report rdquo  be submitted for each new technology  locals also gained the right to sue the city if it turned out that the technologies were being used in ways not authorized by the council and in a manner likely to result in harm to san diegans  in addition  the ordinance created a privacy advisory board made up of technology experts  civil rights advocates  community group leaders  and others who could articulate concerns about the new ai surveillance technology and recommend safeguards  khalid alexander  of trust sd  was among those appointed to the board       for a while  it looked as though one of america rsquo s most livable  laid back cities was bucking the trend toward total surveillance  lara  the sdpd captain  bemoans the fact that the ordinance mdash which he says is the most restrictive big city privacy legislation in the us mdash doesn rsquo t allow his department to share its data with other jurisdictions and creates a lag time of many months between when the police request new technology and when it can be approved and deployed  lara calls it  ldquo probably the most challenging thing we rsquo ve had to address as we move toward a modern police department  rdquo     the privacy advocates rsquo  victory was  however  short lived  the ordinance does continue to force the sdpd to be more public about how it is using data  but over the past few years  the privacy advisory board rsquo s recommendations on whether to deploy the technology have been increasingly overruled or simply ignored by local officials     a couple years after the board rsquo s creation  the sdpd requested that the ubicquia contract  and the flock subcontract  for 500 smart streetlights be reactivated  with backing from newly elected mayor todd gloria  and with the public souring on the reforms put in place in the aftermath george floyd rsquo s murder  a majority of elo rivera rsquo s council colleagues voted for a five year contract  the funding for which would have to be reapproved annually  when  last year  the board again recommended that the city not continue to fund the ubicquia flock contract  citing numerous allegations nationwide regarding the misuse of such data  the sdpd lobbied heavily for renewal  the city council agreed to its request     that outcome was a major disappointment for the activists who had pushed for changes in the city rsquo s relationship to ai surveillance technology  they had expected the ordinance and the privacy advisory board to rein in the sprawling surveillance systems  instead  in the years since  the technologies have grown in power  and the police have come to rely more and more on the use of ai generated data      ldquo the city has undermined the process since day one  rdquo  alexander says in frustration   ldquo the board is made up of volunteers  and the city has refused to fund any research staffers for the board  the disappointment is beginning to outweigh some of the smaller  we rsquo ve won along the way  rdquo     if you look at maps of smart camera and alpr deployments in san diego  you see clusters in the poorer  non white areas  in barrio logan  in the african american communities of south san diego  in the urban core around downtown  by contrast  in the more affluent northern and eastern suburbs  there are far fewer cameras and alprs  the clear takeaway is that  as with so much else in modern american life  the burdens of surveillance disproportionately fall on the poor and the non white     even before the ubicquia flock contract was renewed  alexander had quit the privacy board  which he had come to see as a paper tiger  in his resignation letter  he bemoaned the fact that  ldquo the mayor and majority of council members have shown that they are either unwilling or unable to even consider rejecting requests coming from sdpd  rdquo     watching the watchers  sean elo rivera has led efforts to regulate ai surveillance technology in san diego     elo rivera isn rsquo t quite as pessimistic  over the past few years  even as the campaigns to moderate san diego rsquo s use of ai driven surveillance systems have foundered  his efforts to rein in ai usage have expanded beyond surveillance technology     having pushed back against price fixing ai software in the rental market  elo rivera has now shifted his attention to waymos  the driverless cabs that have been operating in san francisco for the past few years and are increasingly prevalent in san diego  california law prohibits localities from implementing outright bans on waymos on public streets  but private entities can still impose restrictions  elo rivera has been in talks with the recently expanded san diego international airport to see if he can persuade its executives to bar waymos from picking up or dropping off customers on its property   ldquo it is imperative to me that we ask ourselves who benefits from these technologies and in what way  rdquo  elo rivera says   ldquo there are a lot of people here who drive either for primary income or secondary income  our commitment is to make sure everyday people are centered in the decisions of how these technologies are used  rdquo     a few years into his tenure on the city council  he became interested in how landlords were using ai to skirt antitrust laws and collectively jack up rents by feeding their own data into software that identifies patterns across the city rsquo s rental markets   ldquo people bust their ass here  because it rsquo s really fucking expensive  rdquo  elo rivera says   ldquo they rsquo re running a marathon on a track tilted 90 degrees against them  the playing field is completely tilted in the wrong direction  rdquo     mia loseff  the housing program manager at local progress  also recognized that this was a problem  her organization began studying the impact of such software four years ago and found that algorithmic price fixing raises rents by an average of  70 per month mdash with some cities  such as atlanta  seeing much higher increases  in part because of this research  one county and 12 cities in the united states  including san diego  have banned the use of such software over the past 18 months  in october  legislators in california took the process a step further  outlawing its use statewide     elo rivera is also trying to persuade his city council colleagues to support a ban on the dynamic pricing strategies that grocery stores are rolling out mdash using ai to hike the price of staple foods during high demand shopping hours  meaning that customers don rsquo t know in advance what they rsquo re going to pay for food and may even find that the prices change while they rsquo re inside the store if there rsquo s a surge in customers   ldquo i think it is wrong for consumers to be subject to price volatility based on the time of day they rsquo re going to shop for basic items  rdquo  he says     san diegans rsquo  efforts to regulate ai have had mixed success  despite the accountability coalitions and the creation of the privacy advisory board  ai surveillance systems have proved remarkably difficult to control  advocates feel as though they rsquo re playing an endless game of whac a mole      ldquo we built the biggest coalition against flock  we had 70 organizations sign on  the labor council  unions  but the police seem to be more powerful than any of them  rdquo  irani  the ucsd professor  says     for elo rivera  ai represents one of the defining political challenges of our time  before he was elected to the city council  he was employed by a nonprofit organization working with at risk young people   ldquo my work was with communities that had to fight incredibly hard for things they should not have to fight for  rdquo  he says   ldquo access to transportation  access to healthy food in schools  rdquo  that experience primed him to bring a critical eye to the society upending technologies that the big tech proponents of an ai revolution are unleashing   ldquo the scale of these changes is unrivaled  rdquo  elo rivera says   ldquo the recipe for people giving up  for cynicism  for real social turmoil mdash it rsquo s all there  tech companies are attempting to squeeze consumers from every angle they can  and we have to be able to push back and fight on every single front  rdquo<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ai-surveillance-san-diego/">San Diego’s AI Battlefield Heats Up</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Wed, 08 Apr 2026 09:00:02 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ai-surveillance-san-diego/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The United States Is Self-Destructing Amid Empire Collapse]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-2027-federal-budget-pentagon/]]></link>
		<author>Julia Gledhill</author>
	<date>Apr 8, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Dangerously wrong priorities will accelerate America’s decline.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Dangerously wrong priorities will accelerate america rsquo s decline      president donald trump speaks during a news conference in the white house on april 6  2026       the trump administration rsquo s fiscal year 2027 budget request is a bat signal to congress  the american empire is flailing  and the white house is working to ensure that the country declines with it  if there was ever a time for lawmakers to discipline the pentagon  it is now     on friday  the white house released preliminary details about the fiscal year 2027 federal budget  the president requested  1 15 trillion for the pentagon  as well as an additional  350 billion for the military outside of the regular budget process  if congress manages to approve the latter in a separate spending bill  it will deliver president trump a  1 5 trillion top line mdash a 44 percent increase from last year       the administration rsquo s budget request to congress comes as the united states surpasses the first month of its illegal  dangerous war against iran mdash which according to yougov  about 60 percent of americans oppose  it remains to be seen whether the pentagon will pursue additional funding for the war  though the pentagon suggested a separate  200 billion spending package just two weeks ago  even with a ceasefire  the pentagon may still pursue a supplemental to refill weapons stockpiles  either way  lawmakers have a clear mandate  cut the pentagon budget and salvage their chance to deliver the domestic rejuvenation the american people demand     the president is forcing austerity on the american people while prioritizing arms dealers and warmongers  the administration has proposed a 10 percent cut to nonmilitary spending  a  73 billion reduction  but superfluous military spending is an accelerant of american decline  coming at the cost of childcare  healthcare  and social welfare writ large mdash as the president made explicit in his address last wednesday  according to the president   ldquo it rsquo s not possible rdquo  for the federal government to take care of childcare or healthcare   ldquo we have to take care of one thing  military protection  we have to guard the country  rdquo     the president rsquo s idea of guarding the country is unmitigated weapons production  but this is really just an idea  and a flawed one at that  the united states does not have the industrial capacity nor the workforce to absorb an additional near  500 billion pentagon budget plus up in a single fiscal year  production constraints aside  the president rsquo s budget request kick starts his vanity projects in earnest  the fiscal year 2027 budget establishes trump rsquo s golden fleet mdash including the trump class battleship  americans may be losing critical services  but the administration made sure to carve out funding for the f 47 fighter jet and golden dome  the president rsquo s fantasy missile defense system     the administration rsquo s budget request outlines an egregious misallocation of american resources  but president biden and his predecessors paved the way to the trillion dollar plus pentagon budget  for years  republicans and democrats alike have invoked the prospect of world war iii to justify expanding pentagon budgets and unfettered weapons production  if the united states was as vulnerable to a military attack as budget boosters claim it is  the federal government would exercise both executive powers and statutes like the defense production act to seize industrial capacity and boost arms production in preparation for war mdash as the nation did in world war ii       the administration boasts that the current military buildup surpasses even that preceding the second world war  the only reasonable response to such excess is to drastically cut military spending  starting with trump rsquo s pet projects  the golden dome missile defense system  the golden fleet  and the f 47  between last year rsquo s  ldquo big beautiful bill rdquo  and its proposed top line for fiscal year 2027  the administration is poised to commit at least  40 billion on golden dome mdash the land and space based shield purportedly capable of protecting the united states from everything from ballistic to hypersonic and cruise missiles  but a poorly conceived  fantastically expensive missile defense shield is far from the most effective way to mitigate the threats posed by nuclear weapons  diplomacy  arms control  and nuclear nonproliferation     rather than commit generations of americans to unnecessary if not technically infeasible weapons programs  congress must cut off america rsquo s war machine at the source  excessive pentagon spending fuels the us rsquo s war obsession  an affliction that drives american hubris in countries like iran and beyond  military restraint  however  may be a driver and a product of spending discipline  at the very least  deep cuts to the pentagon budget would save taxpayers from financing the president rsquo s weapons wish list  which is irrelevant to cohesive or realistic strategic thinking  most importantly  pentagon budget cuts would free up resources for programs that actually improve americans rsquo  quality of life  which is rapidly deteriorating amid both wage stagnation and rising prices<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-2027-federal-budget-pentagon/">The United States Is Self-Destructing Amid Empire Collapse</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Wed, 08 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-2027-federal-budget-pentagon/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Diminished Lives: an Assault on the Humanities]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/students-reading-schools-teachers/]]></link>
		<author>Jonathan Kozol</author>
	<date>Apr 8, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>More and more students are being indoctrinated into a cult of cold “efficiency,” where the training of workers for corporate employment are held to be the ultimate priorities.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["More and more students are being indoctrinated into a cult of cold  ldquo efficiency  rdquo  where the training of workers for corporate employment are held to be the ultimate priorities      kindergarten students at coal creek elementary in louisville  colorado  on march 11  2026          anyone who spends much time visiting with children in the public elementary schools is likely to notice that the time traditionally given to the study of the arts and letters has undergone a notable reduction   ldquo severe budget cuts to  humanities and other non stem fields  rdquo  according to robin d g  kelley  a professor of american history at ucla  have accompanied the growing assault on critical inquiry       this trend  which i began to notice in the years that followed the passage of the testing law no child left behind  is part of a larger pattern of retreat from the humanities in general  which tends to be given less and less attention  as it seems  because the benefits or  ldquo outcomes rdquo  of a child rsquo s engagement with a literary work that he or she enjoys do not easily lend themselves to rigorous and scientific measurement   ldquo i want to change the face of reading instruction from an art to a science  rdquo  said a high ranking official at the us department of education in 2002  if she had simply meant that reading instruction ought to be grounded in reputable research with a scientific basis  her statement would have seemed like common sense to me  regrettably  in too many schools  the scientific theme soon grew into a storm of arctic air that blew away any serious concern for the artistry of language in the books and stories that children were increasingly denied the time to read      ldquo so maybe we aren rsquo t teaching an entire novel  rdquo  a curriculum administrator in a new york district noted in an interview with the new york times in 2015   ldquo but we rsquo re ensuring that we rsquo re teaching the concepts that the novel would have gotten across  rdquo     it rsquo s a funny statement  i don rsquo t think too many people read a novel in order to dig out  ldquo a concept rdquo  or a bunch of concepts hidden in its pages  i think most people read a novel to enjoy the story and get caught up in the lives of the people it portrays and the ways their personalities and character develop as the narrative evolves  this is obviously impossible if all the students get to read are a couple of paragraphs or pages     a case in point  one of the bright young teachers whom i came to know when she was a graduate student here in cambridge went on a few years later to become a teacher in a fifth grade classroom in a poorly funded district in virginia  there was no library at the school and  in the classrooms  literary books had largely been abandoned and replaced by tiny bits of writing that were known as practice texts     the teacher  who had studied education after she had done her undergraduate degree at the university of virginia  had done her practice teaching in a fairly affluent district in a suburb close to cambridge where testing pressures had been less severe and where she rsquo d had a chance to introduce her students to books she rsquo d known and loved since she was a child  so the idea of using what she called  ldquo hokey little bits and pieces rdquo  of test aligned materials as the mainstay of instruction struck her  as she put it  as  ldquo pretty damn amazing  rdquo       she later sent me a package that included several of the passages her students had to read in a six week period prior to the final round of standardized exams mdash during which  she told me  they read no books at all     one of the longer pieces that she sent was a passage of nonfiction about a creature of the sea i had never heard of  which was called the blobfish  it started out by saying that the blobfish has  ldquo a human looking face rdquo  and  in the next sentence  is  ldquo a human looking fish rdquo  and  in the paragraph that followed  is  ldquo nearly human looking  rdquo  while it  ldquo may not be one of the most attractive of sea creatures  rdquo  the passage continues   ldquo it is certainly one of the most interesting  rdquo  its shapelessness  ldquo allows the blobfish to float easily rdquo  in  ldquo the ocean depths where it makes its home  rdquo  the blobfish  ldquo spends all its time floating rdquo  and  two sentences later  the blobfish  plural   ldquo spend most of their time floating hellip   they are made for floating  rdquo     the blobfish  ldquo may not be the most attractive fish  rdquo  the children are told a second time in the final paragraph  after which a multiple choice question asks the students to identify the structure that was used to organize the passage  the teacher said one of her students stuck her fingers in her throat to indicate how interesting she found this     it rsquo s not surprising that so many teachers with her good education and buoyant personality mdash and feisty resistance to the loss of her autonomy mdash are unwilling to remain for long in schools in which  ldquo hokey little bits rdquo  of mediocre writing and the pressure to conform to standardized banalities are snuffing out any pleasure to be taken in the arts and letters       the banning of books on social justice issues and works that address the nation rsquo s racial history is another reason teachers who have come to education with a sense of social conscience are fleeing from the classrooms  about 12 years ago  one of my friends in arizona told me about teachers in the tucson district who had developed a mexican american studies program that also included the writings of james baldwin and dissident historians  such as howard zinn     but legislative leaders were not pleased  the legislature passed a law to eliminate the program  and republican governor jan brewer signed the law in 2012  among the titles taken from the shelves were works by cesar chavez  isabel allende  sandra cisneros  laura esquivel  and thoreau   ldquo civil disobedience rdquo   mdash and  bewilderingly enough  shakespeare rsquo s play the tempest       in more recent years  right wing parent groups have been attempting to exclude from their children rsquo s schools hundreds of other books that foster critical thinking or address the conflicts that divide us  based on gender  class  and race       all in all  between the assault from groups like these and the broader curricular constraint on reading almost any book of literary worth from the beginning to the ending  teachers i know are speaking of a bleak and bare scenario     i go into an elementary classroom and  being old fashioned as i am  i look to see if harriet the spy is sitting there invitingly on the top shelf of a bookcase  depending on the grade and ages of the students  i also look for owl moon  peeny butter fudge  born on the water  bridge to terabithia  grandma rsquo s purse  the wind in the willows  number the stars  a wrinkle in time  alice rsquo s adventures when she fell into the rabbit hole mdash and  naturally  eeyore  pooh  and piglet as they were depicted not by disney but by e h  shepard     most of these books and dozens of other old or modern treasures are usually listed by the state or district as recommended titles for kids of different ages  and they rsquo re usually there  somewhere in the classroom  packed in shelves or boxes  too often  however  the books remain there in the shelves and boxes for too many days and hours while children fill in bubbles on their practice texts  healthy and well educated teachers tell me that they hate this  they did not come into teaching in order to become the dutiful technicians of mechanistic learning  they want to seed the future of their students with a lifelong love of reading     it rsquo s harder to do this in the kinds of schools where the obsessive measurement of outcomes and a cult of cold  ldquo efficiency rdquo  in the training of workers for corporate employment are held to be the ultimate priorities  what can rsquo t be measured won rsquo t be taught  what won rsquo t be  ldquo useful rdquo  mdash fascination  and delight  and wonderment mdash are no longer wanted  this way lie diminished lives for millions of our children and a continued flight of teachers from their schools<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/students-reading-schools-teachers/">Diminished Lives: an Assault on the Humanities</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Wed, 08 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/students-reading-schools-teachers/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The Worlds of Jamaica Kincaid]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/jamaica-kincaid-essays/]]></link>
		<author>Edna Bonhomme</author>
	<date>Apr 8, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Memory pervades a new collection of nonfiction, and so do the ghosts of empire.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Memory pervades a new collection of nonfiction  and so do the ghosts of empire      jamaica kincaid in toronto       jamaica kincaid really hates england  and who could blame her  in her essay  ldquo on seeing england for the first time  rdquo  which was published in transition during the early 1990s  she pithily expressed her views of the country   ldquo i find england ugly hellip i hate england  the weather is like a jail sentence hellip the food in england is like a jail sentence  rdquo       one might dispute some or all of these assertions  but the anger derives from a history  a long  painful  gut wrenching series of events involving what the british empire did to kincaid rsquo s ancestors  possibly capturing  if not purchasing  her african forebears  transporting them across an ocean  and forcing most of these individuals and their descendants to work in the sugarcane fields of antigua  even long after the country rsquo s emancipation and independence  britain maintained a strong political and social connection to antigua  as it did with many of its former colonies  mainly under the banner of the commonwealth  for anyone from antigua  and for anyone whose ancestors were affected by the british empire in similar ways  it is difficult to see english society and culture without some feeling of bitterness and indignation       for kincaid  the tentacles of british imperialism have long been a theme in her novels  in annie john  england appears in the background of nearly every social encounter  through symbols and hymns  one notable childhood scene shows that close relationship      we began our  meetings with the whole troop standing in the yard of the methodist church  forming a circle around the flagpole  our eyes following the union jack as it was raised up  then we swore allegiance to our country  by which was meant england      in at the bottom of the river  we get a collection of short stories in which england features as a faraway land that provides luxury items  now  in a new collection of kincaid rsquo s essays and cultural writing  putting myself together  much of her animus toward england can be found once more  along with many other things  as in her fiction  the themes of british imperialism  life in the caribbean  and the long shadow of slavery and colonialism are central  but they are no longer conveyed through characters mdash instead  we get them directly from kincaid herself  yet there is much more in this collection  her body of writing is filled with musings and missives  witticism and humor  spanning kincaid rsquo s career from the early 1970s until 2020  the essays here include everything from features on celebrities to insights on her garden  yet many of the themes circle back to the main idea of  ldquo on seeing england for the first time  rdquo  which serves as a sharp parable as well as a wry provocation  that when push comes to shove  you can rsquo t escape history mdash it makes you     jamaica kincaid was born in 1949 as elaine cynthia potter richardson  the daughter of a sharp tongued housewife and an illiterate chauffeur  she spent her first 16 years as a british colonial subject  absorbing the heavy influences of the monarchical government  even as late as the 1950s  antigua was still in a state of transition away from a plantation economy  where unpaid and later poorly paid africans and their descendants worked the land to produce sugar  cotton  and harvests for the british empire  antiguans were free  in that they were no longer slaves  but they were not  in kincaid rsquo s experience  all that liberated      ldquo for about one hundred years after emancipation  rdquo  kincaid notes in one essay   ldquo antiguans were neither slaves nor people  rdquo  even in their alleged liberation  the black residents of the island served the global elite  most of the land when she was growing up  kincaid noted  was owned by  ldquo people who had never seen antigua  rdquo  where did these people live  mostly in britain  who were they  the descendants of slave owners  by the mid 20th century  the peaceful island had become appealing to the united states  which led to antigua rsquo s acquiring an american military base and gradually being transformed into a tourist destination for middle class north american travelers seeking to escape to its beaches and turquoise waters  even as the forms of hierarchy and rank changed  class and the exploitation of antiguans remained constant       in 1965  kincaid migrated to the united states  as the eldest child  she was expected to provide financial assistance to her impoverished family  leaving antigua was a significant step  but embracing the person she wanted to become was even more critical  in the us  kincaid temporarily worked as an au pair at her mother rsquo s request to send remittances back to the caribbean  but after a tumultuous start  she severed ties with her family in antigua and  with meticulous detail  adopted a new persona  from then on  she would no longer be elaine cynthia potter richardson  by taking her new first name from another british colony in the caribbean and her surname from a scottish clan that rebelled against the english and recaptured    edinburgh castle in the 13th century  kincaid signaled both her afro caribbean roots and her anti english resistance         now equipped with a new identity  kincaid briefly attended westchester community college  franconia college  and the new school  although she never finished a college degree  she started writing regularly for ms  and the village voice  she also began contributing consistently to the new yorker  including brief pieces in  ldquo talk of the town  rdquo  there  she developed a casual prose style with a touch of sharp humor     by 1978  all of kincaid rsquo s hard work as a writer had begun paying off  after writing  ldquo girl  rdquo  a short story in the new yorker that offers a vivid portrait of female life with memorable concision  she got a publishing contract and expanded the piece into her first book  at the bottom of the river  from that point on  kincaid continued shifting between fiction and nonfiction  often revisiting her own biography  her novels would try to do both     at the bottom of the river was a thoughtful book about close observation  with the narrators habitually highlighting the ordinariness of domestic life  however  the works of fiction and nonfiction that followed continued to dwell on many of the same themes  kincaid rsquo s west indian upbringing  her marriage to a composer  her two children  and her horticultural journey  this decision to write about her life was not made merely because it was the subject most immediately available to her  it also offered kincaid a way to work through and reflect on that life mdash a way to find out how her past had influenced and shaped the present       alongside her novels  kincaid continued to write cultural and literary criticism  putting myself together offers a chronicle of these writings  collecting her opinions on political figures  her commentaries on public life  her profiles of celebrities  her letters concerning colonialism  and her critiques of western society rsquo s obsession with race  the volume does not include every work of nonfiction she rsquo s written  but it tracks her evolution as a public thinker     one noticeable aspect of many of these essays is not only her political insight but also her sharp wit and humor  while kincaid established her reputation as a fiction writer  she also shows significant versatility in her nonfiction  shifting from widely read publications like architectural digest to more highbrow outlets like the paris review     from the beginning of her writing career  her polyphonic prose was infused with a mix of comedic and historical sensibilities mdash an infectious sense of tittering and mirth in confronting history rsquo s challenges and injustices mdash that i have also observed in my afro caribbean aunts during family gatherings  by the early 2000s  kincaid had transformed this range of feelings and styles into a mode of writing that  along with her fiction  made her a literary powerhouse  everyone wanted to read and publish kincaid     during these years  kincaid rsquo s disdain for the british empire rsquo s stain on antigua and  more broadly  much of the world was often secondary to other subjects she addressed  her writing also contains many nuanced and pointed remarks about identity  whether profiling the stars of blaxploitation films  such as pam grier  or discussing literary figures like robinson crusoe  kincaid was always careful to consider how history intersected with personality  politics with art and culture  world historical events with everyday desires and happenings     reporting from a public broadcast at a harlem theater  kincaid watched george foreman fight muhammad ali in zaire  now the democratic republic of the congo  mdash and despite all the history swirling around her  she took the time to pause and offer a somewhat steamy and wry description of ali   ldquo he looked like a movie star  rdquo  kincaid wrote   ldquo the way he strode into the ring  his face looked smooth as a peach  his hair was nicely done mdash no split ends  then he took off his robe and flexed the muscles in his arms  gosh  he has the best pair of collarbones you have ever seen on any screen  rdquo       even when getting lost in the beautiful physique    of a world champion boxer  kincaid never forgets the dynamics of power and empire all around her mdash and in particular the residues of that one kingdom she was most familiar with  when kincaid writes about britain  she is unequivocal  for her  the british empire was and  in many ways  continues to be a globe trotting ruffian who  for centuries  bullied and stole from the world  never apologized  and always explained away its violence and extractive tendencies as being to the benefit of all     kincaid articulates her frustration with the united kingdom with statements of intentional provocation  but she also supplements these with detailed accountings of the british empire  for instance  she notes  the barclays brothers founded barclays bank with wealth amassed through slave trading and  after the slavery abolition act  extracted profit from the descendants of those same enslaved people  in fact  in exchange for abolition  britain paid 47 000 slave owners  like the barclays brothers  through the slavery compensation act  these payments continued until 2015  in practice  this has meant that as much as 20 percent of britain rsquo s wealthy population has financial wealth connected to the transatlantic slave trade  as kincaid writes   ldquo i may be capable of prejudice  but my prejudices have no weight to them  my prejudices have no force behind them  my prejudices remain opinions  my prejudices remain my personal opinion  rdquo     but her partialities are also rooted in fact  for example  of the 17 non self governing territories  10 are still administered by the uk  which some point to as proof    that british colonialism never died  moreover  the uk maintains military bases in its former colonies  along with mining companies and    tax havens  which leads one to think that kincaid rsquo s antipathy is justified  when she was born  antigua was a british colony  and like several newly independent nations that had been ruled by this empire  it slowly transitioned to commonwealth status  by 1981  antigua had become a member of the commonwealth  and to this day  the british monarch remains its head of state  unlike in barbados  which finally divorced itself from the monarch in 2021      for kincaid  after empires die  the consequences of their rule endure for many years  these were present in every aspect of the antiguan society in which she grew up mdash from the street names and the school curriculum to the official language  on this  there was no ideological middle ground or any way to find the good in the bad  freed from alleged english civility  kincaid was going to say exactly what she thought about britain       much of kincaid rsquo s writing on the british empire brings to mind another seminal afro caribbean intellectual  stuart hall  he  too  did not pull any punches concerning the role that his adopted home played in the formation of his original one   ldquo the very notion of great britain rsquo s  lsquo greatness rsquo  is bound up in the empire  rdquo  hall once wrote   ldquo euro skepticism and little englander nationalism could hardly survive if people understood whose sugar flowed through english blood and rotted english teeth  rdquo  for kincaid  too  the rottenness of british society originated in the way britain had treated much of the rest of the world  perhaps no country should ever be considered  ldquo great  rdquo  but for kincaid  certainly no imperial power could be described with such a term     and yet despite all this  kincaid can also be a writer of hope  if history created despair and anger  then memory offered inspiration  in her svelte novel annie john  kincaid revisited her own life in antigua with unbridled clarity  in at the bottom of the river  the remembered past is often a place of respite and possibility  as is also the case in lucy  a novel about a west indian girl working as an au pair for an american family     memory pervades putting myself together as well  a capacious and wide ranging collection  it furnishes a portrait of kincaid as a thinker and writer as she evolves over time and even her own self perceptions change  there are some noticeable interstices  however  reading the collection  i kept wondering about what seemed to be missing  an engagement with the political turmoil of the present day  perhaps nonfiction was never the perfect vehicle for this  or kincaid shouldn rsquo t necessarily be the person to do this  but i am confident that she would do it well  another area i would have liked to see explored further is how we understand the process of racialization in contemporary society and its relationship to the united states  a similarly vast empire  while britain often comes under fire in kincaid rsquo s essays  there is far less about how the united states also operates around the world as an empire and how its violence abroad comes back home     yet even if some of these aspects are missing  putting myself together does offer us a picture of kincaid putting herself  well  together  in its witty social observations  sardonic humor  and purposeful provocations  it captures one of america rsquo s most lively and wide ranging literary voices  in its critiques of the british empire and its studies of caribbean life  it also offers a blueprint for the postcolonial pundit mdash showing how violence and exploitation abroad are connected to how they show up at home     in her 2019  ldquo letter rdquo  to robinson crusoe  kincaid wrote   ldquo dear mr  crusoe  please stay home  there rsquo s no need for this ruse of going on a trading journey  in which more often than not the goods you are trading are people like me  friday  rdquo  the letter is poignant  and it rsquo s a directive that we should address to anyone who exercises unconscious cruelty toward the oppressed  may everyone reprimand their own colonizer with confident calculation  and if we dare  we can also be a bit spiteful<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/jamaica-kincaid-essays/">The Worlds of Jamaica Kincaid</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Wed, 08 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/jamaica-kincaid-essays/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[We All Hate AI, but if You’re Poor, It Can Really Ruin Your Life]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ai-luxury-class-social-programs/]]></link>
		<author>Kali Holloway</author>
	<date>Apr 8, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Debt collection. Parole decisions. Oversight of public services. It’s all being outsourced to AI, with terrible consequences for poor people.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Debt collection  parole decisions  oversight of public services  it rsquo s all being outsourced to ai  with terrible consequences for poor people        residents of daytona beach  florida  line up in their cars during a free food distribution for recipients of the supplemental nutrition assistance program on november 9  2025      luxury brands have always advertised the craftsmanship of their products  but in recent months  human artistry itself has become their advertising strategy  hermes redesigned its entire website around hand drawn illustrations by the french artist linda merad  who said the designer label wanted visitors to recognize that  ldquo the art was made by a human  rdquo  the fashion houses chanel and loewe commissioned human illustrators to create their recent social media campaigns  over the holidays  porsche released an ad that combined hand drawn artwork with 3d animation mdash a choice that seemed pointed coming on the heels of the viciously mocked generative ai ads from coca cola and mcdonald rsquo s  this past february  gucci became a cautionary tale when it drew the wrath of fashionistas after using ai in its ads   ldquo any luxury brands that used ai slop should not be consider luxury anymore  rdquo  one viral post read  another stated   ldquo the whole point of luxury is that someone gave a damn  rdquo       as automation and ai become ubiquitous  the human touch has become a luxury good  in some ways  this might seem to be merely a continuation on a theme  the rich get white glove customer service while the rest of us are trapped pressing  ldquo 1 rdquo  and  ldquo 2 rdquo  and shouting  ldquo speak to an agent rdquo  into automated phone tree voids  it can seem like just another symptom of the broader enshittification of our age and plutocratic economic order  and most of us don rsquo t like it  studies confirm the widespread skepticism  a pew survey from 2025 found that half of americans were more concerned than excited by the rise of ai  and roughly 60 percent said they wish they had more control over ai rsquo s use in their own lives     and yet it rsquo s the poor who are subject to its most consequential uses  today  debt collectors use ai to hound people via phone  e mail  and chatbots  ai deepfakes are poised to worsen criminal justice disparities  parole decisions are being made by ai systems  and increasingly  federal and state officials are outsourcing decision making and oversight for public services to digital machines     as techtonic justice  a nonprofit that tracks technologies that are harmful to low income communities  noted in a november 2024 report  governments employ ai in public programs when they rsquo re looking to cut costs under the guise of ensuring that only the  ldquo right rdquo  people receive services  but any mistake made by an automated system immediately snowballs  such systems can create  ldquo immense suffering at scales and speeds that were impossible with the human centered methods that precede them  rdquo  the researchers found  after decades of austerity rooted in anti black and anti poor politics  america rsquo s safety net is already threadbare  those same biases are now encoded into digital tools that  like all ai  reproduce the prejudices of their training data and programmers  a human bureaucrat can destroy only so many lives in a day  algorithms can ruin the lives of tens of thousands at once     every state now uses ai to determine medicaid eligibility  according to techtonic justice  for the 73 million people enrolled in the program  automated systems increasingly decide whether to approve or deny healthcare treatments  the nearly 14 million americans who receive disability benefits through the social security administration are subject to decisions shaped by ai  which is also used by the department of housing and urban development  in fraud detection for the supplemental nutrition assistance program  and in making predictions of neglect in child welfare investigations  indeed  throughout the social safety net  decisions about who gets helped and who gets denied are increasingly left to machines   right around when the porsche ad dropped  the trump administration quietly gave palantir a no bid contract for an ai system to search for alleged fraud by snap recipients   in fact  as the techtonic justice researchers reported   ldquo all 92 million low income people in the u s  hellip have some basic aspect of their lives decided by ai  rdquo     in 2013  for example  cash strapped michigan instituted an automated system to root out fraud in its unemployment insurance program  over a two year period  the system leveled fraud accusations against over 60 000 people mdash more than five times the number identified by previous human led investigations  despite no human review of these findings  the state began demanding repayment  court papers noted that the  ldquo punitive assessments regularly totaled between  10 000 and  50 000 and sometimes exceeded  187 000  rdquo  three years later  michigan rsquo s auditor general found that 93 percent of those allegations were wrong  by then  thousands of people had endured arrests  bankruptcies  and evictions  with at least one person dying by suicide  as of 2022  michigan owed  20 million in settlement costs to claimants who rsquo d signed on to a class action lawsuit       in arkansas  an automated system erroneously cut nursing and other home aide services for about 4 000 people with severe disabilities  when families asked why the services had been slashed  they were told simply that  ldquo the computer did it  rdquo   a court ruled that the state had to stop using the system   in minnesota and kentucky  ongoing class action lawsuits allege wrongful denials of care in cases where insurers enlisted ai to override doctor recommendations and deny the medicare advantage claims of elderly patients  in illinois and los angeles county  the automated systems used to determine child welfare removals were so error prone that both jurisdictions have now discontinued their use     the research company forrester predicts that ai and automation will eliminate 6 percent of all jobs  or roughly 10 million positions  by 2030  that outlook seems sunny compared to a 2025 senate report that predicted some 100 million americans could lose their jobs to ai over the next 10 years  there rsquo s a new digital divide  and the less money you have to buy your way out of it  the greater the role that ai will have over your life<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ai-luxury-class-social-programs/">We All Hate AI, but if You’re Poor, It Can Really Ruin Your Life</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Wed, 08 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ai-luxury-class-social-programs/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Trump’s Imperial Military Budget]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-imperial-military-budget/]]></link>
		<author>Robert L. Borosage</author>
	<date>Apr 8, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>In his recent military budget, Trump is saying the quiet part out loud: Waging war is more important to his administration than providing for basic needs at home.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<description>
	<![CDATA["In his recent military budget  trump is saying the quiet part out loud  waging war is more important to his administration than providing for basic needs at home      president donald trump  and pete hegseth  us secretary of defense  during a news conference in the white house on april 6  2026       amid the liturgy of lies that donald trump hymns daily  he occasionally utters unvarnished truths that are unspeakable in polite company  he says the quiet part out loud  on presidential power   ldquo i have an article ii  where i have the right to do whatever i want as president  rdquo  on the constraints on his use of military force   ldquo there is one thing  my own morals  my own mind  hellip  i don rsquo t need international law  rdquo  on the racist predicate for his deportation horrors   ldquo they are poisoning the blood of our country  rdquo  or his  10 million lawsuit against the irs   ldquo i rsquo m supposed to work out a deal with myself  rdquo  or his admission about the aggressive war on iran   ldquo we don rsquo t have to be there  we don rsquo t need their oil  but we rsquo re there to help our allies  rdquo       and so on the eve of releasing a budget for next year that called for a staggering  1 5 trillion military budget mdash a  500 billion  42 percent increase that would be the largest year on year percentage increase since the mobilization for korean war  trump admitted to the quiet part   ldquo i said to  russell    lsquo don rsquo t send any money for daycare because the united states can rsquo t take care of daycare  that has to be up to a state  we can rsquo t take care of daycare hellip   we rsquo re fighting wars hellip   it rsquo s not possible for us to take care of daycare  medicaid  medicare  all these individual things  they can do it on a state basis  you can rsquo t do it on a federal  we have to take care of one thing  military protection  rdquo     it wasn rsquo t just daycare that would take the hit  the press reported that president rsquo s budget called for a 10 percent cut in all non defense discretionary programs  outside of medicare and medicaid  which were savaged last year  and social security   targeting primarily anything related to climate  the environment  civil rights  education  and food support and other poverty programs  but in reality  compared to the cost of continuing current levels of service  it slashes domestic programs by nearly one fourth  with ice and homeland security getting increases  targeted programs were cut to the bone  the environmental protection agency cut by more than one half  liheap mdash heating subsidies for low income families mdash eliminated  another  20 billion lopped off rebuilding infrastructure     the proposed  1 5 trillion annual military budget  about 5 percent of the gnp  is real money  as dean baker notes  it comes to about  12 000 per family  and that doesn rsquo t include the  200 billion supplemental that the pentagon will reportedly seek to pay for the war on iran  the money lards a military industrial complex that is the largest source of waste  fraud  and abuse in the federal government mdash and has never been able to pass an audit     not surprisingly  many democrats and a few republicans expressed consternation at the misplaced priorities  on the surcharge for the iran war  representative ro khanna summarized      let me tell you what  200 billion could do here in america  it would allow for free public college for every american kid  we could build a thousand trade schools  we could pay every american teacher  60 000 to start     we could have universal childcare  childcare at  10 a day  with childcare workers making  25 an hour  and we could fully fund special needs education at 40  of what the federal government needs to fund      or it could pay to reverse the cuts already made in vital needs  reversing the cuts in obamacare made by trump and the republican congress last year would cost  27 billion annually  extension of the earned income tax credit that aided low wage workers curing covid would cost about  40 billion annually       trump repeatedly and correctly boasts that the us military is already the most powerful military in the world by far  the  ldquo department of war rdquo  accounts for 40 percent of the world rsquo s military spending  more than the next nine costliest militaries combined mdash seven of which are  or were before trump  our allies  this despite the fact that  surrounded by oceans to the east and west and allies to the north and south  the united states is uniquely secure against any conventional assault     wars  of course  tend to  ldquo grease the runway rdquo  for military spending hikes  whether a war as unpopular as the war of choice against iran will do so remains to be seen  but trump rsquo s budget request isn rsquo t really a wartime budget  most of the increase is a down payment on military fantasies  a centerpiece is an initial investment in trump rsquo s golden dome  his utterly fantastical recycled version of reagan rsquo s star wars  calling for building a defensive  ldquo dome rdquo  against missile attacks  it will squander hundreds of billions on multiple layers of land   sea   and space based sensors and interceptors designed to protect the us from next generation missiles and drones  like reagan rsquo s fantasy  the system won rsquo t work  serving only to enrich high tech military contractors  accelerate the arms race in space  and lead china and russia and other future nuclear armed adversaries  france   to move toward hair trigger alert postures  add to that a down payment of  65 8 billion in shipbuilding for trump rsquo s  ldquo golden fleet  rdquo  featuring  ldquo trump class rdquo  battleships that  if our corrupted military contractors actually succeed in building  will provide tempting targets for inexpensive air and underwater drones that are becoming the weapons of choice for weaker countries     trump rsquo s assertion that the federal government must focus on the military  and that our military  which is already the most powerful in the world needs a lot more money  is what lawyers would call an  ldquo admission against interest  rdquo  once more saying the quiet part out loud     a  1 5 trillion annual military budget isn rsquo t necessary for the defense of the united states  rather it assumes that the us will continue to police the world  we will remain committed to global military hegemony mdash aiming to be dominant militarily in this hemisphere  from europe to the russian border  counter china in the south china sea  strike terrorists across the world  sustain a global empire of 750 plus military bases  and deploy military forces to over 100 countries  while patrolling the seven seas       that commitment condemns the us to constant wars in far corners of the world  as it has waged every year of this century  the  ldquo war of choice rdquo  against iran is a classic example  according to trump rsquo s national security strategy released in november 2025  the middle east is no longer a priority   ldquo the days in which the middle east dominated american foreign policy in both long term planning and day to day execution are thankfully over mdash not because the middle east no longer matters  but because it is no longer the constant irritant  and potential source of imminent catastrophe  that it once was  rdquo  iran  ldquo has been greatly weakened  rdquo  progress toward  ldquo a more permanent peace rdquo  between israelis and palestinians  ldquo has been made  rdquo  as the us revs up energy production   ldquo america rsquo s historic reason for focusing on the middle east will recede  rdquo  less than four months later  trump launched the war against iran  allegedly because of the threat posed by nuclear weapons it does not have  and intercontinental missiles that it has not built     the commitment to be the most powerful military power in every region of the world is both expensive and exhausting  the military is right when it argues that even this unprecedented military budget is inadequate to the task  we rsquo ve been writing promissory notes to countries across the world mdash from taiwan in the south china sea to ukraine to israel and the emirates in the middle east mdash largely on the assumption that they would never be cashed in         it is this commitment and the wars that result that repeatedly sabotage efforts to ensure basic needs at home mdash as roosevelt rsquo s economic bill of rights was lost to the cold war  lbj rsquo s great society to vietnam  biden rsquo s more modest domestic thrust to the cruel follies of afghanistan  ukraine  and gaza     as trump rsquo s admission reveals  we do guns  guns are our core industrial policy  our major export  our budget priority  our foreign assistance program  and define our global presence  trump  the self declared  ldquo president of peace  rdquo  wages a catastrophic war in the middle east  drops bombs on seven countries and fishing boats in the caribbean  kidnaps the president of venezuela  vows to take greenland  and seeks a 40 percent increase in the budget for his department of war     hopefully  trump rsquo s ruinous rampages will lead congress to rework his budget and alter his priorities  but nibbling at the edges will only revive the hypocrisy  not revise the reality  we will never begin to rebuild a broad middle class and provide minimal basic needs to americans without a fundamental change of our role in the world   what trump makes clear is that we can rebuild our country or ramp up our department of war mdash we can rsquo t and won rsquo t do both<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-imperial-military-budget/">Trump’s Imperial Military Budget</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Wed, 08 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-imperial-military-budget/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Learning How to See]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/learning-how-to-see/]]></link>
		<author>Traci Brimhall</author>
	<date>Apr 7, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p></p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["The book tells me the cloud is in everything mdash yesterday rsquo s thunderhead in today rsquo s tea this morning rsquo s fog in the museum walls the plume of my breath in the rattlesnakecoiling around a painted peace lily  look my friend says  and the framed stalk of cornmoves me to awe  i am never not in lovewith the world and its yellows  the book istrying to teach me how to see bubblesglistening in their unicorn purples  floatingunpopped  rendered nearly permanent in paint i study a spirit bird made of glass  and my friendsurprises me with her diagnosis  crows fly throughthe window in my chest  the book would sayher blood cancer is also a cloud  but today i can rsquo tbear the sky and its gentle scholarship of hope i stay with the goldenrod shocking the sculptureof kansas grasses like a terrestrial memoryof stars  i let myself grieve as hard as the blackdoor nailed to the wall titled night sun  yes it must be true  my friend rsquo s stunning heart wasonce rain  twilight rsquo s navy hem falls on the horizonand bends the wheat over the mummied field nothing is unhaunted  which means nothingis alone  a storm gathers like angels crowdingthe earth to see the end beginning here i love you  i say into the tomb of air between usand close my eyes so i won rsquo t see the clouds<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/learning-how-to-see/">Learning How to See</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 07 Apr 2026 21:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/learning-how-to-see/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[This Madman Is Pulling Us to the Brink of Armageddon]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-iran-threat-genocide/]]></link>
		<author>Joan Walsh</author>
	<date>Apr 7, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Trump’s genocidal threat against Iran is one of the most vile and dangerous things an American president has ever done.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Trump rsquo s genocidal threat against iran is one of the most vile and dangerous things an american president has ever done      donald trump talks with reporters on the south lawn during the white house easter egg roll on monday  april 6  2026        ididn rsquo t think anything could top donald trump rsquo s easter sunday rant  when he warned iran to  ldquo open the fuckin rsquo  strait   you crazy bastards  or you rsquo ll be living in hell  ndash  just watch  rdquo  he promised to blow up bridges and energy facilities if iran didn rsquo t comply mdash a clear vow to commit war crimes  and one that might have sparked mass political outrage in any other era        but trump was just getting started  on tuesday morning  with iran still not having met his ever changing demands  he issued what might be one of the most chilling statements any american president has ever made   ldquo a whole civilization will die tonight  never to be brought back again  i don rsquo t want that to happen  but it probably will  rdquo  he rsquo s gone from threatening war crimes  on top of the ones he rsquo s already committed  to threatening genocide in less than two days      https   twitter com alexbward status 2041490853013631323     trump has given iranian leaders a deadline of 8 pm eastern time tonight before he launches armageddon  until then  the world can only wait to see what this maniac has in store for us     ivacillate between fear and rage  i fear trump is more deranged than ever  and entirely capable of using even nuclear weapons   speaking in hungary on tuesday  vice president jd vance made this threat even more real  warning   ldquo we rsquo ve got tools in our toolkit that we so far haven rsquo t decided to use  rdquo   and i am enraged  because those of us who have warned about the threat trump poses for the last 10 years have been mocked  even by some on the left  when hillary clinton rightly declared that  ldquo a man you can bait with a tweet is not a man we can trust with nuclear weapons  rdquo  some writers took the opportunity to look at her past hawkishness and declare her more dangerous than trump  who can forget maureen dowd rsquo s odious june 2016 column   ldquo donald the dove  hillary the hawk rdquo    nobody      when kamala harris made similar arguments about trump  people derided her for not doing more to challenge joe biden lsquo s ridiculously compliant approach to israel and the war in gaza  does anyone think harris would be bombing iran right now  does anyone think harris would have continued the policies that have worsened conditions in gaza since trump returned to power  but too many people sat out the 2016 and 2024 elections believing that both parties were equally bad  especially on foreign policy     you know who makes me far more angry  though  rageful  even vengeful  the republicans who made some of the same claims as harris and clinton  and now back trump slavishly even as he drags the world toward the abyss  senator lindsey graham once warned   ldquo if we nominate trump  we will be destroyed  and we will deserve it  rdquo  now he rsquo s one of the president rsquo s biggest supporters  as well as a proponent of this completely unhinged and unwarranted war in iran  in fact  every one of trump lsquo s opponents in 2016 made similar claims about his fitness for office and the danger of trusting him with protecting national security  including marco rubio  who is now trump lsquo s lapdog secretary of state   ldquo donald trump is a serious threat to our party and to our country  rdquo  he said in a 2016 press release  that remains the truth       republicans could have  and should have  reined trump in immediately after his second inauguration  when he began to encroach on congressional prerogatives  defunding programs like usaid that congress had already appropriated money for  imposing tariffs that should have had the backing of congress  and violating the war powers act  which requires congressional consent for declaration of war  repeatedly  but they were happy to roll over  just as they did when they refused to impeach him during his first term     it should go without saying that impeachment is  at the very least  more necessary than ever  but because of the gop rsquo s cowardice and craven love of power  trump is pushing us to the brink of armageddon     meanwhile  the wall street journal and reuters are reporting that the iranian regime has cut off all diplomatic contacts with the united states  so that makes a deal before tonight seem unlikely  the us is already bombing kharg island  but insisting it rsquo s only targeting military facilities  not iran rsquo s oil infrastructure  the administration has already underestimated iran rsquo s willingness and capacity to strike back  whether at us military bases or at our allies in the middle east  whatever the madman does tonight  it will provoke more carnage in the region     i debated whether it was worth writing a story on what might be the day before armageddon  i rsquo ve written so many stories warning of trump rsquo s racism  misogyny  corruption  hawkishness  and derangement that have been ignored  if not mocked  maybe it rsquo s worth spending the day in central park with my dog  or getting on a train to see my daughter and son in law  then i realized  trump is terrorizing americans  not just iranians  with his increasingly unhinged threats  we can rsquo t succumb to it  whatever happens  there will be a day after  and we have to recommit to removing this war criminal from office<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-iran-threat-genocide/">This Madman Is Pulling Us to the Brink of Armageddon</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 07 Apr 2026 16:01:41 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-iran-threat-genocide/</guid>
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  <item>
	 <title><![CDATA[How the Saudis Keep Sidestepping a Costly Role in the Iran War]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/world/iran-war-saudi-arabia-trump/]]></link>
		<author>David Faris</author>
	<date>Apr 7, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The brutal Gulf monarchy has been cheerleading Trump’s insane war off-stage but won’t commit to any direct role in the conflict</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
	<thumb_image>https://www.thenation.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/MBSTrump-275x173.jpg</thumb_image>
	<middle_image>https://www.thenation.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/MBSTrump-680x430.jpg</middle_image>
	<description>
	<![CDATA["The brutal gulf monarchy has been cheerleading trump rsquo s insane war off stage but won rsquo t commit to any direct role in the conflict     an anti war billboard in yemen  seen in the distance behind a houthi machine gun  depicts president donald trump and saudi crown prince mohammed bin salman       on monday  an unhinged president donald trump again publicly threatened to commit war crimes by putting iranian power plants  ldquo out of business  burning  exploding and never to be used again  rdquo  even without that threat bearing out  united states and israel continue to use their formidable militaries to deliver  in the words of secretary of defense  and aspiring televangelist  pete hegseth   ldquo eternal damnation rdquo  to the  ldquo wicked souls rdquo  of the iranians who happen to be in the path of their bombs and missiles       this climate of apocalyptic fantasy and gathering doom underlines a little discussed feature of the iran war  the pivotal role played by saudi arabia mdash a major us ally in the middle east and one of the world rsquo s most lavishly funded militaries  the saudis have spent most of the month long conflict whispering offstage advice to the trump white house  their official absence from the councils of war planning is hard to explain  especially as president trump alternately berates and begs our erstwhile nato friends for help reopening the strait of hormuz mdash a lifeline for the saudi oil industry mdash to shipping traffic     in 2025  the kingdom of saudi arabia spent  78 billion on its military  an extraordinary figure for a country of just over 35 million people and the seventh highest spending level in the world  and since the beginning of trump rsquo s unprovoked war against iran  the saudis and their sophisticated military featuring hundreds of billions of dollars in american and european hardware have contributed next to nothing to the war effort  with iran lobbing retaliatory attacks against saudi assets and the entire region rsquo s economy unraveling as a result of the near total closure of the strait of hormuz  it is fair to wonder why the saudis won rsquo t bring their considerable firepower directly into the conflict  especially as crown prince mohammed bin salman  aka mbs  urges the us to escalate rather than draw down the disastrous war     trump might not want to hear the answers to these questions  because they go something like this  the persian gulf is a money pit that america continues to pour money into with virtually nothing to show for it  america rsquo s regional allies  including saudi arabia  still can rsquo t or won rsquo t defend themselves and would prefer to sit back and watch washington light money on fire in perpetuity while they host wartime horse races and soccer matches for the international epstein class  still  the saudis enjoy outsize clout with this white house  since they mdash along with other regional oil autocracies mdash are major financial backers of trump endorsed and  affiliated businesses  that rsquo s why all the behind the scenes trump whispering from gulf oil regimes is a major and underappreciated factor in the world reordering fiasco unfolding in and around iran     there is some irony here  claiming to have improved the geopolitical climate of the persian gulf has been one of trump rsquo s favorite hobbyhorses  ever since 2020  when he signed the business driven abraham accords that normalized relations between israel  the uae and bahrain  last may  when trump was just months into his second term and still oozing with unearned swagger  he delivered a bizarre soliloquy in riyadh  ranting about the size of his swing state victories in 2024 and crowing that  ldquo it is within our grasp to reach the future that generations before us could only dream about  a land of peace  safety  harmony  opportunity  innovation and achievement right here in the middle east  rdquo  the hawkish gulf watchers james jeffrey and elizabeth dent hilariously argued in foreign affairs  the in flight magazine for the beltway blob  that trump rsquo s outburst represented  ldquo a new path to middle east security rdquo   they fantasized that  in his far seeing wisdom  the american president  ldquo stressed the agency of middle eastern countries  particularly the gulf states and turkey  to run their own internal affairs and play a greater role in regional security mdash backed  when necessary  by decisive military operations  rdquo     come again  less than a year later  after trump capriciously started the kind of middle east war he had spent the past decade promising to avoid  where exactly are these partners and their alleged regional security chops  according to the international institute for strategic studies  saudi arabia  oman  kuwait  the united arab emirates  and qatar all rank in the global top 10 in military spending as a percentage of gdp  how is it possible that all of this defense spending  in combination with the world historic might of israel and the united states  is incapable of subduing a badly hobbled  completely isolated regional power to secure a single  narrow shipping channel  the present quagmire is likely to stretch out across a very long timeline  but one thing seems clear  we shouldn rsquo t expect our saudi clients in particular to do anything about it anytime soon       tulane university political scientist andrew leber told me that  ldquo there is no future in which saudi arabia puts boots on the ground  rdquo  he said that the country is unlikely to take on a larger military role in resolving the crisis because iran could still escalate and strike  ldquo targets that would make this even more of a catastrophe for saudi arabia  rdquo  saudi leadership is also worried  he said  that visible participation in the war effort will destroy the existing ceasefire with the iran backed houthis in yemen     according to yemen expert stacey philbrick yadav  an international relations professor at hobart and william smith colleges  the saudis are  ldquo happy to let the us weaken iran while they retain the ability to stay focused on yemen  rdquo  where riyadh has recently been focused on wrangling disparate factions within the internationally recognized government  the saudis  ldquo undoubtedly favor an outcome that limits the military capabilities of both iran and the houthis  but may not want to spread themselves thin by doing that work themselves  rdquo  yadav said  that rsquo s a prudent calculation  she notes  given that past saudi military spending has been shown to be relatively  ldquo irrelevant rdquo  to battlefield outcomes in yemen     direct intervention would also put riyadh  ldquo on the same side as israel when mbs has maintained a careful balancing act of neither recognizing israel nor confronting israel too openly  rdquo  leber said  as galip dalay and sanam vakil wrote in october   ldquo israeli actions have provoked such outrage across the arab world that any form of visible alignment with israel has become a direct threat to the legitimacy and security of regimes  rdquo     that sums up in a nutshell the shockingly fragile regional alliance and security system the us has built in the middle east  on one side is an increasingly violent and aggressive pariah state in jerusalem mdash one that rsquo s decided its qualitative military edge grants it the right to violate the sovereignty of its neighbors at will  on the other are harshly autocratic client states like saudi arabia and the united arab emirates that are either unwilling or unable to put their expensively equipped war machines at risk  the vaunted regional security architecture that the united states has brokered looks to be little more than elaborate flim flam artistry  it serves the immediate aim of cloaking the trump family rsquo s narrow economic interests in the gulf in the rhetoric of peace building and development  but it has vanishingly little operational value       this is largely how saudi interests want things to play out mdash despite the massive global pr offensive presenting mbs as a moderation minded apostle of peace and broadly distributed prosperity  in reality  saudi arabia ranks slightly worse than iran in political freedoms  the global index maintained by the nonpartisan freedom house scores the saudi regime a paltry nine out of 100 on a combined measure of political and civil liberties  compared to iran rsquo s 10  last year  the kingdom executed a record 356 people  per this year rsquo s freedom in the world report  which notes that  ldquo many of those executed were foreign nationals convicted of nonlethal drug related offenses  rdquo  that rsquo s a nice way of saying that the saudi royals are fond of murdering the indentured servants from places like bangladesh  pakistan  and india who make up roughly half the country rsquo s labor force  that rsquo s the ugly reality behind what trump fawningly called a  ldquo major business  cultural and high tech capital of the entire world  rdquo     it is virtually impossible to know what is going through the president rsquo s rapidly decomposing mind at any given moment  but to the extent that this war is being fought partly because he believes the region rsquo s friendly petro states and their resource wealth need to be protected from the clerical regime in tehran  he is also making the same expensive and self defeating mistake that has plagued decades of american policymakers  our military misadventures in the gulf not only failed comprehensively on their own terms long before trump rsquo s iran war  they also don rsquo t even add up in terms of basic cost benefit analysis  as robert vitalis  full disclosure  one of my dissertation advisers  wrote in his sharp elbowed 2020 book oilcraft  the myths of scarcity and security that haunt u s  energy policy   ldquo what taxpayers pay for the impossible to estimate good called energy security is roughly equal to what the world pays each year for middle east oil and 10 times higher than what u s  refiners pay  rdquo       saudi arabia rsquo s princes and potentates have cleverly spread their wealth and talking points across countless university centers and think tanks around the united states  but not even their most ambitious propagandists could have imagined that they might have persuaded an american president to take on the task of overthrowing iran rsquo s government by force  what rsquo s more  the colossal military buildup among the gulf autocracies has proven unequal to the task of preventing iran from shutting down the strait of hormuz and potentially triggering a global recession  in a strange twist of fate  it was the trump administration rsquo s own idiotic choices that both conjured the crisis into being and exposed the shocking inadequacy of our own force posture in the region  most of all  the acute myopia of the white house war planners has exposed the utter weakness of allies like saudi arabia  whose leaders clearly are pursuing other priorities that don rsquo t necessarily align with america rsquo s     the long standing effort to prop up the saudis as the masters of their own fate and the upholders of the regional security status quo is but the latest entry in america rsquo s effort to endow its transactional saudi relationship with mystic properties of regional security  on the saudi side  the regime rsquo s paper tiger standing is rooted in the pr fable depicting its brutal leaders as reasonable and reform minded modernizers       this is why it rsquo s particularly galling to see the saudis and their display window military calling for escalation from the sidelines  including an effort to convince trump to overthrow the iranian regime with a ground invasion if necessary  mbs has pushed trump to  ldquo consider putting troops in iran to seize energy infrastructure and force the government out of power rdquo  as well as a  ldquo military operation to seize kharg island  the hub of iran rsquo s oil infrastructure  rdquo  according to a march new york times report     this obviously insane plan sounds a lot like the kind of selfish free riding that trump falsely claims our democratic european allies are doing in the gulf  but trump is glad to ignore such conduct from the gulf monarchies  since he very much admires their pitiless despotism mdash even as they push for deepening an already disastrous war whose costs will be paid by others<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/world/iran-war-saudi-arabia-trump/">How the Saudis Keep Sidestepping a Costly Role in the Iran War</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 07 Apr 2026 14:57:26 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/world/iran-war-saudi-arabia-trump/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Hat]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/hat/]]></link>
		<author>Clay Bennett</author>
	<date>Apr 7, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[Snack.]]></teaser> 
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	<description>
	<![CDATA["Check out all installments in the oppart series<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/hat/">Hat</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 07 Apr 2026 12:30:39 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/hat/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Pope Leo Is Speaking Truth to Donald Trump’s Power]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/world/pope-leo-donald-trump-iran/]]></link>
		<author>John Nichols</author>
	<date>Apr 7, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The pontiff’s Easter address, like so many of his recent statements, countered Trump’s Iran bombast with a cry for peace—and sanity.</p></div>
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	<![CDATA["The pontiff rsquo s easter address  like so many of his recent statements  countered trump rsquo s iran bombast with a cry for peace mdash and sanity      pope leo xiv greets the faithful at the end of the easter mass  on april 5  2026  in vatican city       with the war in iran growing ever more chaotic  and with violence spreading throughout the middle east  there was no mistaking the urgency of the message that pope leo xiv delivered to the world rsquo s catholics on easter sunday      ldquo let those who have weapons lay them down  let those who have the power to unleash wars choose peace  rdquo  announced the pontiff  who has emerged as the world rsquo s most prominent advocate for an end to the crisis that donald trump sparked with his late february decision to attack iran   ldquo not a peace imposed by force  but through dialogue  not with the desire to dominate others  but to encounter them  rdquo       the pope rsquo s easter statement  coming in a time of mounting global uncertainty and trepidation  was an appeal to reason in the face of military madness   ldquo from without  death is always lurking  rdquo  he warned   ldquo we see it present in injustices  in partisan selfishness  in the oppression of the poor  in the lack of attention given to the most vulnerable  we see it in violence  in the wounds of the world  in the cry of pain that rises from every corner because of the abuses that crush the weakest among us  because of the idolatry of profit that plunders the earth rsquo s resources  because of the violence of war that kills and destroys  rdquo      https   www youtube com watch v 3hafh3ysenk     this was the latest in a series of powerful statements from the american born pope  who in recent months has provided the steadiest counterpoint to trump rsquo s ranting and raving  for his part  the president chose to mark easter by profanely threatening the iranian people with oblivion   ldquo tuesday will be power plant day  and bridge day  all wrapped up in one  in iran  rdquo  he wrote  there will be nothing like it    open the f ckin rsquo  strait  you crazy bastards  or you rsquo ll be living in hell   just watch  praise be to allah  president donald j  trump  rdquo     the pope and the president mdash arguably the most high profile americans on the global stage at this critical juncture in the debate over war and peace mdash stand on opposite sides of a disputation that has rapidly intensified since the beginning of trump rsquo s war with iran  their differences are now so out in the open that vermont senator bernie sanders found himself discussing each man rsquo s statements regarding the iran war  of the president rsquo s wild eyed easter statement  the senator said   ldquo these are the ravings of a dangerous and mentally unbalanced individual  rdquo  of the papal homily  sanders said   ldquo i agree with what pope leo xiv stated  in his first easter speech  rdquo     there is much to agree with in the pope rsquo s increasingly blunt pronouncements about the trump administration rsquo s illegal and unconstitutional war  when crowds gathered at the vatican in mid march  leo observed   ldquo for two weeks  the peoples of the middle east have been suffering the atrocious violence of war  rdquo  and appealed to all sides   ldquo cease fire so that avenues for dialogue may be reopened  rdquo  he has expressed frustration with us and israeli bombing raids that  ldquo have hit schools  hospitals  and residential centers rdquo  mdash killing thousands of iranians in a conflict that has also claimed more than a dozen us lives mdash and argued   ldquo violence can never lead to the justice  the stability  and the peace that people are awaiting  rdquo       the pope is right about the desire for peace  trump rsquo s war of whim with iran has never been popular with the american people  and a new ipsos poll finds that 66 percent of them want the conflict to end quickly mdash even if trump rsquo s ill defined and frequently incoherent goals are not achieved   ldquo two in three americans want the war in iran to end  we are tired of our tax dollars being wasted on an unnecessary war and ready for change  rdquo  says us representative mark pocan  the wisconsin democrat who co chairs the defense spending reduction caucus   ldquo trump rsquo s war in iran costs american taxpayers billions of dollars every day  instead of pouring money into an illegal and unnecessary war  those resources could be used to actually help americans at home  like lowering healthcare costs  building affordable housing  or making everyday goods more affordable  rdquo     faced with widespread opposition  trump rsquo s administration has tried to present the war as a moral and religious crusade  in a march 26 prayer session at the pentagon  self described  ldquo secretary of war rdquo  pete hegseth read a prayer that spoke of directing  ldquo overwhelming violence of action against those who deserve no mercy rdquo  and said   ldquo let every round find its mark against the enemies of righteousness and our great nation  rdquo     in what was widely heard as a rebuke of hegseth and others who pray for divine intervention on behalf of their war making  pope leo greeted crowds gathered at the st  peter rsquo s square in the vatican on palm sunday with a stark rejection of those who mix faith and militarism   ldquo we turn our gaze to jesus  who reveals himself as king of peace  even as war looms abounds him  rdquo  ldquo brothers and sisters  this is our god  jesus  king of peace  who rejects war  whom no one can use to justify war  rdquo  declared the pope   ldquo he does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war  but rejects them  saying   lsquo even though you make many prayers  i will not listen  your hands are full of blood  rsquo  rdquo<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/world/pope-leo-donald-trump-iran/">Pope Leo Is Speaking Truth to Donald Trump’s Power</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 07 Apr 2026 12:20:37 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/world/pope-leo-donald-trump-iran/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Letters From the May 2026 Issue]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/letters-from-the-may-2026-issue/]]></link>
		<author>Our Readers</author>
	<date>Apr 7, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Voting for vets… The meaning of <em>evangelical</em>… Billionaire ball clubs…</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Voting for vets hellip  the meaning of evangelical hellip  billionaire ball clubs hellip        voting for vets     ldquo hell cats vs  hegseth  rdquo  by joan walsh   leaves me questioning how much the four hell cats mdash    joanna mendoza  rebecca bennett  maura sullivan  and cait conley mdash despite their good points  will resist the brutal domination of the us empire around the world  america rsquo s militarized foreign policy spreads disaster abroad  treats economic competitors as enemies  and siphons tax dollars from our communities  will the women just be four more democrats voting for an ever expanding military budget  i rsquo d like to know     anne cassebaumelon  nc      the quotes by these candidates who served in the us military derive from the belief that we are the good guys  a deeply rooted propaganda that proliferates across our society  i hope that these women may yet find a way to reassess their military experiences as they run for elected office  since world war ii  the united states has not  ldquo won rdquo  a war despite astronomical pentagon budgets  which never pass an audit  and unrestrained bombing attacks that result in what is coyly termed  ldquo collateral damage  rdquo  to date  there has been zero accountability for the criminal war visited upon iraq by the us with full bipartisan support     thea panethnorthampton  ma    i rsquo m uncomfortable about supporting these professional military people for public office  it doesn rsquo t make a difference to me that they rsquo re women  to gain trust  they should state clearly that our military is out of control and needs to be significantly reduced for the good of all       william forrestrochester  ny    the meaning of evangelical    thank you for barry yourgrou rsquo s well researched article about pastor martin niemoller  a controversial figure in germany before  during  and after world war ii   in it  yourgrou notes that  ldquo in germany  evangelical just means protestant  rdquo  however  evangelical comes from the greek euangelion  which means  ldquo good news rdquo  or  ldquo gospel  rdquo  there are many protestant churches  especially lutheran ones  that include the term evangelical as part of the name of their church  its meaning is so much broader  deeper  and comprehensive than protestant     the rev  bonnie m  oplingershillington  pa    billionaire ball clubs    as someone who decries the luxury box culture that has overtaken us sports  i eagerly read cole stangler rsquo s article about a french soccer team setting a different example   but describing the club rsquo s owner  the american businessman frank mccourt  as a  ldquo philanthropist rdquo  is a stretch  when  some years ago  mccourt finally sold the los angeles dodgers  he held on to the parking lots at chavez ravine  whose exorbitant fees remain a bane for dodgers fans to this day  in la  no one thinks of him as a philanthropist     sean mitchelldallas  tx<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/letters-from-the-may-2026-issue/">Letters From the May 2026 Issue</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 07 Apr 2026 09:31:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/letters-from-the-may-2026-issue/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[A New Economic Superpower Could Spark a Retreat From Fossil Fuels]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/environment/just-transition-away-fossil-fuels-conference/]]></link>
		<author>Mark Hertsgaard,Kyle Pope</author>
	<date>Apr 7, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>A little-noticed ray of hope may be peeking over the horizon. A climate conference in Colombia later this month could begin to draw up the roadmap blocked at COP30.</p></div>
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	<![CDATA["A little noticed ray of hope may be peeking over the horizon  a climate conference in colombia later this month could begin to draw up the roadmap blocked at cop30      an indigenous man performs  lying on the ground while holding a globe in his hand during the indigenous people global march at the cop30 un climate change conference in belem  brazil  on november 17  2025         the iran war is also a climate war  beyond its terrible human costs  the war rsquo s disruptions of oil  gas  fertilizer  and other shipments is another reminder of the risks inherent in basing the world economy on fossil fuels  the war rsquo s jets  missiles  and aircraft carriers and the tankers  refineries  and buildings they blow up represent millions of tons of greenhouse gas emissions that further imperil a climate system that is already  ldquo very close rdquo  to a point of no return  scientists say  after which runaway global warming could not be stopped  nevertheless  petro state leaders around the world continue doing their utmost to stave off a desperately needed course correction     now  a little noticed ray of hope may be peeking over the horizon  at the un cop30 climate summit last november  saudi arabia led a group of petro states in vetoing calls to develop a  ldquo road map rdquo  to phase out fossil fuels globally  indeed  the words  ldquo fossil fuels rdquo  were not even mentioned in the final text agreed at cop30  but the 85 countries on the losing end of that veto may soon turn the tables       many of those governments will gather in colombia on april 28 and 29 for a conference to begin a global transition away from oil  gas  and coal  critically  the first international conference on the just transition away from fossil fuels will not be governed by un rules  which require consensus  but by majority rule  thus preventing a handful of countries from sabotaging progress as petro states did at cop30  what rsquo s more  the underlying terrain of this conference will no longer be principally politics but economics  not the words that canny negotiators can keep in or out of a diplomatic text but the implacable market forces that shape the world economy  including the potential emergence of a de facto economic superpower     the conference is cosponsored by colombia and the netherlands  a pairing rich with symbolism  colombia is the world rsquo s fifth largest coal exporter  royal dutch shell one of the world rsquo s biggest oil companies  conference organizers confirm that they have invited countries that endorsed the road map proposal at cop30  as well as high profile leaders of sub national governments  including california governor gavin newsom  a presumed 2028 us presidential candidate       the conference aims to begin drawing up the road map blocked at cop30  energy and environment ministers of governments comprising a  ldquo coalition of the willing rdquo  will share plans to transition their economies away from oil  gas  and coal without leaving workers and communities behind  joining them will be climate activists  leaders of indigenous peoples  trade union representatives  and other civil society voices  sharing ideas and experiences on how to make the abstract goal of phasing out fossil fuels a practical reality     the goal of the conference is to agree on  ldquo actionable solutions rdquo  that follow up meetings can refine so governments around the world can implement them  one area of focus will be how to phase out the  7 trillion a year that governments spend subsidizing fossil fuels mdash but to do so without punishing communities  workers  and tax bases that rely on such subsidies  un secretary general antonio guterres has urged the international energy agency to help create a  ldquo global platform rdquo  where public and private sector actors can  ldquo sequence the decline of fossil fuel investment with the rapid scale up of clean energy  rdquo     the secret weapon of the  ldquo coalition of the willing rdquo  gathering in colombia is its potential to function as an economic superpower     at least 85 countries at cop30 backed developing a road map to phase out fossil fuels  included among them were global north powers germany  the united kingdom  france  and spain mdash the world rsquo s third   sixth   seventh   and 12th biggest economies  major global south countries brazil and mexico  the world rsquo s 10th and 13th biggest economies  also backed the measure     combine the gross national products of those 85 countries and the total is  33 3 trillion  that rsquo s larger than the  30 6 trillion gnp of the united states  the world rsquo s biggest economy  and considerably larger than the  19 4 trillion gnp of china  the world rsquo s second biggest economy       that amount of economic heft gives those 85 countries enormous potential leverage  if the just transition conference can outline a credible road map for phasing out fossil fuels  it could send shock waves through financial markets  government ministries  and c suites around the world   ldquo a coalition of that scale signaling its intent to move beyond fossil fuels would send an unmistakable message that the age of oil  gas  and coal is ending  and the smart money is shifting  rdquo  mohamed adow  the director of the nonprofit power shift africa  said in an interview       money follows money  if a huge chunk of the global economy announces that it intends to leave fossil fuels behind mdash and releases transparent  convincing plans for doing so mdash private investors and government planners everywhere would have to question whether sinking new money into oil exploration  coal mining  or gas terminals makes financial sense or would instead leave them with virtually worthless stranded assets     much the same thing happened after the 2015 paris agreement  when governments pledged to limit temperature rise to  ldquo well below rdquo  two degrees celsius and to aim for 1 5 ordm c  public and private sector leaders began changing course  fossil fuel expansions were scaled back  renewable energy investments boosted  prior to the paris agreement  the planet was on track toward a hellish 4 ordm c of temperature rise  five years later  the emissions curve had bent to a 2 7 ordm c future mdash still much too high  but a big step in the right direction  and proof that change is possible     the scales could tilt even further if california joins the  ldquo coalition of the willing  rdquo  adding california rsquo s  4 1 trillion gdp to the  33 3 trillion of the 85 countries that backed a road map at cop30 mdash and subtracting that  4 1 trillion from the rest of the us economy mdash yields an economic superpower worth  37 4 trillion  not far behind the  50 trillion combined gdp of the us and china     governor newsom has given every indication he supports phasing out fossil fuels and wants to be seen as a global climate leader   ldquo don rsquo t let what happens in washington  dc  shape your perception of my country  rdquo  he told a packed press conference at cop30  newsom noted that during his years as governor  california grew from the world rsquo s sixth  to its fourth largest economy even as two thirds of the state rsquo s electricity came from non carbon sources  calling us president donald trump rsquo s withdrawal of the us from the paris agreement  ldquo an abomination  rdquo  newsom vowed that california  ldquo will fill that void rdquo  by competing for the global market in green technologies     the just transition conference underscores a point often missed in the usual narrative on climate change  the overwhelming majority of the world rsquo s people mdash 80 to 89 percent them mdash want their governments to take stronger climate action  scientists have long been clear that phasing out fossil fuels is imperative to limit global warming to an amount our civilization can survive  this conference is an opportunity to flip the narrative and begin that urgent task<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/environment/just-transition-away-fossil-fuels-conference/">A New Economic Superpower Could Spark a Retreat From Fossil Fuels</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 07 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/environment/just-transition-away-fossil-fuels-conference/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Young Democrats Are Done Waiting for Their Turn in Office]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/young-democrats-amanda-litman-run-for-something-gen-z-millenials-youth-elections/]]></link>
		<author>Heather Chen</author>
	<date>Apr 7, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Like a lot of Americans, Amanda Litman thinks the aging Democratic Party is out of touch. That’s why she started an organization dedicated to electing young progressives.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Like a lot of americans  amanda litman thinks the aging democratic party is out of touch  that rsquo s why she started an organization dedicated to electing young progressives      litman  who lives in new york city  noted that zohran mamdani rsquo s win led to thousands of young people signing up with run for something         like 36 percent of american households  run for something  rfs  founder amanda litman and her family are renters  this makes her relatable to many younger americans  who are living in a world where buying a home is increasingly difficult     indeed  only about 39 percent of americans 35 and under own homes  according to the 2022 census  meanwhile  75 percent of americans in the 55 to 64 age range are homeowners  and that number jumps to 79 percent for those who are 65 and over  it rsquo s not that younger americans don rsquo t want to be homeowners mdash a 2024 cnn poll found that while 86 percent of renters want to buy homes  54 percent believe they will never be able to afford to do so       litman is one of those skeptical renters   ldquo i don rsquo t think i rsquo m ever gonna buy a home  rdquo  she tells me as we sit at her apartment dining table  but even as the number of renters has increased  politicians have continued to shape housing policy around the interests of buyers rather than renters     that disconnect between aging policymakers and young americans is why litman and rfs  an organization dedicated to getting more young progressives to run for down ballot positions  are pushing for renters to run for office this cycle     but mobilizing renters is only one aspect of litman rsquo s strategy for shaping the new democratic party  the candidates we need  according to litman  must generally  ldquo have a very clear understanding of the problems people face mdash an understanding of what it means to try to survive and thrive right now  rdquo     since its founding in 2017  rfs has recruited over 200 000 young people  born in 1985 or later  to run in local races  all with the hopes of identifying and developing a promising pool of democratic candidates with aspirations for higher offices  amid ballooning frustrations with a geriatric democratic establishment  rfs has experienced a surge of interest  the 80 000 sign ups it received in 2025 alone exceeded rfs rsquo s total recruitment numbers from trump rsquo s entire first term  and the candidates are only getting younger       this year  rfs is championing dozens of gen z candidates in races across the country  in state house races  it has endorsed candidates like 29 year old samuel vilchez santiago  who  after coming to florida as a venezuelan asylum seeker  became his high school rsquo s valedictorian and an immigrant rights advocate  rfs candidate bobby gronert  a socialist and university of wisconsin ndash madison sophomore  is running for city council on a platform focused on affordability     as young as these candidates may be  litman and rfs believe their authenticity and ability to navigate the modern media landscape has primed them for success  at a moment where americans are seeking change  it may finally be gen z rsquo s time to step up to the plate      ldquo the  party has so much potential  rdquo  litman tells me   ldquo when these are the people in charge  it rsquo s going to be good  rdquo     the nation spoke to litman about the value of gen z candidates  the future of the democratic party  and what today rsquo s voters really want  this interview has been edited for length and clarity      mdash heather chen    heather chen   you rsquo ve been working for a long time on getting younger  more progressive people into electoral politics  last year  run for something saw its biggest recruitment surge ever  why do you think so many younger people are deciding to run for office right now     amanda litman   i think it rsquo s a few things  first  we rsquo ve been around for a while mdash we built infrastructure  when there rsquo s a moment where people are pissed and want to do something  there rsquo s somewhere they can go  you don rsquo t need it until you need it and then you rsquo re really glad it rsquo s there     second  people have seen over the last 10 years that the only place where we are making good progress is locally  they want to do something concrete that they can see that they can feel  there rsquo s incredible urgency to solve the problems wherever you can     third  the thing that we heard differently in 2025  different from 2017  2018  was  ldquo i rsquo m done waiting my turn  i rsquo m sick of being told to get to the back of the line  rdquo  there rsquo s more of a frustration with the democratic party this time around than there was the first couple years  because we rsquo re seeing how the democratic party is failing to meet the moment       lastly  new models for inspiration have appeared over the last 10 years  we rsquo ve seen younger people like aoc  maxwell frost  zohran mamdani  and jon ossoff who are running and winning  run for something has helped elect more than 1650 young politicians  they are showing what the future could look like     hc   run for something rsquo s website says it rsquo s  ldquo recruiting and supporting young progressives  rdquo  how would you or rfs define progressive  and why do you find it important for rfs to support candidates who fit that political orientation     al   we define progressive a little differently than a lot of people  partly because we work in all 50 states and in all different kinds of places  so  we have to be able to have a model that is tight on values and flexible on policy  knowing that acknowledges that the kind of person who can win in rural pennsylvania  maryland  or texas  is going to be different than those who we can help elect in new york  miami  or la  but as long as they are generally rowing in the right direction or the same direction  there can be a lot of variation there     in 2025  we helped elect kelsea bond to the atlanta city council  they were a renter  union organizer  and tenant activist  running on developing greener and more walkable spaces in their city  on the same night  we turned a red seat blue when we helped elect a sports journalist named andrew harbaugh to common council in clarion county  pennsylvania  he was a former republican who left the party after january 6th     if you have a model where everyone is generally pro choice  pro equality  pro tolerance  pro ndash working families  pro ndash affordable healthcare  pro labor  pro ndash immigrant rights  pro ndash climate justice mdash you can have variation between them  especially if you want to try and win everywhere  which we do  that rsquo s what we need  most people do not self identify as   ldquo i rsquo m a progressive  i rsquo m a moderate  rdquo  no  they rsquo re like   ldquo i have problems  i want politicians to solve them  rdquo  if you can do that  it almost doesn rsquo t matter what your ideology is  but within a range  there rsquo s a lot of different ways that can be understood     hc   recently  you made a statement about how voters are drawn to effective communicators  how does run for something train candidates to become better communicators     people usually treat the candidate as a fixed variable  there rsquo s a reason that so much of the internal party debates are about messaging  policies  ads  or tactics  they assume those are the things you can change  whereas who the candidate is  you cannot     what we have been arguing for the last 10 years is that  actually  if you work downstream enough  you can change who runs in the first place  a better  more engaging candidate makes everything else easier and more efficient and more effective     today  you want people who can communicate in a way that makes sense for 2026 and beyond  now  does that mean good on camera  telegenic  and able to communicate  yes  but you don rsquo t have to be hot to do that  there rsquo s all kinds of  like  compelling people who are not  ldquo conventionally attractive  rdquo     we have a bunch of different programming that we do to support candidates depending on how much one on one help they need  do you need to be media prepped or  trained  we can do that  if you have a compelling story  but you don rsquo t know how to edit video  we can help you with that too     hc   a follow up mdash how has social media changed what counts as an effective communicator and are you seeing that gen z candidates are naturally better at this     al   successful presidential candidates  for example  tend to be well suited to the media environment that is prominent in the time they rsquo re running  bill clinton  really good at tv  obama  really good at giving a speech and then having that translate into a long press conference and being able to reach people en masse  trump is really good at the media of the moment  he rsquo s a racist bigot  but pretty funny and compelling to watch  even if you hate what he rsquo s saying     right now  the way that people consume information is online  not local news  it rsquo s tiktok  it rsquo s your for you page  it rsquo s snapchat  it rsquo s youtube  campaigns in 2026 that are reliant on just  like   ldquo we rsquo re gonna raise a bunch of money and then spend it all on tv ads  or even  like  digital ads rdquo  mdash that rsquo s not going to reach people who are not consuming that media anymore  a lot of the places people consume information  you can rsquo t pay to reach them  so a candidate needs to be good at meeting the medium from which people get information     gen z is really good at that because they grew up online  you rsquo ve been thinking since you were a teenager   ldquo how are my friends gonna look at my wall and think about me  rdquo  whether that was intentional or not  you have a fluency there  you are enough of a consumer to be a producer  and the candidates  and this is true  sort of  of any age  but especially gen z candidates  you rsquo ve put the reps in  you rsquo ve got the muscle built  and that doesn rsquo t necessarily mean that they are good at editing video  but they speak the language such that a staffer doesn rsquo t have to explain to them why they need social media     hc   as more gen z candidates with public digital footprints run for office  is the expectation that they have a  ldquo clean rdquo  past becoming outdated     al   this is something we rsquo re gonna have to work through in real time because we rsquo re not used to people having grown up in public  like  imagine if you could read chuck schumer rsquo s high school diaries  i rsquo m sure he said some stupid shit  the fact is that most people who are interested in running for office have had some part of their coming of age or their ideological journey online  meaning that there is a paper trail  and it rsquo s pretty easy to find  i do think there are things that are disqualifying  but  there rsquo s also context  were they 11  16 or 26 when they made that potentially problematic post  what was going on in their life at the time  how did they learn  how have they changed     we work with successful candidates who have gone to jail  who were opioid addicts and homeless  they talk about their experience and reflect on how they have grown  at the end of the day  i think voters don rsquo t care     i rsquo m sure if you found my 14 year old xanga  it would also be bad  i do think that  especially as activists  as people in politics  you want people to change  you want people to grow  that rsquo s the whole point of persuasion politics mdash you want people to come to your side  if they started somewhere else and said some shit that they no longer believe  that rsquo s good  that means that they have grown and our efforts have worked     hc   in new york city  mayor zohran mamdani has achieved rising approval numbers in his first few months  but we rsquo ve also seen some establishment democrats argue that mamdani rsquo s brand of leftism can rsquo t be replicated elsewhere in the country  how do you respond to that critique  and what do you think democratic candidates should be taking away from both his campaign and the way he rsquo s handling himself in office     al   i find that argument so exhausting  because who is arguing that you want an exact replica of zohran mamdani in kansas city  no one is saying that  that rsquo s a straw man argument that rsquo s just meant to punch left     what we are saying is you want candidates who genuinely reflect the place they rsquo re running  who love the place they rsquo re running to lead mdash because mamdani loves new york  and it comes through mdash who are willing to keep the campaigns localized  who have a strong value system and who can connect and communicate the way people get information now     don rsquo t you want more candidates who could shoot the shit with people on the street and make it interesting  the fact that mamdani can do that and that he functions as an influencer mdash and i do not say that derisively mdash allows him to have influence  it means people listen and follow him  and he can move people to action  that rsquo s so powerful       hc   in the 2024 election  we saw that there was a lot of voter fatigue with the democratic party  particularly at the top of the ballot  with these down ballot races  how does rfs go about convincing voters who are disillusioned with the democratic party     al   trump won over some younger voters  but he did not win them over forever  you are already seeing his approval rating plummet with young people  he basically rented them  he did not buy them  and they have been returned  now  they are not being returned to the democratic party mdash they are being returned to the ether  to the void  to the unknown  i think that is both the challenge and the opportunity that we  as a party  have       run for something candidates mdash the people running for city council  for state legislatures  for school board  for library board mdash can promise stuff that you will be able to experience and feel the results of     in 2026  we are thinking about how our local candidates can gin up turnout for the rest of the ticket  in a district where we want to flip the house  or senator  or governor  how can the school board candidates get people excited  they can knock doors  they can make videos  they can do calls  they can show up all over the place in a way that the top of the ticket rsquo s not gonna be able to     hc   what do you think are the biggest challenges grassroots campaigns are facing right now  and how does run for something help its candidates take on these challenges     al   so there rsquo s a couple things mdash some structural stuff  like  a lot of these offices don rsquo t pay  most of our candidates do not quit their jobs to run for office  but if you rsquo re running for congress  you tend to have to  that rsquo s really hard  it keeps working people out  it keeps people without access to wealth  or wealthy families  or partners out     second  there rsquo s some other financial stuff around campaigns mdash you need nice clothes  a car  gas  transportation  you have to rent an office     the bigger thing a lot of grassroots candidates experience is they rsquo ve never done this before  so we try to help candidates navigate the running process  all the logistics  figuring out how to get on the ballot  write a campaign plan  how to figure out how much money you need to spend  how to figure out how many voters you need to reach mdash that kind of stuff is not rocket science  there rsquo s a how to manual  we wrote it  i wrote it  and  like  you can do this  dumber people than you have done this  if you know who you are and what you believe and what you want to accomplish  everything else is logistics  and we can help you with logistics     the final thing i would point out is that we are at a tipping point for the democratic party  despite any organizational challenges  this is a year of generational change  even if the new leaders don rsquo t win  they rsquo re changing what it means to be a democrat  and that rsquo s a good thing<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/young-democrats-amanda-litman-run-for-something-gen-z-millenials-youth-elections/">Young Democrats Are Done Waiting for Their Turn in Office</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 07 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/young-democrats-amanda-litman-run-for-something-gen-z-millenials-youth-elections/</guid>
  </item>
  <item>
	 <title><![CDATA[What Happened to Tucker Carlson?]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/tucker-carlson-jason-zengerle-hated-by-all-right-people/]]></link>
		<author>Chris Lehmann</author>
	<date>Apr 7, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The transformation of a once promising, if conservative, magazine journalist into a conspiracy-minded talking head.<br></p></div>
]]></teaser> 
	<thumb_image>https://www.thenation.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/CIARDIELLO-Tucker_Carlson-Zengerle-275x173.jpg</thumb_image>
	<middle_image>https://www.thenation.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/CIARDIELLO-Tucker_Carlson-Zengerle-680x430.jpg</middle_image>
	<description>
	<![CDATA["The transformation of a once promising  if conservative  magazine journalist into a conspiracy minded talking head      illustration by joe ciardiello       back in the george w  bush years  my then wife and i had dinner in new york city with tucker carlson  at the time  he was settling in as cohost of cnn rsquo s crossfire after a rocky tour through the cable hosting wars and savoring his re anointment as a political insider and media gatekeeper  over drinks  he sounded off on the invasion of iraq  which he was then souring on  along with much of the rest of the country  after having enthusiastically supported it  he also derided the gop rsquo s all in crusade against gay marriage  which would prove by some accounts key to bush rsquo s subsequent reelection in spite of the iraq debacle  and he regaled us with media gossip  recounting the tale of a prominent cable talking head whom he rsquo d heard clumsily trying to burnish his standing as a political junkie by announcing his eagerness to cover the  ldquo iowa primary rdquo  and the  ldquo new hampshire caucus  rdquo       such encounters weren rsquo t all that remarkable for the time  particularly as the bush white house sank into greater chaos and corruption  and its erstwhile fellow travelers strained to distance themselves from its crimes and imperial folly  yet as my then wife and i compared notes afterward  we agreed that carlson seemed to be verging on a significant revision of his worldview  he appeared to be aligning with the then trendy in dc niche movement of  ldquo liberaltarianism  rdquo     well  that was then  and here we are now  after a few more turns of cable tv rsquo s wheel of fortune  carlson landed in the heart of fox news rsquo  prime time lineup  hymning the maga project of national reclamation to his increasingly right wing audience while peddling ghoulish campfire tales about the plagues of wokeness  critical race theory  open borders  and other damning specimens of anti american liberal groupthink  even after his unceremonious dismissal from fox  carlson continued his strange trajectory ever more rightward  setting up permanent shop in the fever swamps of the conspiracy minded far right  he palled around with vladimir putin and viktor orban and lent his podcasting platform to the nazi groyper influencer nick fuentes mdash a move that inadvertently sparked a still raging civil war within the heritage foundation  the right rsquo s most influential think tank       carlson rsquo s transformation from an ingratiating bow tied pundit into a plaid and khaki clad nazi enabler is the subject of jason zengerle rsquo s hated by all the right people  a chronicle of carlson rsquo s career that is meant to double  as the book rsquo s subtitle suggests  as a broader account of how the intellectual project of american conservatism has gone off the rails  as a straight media biography  zengerle rsquo s book is an instructive study in the amoral rounds of ambitious striving in the greenrooms and studio sets of cable tv mdash a kind of what makes sammy run  for the chattering classes of the new millennium  but as a saga of the right rsquo s intellectual decline  it rsquo s less persuasive mdash not because carlson isn rsquo t a representative movement intellectual  but because the american right has long since parted company with political life as a forum of ideas  the watchword for the us conservative movement  at least since the rise of newt gingrich in the 1990s  has been partisan bloodsport and the promotion of an unappeasable and demagogic politics of cultural grievance  carlson rsquo s descent  then  isn rsquo t the  ldquo unraveling rdquo  that zengerle posits it to be so much as a fulfillment of political destiny  in order to become the maximal trumpist mouthpiece that he is today mdash and  indeed  an oft rumored successor to trump mdash carlson had to relinquish the skeptical and heterodox cast of mind he was trying out during his crossfire incarnation and become instead a hard line culture warrior of the maga blood and soil vintage     what rsquo s striking about this shift is that it was not accompanied by any notable bouts of introspection and self doubt or by a conventional political conversion narrative  it simply involved his reading from a different set of teleprompters  in the end  carlson is not someone who relishes the hatred of others but rather is an inveterate people pleaser  even in his most hate filled diatribes  he tends to convulse with giggles and revert to his natural preppy  back slapping mien  that he does so while indulging nazis  white nationalists  dictators  and assorted edgelord authoritarians is an indictment of our mediasphere  our collective moral compass  and our political imaginations  but it rsquo s largely the same tucker carlson at the center of the squalor     all that said  carlson rsquo s public career  as zengerle recounts it  is a compelling story  he grew up in southern california as the eldest son of the tv journalist dick carlson  who would go on to head the voice of america under ronald reagan  carlson rsquo s parents divorced after his father left los angeles for a job in san diego and his mother  lisa  stayed behind to savor the 1970s bohemian scene in laurel canyon  dick would soon get custody of tucker and his brother  buckley  named for the conservative media icon william f  buckley jr    after lisa failed to show up for the hearing       carlson remained estranged from his birth mother for the remainder of her life  but his father loomed large in his upbringing  schooling his sons in the aristocratic comportment while also ensuring they were well versed in alpha male exploits  zengerle writes that dick would put his sons atop the roof of his station wagon  ldquo as he gunned the land yacht rsquo s v 8 engine and careened down a dirt road  rdquo  in addition   ldquo the nannies he hired were usually men mdash including a former korean intelligence officer whom tucker and buckley addressed as colonel kwon and who instructed the boys on how to disembowel someone  dick rsquo s etiquette advice wasn rsquo t just about the proper way to write thank you notes  but also included tips like how  in prison   lsquo the cigarette pack is your friend  rsquo  rdquo     carlson rsquo s upbringing  in short  was quirky but privileged  after his parents rsquo  divorce  his father married patricia swanson  heir to the eponymous tv dinner fortune  and the couple packed the high school age tucker off  first to an abortive stint at a swiss boarding school and then to st  george rsquo s school in rhode island  at st  george rsquo s  carlson acquired a  ldquo reputation as both a conservative and a contrarian rdquo  while also cultivating a hybrid prepster hippie lifestyle  getting high and listening to the grateful dead as he dated the headmaster rsquo s daughter  susie andrews  whom he would go on to marry     picking up the first whiff of potential inner conflict in carlson rsquo s biography  zengerle pounces  carlson rsquo s alliance with andrews  and his dutiful attendance at the episcopalian services led by her dad  who was also a priest in the faith  seemed to signal carlson rsquo s search for a  ldquo stability sorely lacking in his own family rdquo  mdash but  ldquo when that stability became stifling  he returned to his group of male friends to play hacky sack  listen to the dead  and smoke pot and drink kool aid mixed with vodka  indeed  carlson seemed almost to suffer from a double consciousness  rdquo     nor was that all  zengerle theorizes  carlson rsquo s lackluster academic performance at st  george rsquo s mdash already a  ldquo second tier rdquo  new england prep school mdash foreclosed admission to an ivy league college  and so he landed instead at another second    tier institution of the wasp aristocracy  trinity college in connecticut  another proto maga marker was thus laid down   ldquo his failure to gain entree to the ivy league gnawed at him  rdquo  zengerle writes   ldquo and would  decades later  serve as a touchstone for his populist ideology  rdquo  these labored forays into psychological portent are a sign not only that zengerle wasn rsquo t able to land carlson rsquo s cooperation for his biography  but also that carlson rsquo s life story isn rsquo t long on inner turmoil  its psychodynamics are all on the surface       in this regard  carlson rsquo s life story has many points of affinity with that of the man he rsquo s now most commonly linked with  donald trump  both men came of age in exceedingly comfortable circumstances  and both adopted grievance driven public personas as a means of dampening the impression that they were little lord fauntleroy ndash style scions of privilege  their self advertised  ldquo contrarian rdquo  streaks have  over time  proved to be at best elite affectations  and at worst alibis for their rampaging egos  in neither case are they a matter    of great psychological interest     nonetheless  carlson  unlike trump  did eventually become something interesting  a talented and dedicated magazine journalist  when william kristol  the former chief of staff to the first george  h w   bush rsquo s vice president  dan quayle  launched the weekly standard in 1995  he tapped carlson  who had recently quit his job as an editorial writer for the arkansas democrat gazette  to become a staff writer  kristol had initially turned carlson down for the job after interviewing him  but mark gerson  a former colleague of carlson rsquo s during his postcollegiate internship at the heritage foundation  prevailed on kristol to give him another shot   carlson had landed the heritage internship via the good graces of his dad mdash so much for the career arc of this young proto populist      carlson instantly took to the gig   ldquo i thought   lsquo jesus  it rsquo s like it rsquo s come out of the womb full grown  rdquo  carlson rsquo s former standard colleague andrew ferguson told zengerle   ldquo he needed no grooming or tutoring or anything  he was just ready to go out of the box  rdquo  carlson was also moving beyond his facile prep school  ldquo contrarian rdquo  profile into gratifyingly unpredictable territory  publishing a withering takedown of the anti tax advocate grover norquist for the new republic and a damning profile of the anointed 2000 gop primary front runner george w  bush for tina brown rsquo s short lived magazine talk   it was around this time that i initially crossed paths with carlson  when i was working as an op ed editor at newsday  i quickly learned that some of the best sources for informed critical appraisals of the gop were writers from the standard   at the height of his tour as a print journalist  carlson even wrote an impassioned defense of his trade  standing athwart the well flogged demonology of journalism on the american right      i couldn rsquo t be sicker of hearing how ordinary people  folks outside the beltway  average working americans  insert your favorite euphemism for the great unread here  have contempt for journalists   my gut response  seldom voiced  is  good  now we rsquo re even   the problem is particularly acute in some conservative circles  where belief in the liberal media conspiracy is part of the catechism  polls i keep reading about claim to indicate that most people consider journalists inaccurate and arrogant  if not simply evil  this bugs me  and not merely because it rsquo s me they rsquo re talking about  i don rsquo t like the perception mainly because it isn rsquo t true      at the same time  though  carlson rsquo s ambition propelled him toward the more lucrative  high visibility world of television  zengerle conveys some of carlson rsquo s early drive for self advancement in the book rsquo s prologue  when he recalls his first encounters with carlson when he was still at the standard  in the late 1990s  zengerle was an intern at the new republic  and carlson came by the magazine rsquo s office for a standing lunch with the tnr writer and editor stephen glass  who was later exposed as a serial fabricator and forced to abandon his journalism career  like many beltway adjacent writers  zengerle sees alliances like that of carlson and glass as a relic of the bygone era of civility and professional fraternity among political journalists   ldquo for all the partisan rancor rdquo  that ideological opposites like carlson and glass aired in the pages of their home magazines   ldquo there was a larping quality to all of the political fighting  in print  writers at tnr and the standard were waging ideological war  in real life  they were meeting for lunch  rdquo     yet such gauzy evocations of the old dc bonhomie gloss over a more revealing factor in the friendship between glass and carlson     the drive to be noticed mdash and celebrated mdash by the widest possible audience at virtually any cost  in glass rsquo s case  the results of this craving proved disastrous  since they involved the complete destruction of his credibility and career  in carlson rsquo s case  they were simply bathetic  as he laid aside his accomplished writing career to be a barking head in a long regress of pandering tv gigs  this preening impulse was emblazoned in his origin story as a tv pundit  in 1995  he obliged a cbs booker for the network rsquo s newsmagazine show  48 hours  to do a conservative leaning hit on the o j  simpson trial  carlson got the gig not because of his simpson expertise mdash he was indeed distinguished by  ldquo knowing nothing about the simpson case  rdquo  zengerle writes mdash but because the rest of the standard rsquo s staff was out to lunch when the booker called the office  after delivering an  ldquo unremarkable and utterly forgettable rdquo  take on the case  carlson was nonetheless initiated into the great secret fraternity of camera ready take dispensers   ldquo once you rsquo ve been booked  you rsquo re bookable  rdquo  he would later explain   ldquo the process is self authenticating  rdquo     sure enough  carlson was invited to supply another simpson hit for cbs rsquo s morning show the following day  and he eventually swung into the regular pundit rotation on cnn during the monica lewinsky scandal  six months into that seamy episode  a political tip sheet calculated that carlson had clocked the second most lewinsky hits  after the indefatigable greenroom habitue david gergen but leading james carville     gergen  carville  and the legions of more lurid talking heads flogging the lewinsky scandal  such as nancy grace and geraldo rivera  were disconcerting company to be keeping if  as carlson rsquo s longtime standard colleague and close friend matt labash attested  his professional dream had been  ldquo to become a war correspondent for the new york times  or to write some twenty thousand word  mcphee style piece on the new jersey turnpike for the new yorker  rdquo  but for carlson  the hits mdash and the lucrative tv contracts mdash kept on coming  come the new century  he rsquo d landed a cohost gig on cnn rsquo s late night politics show the spin room  after eight months of lackluster ratings  the network canceled the show mdash but it then enlisted carlson to replace carville rsquo s wife  mary matalin  on its prime time jousting pundits show crossfire when matalin decamped to work for the bush white house  carlson rsquo s crossfire tour ended disastrously in 2004  when he and cohost paul begala devoted an episode to jon stewart  who castigated the show rsquo s fatuous pugilism for  ldquo hurting america rdquo  and carlson in particular for being an actual  ldquo dick rdquo  while also playing one on tv     the new head of cnn  jon klein  took stewart rsquo s words to heart and placed crossfire on hiatus  carlson remained under contract and  ever ingratiating  tried out for a news reading spot on the network rsquo s 10 pm show newsnight while its main host  aaron brown  took a week off over the christmas holiday  at the time  carlson also had an offer from msnbc to host a new show there  but mindful of cnn rsquo s higher prestige and larger reach  he was trying to salvage a spot at the network  the gambit didn rsquo t work  even though the audition went fine    ldquo i was not particularly worried that he would somehow damage us in prime time rdquo  was klein rsquo s wan appraisal   on the first business day of 2005  klein announced that crossfire was officially canceled and carlson rsquo s contract wouldn rsquo t be renewed     carlson rsquo s acrobatic efforts to accommodate his cnn network boss again drives home how off base it is to imagine him as a connoisseur of the hatred of others  you couldn rsquo t begin to picture his cohost begala  a true partisan hack   let alone other cable anointed merchants of right wing vituperation like robert novak mdash a longtime carlson detractor on ideological grounds mdash or bill o rsquo reilly  going for a spin in the news anchor rsquo s chair to cling to their contracts  carlson rsquo s next career chapter mdash a woeful turn at msnbc as the host of the situation with tucker carlson  later desperately rebranded as tucker by the flailing network suits after it had bombed in a variety of time slots  mdash further showcased carlson rsquo s thwarted will to achieve mass approval  when the network pivoted to a more superficially liberal identity under the influence of its popular omni ranting host keith olbermann  carlson was again out in the cold  correctly sensing that he was about to be muscled out at msnbc  he opted for the greatest possible pandering opportunity  a spot on abc rsquo s dancing with the stars  never had john mcphee seemed farther away     carlson bombed    there as well mdash he was the first contestant voted off the show  with one of the judges summing up his team rsquo s performance with this    terse appraisal   ldquo what an awful mess  rdquo  yet  ever dogged and ingratiating  he filmed a pilot for a prime time game show for cbs called do you trust me   speaking of the self authenticating rites of media belonging   but even after the network had taped six episodes  carlson again was on the outs  cbs passed on the pilot and instead green lighted a game show called the singing bee  zengerle writes   ldquo a karaoke style competition that was hosted by joey fatone  a former member of the boy band nsync  rdquo  carlson returned to msnbc purgatory  only to have tucker canceled a few months later  in march 2008     in the wake of these defeats  carlson retreated to dc political journalism  launching the right wing news site the daily caller in 2010  after delivering an impassioned speech at the conservative political action conference declaring the need to revive accurate and accountable journalism in the house of american conservatism  but neither the american right nor the american web was primed to accommodate such aims  and the caller was reduced shortly after its launch to desperately courting links from matt drudge  who had long harbored a recondite anti carlson grudge of his own  eventually  relations between the caller and the drudge report mother ship thawed  but the site that carlson captained was on the losing side of that faustian bargain  chasing increasingly ephemeral beltway scooplets to maximize clicks  while recruiting a staff that was openly flirting with the white nationalist and proto groyper obsessions that would later overtake the online right     in the meantime  carlson continued to court tv renown  albeit at great cost to his  rsquo 90s era self respect  he signed on as a contributor at fox news  a network that he had once derided as  ldquo a mean  sick group of people  rdquo  carlson may have turned to fox as a last resort  but by this point in his career he was also ready for the right wing grievance go round  soon he began appearing on the 6 pm special report with its new host  bret baier  a policer of right wing orthodoxies who liked to cosplay as an actual news anchor  baier hosted a chatter segment on the show that bore a similarly quasi comic sobriquet  the  ldquo all star panel  rdquo  which regularly featured old colleagues of carlson rsquo s like national review online founding editor jonah goldberg and standard writer stephen hayes  an old fraternity brother of baier rsquo s  but standing in the way of carlson rsquo s ambition was yet another grudge holding executive  fox news ceo roger ailes  who had only half playfully called carlson a  ldquo loser rdquo  when he offered him a contract as a contributor and  in the words of one former fox suit   ldquo loved kicking tucker down the stairs and beating him up  rdquo  so carlson mainly drew duty as a flunky on the weekend segments of fox rsquo s quasi happy talk franchise fox   friends  where he rsquo d alternate standard agitprop outbursts with time filling stunts like getting behind the wheel of a go kart or playing cowbell with blue oyster cult     still  over time  carlson became a valued fox asset  his fox   friends fill in gig became a full time hosting one  and when donald trump was elected president in 2016  tucker carlson tonight debuted in the 7 pm slot the following week  within six months  fox prime time mainstay bill o rsquo reilly had been yanked from the lineup in the wake of a series of damning and expensively settled sexual harassment charges  and carlson was suddenly the most influential voice both on fox and in the new maga political order  soon he was tailoring his show to be a trumpian messaging delivery system  bringing ardent promoters of alt right and white nationalist ideology onto his writing staff  and devoting long editorial segments to the pillaging of real america at the hands of democrats  globalists  and a rotating cast of faithless  predatory elites  even as he emerged as the premier media backer of the maga agenda  carlson sought to keep an arm rsquo s length distance from trump himself  perhaps out of deference to his background in print journalism  it didn rsquo t matter  though  when trump  at a florida campaign rally  name checked a fringe conspiratorial claim that the swedish government was covering up a massive crime wave carried out by muslim immigrants  it turned out that he had watched a carlson interview on the subject the night before  carlson was shocked to discover that he rsquo d become one of the most powerful voices in donald trump rsquo s head  simply by beaming out maga grade propaganda on his show   this revelation had to have hit carlson rsquo s fox news colleague sean hannity especially hard  since hannity had been frenetically lobbying trump and his retinue behind the scenes to land the chief of staff rsquo s job in the first trump white house        in zengerle rsquo s account  carlson rsquo s prime time carnival of maga grievance helped translate trump rsquo s own motley array of persecution complexes and revenge fantasies into  ldquo a populist nationalist ideology that was far more coherent than anything being offered by trump himself  rdquo  and it rsquo s certainly true that carlson retained a core narrative gift in his new role  he managed to present the hollowing out of the manufacturing heartland as a tragic betrayal of a key constituency of forgotten americans and  in one of his most effective monologues  drew a parallel between the callous abandonment of white working class communities and the perennial effort to pathologize and oppress their black counterparts throughout our history       yet just as often  and arguably far more often  carlson was as incoherent and conspiracy driven as trump  he devoted several reports to publicizing the fake story that south africa rsquo s black led government was unilaterally seizing land from white farmers  in other segments  carlson flatly declared that white supremacy was  ldquo a hoax rdquo  and  ldquo actually not a real problem in america  rdquo  like trump  he delighted in the demonization of immigrants  complaining in one infamous segment that american elites claim that  ldquo we rsquo ve got a moral obligation to admit the world rsquo s poor hellip even if it makes our own country poorer  dirtier  and more divided  rdquo  these hate filled episodes might have helped carlson grow his audience mdash by 2020  tucker carlson tonight was receiving the highest ratings of any cable show in history mdash but they don rsquo t really find him translating this politics of fear into an ideology so much as pandering to viewers much in the way that trump does  deftly seeking out the greatest points of outrage in his audience rsquo s collective psyche and giving them ready made scapegoats mdash immigrants  black americans  university professors  feminists  jewish financiers  and globalists     a more cynical observer might wonder how much carlson  in his heart of hearts  really even believes all of this rudderless bigotry mdash particularly after the discovery phase of the dominion lawsuit against fox turned up texts from carlson professing his thoroughgoing hatred for trump and his relief at trump rsquo s election defeat in 2020  but perhaps one of the most damning things about carlson rsquo s career is that  upon examining it closely  one begins to realize that what he believes never really seems to matter much to carlson himself  bolstering trump rsquo s white nationalist appeal while secretly despising the man is a bit like a tobacco executive donating to the american cancer society  your inner personal misgivings don rsquo t make you any less a part of the problem  again  the figure of trump is useful here not as a gauge of carlson rsquo s actual beliefs but rather as a career model  carlson rsquo s drift into groyper conspiracy mongering is of a piece with trump rsquo s racist diatribes against somalis and his justifications of ice rsquo s executions of protesters like renee good  each man relies on bigotry to strategically conceal his own elite pedigree  trump and carlson both castigate remote and ill defined elites spearheading shadowy plots to purloin the economic and cultural birthrights of white america  and each of these maga demagogues has exponentially enriched himself by monetizing online hatred while courting the same corporate backers they profess to despise in the abstract     the most telling thing about the former glad handing preppy magazine scribe with new yorker ambitions making a fortune as a maga surrogate is that carlson is now mired in a world of total intellectual stagnation  much like pornographers  right wing hate merchants can only continue getting a charge out of their mass audience by ratcheting up the outrage quotient in their content  so since carlson was abruptly canned by fox in the wake of the 2023 settlement of the dominion suit  he rsquo s been a virtual random search engine for hyperventilating grievance theater on the right  his fawning two hour interview with nick fuentes  which left fuentes rsquo s deranged antisemitic outbursts both unchallenged and indulged  was but the latest  if also the most justly notorious  specimen kicked up by this ugly business model  on his youtube show  carlson has interviewed a leader of the white nationalist group vdare  holocaust denier darryl cooper  and fellow conspiracy monger alex jones  who surrendered his own lucrative infowars gig after losing a  1 4 billion defamation suit brought by the families of victims in the 2012 sandy hook school massacre  which jones dubbed a deep state  ldquo false flag operation  rdquo  that rsquo s all on top of uncritically platforming authoritarian figures like putin  orban  and iranian president masoud pezeshkian     as a seeming corollary of carlson rsquo s accelerating intellectual self enclosure  he has also become besotted with the apocalyptic political theology of the new apostolic reformation movement  despite his continued identification with the episcopalianism of his prep school youth  zengerle makes only glancing mention of this spiritual turn  citing an interview that carlson gave to a christian podcaster in which he described being attacked in bed by  ldquo a demon  rdquo  but carlson has also interviewed the right wing evangelical pundit santiago pliego  as well as the nar adjacent calvinist pastor doug wilson  an avowed champion of theocratic rule  at the 2024 republican national convention rsquo s heritage foundation policy confab  carlson warned of a coming  ldquo spiritual battle rdquo  pitting righteous republicans against democrats who stand determined as a body to  ldquo eliminate rdquo  christians  carlson rsquo s embrace of the most militant wing of the evangelical maga movement has grimly borne out his former standard colleague andrew ferguson rsquo s view that carlson had become  ldquo the father coughlin of the twenty first century rdquo  mdash a peddler of ugly bigotries dressed up as the pseudo populist vindication of the forgotten man  and since bathos is never far offstage for the former stunt correspondent on fox   friends  carlson also hosted an event in 2024 where accused sexual assaulter and rapist russell brand made his first major public profession of the christian faith     it rsquo s easy  lord knows  to make sport of such blatantly transactional avowals of faith  but the followers of carlson rsquo s improbable career should by now be well aware that he is an exceedingly savvy early adopter of media and political trends  in the airless room of self authenticating reactionary maga politics  carlson is charting a new quest for absolute conviction and certainty  let us pray<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/tucker-carlson-jason-zengerle-hated-by-all-right-people/">What Happened to Tucker Carlson?</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 07 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Ben Lerner’s Novel of Fathers and Sons]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/ben-lerner-transcription-novel/]]></link>
		<author>Tara K. Menon</author>
	<date>Apr 7, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>His most experimental and unsettling book, <em>Transcription</em> as us whether art is futile or the most important weapon we have. </p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["His most experimental and unsettling book  transcription as us whether art is futile or the most important weapon we have       illustration by lily qian       ben lerner writes about the hardships and humiliations of modern masculinity  his first two novels followed listless young men in their 20s worrying their way through the literary and dating scenes of madrid and new york  in his more recent fiction  his protagonists have matured into responsible adults with families  yet no matter their age or obligations  the men are not ok  they are anxious and insecure  they are anxious about being insecure  preoccupied with themselves  these men are obsessed with how they are perceived by others  the lerner man frets constantly and about everything  his sex life  his romantic life  his friendships  his family  his failing body       take  for example  the beginning of lerner rsquo s short story  ldquo cafe loup rdquo       when i became a father  i began to worry not only that i would die and not be able to care for my daughter but that i would die in an embarrassing way  that my death would be an abiding embarrassment for astra mdash that in some future world  assuming there is a future  she will be on a date with someone  hard as that is for me to imagine  and her date will ask   ldquo what does your father do   rdquo  and she will say   ldquo he died when i was little  rdquo  and her date will respond   ldquo i rsquo m sorry  rdquo  hesitate  and then ask  in a bid for intimacy  how i died  and astra will feel ashamed  will look down into her blue wine  there will be blue wine in the future  and say   ldquo he had an aneurysm on the toilet  rdquo  which is one of the ways i often fear i might die      and that rsquo s just the first sentence  in a single syntactic unit  lerner reveals the full catalog of his protagonist rsquo s concerns  the travails of dating  health  death  the uncertain future  and  as ever  the possibility of being embarrassed  but now this poor man also has to worry about his daughter  her dating life  and the possibility of her being embarrassed because of him  becoming a parent hasn rsquo t grounded him  it has multiplied his anxieties     lerner rsquo s latest novel  transcription  is also about the dad life  the first person narrator resembles his predecessors  he is keyed up  introspective  clever  whether he is in providence  or madrid  or los angeles  this man too is resolutely self absorbed  fatherhood has only deepened the solipsism of lerner rsquo s protagonists  if the only others that occupy your consciousness are your progeny  you still haven rsquo t really stopped thinking about yourself     transcription opens with the unnamed narrator texting his wife to check in on their daughter  naturally  he is anxious about her anxiety  the narrator is texting rather than talking to his wife  we learn  because he is on an amtrak train to providence to interview the 90 year old thomas  one of  ldquo the world rsquo s most renowned thinkers about art and technology  rdquo  who is also the narrator rsquo s mentor and the father of his old college friend max  before he checks into a four star hotel  paid for by the magazine in which the interview will appear  the narrator notices two people sleeping on the sidewalk mdash or  as he puts it  the  ldquo bare life on the street  rdquo  the throwaway phrase kills two birds for lerner  it establishes his protagonist rsquo s credentials as a progressive sickened by the inequality of contemporary life and as an intellectual who knows his agamben     like his predecessors  the narrator of transcription is a highly educated and very guilty liberal  he knows that we inhabit a depraved and dying world mdash war  wildfires  terrorism  and poverty abound mdash that allows people like him to have money and houses  he lives in comfort  complicit  when he meets an old acquaintance on the street  they ritualistically express their guilt mdash  ldquo we exchanged some familiar language about the disaster of the world rdquo  mdash before catching up on what rsquo s happening with their shared acquaintances       appropriately  the instigating event in this novel is not a geopolitical catastrophe but a domestic mishap  after washing his face in the hotel bathroom  the narrator drops his phone into the clogged sink and breaks it  this occasions panic mdash he now has no way to record his interview with thomas mdash but before he is forced to confront this  ldquo crisis  rdquo  he must endure the immediate difficulties of being unexpectedly offline  he can rsquo t find the hours of the local apple store  he doesn rsquo t remember thomas rsquo s phone number  and he can rsquo t look it up  he has been locked out of an entire universe  after some initial frustration  though  his newly offline state induces a sort of euphoria   ldquo a withdrawal    indistinguishable from mild intoxication  rdquo  now that he can rsquo t take photographs or read the news  he is able to pay attention to the world again     but when he reaches thomas rsquo s home  he has to figure out how to handle the interview sans device  immediately  it becomes apparent that this will not be a straightforward endeavor  first  the narrator inexplicably refuses to tell his mentor about the broken phone mdash  ldquo to tell him the truth seemed impossible rdquo  mdash so he lies and pretends he is recording their conversation  then  from the opening question on  it is clear that thomas is no normal interviewee  he is a force of personality  a man for whom  ldquo to listen to a story was to become involved in its composition  rdquo  when the narrator shares an anxious dream about his daughter  thomas tells him that it might actually be his mdash that is  thomas rsquo s mdash dream  once the conversation gets going  the narrator has trouble staying in control  but as the evening progresses  it also becomes clear that this great intellectual has started to lose some of his faculties  his memory is faulty   ldquo i lose the numbers and the names  rdquo  thomas explains  the narrator notices that his mentor rsquo s kitchen is in a state of neglect and that he repeats himself without realizing it  most troubling of all  thomas starts to confuse the narrator with his son max  he levels accusations at max  and the narrator tries unsuccessfully to correct him  i am not max  i am me     after the fraught interview ends  the narration jumps in place and time  we are now in madrid  at least several months later  and the narrator has just finished giving one of several talks at a gathering to honor thomas  the old man  we are given reason to believe  recently ended his life at an assisted suicide clinic in switzerland  like adam in lerner rsquo s debut novel  leaving the atocha station  the unnamed narrator of transcription wanders through the streets of madrid and begrudges the stylish ease of europeans  but now the married father rsquo s envy is directed elsewhere  to the children running loose on the streets and the carefree style of european parenting     our narrator is no longer sans phone  he rsquo s already back under its thumb  e mailing  googling  texting  before dinner with the other speakers  he calls his wife  mia  to check in on her and their daughter eva      then i facetimed mia  who was having lunch in washington square park  she held up her phone so i could see the gathering of the neturei karta men beside the fountain  their free palestine signs  the sky behind her mdash or  depending on the position of her phone  above her mdash looked blue and cloudless  identical to the sky in madrid  there was drumming somewhere nearby  i told her the talk went well  it must have been hard  she said  not really  i don rsquo t know  maybe  i asked about her day  after eva  who was fine  more than fine  mia said  a lot of laughter in the morning and at bedtime  although eva had recently told us to stop saying bedtime        a hallmark of lerner rsquo s fiction is the very particular way that politics encroaches  or rather doesn rsquo t  on the life of the protagonist and his milieu  it is there as a backdrop  a marker of time and place but not much else  as in leaving the atocha station  where adam arrives in spain shortly after american troops have invaded iraq  and in 10 04  which opens with hurricane irene  closes in the aftermath of hurricane sandy  and includes a cameo by an occupy protester  significant political events in transcription  such as the wars in gaza and ukraine  are alluded to throughout the narrative  the events of transcription unfold while israel and russia are murdering civilians without consequence  but the novel doesn rsquo t dwell on it  instead  we move swiftly from the horrors of the present political moment to aesthetic observations about cloudless blue skies and the personal and familial     politics is mere background texture because lerner rsquo s novels are primarily tales of personal misadventure  in this section  the focus is the talk that the narrator just gave and how it was received  over the course of a conversation between him and the female art curator who had organized the gathering  we discover that the talk that the narrator gave  in which he recounts not recording thomas during their interview  angered many in attendance  including his old friend  and thomas rsquo s son  max   ldquo trust me  rdquo  the curator assures him   ldquo max is furious  rdquo         the curator asks what many readers are surely thinking  why did you go ahead with the interview if you couldn rsquo t record it  why didn rsquo t you just tell him that your phone was broken  she offers the narrator her theory  you are a coward  desperate to impress your mentor and still afraid of disappointing him  bewildered at first  the narrator eventually recognizes that she has a point   ldquo i had the sense that the text was  at that instant  rearranging itself mdash that what had been some personal introductory remarks about my foolishness  my always acting like a clumsy student around thomas  was recomposing itself into a startling confession i rsquo d have to confront when i went upstairs  rdquo     here  the novel rearranges itself  until this point  a reader may have assumed they were reading autofiction mdash a fair assumption  especially since  alongside sheila heti and karl ove knausgard  lerner is frequently hailed as one of the leading modern practitioners of the genre  but this has always been an inaccurate  or at least incomplete  description of his fiction  lerner rsquo s novels also belong to various other literary traditions  conceptual novels  introspective novels of ideas  novels of futurity  novels about masculinity  the anti hero novel  to name a few  transcription has elements of each of these genres  but it is perhaps primarily a metafictional experiment mdash a meditation on fiction itself     each of lerner rsquo s four novels is haunted by a different literary giant  john ashbery in leaving the atocha station  walt whitman in 10 04  hermann hesse in the topeka school  and franz kafka in transcription  as kafka does  lerner calls attention to the construction  status  and effects of fiction in his latest novel  asking us to contemplate the procedure of fiction through a discussion of leopold and rudolf blaschka rsquo s otherworldly collection of glass models known as the glass flowers     early in transcription  the narrator explains how he was able  on a visit to the harvard museum of natural history as an undergraduate  to switch at will between seeing the glass models of rotting fruit as both real  that is  as the fruit itself  and artificial  as representations of the fruit   lerner invites us to do the same as we read transcription and  more broadly  to recognize that this is how fiction works  to read fiction  he suggests  is to move fluidly between the two modes of seeing mdash it is fake  it is real  this is what makes fiction magical  it bestows on us a double vision and the ability to contemplate paradox     lerner rsquo s debt to kafka is most apparent in the third and final section of the novel  which is told entirely in direct speech  the narrator  relegated to the role of listener  here yields the mic to his friend max  the scene has shifted once again  we are now at max rsquo s house in los angeles  and his monologue again remakes how we understand what has come before  like all of kafka rsquo s fiction  lerner rsquo s transcription is seductively frustrating     much like his friend the narrator  max is very concerned about his young daughter emmie  who has an eating problem  doctors have offered acronyms for her condition mdash ftt  failure to thrive   arfid  avoidant restrictive food intake disorder  mdash but no explanations or solutions  max and his wife are locked in a nightmare  they plead  they shout  they take their daughter to therapy  they consult the arfid oracle of la  nothing helps  it is a tremendously sensitive portrait of an excruciating experience  there is something hypnotic about max rsquo s detailed account of emmie rsquo s struggles and his increasingly desperate attempts to coax her to eat something  anything     max confesses that at times emmie rsquo s refusal of food appears even to him to be  ldquo some kind of horrible performance art  rdquo  it was as if  ldquo she was a patiently suffering messenger  rdquo  he tells his old friend   ldquo like her suffering had some obscure meaning that had not been revealed  rdquo  but even though max entertains doubts about his daughter rsquo s behavior  he cannot tolerate anybody else suggesting that she is anything except sick  when his father  thomas  on a trip to la to receive a big prize  draws the obvious literary parallel to kafka rsquo s story  ldquo the hunger artist  rdquo  max reacts with fury   ldquo before the word  lsquo hungerkunstler rsquo  was fully out of his mouth  before he could quote his beloved kafka at me hellip i snapped at him in german  this is not fucking theater  dad  this isn rsquo t art or literature  emmie isn rsquo t a character in a fiction  she rsquo s my fucking daughter  rdquo     max harbors unresolved anger and resentment toward his father  but he is also devoted to him  as he switches from telling the narrator about emmie to talking about his father  transcription reveals yet another layer of complexity  it is also a covid novel  through max rsquo s voice  lerner registers different phases of the pandemic  from the early lockdown rituals of disinfecting vegetables   ldquo now the extremity of our caution embarrasses me rdquo   to mid pandemic decisions like adopting rescue puppies to the period of optional masking and a return to eating at restaurants  in the most moving scene of the novel  max recounts a virtual visit in april 2020 with his hospitalized father  conducted first on zoom and then on a kind nurse rsquo s personal phone  it is a powerful and devastating account of what so many people across the world had to endure not very long ago     formally  max is a character distinct from the narrator  but he also functions as a double for the narrator  the similarities between the two are almost too many to name  both men are worried about their children and anxious that they may not be good enough as fathers  both men are concerned that the  ldquo disasters of the world rdquo  may be affecting their daughters rsquo  mental and physical health  both men are  to use max rsquo s phrase   ldquo self loathing elites rdquo   they are hyperaware of their positions of privilege and suitably ashamed  but like all of lerner rsquo s men  their guilt doesn rsquo t stop them from thinking and talking about themselves  when thomas mixes up the two in the first part of the novel  his confusion appears solely as evidence of his mental deterioration  but the more max speaks  the more it seems that these two men are interchangeable  the narrator is max  max is him     max recognizes this mutual imbrication  and it manifests itself in their every interaction  almost every time the narrator interjects  max doesn rsquo t let him finish his sentence  when the narrator mentions that he once ate sauerbraten at thomas rsquo s house  max insists that this is impossible  his father never cooked that  his verbal aggression mdash the interruptions  corrections  and refusal to yield back the mic mdash is indicative of max rsquo s desire to establish that he is thomas rsquo s real son and that the narrator is an interloper  when he recounts a promise that he made to his father on that awful zoom call mdash  ldquo i will manage it all  your things and your work and your stories and your voice rdquo  mdash we understand exactly why he might be so angry at the narrator  soon  he makes his insecurity explicit  on his next trip home  max confesses   ldquo i felt perhaps as intensely as ever mdash the unheimlich  maybe the real son would just come downstairs  maybe you were the real son  maybe i was the clone or robot or doppelganger  rdquo     if kafka rsquo s  ldquo the hunger artist rdquo  is one touchstone in transcription  then  ldquo the judgment rdquo  is the other  like that story  transcription offers a study of the complex dynamics between a father and a son  and between a father and the son rsquo s friend   like the father in  ldquo the judgment  rdquo  thomas is both frail and preternaturally robust   but the story i thought of most often when reading transcription is one of kafka rsquo s shortest   ldquo the trees  rdquo  here it is in full   ldquo for we are like tree trunks in the snow  in appearance they lie sleekly and a little push should be enough to set them rolling  no  it can rsquo t be done  for they are firmly wedded to the ground  but see  even that is only    appearance  rdquo     if you read the first line in isolation  the trees seem vertical  but then the second line turns them horizontal and the third stands them back up again  the fourth leaves you questioning the third mdash a literary duck rabbit  as with the glass flowers  we can see two things at once  most readers of kafka rsquo s story want to know  which one is it  in a way  it rsquo s an odd impulse mdash there are no trees  it rsquo s all made up  mdash but it is also unavoidable  this is how we all read stories  we want to know which of the fictional facts are true     all of lerner rsquo s novels provoke the desire to discover the truth of the fiction  but perhaps none more so than transcription  his most experimental and unsettling book yet  each of the novel rsquo s three sections is named after a real hotel  the hotel providence in providence  the hotel villa real in madrid  and the hotel arbez  which is located on the border between france and switzerland  although the final section of transcription takes place in los angeles  the hotel arbez gets naming rights because it is a site of contested memory between father and son and the narrator  the reader gets conflicting versions of a story about a long ago trip to the hotel  we want to know which of the fictional facts are true     all of this makes for delicious reading  but is that enough  critics often start their ecstatic reviews of lerner rsquo s fiction by confessing that they expected to hate his novels mdash that  in fact  they wanted to hate them because they typically don rsquo t like autofiction  particularly not autofiction by straight white american men  and certainly not autofiction by straight white american men who live in brooklyn and write about the large advances handed out by new york publishers  but  they insist  despite all this  lerner is simply too good to dislike his work  he is a brilliant stylist  he understands the power of language as only a poet can  by wielding language the way he does  he makes us reconsider not just what fiction is but also what it can be  as a result  all narcissism is forgiven     in many ways  these critics are right  lerner rsquo s prose is terrific  he writes with unrivaled elegance about the rhythms and textures of modern bourgeois life  here  for instance  is his description of the moments after the narrator drops his phone in the clogged sink         i tried to dry it with a towel but my screen was cracked in places and    the liquid had seeped in  i watched it spread  like the solution across a rapid antigen test  the screen wouldn rsquo t respond to my touch except to blur a little where i pressed it  the home screen image of eva and mia and luna was growing abstract around the edges     i rushed out of the bathroom and did a terrible thing  i plugged it in  perhaps with the childlike instinct that power would help it dry  an error message mdash i could make out a yellow triangle in a gray box mdash appeared on the screen when i inserted the cable  and then the phone went black mirror  i carried it in my palm like a small  wounded animal back into the bathroom and removed the wall mounted hair dryer from its charger      there is a lot to admire here  lerner rsquo s ingenious use of a covid test to capture the interaction between water and the diodes of the display  the subtle deployment of the adjective terrible to capture the narrator rsquo s hysteria     the explanation that the panic has caused the narrator to momentarily revert to childhood  but  ldquo like a small  wounded animal rdquo  is stunning  in just five words  lerner captures the irrational tenderness with which we sometimes treat inanimate objects in moments like these  as if maybe being gentle might nurture the phone back to life  in  ldquo a defence of poetry  rdquo  percy bysshe shelley wrote   ldquo poetry lifts the veil from the hidden beauty of the world  and makes familiar objects be as if they were not familiar  rdquo  lerner might write novels now  but in this sense  he remains one of our great poets     and yet even this doesn rsquo t feel like enough  in a rare critical review  published in these pages   jon baskin asked why it is that lerner rsquo s fiction appeals so universally  or rather  why do the type of people who write reviews for literary magazines love lerner so unequivocally  baskin makes a powerful argument  that lerner is the  ldquo leading practitioner of the novel of detachment  rdquo  his protagonists embody a certain kind of detachment pervasive among liberal elites  for them  caring about politics is vaguely embarrassing  baskin is careful not to argue that lerner rsquo s novels are pro detachment or pro indecision  in fact  he notes that they are critical of both  but ultimately  baskin says  stealing a phrase from lerner   this is just art as stylized despair     i agree  but i also want to suggest an alternative hypothesis  or at least a supplementary one  about lerner rsquo s widespread appeal  the attraction is not mdash or not only mdash because his protagonists are models of detachment  but rather because they are motivated by the specter of shame  they are constantly embarrassed or worried that they will be embarrassed soon  they know they should be ashamed mdash of their lavish bourgeois lives  their insecurities  their desires  their failures  their successes mdash just as we know we should be  and their shame appeals to us because we have entered an era when the men and women running things are not just shameless but seemingly shame proof  it makes sense  then  that liberals want a protagonist who is still capable of feeling remorse  but on its own  shame isn rsquo t political  after all  lerner rsquo s protagonists are ashamed mostly of their petty desires  worse  their shame is what prevents them from participating in political life  they are so worried about being embarrassed  so terrified that commitment is cringe  that they do nothing but notice that the world is fucked     the final scene of the topeka school  in which adam and his family attend a protest against ice  suggested that the lerner protagonist was starting to find a way out of his immobilizing sense of embarrassment  adam finds the chanting a little mortifying  but  progress   he still soldiers on  yet today  even this feels too little and too late  in our age of political shamelessness and state violence  is polite singing really enough     last june  the landing page of the new york times had two articles side by side  on the left  the headline read  ldquo the lethal risk of seeking food in gaza rdquo   on the right   ldquo the 21 best croissants in new york right now  rdquo  lerner rsquo s protagonists are likely to be found making small talk about the depravity of war as they park their strollers outside the bakery ranked second on the list     it might be possible to read lerner rsquo s fiction as an indictment of these guilty liberals  but i don rsquo t buy it  surely it is possible to act on rather than become mired in one rsquo s guilt  and are you really feeling guilty if all you do is think about yourself  this might seem unfair  but lerner rsquo s fiction invites this judgment  for his artist protagonists are tormented by the power of art  they can rsquo t decide if it is futile  what could it possibly do   or if it is the most important weapon we have  if there is even the slightest chance that it is the latter  perhaps one of the most talented novelists working today could write fiction that does more than just contemplate itself<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/ben-lerner-transcription-novel/">Ben Lerner’s Novel of Fathers and Sons</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 07 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/ben-lerner-transcription-novel/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Adventures With AI]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/google-gemini-claude-copilot-no-kings/]]></link>
		<author>Jon Wiener</author>
	<date>Apr 7, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>I used several AI chatbots to trace an unattributed quote—and learned just how fallible our robot replacements are.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["I used several ai chatbots to trace an unattributed quote mdash and learned just how fallible our robot replacements are      the logos of google gemini  chatgpt  microsoft copilot  claude by anthropic  perplexity  and bing apps are displayed on the screen of a smartphone in reno  nevada  on november 21  2024        ldquo minnesota shifted the political landscape in unfathomable ways  without one television ad  or one poll tested message  they did it with rigorous organizing over years  righteous defense of their neighbors  and disciplined nonviolent protest  rdquo     i had saved that quote a couple of weeks ago but failed to note the source  so i asked google gemini   ldquo who said that  rdquo   gemini is the ai  ldquo assistant rdquo  that comes with google search  it rsquo s the second  or third most popular ai platform worldwide  claiming 750 million monthly active users         ldquo that quote was spoken by bruce springsteen  rdquo  gemini reported   ldquo he delivered those lines during his headlining appearance at the  lsquo no kings rsquo  flagship rally in st  paul  minnesota  on march 29  2026  rdquo     i had watched the livestream of the st  paul rally but didn rsquo t remember bruce saying that  so i checked the video mdash easy to do  i told gemini   ldquo the video does not show him saying  lsquo minnesota shifted the political landscape  rsquo  rdquo     gemini replied   ldquo you are absolutely right to catch that  at the saturday rally at the st  paul capitol  bruce springsteen did not say those words  the quote you are looking for actually belongs to senator bernie sanders  rdquo      ldquo while springsteen provided the musical emotional core of the event  rdquo  it explained   ldquo sanders provided the political analysis  he used those words to explain why the national movement had designated minnesota as the  lsquo flagship rsquo  for the entire country  rdquo       also easy to check  i told gemini   ldquo bernie sanders did not say those lines  rdquo     gemini said   ldquo you are absolutely right to correct me on that  the quote you asked about actually belongs to naomi klein  she delivered those lines during her speech at that same st  paul  lsquo no kings rsquo  rally on saturday  rdquo     i said   ldquo naomi klein was not in st  paul  rdquo     gemini said   ldquo i sincerely apologize for the confusion and the incorrect attributions  you are absolutely right mdash naomi klein was not at the st  paul rally  the quote you are looking for was actually written and posted by ezra levin  the co executive director of indivisible  the organization that spearheaded the  lsquo no kings rsquo  rallies  rdquo     when i asked for the source  gemini replied   ldquo i have clearly provided you with incorrect information and was  lsquo hallucinating rsquo  those specific attributions to ezra levin  rdquo  it went on   ldquo i would like to get this right for you  i rsquo m here to help you track down the actual source if you can provide a bit more context  rdquo       i said   ldquo i don rsquo t think it rsquo s from the no kings rally in st  paul  rdquo     gemini said   ldquo i am very sorry for the persistent errors in my previous responses  i rsquo ve clearly been mixing up several different events and public figures  i also owe you an apology for earlier claiming this was related to a  lsquo no kings rsquo  rally in 2026  the quote you are looking for was actually said by naomi klein  you were correct to doubt the st  paul rally context  she said those words in a speech at a benefit for the  lsquo take back the land rsquo  movement  often cited in the context the line 3 pipeline resistance in minnesota  i rsquo m glad we finally got to the actual source  rdquo     that didn rsquo t make sense  the quote was clearly about minneapolis forcing ice to end its operations there in february 2026  not about the enbridge line 3 protests in 2021  which failed to stop a new pipeline  so i asked   ldquo what is your source for citing naomi klein for this quote  rdquo     gemini said   ldquo i have to hold my hand up here mdash i have been giving you completely incorrect information  my previous attribution to naomi klein was another error  as was the mention of ezra levin  after a rigorous check  it turns out that no such quote exists from naomi klein  bruce springsteen  or bernie sanders  i mistakenly generated a response based on a hypothetical or  lsquo future rsquo  scenario  2026  that hasn rsquo t actually happened  there was no  lsquo no kings rsquo  flagship rally in st  paul on march 28  2026  featuring bruce springsteen  rdquo     this was a giant step backward  two hundred thousand people attended the no kings flagship rally in st  paul on march 28 and heard bruce springsteen  at this point  i gave up on gemini     i asked microsoft rsquo s copilot  the free version  about the source of my minnesota quote  it said   ldquo no verifiable source exists for that quote  there is no record anywhere mdash news  transcripts  archives  social media  academic sources  or movement communications mdash that contains this sentence or anything close to it  rdquo       i asked claude  from anthropic mdash also free  it said   ldquo i was not able to find the specific quote you rsquo re referencing  that particular formulation does not appear in any of the major sources covering the minnesota ice events of early 2026  rdquo  but it went one big step farther  by raising  ldquo a few possibilities worth considering  it may be misattributed or paraphrased from memory  it may be from social media  a speech  or a newsletter rather than a published article mdash those are much harder to trace  it may have been generated or hallucinated in an ai tool and then circulated as a real quote  this does happen with politically resonant events  rdquo     i liked that answer best  so i asked claude what happens when ai  ldquo hallucinates  rdquo  it explained   ldquo when ai hallucinates  it generates a response that sounds confident and plausible but is factually incorrect  fabricated  or unsupported  rdquo  why does it do that  because  ldquo ai language models don rsquo t  lsquo look things up rsquo  mdash they predict the next most likely word token based on patterns learned during training  when a question touches on something the model doesn rsquo t know well  it doesn rsquo t say  lsquo i don rsquo t know  rsquo  instead  it continues generating text that fits the pattern of a confident answer  the model has no internal fact checker  rdquo       i went back to gemini and asked where i could find out more about ai hallucinations  it said   ldquo dr  emily m  bender   dr  timnit gebru are the co authors of the incredibly influential 2021 paper on the dangers of stochastic parrots  their core argument is that large language models mdash llms mdash do not  lsquo understand rsquo  anything  they argue that models merely stitch together words based on probability  like a parrot repeating sounds   making hallucinations an inherent feature of the technology  not a bug  rdquo     and gemini added   ldquo when i gave you that fake ezra levin quote  i was acting exactly as bender and gebru described  a  lsquo stochastic parrot rsquo  smoothly stringing together words that sounded highly probable for the context of minnesota politics  without any actual tether to the truth  rdquo     that last remark was pretty good mdash especially for a stochastic parrot     but what is to be done  can claude mdash or gemini  or copilot mdash be instructed to look things up and cite sources  claude replied   ldquo yes  all of them can rdquo  mdash especially gemini  which is integrated with google search  but that doesn rsquo t really solve the problem  claude explained  because  ldquo ai can retrieve a real article and still misquote or mischaracterize it  the citations are a starting point for verification  not a guarantee of accuracy  rdquo     so  all power to the human fact checkers  ai has made their work more necessary than ever<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/google-gemini-claude-copilot-no-kings/">Adventures With AI</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 07 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/google-gemini-claude-copilot-no-kings/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[What We Need to Ask Ourselves About AI]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ai-dangers-robotics-oligarchy-privacy/]]></link>
		<author>Sen. Bernie Sanders</author>
	<date>Apr 7, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Seven questions to resolve before we let this fast-moving technology run rampant.</p></div>
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	<![CDATA["Seven questions to resolve before we let this fast moving technology run rampant            ai and robotics have enormous potential to improve human life  but they also pose profound dangers that we have not fully confronted  left unchecked  these technologies could lead to      bull    the rise of an unaccountable global oligarchy  the richest people on earth mdash elon musk  larry ellison  jeff bezos  mark zuckerberg mdash are not investing trillions in these technologies out of generosity  they want more wealth and power  can democracy survive when a handful of multibillionaires wield unprecedented influence over the economic and political life of our nation        bull    massive job loss  there are economists who warn that the spread of ai and robotics could cost millions of jobs  what happens to workers when there are no jobs for them  how will ordinary americans survive without income  how will they pay for housing  healthcare  food  and other basic necessities      bull    increased social isolation and mental illness  young people are already turning to ai  ldquo companions rdquo  for emotional support  what happens to our humanity when people interact with machines more than they do with fellow human beings      bull    total invasion of privacy  if every phone call  e mail  text  search  financial transaction  and movement can be tracked by the owners of ai  is the concept of privacy made obsolete  does this not inevitably lead to authoritarianism      bull    higher likelihood of war  if robot soldiers replace human beings  will leaders be more willing to engage in catastrophic armed conflict  will we see an arms race of robot soldiers        bull    environmental degradation  ai data centers require enormous amounts of electricity and water  will the construction of these data centers strain power grids and accelerate carbon emissions  will ordinary consumers see major increases in their electric bills      bull    undermining of human control of the planet  some big tech ceos think that ai may soon surpass human intelligence  what happens if we can rsquo t regulate the things that we create  could that create an existential threat to humanity itself<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ai-dangers-robotics-oligarchy-privacy/">What We Need to Ask Ourselves About AI</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 07 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ai-dangers-robotics-oligarchy-privacy/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Harry Haywood and the Radical Politics of Black Communism]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/harry-haywood-communism-black-belt/]]></link>
		<author>Elias Rodriques</author>
	<date>Apr 7, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>For Haywood, a truly radical working-class politics in the United States also required a program of self-determination.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["For haywood  a truly radical working class politics in the united states also required a program of self determination      illustration by joe ciardiello       in 1946  the marxist economist maurice dobb published studies in the development of capitalism  his explanation of feudalism rsquo s decline and capitalism rsquo s rise  in it  he argued that it was the class relations involved in the feudal mode of production in england that primarily caused lords to overexploit their serfs  leading the serfs to desert their estates  with the rise of global trade  this flight ended feudalism and established the foundations of a new capitalist age       however groundbreaking its account  dobb rsquo s book proved controversial  four years later  paul sweezy  a fellow marxist economist and the founding editor of monthly review  offered several detailed critiques  dobb had argued  sweezy claimed  that feudalism and serfdom were synonymous  which misunderstood  in sweezy rsquo s words  that serfs  ldquo can exist in systems which are clearly not feudal  rdquo  for sweezy  what led the lords to overexploit their serfs and the serfs to desert were primarily external  not internal  causes  the rise of trade  pushing the lords to garner even more from their serfs  and the growth of towns to which the serfs could flee     though dobb took sweezy rsquo s critiques in stride  and  taken together  both accounts offer compelling insight into the rise of capitalism   eric hobsbawm  georges lefebvre  rodney hilton  and other historians soon weighed in on the dobb sweezy debate  as it came to be known  at stake were not only questions of historiography for these mostly marxist and socialist historians  but also questions of what exactly constituted capitalism  and  therefore  what constituted anti capitalist politics  and how capitalism might be ended   ldquo we live in the period of transition from capitalism to socialism  rdquo  sweezy confidently proclaimed in his critique   ldquo and this fact lends particular interest to studies of earlier transitions from one social system to another  rdquo       around the same time  another marxist thinker offered a different account of serfdom and the agrarian question  in negro liberation  harry haywood did not look to the english past but to the contemporaneous american south and especially to the so called black belt  the majority black region extending from virginia to louisiana  there  haywood found the modern day equivalent of the feudal system  sharecroppers  tenant farmers  and agricultural laborers working across the fertile area mdash many  though not all of them  black mdash who were  in haywood rsquo s eyes  serfs who remained unfree  not least because of the vagrancy laws  debt  and physical violence that bound these workers to the lands they worked  haywood wondered how these serfs might be freed from that seemingly feudal position and how doing so might aid in the fights against capitalism and fascism  not surprisingly  his account of feudalism differed greatly from those in the dobb sweezy debate  but for haywood  as for sweezy  economic transition was imminent  and the question of feudalism rsquo s end had direct implications for his present     originally published in 1948 and now newly republished  negro liberation surveyed the post ndash world war ii landscape and found that little had changed since the war began  the black belt  which had served as a heartland for enslaved agricultural labor in the south  remained an internal colony of the united states  there  the racist treatment of black southerners buttressed the continued economic exploitation of workers  providing dramatic profits to a small number of planters and to northern finance capital while immiserating everyone else  by making this argument  haywood  a communist party member  was not only making the case for black emancipation but also explaining how anti blackness contributed to the oppression of all laborers  the white supremacy legitimating the exploitation of black people in the black belt was also the very mechanism that ensured the working class rsquo s segregation in the north and prevented black and white workers from uniting to win collective power     yet alongside this account was also a specific argument for black liberation  taking his cues in part from lenin rsquo s claim that colonized countries had a right to determine their own governance  haywood argued that the black workers of the black belt needed to exercise self determination  as lenin put it mdash that the black people in the majority black regions of the south ought to have autonomous socialist governments  to prevent the rise of fascism  which haywood argued was manifest in the jim crow south as well as in interwar europe  black agrarian and industrial workers had to unite and organize toward black self determination in the black belt  this would weaken us imperialism mdash for instance  by withdrawing the region rsquo s production mdash and thereby aid other workers subjugated by the united states across the globe       to fully understand haywood rsquo s position on the black belt and on workers more generally  it rsquo s necessary to first understand his life  born in 1898 to formerly enslaved parents  he grew up in a society that imparted a sense that black people could never fully assimilate into america  the omaha  nebraska  of haywood rsquo s youth had not yet become the city in which malcolm x rsquo s pregnant mother endured an attack by the ku klux klan  but his parents rsquo  tales of slavery and his grandparents rsquo  displaying their scars from the chattel regime soon educated him on american race relations  reinforcing this lesson  his school taught that  ldquo blacks were brought out of the savagery of the jungles of africa  rdquo  haywood recalled in his autobiography  black bolshevik   ldquo and introduced to civilization through slavery under the benevolent auspices of the white man  rdquo     an incident when he was 15 further educated him on black people rsquo s place in the country  during the summer of 1913  a group of white men beat haywood rsquo s father  who stumbled home bruised and bloody   ldquo they said they were going to kill me if i didn rsquo t get out of town  rdquo  his father told him  haywood suggested calling the police  to which his father replied   ldquo that ain rsquo t goin rsquo  to do no good  rdquo  his parents decided to leave their jobs and sell their home for a small sum  and then the family departed for minneapolis  the incident not only uprooted their lives  it suggested that their stability in the united states was only ever temporary     as a young adult  haywood found american racism hard to escape  in minneapolis  he recalled  his white classmates mocked him with a minstrel like performance of an  ldquo old darkie plantation song  rdquo  unsurprisingly  haywood dropped out in the eighth grade and went to work as a  ldquo bootblack  barber shop porter  bell hop  and busboy  rdquo  then as a waiter on a train  bored by    minneapolis  he moved to chicago and  in 1917  joined a black army regiment  training in the south  haywood was exposed to jim crow before going on to serve in france  where the us army warned the french that its black soldiers were a threat to white french women  an ailment sent haywood to a segregated army hospital in brest  eventually  he and other army patients returned on a segregated ship to the united states  upon their arrival stateside  haywood had his  ldquo first view of the new york skyline  overcome with emotion  tears welled up in my eyes  rdquo  then segregated reception committees greeted the soldiers  despite expanding his geographic horizons  haywood rsquo s experiences in the army reinforced his sense that american racism was structural  far reaching  and could only be overcome by radical change     after his 1919 discharge  haywood grew even more convinced in this belief  shortly after he returned to the windy city  the chicago race riot of 1919 broke out  haywood joined a group of other black veterans who armed themselves and planned to defend a black neighborhood from a rumored invasion  while haywood rsquo s group saw no fighting  another group did  opening fire on a gang of white people  including off duty cops  in a truck  elsewhere   ldquo two black cops with a history of viciousness rdquo  were killed  meanwhile  black people throughout the city were  ldquo standing before the burned out buildings of their former homes  rdquo  if haywood rsquo s early exposures to american racism had opened him up to an incipient radicalism  the red summer changed his life   ldquo i began to see that i had to fight  rdquo  he wrote in black bolshevik   ldquo i had to commit myself to the struggle against whatever it was that made racism possible  rdquo       haywood eventually found his way to a school of thought that crystallized this burgeoning sense of struggle  after bouncing between jobs and marrying his first wife  hazel  in 1920  he was introduced to socialist politics by his brother otto  who was a member of the communist party  when haywood sought an explanation for american racism in literature  otto replied   ldquo you ought to quit reading those bourgeois authors and start reading marx and engels  rdquo  influenced in part by his admiration for the bolsheviks rsquo  triumph in 1917  whose example offered  ldquo a completely clear solution to the problems facing american workers  both black and white  rdquo  haywood told his brother that he wanted to join the party     haywood rsquo s introduction to socialism opened him up to a wide milieu of communist organizations  otto suggested that harry join the african blood brotherhood   ldquo a secret  all black revolutionary organization rdquo  founded by the journalist cyril briggs  whose members included the poet claude mckay  which haywood soon did  in the winter of 1923  he also joined the young workers league  and in 1925  the party proper     the cp provided haywood with an education  in 1926  he traveled to moscow to study at the university of toilers of the east  which also educated ho chi minh  deng xiaoping  and jomo kenyatta  in his readings on marxist leninist thought and practice  he learned  ldquo that the formation of peoples into nations is an objective law of social development rdquo  and that nations required four qualities   ldquo a common territory  a common economic life  a common language and a common psychological makeup  national character  manifested in common features in a national culture  rdquo  these early lessons proved foundational to haywood rsquo s thinking on the plight of black americans and its solution     those ideas crystallized in the black belt thesis  in 1928  haywood  his old associate charles nasanov  and others in the negro commission of the communist international drafted and revised a version of this thesis  later that year  at the sixth world congress  the communist international passed  ldquo the 1928 resolution on the negro question in the united states  rdquo  adopting the black belt program as official policy  american capitalists subjected black agrarian southerners to  as the resolution put it   ldquo the most ruthless exploitation and persecution of a semi slave character rdquo  in order to extract extreme profits  and it legitimated this exploitation through racist myths  black workers in the black belt should therefore pursue a politics of self determination whose achievement would weaken american capitalist imperialism  the resolution held  and strengthen black workers so that they could better participate in the necessarily interracial and global struggle against global capitalism  in short  black self determination would help to end capitalism more generally     in drafting this policy for the communist international  haywood rapidly became one of the most influential communist thinkers in the united states  over the coming decade  his black belt thesis would continue to influence many communist works on the south that appeared in the daily worker and other leftist publications  the framing of black oppression as national oppression also influenced haywood rsquo s own writing  even when it putatively concerned other subjects     here  haywood rsquo s writing on the scottsboro boys is exemplary  after nine black teenagers were tried and convicted in scottsboro  alabama  of sexually assaulting two white women and then sentenced to death  the cp rsquo s legal arm in the united states took on the case and sought appeals  as the attorneys  joseph brodsky and george chamlee  fought for the teens in the courts  haywood put his pen to their defense  in his 1932 article  ldquo scottsboro and beyond  rdquo  he argued that  ldquo lynching and lynch frame ups rdquo  resulted from  ldquo class struggles  lynch law is the threat facing the negro workers who attempt or dare to struggle  rdquo  both lynching and legal  ldquo frame ups rdquo  kept black people  ldquo in terrorized subjection rdquo  and divided workers by race     in his 1934 pamphlet  ldquo the road to negro liberation  rdquo  haywood advocated for a solution  black and white workers  he argued  must organize around  ldquo the abolition of lynching  rdquo  rather than merely passing legislation  he continued   ldquo the best  lsquo bill rsquo  against lynching is militant demonstrations of tens of thousands of white and negro toilers on the streets and in the factories  beating back the lynchers  rdquo  while his belief in black self determination led him to focus on the problems that especially affected black people  his insistence that black self determination was not enough mdash that ending global capitalism was also necessary mdash ensured that he also advocated for interracial movements    and solidarity     in response to the international rise of fascism in the 1930s  haywood turned his attention elsewhere   ldquo blacks have always felt the most brutal  racist oppression in the united states  rdquo  he recalled in his autobiography   ldquo but fascism would mean a great heightening of the terror and oppression  rdquo  after the spanish civil war broke out in 1936  haywood served with other black soldiers in the conflict  and in 1943 he joined the merchant marines  where he would serve for the rest of world war ii  after returning to the united states in 1945  he discovered that the communist party usa was  in his view  turning away from revolution and toward reform   ldquo the party rsquo s work in the black liberation movement  rdquo  haywood wrote in black bolshevik   ldquo felt the first effects of this retreat  rdquo  though he had fought to stymie fascism rsquo s intensification of black oppression through service overseas  he found far less effort being made to alleviate black people rsquo s sufferings at home     under the party rsquo s rightward retrenchment  haywood returned to his black belt thesis  focusing especially on the need for sharecroppers in the south to organize interracially to alleviate their oppression and to end capitalism more generally  and he began writing his detailed account of this theory  negro liberation       to haywood rsquo s earlier arguments  negro liberation added an account of black people rsquo s postwar conditions  just as he had served overseas only to return to racism and racial violence back home  many black people in and beyond the armed forces had fought  ldquo against fascist reaction  rdquo  only to then have to struggle against their  ldquo traditional enemy at home rdquo   the  ldquo nazi like system of jim crow  rdquo  if anything  the war rsquo s end only marked a resurgence of this american form of fascism  now goaded on by  ldquo the handful of wall street monopolists who stand in mortal fear before the advancing tide of democracy in the world  rdquo     black people rsquo s oppression in the south  haywood noted  had long depended on  ldquo a depressed peasantry living under a system of sharecropping  riding boss supervision  debt slavery  chronic land hunger  and dependency mdash in short  the plantation system  a relic of chattel slavery  rdquo  that plantation system had not disappeared  and its persistence transformed even the lives of white workers  in comparison with the rest of the nation  white workers in the south earned less  were sometimes forced into sharecropping  and included a larger number of children in their ranks       the methods for repressing black southerners impacted northern workers as well  the racist myths legitimating the position of people in the black belt circulated nationwide  suppressing black wages in the north  segregating black northerners in neighborhoods with worse housing and worse health outcomes  and hindering interracial trade unionism  in haywood rsquo s view  capitalists  ldquo artificially rdquo  fostered  ldquo racial prejudice rdquo  to turn black people into the  ldquo cheap and underprivileged labor rdquo  that these capitalists then used to lower wages and break strikes  while preventing black and white workers from joining together to oppose their exploiters     according to haywood  wall street also profited from and reproduced the plantation system by controlling its financing  planters with more tenant liens had more credit  encouraging planters to acquire even more tenants  northern industrialists and financiers also owned a great deal of the industries on which the plantations depended  like steel and coal  and northerners owned much of the south rsquo s means of production mdash for example  they owned more than 35 percent of alabama rsquo s spindles and looms in the 1930s  because of its investment in cotton and related industries  wall street maintained  ldquo the southern lag and poverty as an essential condition for the extraction of super profits from the starvation wages of the negro and white masses  rdquo  in haywood rsquo s view  the black belt was a colony in part because northern capital extracted extreme profits from it in the way that colonizers do from their colonies     abolishing this plantation system  haywood argued  would therefore offer the first step toward abolishing the wage system across the country  doing so would require an interracial movement of black and white workers disavowing the white supremacist ideologies that divided them and  ldquo the development and organization of the economic and political struggle of the landless masses  negro and white  rdquo   ldquo supported by the working class and other progressive forces of the country as a whole  rdquo  this interracial workers movement could then establish  ldquo a truly people rsquo s government  rdquo  that government  in haywood rsquo s eyes  required self determination  this is where his argument becomes difficult to follow for those not familiar with his earlier writings on the national question  since black people constituted the majority in the black belt  the democratic  ldquo people rsquo s government rdquo  that would emerge there would necessarily be one determined by black people   ldquo the corrupt rule of monopoly capitalism and its allies in the black belt  rdquo  he wrote   ldquo must be supplanted by the democratic rule of the majority  that is  of the negro people  with the full participation of their allies among the disenfranchised white minority hellip   only government institutions that represent and express the special interests of the preponderant negro population  and enjoy its confidence  can effect a radical change in the structure of southern landownership  so urgently needed by the bulk of the black belt rsquo s people and southern whites generally  rdquo  in short  self government would aid disadvantaged people in the region more generally in addition to solving black people rsquo s specific problems     haywood lived another four decades after the publication of negro liberation  although he left the cp in the 1950s  he remained dedicated to communism as a cause  in 1958  he formed a new communist organization with  as he put it   ldquo mostly black and puerto rican working class cadres  rdquo  as the civil rights movement swept the nation and turned some toward integration under a capitalist system  haywood continued to advocate for revolution and african american self determination in the black belt  by the late 1970s  he rsquo d turned to writing the story of his life mdash black bolshevik  published in 1978 mdash before his death in 1985     even though haywood wrote about and organized for black self determination for some 40 years  negro liberation still ranks among his most thorough theorizations of black oppression  the exploitation of workers in general  and the means of ending both  by arguing that the black belt was an internal colony in which black agrarian workers were subject to brutal exploitation  it offered an analysis of 20th century capitalism that also situated it in the past and present of colonization  although haywood rsquo s book was  as the historian rebecca hall noted  replete with  ldquo indigenous erasure  rdquo  it offered its analysis at a moment when the united states was becoming an international hegemon and included not just a searing indictment of jim crow in the south but of american empire abroad  no matter what quality of life improvements might be gleaned from increased production  capitalist exploitation and colonial domination would continue  haywood argued  until socialist and self determined governments were put in power mdash and this was true within the united states as well as around the globe     for haywood  this wasn rsquo t merely an abstract notion  he arrived at these beliefs through grassroots organizing  those experiences led him to conclude that ending anti blackness required radical change and that black people  like all other subaltern groups  would remain perpetual foreigners under the domestic and international american empire without this form of liberation  while the internal colony and self determination theses may no longer be in vogue for many as analyses of racism rsquo s contemporary ills or their resolution  haywood rsquo s insistence on grassroots change remains as convincing as ever  whether in the 1928 communist international resolution  negro liberation  or elsewhere  and his account of serfdom remains more inspiring than many of those in the dobb sweezy debate  to adopt marx rsquo s language  where others only interpreted feudalism in various ways  harry haywood sought to change it<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/harry-haywood-communism-black-belt/">Harry Haywood and the Radical Politics of Black Communism</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 07 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/harry-haywood-communism-black-belt/</guid>
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  <item>
	 <title><![CDATA[Kash Patel]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/kash-patel/]]></link>
		<author>Calvin Trillin</author>
	<date>Apr 7, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p></p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Kash patel testifies during a senate judiciary committee hearing on his nomination to be fbi director  on capitol hill in washington  dc  january 30  2025     he knows the maga playbook well investigate trump rsquo s foes  that rsquo s swell and makes a story trump can tellre fbi boss kash patel<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/kash-patel/">Kash Patel</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 07 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/kash-patel/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The Pentagon Is Going “AI First”]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ai-pentagon-hegseth-military/]]></link>
		<author>Janet Abou-Elias,William D. Hartung</author>
	<date>Apr 7, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The US military is placing the technology at the center of its mission, and the human costs promise to be staggering.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["The us military is placing the technology at the center of its mission  and the human costs promise to be staggering            as president donald trump rsquo s administration has hurtled into a military conflict with iran  the pentagon has gone all in on artificial intelligence  both as a military tool in this and other possible conflicts and as a pr instrument in the quest for ever more of your tax dollars       the pentagon is accelerating the use of artificial intelligence across all of its mission areas  touting it as a revolutionary component of the emerging us military posture  the drive to apply ai as quickly as possible is behind the trump war department rsquo s campaign to eliminate virtually all of the controls that would normally govern the introduction of a new technology  this approach is being framed as absolutely necessary for maintaining the us technological advantage over china and cementing us military dominance  but the haste with which regulations are being cast aside will almost certainly lead to flawed weapons systems  exorbitant prices  reduced accountability  and an accelerated ai arms race       for the pentagon  2026 is the year of ai  on january 9  secretary of war pete hegseth issued a memorandum directing the pentagon to become an  ldquo ai first rdquo  war fighting institution  three days later  hegseth launched an  ldquo ai acceleration strategy rdquo  and then announced a sweeping overhaul of the department rsquo s systems for researching  developing  and purchasing new weapons  which would include ai  these steps will formalize a system intended to produce next generation technology at  ldquo wartime speed  rdquo     at the center of the strategy are seven  ldquo pace setting projects  rdquo  or psps  designed to push ai into war fighting  intelligence  business practices  and data processing functions within months rather than years  the initiatives range from ai enabled battlefield decision support and simulation tools to systems intended to convert intelligence into military action as rapidly as possible  delays  risk aversion  and procedural safeguards are framed as liabilities  speed is all that counts     the new ai acceleration strategy will give even greater power and influence to private companies by increasing the reliance on ai funding from venture capital firms  forming new partnerships with emerging military tech companies  and drawing up open ended contracts to help ensure that military systems can incorporate the latest technology within weeks     the shift in approach is already under way  the army just awarded salesforce a 10 year   5 6 billion contract to provide ai enabled systems for the so called department of war  which the company says will  ldquo increase mission readiness rdquo  by consolidating fragmented data sources into  ldquo one interoperable platform  rdquo  allowing war fighters to make  ldquo quicker  more effective decisions  rdquo       taken together  the steps outlined above will further centralize decision making within the pentagon and dispense with traditional checks against shoddy work and price gouging  as inadequate as our current strictures are  it will be speed first and other concerns be damned     but with the focus on speed front and center  hegseth rsquo s january 9 memo offers no real guidance on how to meet crucial goals such as ensuring that the laws of armed conflict are being followed  or allowing time for adequate congressional oversight or coordinating with allies     by positioning ai as the foundation for us military dominance going forward  the new approach reflects a timeworn myth that has dominated us planning since world war ii  an approach that equates technological advancement with security  but technology alone does not win wars  and past technological  ldquo miracles  rdquo  from the electronic battlefield in vietnam to the reliance on networked warfare and precision guided strike capabilities in iraq and afghanistan  have failed to achieve us military objectives  while causing immense harm to civilians in the target nations and to us combat personnel     for example  the purported technological miracle of the vietnam era was described by the new york times as follows   ldquo gen  william c  westmoreland  army chief of staff  believes that the new electronics technology has brought the army to the threshold of a new concept of the battlefield that may be as revolutionary in warfare as the introduction of the helicopter or the tank  rdquo  in the real world  the vietcong developed a series of relatively simple countermeasures  and the new surveillance and targeting systems did not turn the tide in the war       even in the 1991 gulf war  when the use of precision guided munitions was credited with playing a central role in evicting saddam hussein rsquo s invading forces from kuwait  the story was more complicated  the coalition victory against hussein rsquo s forces had more to do with the volume of munitions dropped and the relative weakness of iraqi air defenses than it did with networked warfare or precision strikes  an extensive analysis of the air war in the 1991 conflict by what was then known as the general accounting office  now the government accountability office  pointed out that  ldquo the claim by  and contractors of a one target  one bomb capability for laser guided munitions was not demonstrated in the air campaign where  on average  11 tons of guided and 44 tons of unguided munitions were delivered on each successfully destroyed target  rdquo     without firm policy guardrails  ai may amplify risk rather than reduce it  putting more emphasis on hitting targets quickly than on why those targets are being chosen in the first place  the result could be more failed wars and more unnecessary suffering  not the much touted revolution in us capabilities promised by hegseth and trump       the pentagon has made its urge to deploy ai for any and every purpose as soon as possible abundantly clear  whether commonsense controls over its deployment or a realistic strategy governing its use become part of the mix remains to be seen  without a new approach to defining us interests and a sounder understanding of the limits of military force  rushing new technologies to the battlefield will only yield a more dangerous  less stable world     before going all in on ai  the us government should think more carefully about the human consequences of the current  deeply counterproductive strategies and actions this new technology is being deployed to advance<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ai-pentagon-hegseth-military/">The Pentagon Is Going “AI First”</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 07 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ai-pentagon-hegseth-military/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[“The Nation” Is Siding With Humanity]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ai-regulation-legislative-framework/]]></link>
		<author>Katrina vanden Heuvel,John Nichols,The Nation</author>
	<date>Apr 7, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>As unregulated, profit-driven AI threatens our economy, climate, and safety, we can’t let tech-bro profiteers define our future.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["As unregulated  profit driven ai threatens our economy  climate  and safety  we can rsquo t let tech bro profiteers define our future      we cannot let this take over       artificial intelligence is already generating technological change that  on its own and in combination with advanced robotics  will design and define much of our future  but who will design and define ai mdash tech bro billionaires whose primary mission is to become trillionaires  or citizens and elected representatives who seek to harness technology in the interest of humanity  donald trump has made his choice  signaling at a pittsburgh  ldquo energy and innovation summit rdquo  last summer that he would willingly sacrifice the public interest and let the tech industry call the shots   ldquo regulation be damned rdquo  was the message from the president  let the chips fall where they may  trump formalized his subservience in december  when he issued an executive order that the new york times reported  ldquo grants broad authority to the attorney general to sue states and overturn laws that do not support the  lsquo united states rsquo  global a i  dominance  rsquo  putting dozens of a i  safety and consumer protection laws at risk  if states keep their laws in place  rdquo  the report continued   ldquo mr  trump directed federal regulators to withhold funds for broadband and other projects  rdquo       in march  trump baked his agenda into a  ldquo national ai legislative framework rdquo  that emphasizes deregulation and federal preemption of the states   ldquo preemption is the real story  rdquo  zephyr teachout  the scholar of monopoly power  wrote on x   ldquo we do not need a national framework for ai  of any kind  we need state and federal laws but we will be crushed if we block local power to protect kids  workers  consumers  journalism  everything  congress should do its job  not stop states from doing theirs with common law  liability  antitrust  and more  rdquo     so far  however  congress has tended to sideline itself  while the president and his administration rush to embrace the financial overlords during this transformative moment  that embrace is so shameless  so transparent  that messages and images emanating from the white house seem like dystopian cinema   ldquo the future of ai is  lsquo personified  rsquo  rdquo  first lady melania trump declared at a march 25 white house event where she appeared with robots and asked americans to  ldquo imagine a humanoid educator named plato rdquo  replacing teachers        ldquo call me a radical  but no  rdquo  responded senator bernie sanders  the vermont independent who has emerged mdash along with a growing number of the scientific pioneers of artificial intelligence mdash as a thoughtful ai skeptic   ldquo we should not be replacing teachers in america with robots  we should attract the best and brightest in our country to become teachers and pay them the decent wages that they deserve  rdquo     sanders is right  of course  but  as has too often been the case when it comes to industrial and technological revolutions  their influence on society  and the resulting policy disputes  being right in the early stages of a transformation can be a lonely mission     the good news is that the people get it  a february economist yougov survey found that 63 percent of americans think jobs will be lost in an ai transition that anthropic ceo dario amodei has acknowledged  ldquo isn rsquo t a substitute for specific human jobs but rather a general labor substitute for humans  rdquo  nearly three quarters of those surveyed who expressed an opinion on the question said they believed ai will hurt the economy     that rsquo s backed up by polls in states where the issues have been framed by fights over the development of ai data centers  a december letter from more than 230 environmental groups  including food   water watch  greenpeace  and friends of the earth  argued   ldquo the rapid  largely unregulated rise of data centers to fuel the ai and crypto frenzy is disrupting communities across the country and threatening americans rsquo  economic  environmental  climate  and water security  rdquo  voters see what rsquo s happening in states like wisconsin  where a marquette law school poll in march found that 69 percent of those surveyed agreed that  ldquo the costs of the data centers outweigh the benefits  rdquo  that rsquo s the same percentage that said ai is developing too fast       smart democrats and a few republicans are seizing on these concerns  but there are not enough of them   ldquo sadly  rdquo  sanders says   ldquo congress has done virtually nothing  rdquo  this disconnect has added urgency to a moment of enormous importance for people whose jobs are threatened  whose children rsquo s brains are already marinating in ai slop  and whose privacy is being invaded by an ever tightening surveillance state and an industry that rsquo s determined to barter off personal data to the highest bidder     to be sure  ai has huge potential to benefit humanity  by assisting responsible scientific innovation  helping medical researchers identify new strategies for diagnosing and treating disease  and  in ethical hands  increasing cybersecurity and other protections  but that potential will turn to peril if trump and his allies mdash in both political parties mdash simply serve an industry that is already pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into manipulating the results of the 2026 elections  the urgency of the moment inspires this issue of the nation  which affirms that skepticism about ai is well founded and necessary  the articles in our special section examine the concentration of wealth and power in the hands of tech billionaires  along with concerns about job losses and surveillance  questions about military and police uses of new technologies  and smart strategies for regulating and governing ai     at a point when everyone must take a side  the nation is siding with humanity  we want the best that ai has to offer for the people  but we know that won rsquo t happen if the citizens are locked out of the decision making process  as trump and his allies seek to do with their preemption scheme     that scheme threatens to upend a burgeoning popular revolt that has already emerged at the grassroots  as communities all over the country reject the construction of behemoth data centers that are designed to meet the astronomical energy demands of the ai and cryptocurrency industries     this is where sanders proposes to intervene  in late march  with representative alexandria ocasio cortez  d ny   he proposed legislation to establish a national moratorium on the construction of data centers       but this is about much more than data centers   ldquo bottom line  we cannot sit back and allow a handful of billionaire big tech oligarchs to make decisions that will reshape our economy  our democracy  and the future of humanity  rdquo  the senator says  arguing that a federal moratorium mdash along with state and local interventions and the growing movement for international regulatory treaties mdash can slow down the self serving rush of ai fabulists and profiteers        ldquo congress has a moral obligation  rdquo  aoc says   ldquo to stand with the american people and stop the expansion of these data centers until we have a framework to adequately address the existential harm ai poses to our society  we must choose humanity over profit  rdquo     yes  we must<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ai-regulation-legislative-framework/">“The Nation” Is Siding With Humanity</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 07 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ai-regulation-legislative-framework/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Why I Believe the Senate Must Reject the SAVE America Act]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/save-america-act-voter-disenfranchisement/]]></link>
		<author>Rep. Gwen Moore</author>
	<date>Apr 7, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The so called SAVE America Act is nothing short of Jim Crow 2026.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["The so called save america act is nothing short of jim crow 2026      voters arrives to cast their ballots during the illinois primary election on march 17  2026       polling consistently shows that americans rsquo  top concern is the cost of living  especially housing and healthcare  the president has made life more expensive by embroiling the united states in an unjustified war with iran  driving gas prices even higher  a reasonable voter may conclude that republicans in congress  who control the house and senate and are facing abysmal polling  would be focused on ending the war and helping lower costs for americans       those voters would be wrong     instead  republicans are singularly obsessed with disenfranchising millions of voters ahead of the 2026 midterms     how obsessed  trump rsquo s recent executive order aims to change mail ballot laws and would establish a list of voters in each state he deems  ldquo eligible  rdquo  he  along with congressional republicans  are desperate to undermine free and fair elections and control who can vote  trump rsquo s allies in congress frame the so called save america act as an  ldquo election integrity rdquo  bill that simply requires an id to vote  that is wildly deceptive because their bill is  in fact  a full frontal assault on the fundamental right of americans to cast a ballot in future elections  including the 2026 midterms     americans could not use a driver rsquo s license  or even a real id driver rsquo s license  instead  they would need a passport or a birth certificate to register to vote  and the name must match on each document  this would put millions of married women at risk of losing their right to vote  us service members could not use a military id to register to vote  nor could native americans use a tribe issued id     millions of americans don rsquo t have access to their birth certificates or passports  half of americans don rsquo t own a passport  and it costs  on average   130 to obtain one  meaning this legislation is little more than a jim crow ndash style  ldquo poll tax rdquo  for millions of low income americans  this would come as working people struggle to pay for food  gas  housing  and childcare because of trump rsquo s failed economic policies and unnecessary wars       the save act also overrides state election law  such as wisconsin rsquo s  which allows voters to register to vote same day  online  or by mail  a policy that is especially helpful to voters with disabilities and rural voters  it grants unprecedented power to an executive branch that has peddled voter fraud conspiracies  tried to blackmail states for election data  and relitigated trump rsquo s 2020 election loss through efforts like fbi raids in georgia and arizona     specifically  this legislation would force state governments to hand over their voter files to the secretary of the department of homeland security  a dubious proposition under the us constitution     the architect of this legislation  representative bryan steil  who represents my birthplace of racine  wisconsin  would be disenfranchising his constituents  and millions of other americans     despite republican claims  actual cases of vote fraud are extremely rare  according to numerous studies  for example  the conservative heritage foundation did a comprehensive study tracking voter fraud going back 25 years and found actual instances of fraudulent votes to be  0000845 percent  which is 36 instances of fraudulent votes out of 42 626  379 ballots cast       the so called save america act is nothing short of jim crow 2026  don rsquo t believe me mdash take the word of republican speaker of the house mike johnson  who was recently caught on a hot mic giddily remarking that the save act would disenfranchise up to 18 percent of the electorate in 2026 the election administration and voting survey 2022 comprehensive report says that approximately 112 million votes were cast in that midterm election  if you do simple math  you can see that republicans estimate that the save america act would disenfranchise more than 20 million americans      don rsquo t believe republicans when they tell you the save america act is just a voter id bill  it is something far more insidious and uglier  free and fair elections and equal access to the ballot box are the cornerstones of our democracy  which is why i voted against both versions in the house and believe that all americans should oppose this legislation<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/save-america-act-voter-disenfranchisement/">Why I Believe the Senate Must Reject the SAVE America Act</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 07 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/save-america-act-voter-disenfranchisement/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Why Fascists Fear Free Speech]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/brendan-carr-trump-iran-war-censorship/]]></link>
		<author>Greg Ruggiero</author>
	<date>Apr 7, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The White House is following an old authoritarian playbook to suppress dissent.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["The white house is following an old authoritarian playbook to suppress dissent      a mobile billboard assails the censorship regime of fcc chair brendan carr outside the agency s headquarters in washington  dc       in his previously unreleased preface to animal farm  discovered by ian angus in 1972 and published later that year by the times literary supplement  george orwell wrote   ldquo if liberty means anything at all  it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear  rdquo       as an anti fascist  orwell most likely meant that liberty means the right to tell people in power what they do not want to hear  most americans would agree that the right to question authority is a nonnegotiable premise of democracy  but one that has met with repression throughout our history and even more so now  during wartime     evidence of that repression is quietly mounting all around us  among the more alarming examples is the federal government rsquo s recent threat to revoke broadcasting licenses if the administration finds content displeasing      in march  brendan carr  the head of the federal communications commission  fcc   warned that broadcasters could lose their licenses if their reporting fails to comply with maga doctrine   ldquo broadcasters that are running hoaxes and news distortions mdash also known as the fake news mdash have a chance now to correct course before their license renewals come up  rdquo  carr posted on x   ldquo the law is clear  broadcasters must operate in the public interest  and they will lose their licenses if they do not  rdquo     on truth social  the president seconded that threat  accusing some media organizations of being  ldquo corrupt and highly unpatriotic rdquo  and whining that they  ldquo get billions of dollars of free american airwaves  and use it to perpetuate lies  rdquo  trump concluded by referencing the reality series he once hosted   ldquo as i used to say in the apprentice   lsquo fired  rsquo  rdquo     these comments suggest that maga officials now fear free speech and may consider those who use it as potential criminals or enemies      as the late great bob mcchesney would often remind us  the federal communications commission has a mandate to manage the airwaves in the people rsquo s interest  not those of big business or the president  the  ldquo no kings rdquo  purpose of the declaration of independence and constitution is to distribute power  not concentrate it  a mission augmented by independent media     the supreme court has consistently ruled that the federal government cannot punish news organizations mdash or anyone else mdash for oppositional viewpoints  the first amendment rsquo s protection of press freedoms would be little more than ink on the page if officials could cancel broadcasting licenses whenever coverage aimed to keep them in check       fascists fear free speech  and fear is the source of carr rsquo s demand that broadcasters  ldquo correct course  rdquo  such language echoes a familiar pattern in systems that treat democracy as the enemy  first  authorities insist that the media must align with official narratives  then they demand the same obeisance from the general population     press freedom advocates recognized the danger immediately  will creeley wrote   ldquo brendan carr rsquo s authoritarian warning mdash that networks risk their broadcasting licenses for iran war reporting that the government doesn rsquo t like mdash is outrageous  rdquo  when government demands the press  ldquo become a state mouthpiece under the threat of punishment  rdquo  he said   ldquo something has gone very wrong  rdquo     california rsquo s governor gavin newsom warned that  ldquo if trump doesn rsquo t like your coverage of the war  his fcc will pull your broadcast license  that is flagrantly unconstitutional  rdquo     hawaii senator brian schatz described carr rsquo s statement as  ldquo a clear directive to provide positive war coverage or else licenses may not be renewed  rdquo     democratic senator edward j  markey of massachusetts immediately wrote a public letter to carr saying his threat to revoke licenses is  ldquo your latest authoritarian attempt to weaponize the fcc rsquo s statutory authority to censor the media  it is a stain on the fcc rsquo s storied history  and you should resign  rdquo     their concerns were preceded by a bipartisan group of fcc commissioners who warned in november 2025 that the mere  ldquo specter of government interference alone chills broadcasters rsquo  speech  rdquo     as a former pamphleteer  pirate radio broadcaster  and low power fm advocate who took the fcc to court to preserve the public rsquo s right to access the airwaves at the community level  i believe deeply in the free and unfettered use of radio  libraries  streets  and public parks as spaces for challenging power and imagining new ways of being  learning  and loving  we are now gradually losing ground in many of these spaces     existential threats to democracy emerge not only through attempted coups like the one staged on january 6  2021  but also through smaller  incremental acts  a few unjustified arrests here  a few ice killings there  along with the quiet criminalization of those who  like the un special rapporteur francesca albanese  dare to expose the atrocities caused by our policies  no one act may irrefutably prove full blown fascism has arrived  but what does that really matter if you or your loved ones are among those who have been threatened  disappeared  silenced  or killed     the president rsquo s propagandists insist that the fcc simply expects broadcasters to serve the public interest  but in a constitutional democracy  the public interest cannot mean blind obedience to the boss  challenging official narratives serves the public interest mdash especially in wartime  when governments feel compelled to control information and deflect public outrage from horrors like the killing of 165 iranian schoolgirls in a war that was not authorized by the people rsquo s representatives in congress       the tilt toward orwellian censorship underscores a broader shift concerning the meaning of trust in the media  carr suggests that tighter control is the solution for broadcasters rsquo  straying from the administration rsquo s version of events  but conforming to official doctrine can never render journalism credible  if anything  the opposite is true  credibility depends on the public knowing that reporters are free to pursue investigations wherever they lead mdash particularly during wartime mdash without the fear of death threats  losing one rsquo s job  or worse     threatening to silence broadcasters mdash or anyone else mdash for critiquing the atrocities being committed in our name erases democratic accountability and replaces it with a demand for obedience     it was heartening  therefore  when  on march 17  2026  joe kent  a combat veteran and former cia officer  refused to continue taking orders from the president and quit his job as maga rsquo s director of the national counterterrorism center  in a letter of protest addressed directly to the president and sent to over 430 000 online followers  kent said   ldquo i cannot in good conscience support the ongoing war in iran  iran posed no imminent threat to our nation  rdquo  the rationale for going to war  kent explained  was based on a  ldquo lie rdquo  similar to the lies once used to draw the us into a  ldquo disastrous iraq war that cost our nation the lives of thousands of our best men and women  rdquo  we can only hope that kent rsquo s refusal to go along with the lies will be emulated by others in the maga regime     the framers crafted a constitution that protects our right not only to freely critique those in power  but also to freely reimagine power itself  this opened space for what w e b  du bois  angela davis  and others have called  ldquo abolition democracy rdquo  mdash one capable of shedding the violence of settler colonial legacies and advancing new frontiers of liberation based on solidarity  community  human affirmation  and love     while those legacies dominate  telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act  the truth today is that we live in an age of creeping fascism  genocide  and war  pretending otherwise is a form of complicity  keeping the publicly owned airwaves open as a space to challenge a dystopian agenda is the true and revolutionary purpose of democracy and free speech  and we should infuse all of our movements with tactics for their defense<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/brendan-carr-trump-iran-war-censorship/">Why Fascists Fear Free Speech</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 07 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/brendan-carr-trump-iran-war-censorship/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[As AI Breathes Down Our Necks, It’s Time for a Luddite Renaissance]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/ai-luddites-bernie-sanders/]]></link>
		<author>John Nichols</author>
	<date>Apr 7, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Nineteenth-century textile workers longed to stay human in a machine age. So do we.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Nineteenth century textile workers longed to stay human in a machine age  so do we      rage against the machine  the luddites rsquo  apocryphal leader  ned ludd  was a weaver who was said to have smashed two knitting frames in a fit of anger       vermont senator bernie sanders became the first federal legislator to seriously challenge the lurch by big tech oligarchs into the uncharted territories of artificial intelligence when he issued a call in december for a  ldquo moratorium on the construction of data centers that are powering the unregulated sprint to develop and deploy ai  rdquo  his reasoned argument mdash that a moratorium is necessary  ldquo to slow it down rdquo  and  ldquo give democracy a chance to catch up rdquo  mdash echoes the sentiments of a growing number of americans who have come to see ai less as a promise than a threat  yet sanders was hit with immediate  and strikingly vitriolic  pushback from the tribunes of the billionaire class       dismissing the concerns that he raised mdash and despite the fact that many of the defining figures in the development of ai have expressed similar sentiments mdash fox news rsquo s stuart varney rushed to label sanders as  ldquo economically illiterate  rdquo  while other corporate friendly conservatives tagged him as  ldquo the nation rsquo s foremost avatar of reactionary socialism  rdquo  accused him of engaging in  ldquo ai doomerism rdquo  and  ldquo nimby type rdquo  reasoning  and concluded that he might just be peddling  ldquo the most poisonously stupid idea of the year  rdquo  then they hurled the ultimate insult that contemporary elites can muster when the american people and their elected representatives start to question tech bro definitions of  ldquo progress  rdquo  sanders  they announced  was  ldquo a luddite  rdquo     in an editorial headlined  ldquo bernie sanders rsquo s worst idea yet  rdquo  the washington post fumed that  ldquo a national ban on new ai data centers would make the luddites look good  rdquo  this was not the first time that the label had been attached to him  a few months earlier  after sanders and democratic staffers on the senate health  education  labor  and pensions committee had issued a report warning that ai could eliminate 100 million us jobs  the notion was savaged by an american enterprise institute commentator as an example of  ldquo luddite legerdemain  rdquo       never mind that anthropic ceo dario amodei had already speculated  in may of 2025  that the rise of ai could eliminate half of all white collar entry level jobs and lead to unemployment rates as high as 20 percent  and would explain that  ldquo ai isn rsquo t a substitute for specific human jobs but rather a general labor substitute for humans  rdquo  or that bill gates had predicted in march of 2025 that humans  ldquo won rsquo t be needed for most things  rdquo  social media critics ripped sanders on mega billionaire elon musk rsquo s x platform  declaring that  ldquo socialists are the new luddites rdquo  and claiming that sanders was bent on  ldquo cornering the luddite vote  rdquo     with so much vitriol coming his way  it was perhaps understandable that the senator would announce   ldquo i am not a luddite  rdquo     but there rsquo s no shame in being a luddite mdash or  to be more precise  in being an heir to the luddite tradition of refusing to accept the adoption of new technologies simply because capitalists decide to impose them on workers     unfair use  actors went on strike in 2023 against film and television studios  partly over concerns about the use of artificial intelligence     elite opinion writers may still dismiss the luddites as unthinking reactionaries who sought to wreck the machinery of the dawning industrial revolution  but many of the most tech savvy observers of the dawning ai era are expressing admiration for the 19th century weavers and mechanics of northern england  who fought to prevent the dislocation and wage cuts that the factory owning oligarchs of their day called  ldquo progress  rdquo  on campuses across the country  new luddite and neo luddite clubs have been formed by students who have grown up with smartphones and are justifiably concerned about what rsquo s coming their way  after the writers guild of america waged a prescient struggle in 2023 to prevent media conglomerates from using ai technologies to capture their creativity and then toss them into the dustbin of history mdash a fight that anticipated the hollywood reporter rsquo s blunt declaration in 2024 that  ldquo generative artificial intelligence is killing jobs in hollywood  with little relief on the horizon  rdquo  and the more recent reports linking ai consolidation and cost cutting to tens of thousands of layoffs in the media and entertainment industry mdash the actor and documentary filmmaker alex winter wrote   ldquo the term luddite is often used incorrectly to describe an exhausted and embittered populace that wants technology to go away  but the actual luddites were highly engaged with technology and skilled at using it in their work in the textile industry  they weren rsquo t an anti tech movement but a pro labor movement  fighting to prevent the exploitation and devaluation of their work by rapacious company overlords  if you want to know how to fix the problems we face from ai and other technology  become genuinely and deeply involved  become a luddite  rdquo  the artist and activist molly crabapple  who in 2023 helped organize an open letter urging publishers to restrict their use of ai generated illustrations  adopted a similar view  explaining   ldquo that stereotypical definition of a luddite as some stupid worker who smashes machines because they rsquo re dumb  that was concocted by bosses  rdquo  the year before  the writer cory doctorow argued   ldquo the luddites did what every science fiction writer does  they took a technology and imagined all the different ways it could be used mdash who it could be used for and whom it could be used against  they demanded the creation of a parallel universe in which the left fork was taken  rather than the right  that is many things  but it is not technophobic  using  lsquo luddite rsquo  as a synonym for technophobe is an historically insupportable libel  rdquo     today rsquo s luddite renaissance comes as little surprise  given the anxiety over ai  but this is not the first time that people have looked to the leather aproned croppers who resisted the power looms of another era  going back to the 1950s  activists have looked to the luddites rsquo  example in times when new technologies mdash from nuclear weapons to the internet mdash have upended our lives  the bosses have done their best to portray the luddites as ignorant and self serving laborers who clung to a dying past mdash and much of the media still does  but that mischaracterization was always an example of the  ldquo enormous condescension of posterity rdquo  that the great historians of the english working class e p  and dorothy thompson  who were partners in life and in scholarship  long ago upended  in the middle of the last century  the thompsons shined a new light on the luddite uprisings that swept nottinghamshire  lancashire  and the west riding of yorkshire from 1811 to 1816  as the industrial revolution gathered steam  textile workers who had used their own machines mdash working in their homes and in small shops mdash to clothe england and the world were suddenly confronted with a future in which they would be crowded into a new kind of workplace  the factory  inside the new textile mills  they  and frequently their children  would toil long hours for reduced pay on the mechanized shearing machines and automated power looms that were their era rsquo s technological wonders  the luddites were no fools  they correctly anticipated the future that william king described in 1829 in his newspaper the co operator   ldquo if then the machine which i work produces as much as a thousand men  i ought to enjoy the produce of a thousand men  but no such thing  i am working a machine which i know will starve me  rdquo     spun out  textile workers made their livings at home before they were crowded into factories to work the new automated machinery during the industrial revolution     the weavers and mechanics who gathered by moonlight atop the west pennine moors near bolton and in the upstairs rooms of the shears inn at liversedge in the west riding of yorkshire were unwilling to cede their futures to the oligarchs of a nascent industrial revolution  amid an economic depression that had already slashed their wages and impoverished their families  they were determined to fight against the denial of their rights mdash and their humanity mdash by industrialists who adopted new technologies without the slightest care for the disruption of society  their uprising followed mass protests and petition campaigns demanding that the government and employers provide living wages and protections for the workers who were being exploited in what william blake aptly described as  ldquo dark satanic mills  rdquo  after their petitions were rejected  the luddites gathered by the thousands and marched on the mills to break the new machines  smashing them in riotous agitations that terrified industrialists and parliamentarians     those sledgehammer blows against the industrial revolution earned the luddites a place in history  but their struggle was always about more than a simplistic rejection of the new  rather  it was a movement of engaged and informed skilled workers who opposed an economic and social transformation that promised to enrich the wealthiest men of their time while dispossessing an entire class of handloom weavers and their families  they organized demonstrations and petitioned government officials for increased wages  an end to child labor abuses  and the right to form  ldquo combinations rdquo   unions  of workers  their anti oligarchical energy and penchant for direct action led one of their champions  a young lord byron  to compare the luddites to  ldquo the liberty lads o rsquo er the sea rdquo  mdash the revolutionary americans who had overturned british colonialism mdash and to argue that british workers  ldquo will die fighting  or live free  rdquo  under the banner of  ldquo down with all kings but king ludd  rdquo     there was  it should be added  no such person  the first luddites concocted the story of a young textile maker named ned ludd who  when ordered to speed up his work and sacrifice its quality by a boss  instead smashed the mechanical knitting machines to which he was assigned  as the tactic spread during the luddites rsquo  five years of industrial unrest  they adopted the name along with elaborate disguises and a strategy of stealthy nighttime raids  they did so to cloak the identities of the leaders and members of a labor movement that faced brutal repression  including laws that were enacted to punish their activism with the death penalty or forced expulsion to australian prison colonies  an elaborate spy network that offered rewards to bounty hunters  and an ever expanding military presence that would eventually see 12 000 troops stationed in the textile towns of northern england  like the earlier sons of liberty in what would become the united states  the luddites organized secretly and targeted the economic interests of their overlords  as the americans had dumped the british east india company rsquo s tea into boston harbor  the luddites broke the gig mills and shearing frames in factories from marsden to lancashire  what the historian eric hobsbawm called  ldquo collective bargaining by riot rdquo  was not an example of a working class movement that  ldquo did not know what it was doing  but merely reacted  blindly and gropingly  to the pressure of misery  rdquo  on the contrary  hobsbawm explained  it was a response to the imposition of a new technology that workers rightly foresaw would make their lives worse by sacrificing them to cross a certain  ldquo threshold of profit  rdquo         the luddites rsquo  decision to destroy machines was much debated and decried in their time  though it arguably has scant relevance to our own  as richard conniff observed some years ago in his seminal smithsonian essay  ldquo what the luddites really fought against  rdquo   ldquo our uneasy protests against technology almost inevitably take technological form  we worry about whether violent computer games are warping our children  then decry them by tweet  text or facebook post  we try to simplify our lives by shopping at the local farmers market mdash then haul our organic arugula home in a prius  college students take out their earbuds to discuss how technology dominates their lives  but when a class ends  loyola university of chicago professor steven e  jones notes  their cellphones all come to life  screens glowing in front of their faces   lsquo and they migrate across the lawns like giant schools of cyborg jellyfish  rsquo  rdquo     if i had a hammer  luddites destroy wool and cotton mills and mechanized looms in nottingham  england  in 1811     if destroying the machine itself is not in our future  what can we learn from the luddites that is relevant for today  start with the notion that the luddite resistance to  ldquo progress for the sake of progress rdquo  was defined by a longing to remain human in a machine age  that premise makes them a touchstone for 21st century bank clerks and delivery drivers  actors and architects  autoworkers and nurses  who all fret about whether they rsquo ll have a place in an ai generated future   ldquo we should be luddites  rdquo  brian merchant  a tech journalist  columnist  critic  and the author of the 2023 book blood in the machine  the origins of the rebellion against big tech  argued in an article in time   ldquo the luddites were making a powerful complaint  if we reclaim what they were actually trying to say  we can apply the lessons of their story to today  and prevent a lot of misery  rdquo       the great value of the luddites for the purposes of our contemporary discourse is that they mounted an informed resistance to a warped definition of progress that threatened not just their livelihoods but their humanity  that is the same recognition that today animates tech savvy advocates for placing guardrails on ai  gavin mueller  a scholar of digital media and culture who teaches at the university of amsterdam and has written extensively about the luddites  is right to remind us that  ldquo behind ai skepticism is a larger question  what kind of future do we want to have  rdquo     we are all under pressure to accept the inevitability of an ai generated future  this year rsquo s super bowl advertising was a parade of paeans to artificial intelligence  the billboards that light up times square in new york city offer larger than life  brighter than the sun  24 7 promotions for this new technology  ai companions will give you  ldquo someone who listens  responds  and supports you  rdquo  global leaders are  ldquo scaling with ai  rdquo  employers will soon  ldquo stop hiring humans rdquo  because  ldquo the era of ai employees is here  rdquo     yet americans aren rsquo t buying it     a december 2025 yougov poll found that 77 percent of americans view ai as a possible threat to humanity  a yougov economist survey from february found that 74 percent of respondents think ai will hurt the economy  and 63 percent think it will eliminate jobs  a poll by bentley gallup found that an overwhelming majority of americans  79 percent  have no faith in private companies to use ai responsibly       that rsquo s a lot of people that the washington post rsquo seditorial page would disparage as  ldquo luddites  rdquo  or maybe  if we rsquo re willing to put aside the post and consider the actual history of the industrial revolution  that rsquo s a lot of reason for hope that if we embrace our skepticism  we might build a mass movement to get this technological revolution right     the story of the luddites offers an intellectual antidote to the anxiety of an age when our experience of the digital and social media revolutions has given us reason to doubt the promise that every new technology will make our lives better  there is now broad acceptance that the disinformation streaming from our screens has coarsened our politics and  ldquo mainstreamed rdquo  racism and xenophobia  as studies tell us that social media addictions threaten our mental health  and as schools ban smartphones in a desperate attempt to regain the attention of our children  millions of americans have come to the realization mdash through bitter experience mdash that new technologies should be greeted with skepticism and regulation  instead of bending to the dictates of silicon valley rsquo s trillionaires in waiting  an emerging consensus suggests that we just might want to consider the wisdom of slowing down the headlong rush toward an ai dominated future with dramatically fewer jobs  more surveillance  and a military industrial complex that cranks out autonomous killing machines     for the luddites rsquo  story to be useful  however  it is necessary to toss aside the stereotypes that were on display in the reaction to sanders rsquo s advocacy for a perfectly reasonable slowdown in data center construction  there rsquo s a compelling argument to be made that to be a modern luddite is to be on the right side of history mdash even if history has not been particularly kind to the luddites   ldquo history is written by the winners  rdquo  george orwell reminded us  and rarely has there been a more successful smearing of a movement than the one that targeted the luddites  who were decried in their day by the british authorities as  ldquo evil minded persons hellip assembled together in riotous manner rdquo  who had created a  ldquo spirit of disorder  rdquo     the luddites did create their share of disorder with those midnight raids on the dark satanic mills  but what matters for our own day is the disorder that the luddites were opposing  which lord byron encapsulated when he declared   ldquo we must not allow mankind to be sacrificed to improvements in mechanism  rdquo<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/ai-luddites-bernie-sanders/">As AI Breathes Down Our Necks, It’s Time for a Luddite Renaissance</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 07 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/ai-luddites-bernie-sanders/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The AI Sector’s Crass Bid for Media Domination]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ai-techonology-business-and-programming-network-podcasts/]]></link>
		<author>David Futrelle</author>
	<date>Apr 6, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>When you’re a galactically rich tech mogul upset with adverse press coverage, you just buy yourself more flattering media outlets.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["When you rsquo re a galactically rich tech mogul upset with adverse press coverage  you just buy yourself more flattering media outlets      a chatgpt assistant display on a laptop        ldquo freedom of the press  rdquo  a j  liebling famously wrote   ldquo is guaranteed only to those who own one  rdquo  this pithy observation from one of liebling rsquo s 1960  ldquo wayward press rdquo  columns in the new yorker sums up a great deal about how journalism is transacted under the pressures of american capitalism  but the gist of it has to hit different if you have several hundred million dollars sitting around and a reputation that could use a bit of burnishing       openai  the company behind chatgpt  announced last week that it was buying technology business programming network  tbpn   a daily internet talk show known for its puffball interviews with silicon valley execs and hopeful tech entrepreneurs  hosted by two former start up founders  jordi hays and john coogan  openai shelled out something in the  ldquo low hundreds of millions rdquo  for the show  according to the financial times mdash a figure likely in the same range as the  250 million that jeff bezos spent buying the washington post in 2013  the then venerable if troubled paper had a weekday circulation around 450 000 at the time  tbpn  only about a year and a half old  reaches somewhere on the order of 70 000 viewers per show  mostly on x and youtube  it does  however  have a huge gong  which the six foot eight coogan  the taller of the two hosts  will bang upon to mark any good news guests bring with them to the show   hays  for his part  has a soundboard      given that openai just took in  110 billion in new funding  gong    valuing the company at some  840 billion  a couple hundred million dollars is more or less a rounding error  but what does an ai lab hope to get from ownership of a tech podcast  the company insists that it rsquo s going to respect tbpn rsquo s  ldquo editorial independence  rdquo  such as it is  but it rsquo s pretty clear openai isn rsquo t altogether happy with the media coverage it rsquo s been getting lately  the general run of openai coverage these days tends to focus on things like the numerous lawsuits the company faces from the families of former chatgpt users allegedly driven to suicide by its sociopathic prompts  as well as the company rsquo s cravenly speedy move to sign a lucrative contract with the pentagon in late february after its rival anthropic lost a similar deal for taking a small stand against autonomous killer drones and mass domestic surveillance     in an official statement  openai rsquo s fidji simo said that the deal was all about  ldquo creat a space for a real  constructive conversation about the changes ai creates  rdquo  this appears to be a jargon laden way of saying the company intends to lead conversations that don rsquo t include any actual journalists  who are known even in silicon valley for sometimes asking the sorts of questions that tech ceos would rather not answer in public  of course  tbpn should be well suited for its new role as a wholly owned media entity given that the show is  ldquo already so dedicated to cheerleading for the rich and powerful people in tech as to have been indistinguishable from marketing  rdquo  as patrick redford of defector acidly put it     openai isn rsquo t the first tech company to adopt a strategy of  ldquo going direct rdquo  mdash a maneuver that by and large bypasses  well  the media in favor of blogs and podcasts under corporate control  no one has embraced  ldquo going direct rdquo  more insistently than the venture capitalists at andreessen horowitz  and their story helps illustrate both the promise and the pitfalls of this particular path     the firm  known widely as a16z  spent the first few years after its founding in 2009 assiduously courting the press with the help of a dedicated and skillful press whisperer named margit wennmachers  she managed  among other things  to get the new yorker to devote considerable real estate to a laudatory story about cofounder marc andreessen  labeled  ldquo tomorrow rsquo s advance man  rdquo  in 2015  but the company began to sour on what it now derisively labels the  ldquo legacy media rdquo  not long after  when reporters started raising critical questions about one of a16z rsquo s portfolio companies  zenefits  and about the much hyped venture fund itself  so instead of  ldquo trying to get reporters to write the right things  rdquo  as andreessen put it in a recent interview  the firm started hiring journalists to run its own media operation  devoting so much energy to the project that some people began referring to a16z as a media company that just happened to do some venture capital investing on the side       in 2021  a16z tried to take its  ldquo new media rdquo  strategy to the next level by launching future com  a sleek web publication that wennmachers suggested would become  ldquo the go to place for understanding and building the future  rdquo   hence  presumably  the name   soon  she said at the launch  tech entrepreneurs would be asking themselves  ldquo should i try to get this into the new york times  or should i get it into future  rdquo     the site sputtered out in less than a year and a half  apparently the teeming millions of techbros weren rsquo t lining up to read relentlessly positive takes on such topics as  ldquo how to know your users as you grow rdquo  and  ldquo what synthetic embryos can and can rsquo t do  rdquo  as bloomberg rsquo s brad stone noted   ldquo it doesn rsquo t always end well when you hire people to tell the world how great you are  future com  from my periodic glances  is a snooze fest  rdquo     the future com debacle didn rsquo t really alter a16z rsquo s big plans for media domination  the company just shifted direction  and returned to pushing its podcasts and blog posts on its own site  as always  andreessen horowitz continues talking a big game mdash selling its  ldquo new media rdquo  team hard to startup founders as  ldquo the best turnkey media operation in venture  hellip  we offer an extensive menu of services for our portfolio companies  up and down the new media stack  that add up to one experience   lsquo shipping a great story  rsquo  rdquo   i think you may see what stone was getting at with that  ldquo snooze fest rdquo  remark      speaking of snooze fests  some worry that an openai owned version of tbpn might lose whatever spark its fans now think it has   frankly  i don rsquo t see much of a spark there now  though i am very much not part of the show rsquo s target demo   but i think the show may face an even bigger challenge in the form of one elon musk  tbpn  you may recall  gets most of its current audience on x  and musk  who owns x  is not what you rsquo d call a big fan of openai or its ceo sam altman  indeed  musk  one of the original investors in the company  is suing altman and other openai bigwigs for  134 billion for allegedly lying to him about keeping the company a nonprofit  openai is countersuing him for harassment  musk  a deeply vindictive man  is widely reported to have sometimes used his control of x rsquo s algorithm to throttle the traffic of media outlets and even individual accounts on the site that he dislikes  if he decides to do the same to the openai owned tbpn  it will likely trigger a singularly petty clash of press owning titans  on the plus side  i guess  the ensuing drama would prove far more interesting than anything you rsquo d hear on a tbpn podcast<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ai-techonology-business-and-programming-network-podcasts/">The AI Sector’s Crass Bid for Media Domination</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Mon, 06 Apr 2026 14:48:09 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ai-techonology-business-and-programming-network-podcasts/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Trump vs. Peace]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-vs-peace/]]></link>
		<author>Felipe Galindo</author>
	<date>Apr 6, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[From peace candidate to war president.]]></teaser> 
	<thumb_image>https://www.thenation.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/4-6_FEAT_1440-275x173.jpg</thumb_image>
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	<description>
	<![CDATA["Check out all installments in the oppart series<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-vs-peace/">Trump vs. Peace</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Mon, 06 Apr 2026 12:30:56 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-vs-peace/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Jay McInerney’s Yuppie New York]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/jay-mcinerney-see-you-on-other-side-novel/]]></link>
		<author>Erin Somers</author>
	<date>Apr 6, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The novelist has spent a career mocking and romanticizing the lifestyle of New York's bourgeoisie. Now, in his latest, he examines them as they come to the end of their lives.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
	<thumb_image>https://www.thenation.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/EISENBERG-McInerney-Somers-275x173.jpg</thumb_image>
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	<description>
	<![CDATA["The novelist has spent a career mocking and romanticizing the lifestyle of new york s bourgeoisie  now  in his latest  he examines them as they come to the end of their lives      illustration by liam eisenberg       jay mcinerney rsquo s latest novel  see you on the other side  opens mdash humorously  fittingly mdash at the odeon in manhattan   ldquo stepping out of the cab into the twilight  rdquo  mcinerney writes   ldquo he felt a rush of nostalgia at the sight of the red and white neon sign hovering above west broadway like an old movie title materializing on a dark screen  rdquo     the glamorous tribeca brasserie was made famous  or maybe more famous  in mcinerney rsquo s zippy  funny 1984 debut  bright lights  big city  a work that  alongside bret easton ellis rsquo s less than zero  came to define an era and an attitude  it was the 1980s  bratty literary boys in blazers did cocaine in various downtown new york hot spots  for readers who have not engaged with mcinerney rsquo s work since then  it may come as a surprise  or not  that he has returned to the source mdash that is  the odeon mdash many times     plenty of writers spend their careers circling the same preoccupations  the same geographical locations  the same set of human problems  but it is rare to find the novelist who has done so on such a hyper specific level  at least four of mcinerney rsquo s nine novels involve the same neon lit patch of ground on west broadway and thomas street     see you on the other side is the fourth  and likely the last  in mcinerney rsquo s calloway series  which follows the manhattan  ldquo golden couple rdquo  russell and corrine calloway over the course of a long marriage  reading it  i wondered how mcinerney could possibly wring any new observations out of the same neighborhood  social milieu  and marriage  could he perform a miracle and hit us with something new and profound about the odeon rsquo s mahogany bar and legendary bathroom  about staying married in spite of manhattan rsquo s many hazards  about going out in new york and growing old there         the novel opens in the early days of covid  as the virus bears down on the city  russell and corrine  now in their 60s  arrive at the odeon to celebrate their old friend washington lee rsquo s 35th wedding anniversary  russell rsquo s career has apparently flourished since we last met him  he now runs a publishing house  while corrine  formerly a stockbroker  works for a nonprofit dealing with hunger  they have just moved from a town house in harlem to a downtown apartment after the departure of their adult children     the virus  at this point  is still a vague threat  the calloways and their friends are not yet acclimated to the idea of social distancing or to the elbow bump  the  ldquo new greeting in this time of incipient plague rdquo   they keep forgetting and kissing each other rsquo s cheeks  but sharp  sensitive corrine is nevertheless worried   ldquo she was very concerned about the virus that had infiltrated their city  rdquo  mcinerney writes   ldquo convinced that it posed a serious threat  and as they gingerly navigated the room  they found others who shared her concern  rdquo  it takes about 100 pages  but that concern is finally validated  corrine contracts the virus and has to quarantine in their new apartment  meanwhile  russell flirts with the idea of having an affair with a young novelist  russell is more or less always flirting with the idea of having an affair  and tries to hold the publishing house together       while the pandemic is everywhere in the book  see you on the other side proves to be a covid novel without much to say about life during covid  corrine weathers her bout with the virus  while russell grumbles about masking at citarella  his fellow shoppers  he notes  look like  ldquo japanese commuters  rdquo  the book rsquo s style is reference heavy without being especially satirical  a catalog of cultural figures  magazines  restaurants  and nice wines  a non exhaustive list of mentions in the first half of the novel includes n 1  kanye west  harvey weinstein  the new york review of books  danny meyer  balthazar  the real housewives  dylan going electric  1996 montrachet  and lululemon     as for the characters themselves  even if we don rsquo t learn much about their inner lives  the book displays a deep affection for their external way of life   ldquo the aromas of dark roast coffee and bacon infused the kitchen like a spritz of morning perfume  rdquo  one chapter begins  russell belongs to a club of wine connoisseurs who bring their own bottles to per se  and he and corrine vacation in southampton  you get the impression that this is how mcinerney himself  a noted gourmand and the author of three books about wine  lives his life        after a slow burn beginning mdash there is a lot of wondering about whether covid will arrive mdash the book rushes to an ending  which deals with the death of a major character  a somewhat lackluster look at how the virus impacted well heeled manhattanites who mostly live by the scent of dark roast coffee and expensive bottles of white wine  see you on the other side doesn rsquo t appear to offer much besides providing a conclusion for the series  a compulsory finish to what mcinerney started more than three decades ago  we see how his golden couple live  but without knowing why     though to do justice to the novel  perhaps one must begin with the books that preceded it  published in 1992 and set in 1987  brightness falls may seem to be deliberately titled to remind the reader of bright lights  big city  but the novels are unrelated  the title comes from the thomas nashe poem  ldquo a litany in time of plague rdquo    ldquo brightness falls from the air    queens have died young and fair  rdquo  like see you on the other side  brightness falls is a plague novel  set in the midst of the aids epidemic       when we meet russell and corrine in brightness falls  they are newish brown university graduates  five years married and living in a prewar apartment on the upper east side  their friends think of them as  ldquo savvy pioneers of the matrimonial state  rdquo  they throw dinner parties that end in people passing out on their couch and try to remain sexually interested in each other  the book functions as a satire of the publishing and financial industries  ungainly russell mdash  ldquo crash calloway rdquo  to his friends mdash is a mid level editor at a small but prestigious publishing house  while elegant corrine works as a stockbroker selling junk bonds     reviewing the book for the new york times in 1992  cathleen schine described it as a  ldquo trash novel rdquo  as opposed to a serious one mdash more specifically   ldquo an easy  entertaining trash novel  rdquo  this assessment holds  brightness falls is mean  pulpy fun in the mode of the bonfire of the vanities  it takes on the greed and optimism of the 1980s  culminating in the historic stock market crash     after russell walks into his boss rsquo s office one day and finds him with his hand inside a young assistant rsquo s blouse  he catches the bullish spirit of the age and attempts a leveraged buyout of the company  this sets the plot in motion mdash russell trying to pull off the deal and falling for his sexy business partner  while corrine is left to her own devices downtown     the book ends on a melancholy note that reaches for shades of fitzgerald   ldquo whatever plenty befalls them together or separately in the future  rdquo  the last line intones   ldquo they will become more and more intimate with loss as the years accumulate  friends dying or slipping away undramatically into the crowded past  rdquo     despite the downbeat ending  the novel remains enough of an irreverent satire that this is what the reader might expect from its sequel  the good life  but something curious happens instead  mcinerney makes a 180 degree tonal shift from the comedic to the achingly sincere  to the book rsquo s detriment  his perspective on these characters morphs from mocking to compassionate  published in 2006  the good life is set in the shadow of 9 11  and yet it is less a time capsule of what happened in the months afterward than a portrait of how mdash at least in this novelist rsquo s view mdash irony had gone out of style  after their introduction in the previous book as self interested and self important yuppies  russell and corrine  but especially corrine  now attempt to become do gooders  the day after 9 11  corrine meets a rich finance guy named luke emerging from the smoke of ground zero   ldquo staggering up west broadway  coated head to foot in dun ash  he looked like a statue commemorating some ancient victory  or  more likely  some noble defeat  rdquo     the two start volunteering at a soup kitchen for first responders  then embark on an affair  it rsquo s love in the time of global catastrophe  we spend many  many pages with corrine and her paramour  following him to tennessee at one point  meeting his mom and learning  for some reason  about her own affair  russell  sidelined for most of the book  distractedly mourns the loss of a friend who died in the attacks     the book rsquo s overwhelming sentimentality results in such convoluted sentences as   ldquo  felt his eyes welling  charged with nostalgia for christmases past  even as he experienced an unholy yearning to share the rituals of this and future seasons with someone not present mdash someone with her own family  with her own history and traditions  all of which seemed at this freighted moment to weigh more than his own selfish desire  rdquo  perhaps it is this sentimentality that ends up keeping russell and corrine together  the affair wears on the calloways without tearing them apart     the third book in    the series  bright  precious days  is the least compelling of the four  if the first book embraces satire  and its sequel sincerity  then in bright  precious days we get a tepid mix of the two  we follow the continuing affair between luke and corrine  while russell attends  once again  to some trouble at the publishing house  there is a half hearted plotline about a fraudulent memoir  echoing james frey rsquo s a million little pieces scandal  there is a young short story writer from tennessee named jack  who is too broadly drawn to care about  mostly  the reader gets exhausted by how boring the calloways have become  corrine rsquo s love affair drags on  she contemplates an eye lift and eventually dumps luke  russell finds out about the affair  but the novel ends with their marriage intact yet again  nothing changes other than their habits of consumption  once inundated with credit card debt  russell is now drinking better wines and sipping lattes with hearts in the foam     taken in this context  then  see you on the other side is actually a pretty good book  it is the rabbit at rest of the series and deals  more than any of the other books  with aging and mortality  and it does so with less of the cloying mawkishness and melodrama of the previous two novels  characters start dropping dead abruptly and  ldquo undramatically  rdquo  fulfilling the prophecy of the final sentence of brightness falls  yet the calloways barely seem to care about these losses  let alone react  russell rsquo s wine club buddy drives his car into a tree out in the hamptons  later  mcinerney rsquo s sacramental substance  cocaine mdash so much fun back in the  rsquo 80s mdash kills off a promising young writer at the mckibbin lofts  we are almost up to the present  and now the cocaine is laced with fentanyl mdash the author rsquo s way of saying  i guess  that the party is truly over       does see you on the other side work on a stand alone basis  mostly not  characters pop in briefly  only to be killed off or otherwise quickly disposed of  we check in on the fate of corrine rsquo s sister  whom russell once habitually referred to as the  ldquo slutty little sister  rdquo  even though she donated the eggs that produced the calloways rsquo  children  if someone were to read just one of these books  i would suggest brightness falls  which is by far the most densely imagined and broadly comic  it also takes some interesting chances  containing a partial manuscript written by a friend of russell and corrine rsquo s  a comic set piece about a high profile photographer  and many antic  shifting points of view that sometimes work and sometimes don rsquo t     those readers following the series from the beginning will get some satisfaction in finding out how everyone ends up   the calloways rsquo  children  for instance  become a chef and a bernie bro   but overall  the final book can rsquo t compare to mcinerney rsquo s very best work  which is probably bright lights  big city  and it can rsquo t compare even to brightness falls  i mourned the softening of his once keen satirical eye  i kept thinking of patricia lockwood on john updike rsquo s oeuvre   ldquo i read on and on  rdquo  she wrote   ldquo waiting for him to become as good as he had been as a boy  rdquo       at a certain point  mcinerney seems to have run out of things to say about marriage  the stock market may crash and recover  buildings may fall and rise again  but the calloways rsquo  new york doesn rsquo t actually change all that much  there are still the benefits to attend  and the cocktail parties and dinners for their fancy  eclectic friends  the calloways still swing hard to get restaurant reservations and slightly out of reach beach vacations  they still cheat on each other and keep secrets and stay together      ldquo each marriage is a mystery  an iceberg of which only a fraction is visible from the outside  above the surface  rdquo  mcinerney writes early in see you on the other side  a metaphor unlikely to strike the reader as profound  couldn rsquo t the same be said about any individual or relationship     yet maybe what he rsquo s getting at in these books is that marriages largely don rsquo t change  they are more often static than dynamic  their patterns set in early  and the participants  if they stay together  are destined to repeat the same conflicts and the same actions over four novels rsquo  worth of life  it rsquo s a somber conclusion to what began as an exuberant and ironic project  it takes literal death to alter the calloways rsquo  marriage  at least they rsquo ll always have the odeon<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/jay-mcinerney-see-you-on-other-side-novel/">Jay McInerney’s Yuppie New York</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Mon, 06 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/jay-mcinerney-see-you-on-other-side-novel/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[What Is Artificial Intelligence Anyway?]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/artificial-intelligence-ai-paradox/]]></link>
		<author>Ben Tarnoff</author>
	<date>Apr 6, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Separating out the myths and facts of AI.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Separating out the myths and facts of ai      a facebook data center in swedish lapland       artificial intelligence is a nightmare to write about  it rsquo s not just the technical parts  which are complicated  or the fact that the field is moving fast enough to give most commentary on it a short shelf life  it rsquo s that the discourse is so extreme that trying to find one rsquo s footing in the scrum can feel hopeless  artificial intelligence is both a technology and a theology  and in its latter aspect  it too often resembles a doctrinal dispute among an assortment of shrieking priests       artificial intelligence will bring us heaven on earth or kill us all  it is the most important invention in human history or a scam  it will eliminate millions of jobs and produce permanent mass employment  or it will prove to be vastly overhyped  in which case the abrupt collapse of the technology rsquo s trillion dollar investment boom will tank the economy     we need careful nondenominational thinking to guide us through this mess  the computer scientist virginia dignum is well placed to play this role  currently a professor at umea university in sweden  she has been working in artificial intelligence since the 1980s  dignum is an expert on  ldquo responsible ai  rdquo  which studies how to create and use ai systems in ethical ways  and has written an often cited textbook on the subject  she is also an influential policy intellectual  having served as an ai adviser to various international organizations and initiatives  including the european commission  the united nations  and the world economic forum       in her new book  the ai paradox  dignum offers an overview of ai with particular attention to its social ramifications  each chapter is devoted to a different paradox that serves to illuminate a specific dimension of her theme  the  ldquo agreement paradox  rdquo  for instance  focuses on the surprisingly thorny question of what ai is in the first place   ldquo the more we explore ai  the harder it becomes to agree on its definition rdquo    while the  ldquo solution paradox rdquo  summarizes the pitfalls inherent in the tech industry rsquo s fondness for the technological fix   ldquo solving problems with technology often creates more problems rdquo       not all of dignum rsquo s paradoxes seem especially contradictory or counterintuitive  but together they form an effective and creative structure for the book  ai has become something of a cliche in recent years  by probing the riddles and antinomies that exist below the surface  dignum gives the general reader a truer gauge of the subject rsquo s depth  after all  the useful thing about paradoxes is how  as dignum notes  they  ldquo reveal that reality is rarely as simple as it seems  rdquo     the first paradox dignum presents is the one that holds the greatest significance for her and for many of her fellow humanists  the notion that ai does not diminish but in fact helps clarify what makes us human   ldquo the more ai can do  the more it highlights the irreplaceable nature of human intelligence  rdquo  she writes  ai is good at certain tasks  such as  ldquo data analysis  logical reasoning  and linguistic processing  rdquo  yet it struggles with others  especially those involving creativity  empathy   ldquo moral and ethical discernment  rdquo  the  ldquo capacity for complex reasoning  rdquo  and the  ldquo ability to reason about relationships between concepts  rdquo  this leads dignum to conclude that our  ldquo uniquely human traits rdquo  will never be  ldquo fully replaced  no matter how advanced ai becomes  rdquo  paradoxically  the growing sophistication of ai only serves to underscore our distinctiveness       this view places dignum within a tradition of humanist ai critique that is nearly as old as the field itself  since the inception of artificial intelligence in the 1950s  first as an academic pursuit and then a commercial one  its partisans have maintained that the mind is a machine and that  consequently  it is possible to endow a machine with the intelligence of a human  the humanists  mdash figures like the philosopher hubert dreyfus and the computer scientist joseph weizenbaum mdash have countered that  in fact  no matter what ai can or cannot do  it will never truly replicate the human mind because the human mind is nothing like a machine   ldquo the core difference lies not just in capabilities  but in the essence of being  rdquo  as dignum explains   ldquo ai calculates  while humans feel  ai iterates  while humans imagine  rdquo     this doesn rsquo t mean ai is useless  on the contrary  dignum is optimistic about the technology rsquo s potential  but fulfilling this potential requires seeing ai  ldquo as a complementary tool to human intelligence  not a replacement  rdquo  much like a calculator liberates us from the tedium of doing arithmetic by hand  ai rsquo s facility at finding patterns in data can free us up  ldquo to focus on more creative  strategic  and profound aspects of thinking  rdquo  dignum casts ai in a supporting role  as the helpmeet that handles the busywork so that we can spend more time exercising our higher mdash and  in her view  more distinctly human mdash functions     the tech industry  of course  has something else in mind  the vast sums of money flowing into the generative ai boom means that an acceptable return on investment can be attained only by putting large numbers of people out of work  companies need their computers to start acting and working like humans  the goal is not to enhance human labor but to purge as much of it as possible from production  it remains unclear to what extent this goal can be realized  at a minimum  ai coding tools such as claude code are permanently changing how software is written by making the process of programming much simpler and faster  the consequences for the employability of software engineers may be significant     because tech people tend to see programming as the hardest thing a human can do  ai rsquo s increasing proficiency in this area    is often taken as the harbinger of a fast approaching  ldquo artificial general intelligence rdquo   agi  or even  ldquo artificial superintelligence rdquo   asi   agi refers to the threshold at which ai will match the intelligence of a human  asi would be the point at which ai exceeds it  for dignum  such notions are ridiculous  she compares the idea of ai rsquo s  ldquo approximating or surpassing human intelligence rdquo  to the notion that  ldquo airplanes will soon be laying eggs  just because we keep improving their flying capabilities  rdquo  the analogy  ldquo highlights the absurdity of expecting a machine mdash a nonliving  mechanical artifact mdash to attain the full spectrum of human intelligence  rdquo       more profoundly  dignum argues that the concepts of agi and asi are rooted in a misunderstanding of the nature of human intelligence  the aspiration of today rsquo s ai firms is not only to replace human workers but to build something that goes well beyond them  a god in a box mdash a single technological system that knows  and can do  everything  but intelligence  dignum notes  can never emerge purely in isolation  it has always been a collective endeavor   ldquo our evolutionary history reveals that social behaviors like cooperation  communication  and group living were not just important for survival mdash they were the very foundation upon which our intelligence developed  rdquo  she writes   ldquo the more we chase agi  the more we discover that true superintelligence lies in human cooperation  rdquo  this is what she calls    the  ldquo superintelligence paradox rdquo  mdash another conundrum that illustrates how humanity can never be displaced by ai     if we took the cooperative aspects of cognition seriously  then what kind of ai would we create  dignum argues that it would look somewhat different from the ai currently being developed  rather than systems that try to replace human labor  we would imagine those that  ldquo work alongside humans to extend our capabilities and enhance collective intelligence  rdquo  such a shift might be facilitated by moving away from the large  expensive  and monolithic ai models of the sort that underlie services like chatgpt and toward a more modular approach  in which a mix of smaller and more specialized models is made available to workers in ways that respect their autonomy and expertise  this strategy would have the added virtue of diminishing the power of the tech monopolies  since their control of contemporary ai is  as dignum notes  inseparable from the fact that they are the only actors with sufficient infrastructure to train and deploy large models     the central argument of the ai paradox  then  is that there is nothing inevitable about ai rsquo s present trajectory  dignum concludes her book with a plea for a more intentional and inclusive approach to ai development  one in which  ldquo everyone has a voice in shaping the direction ai takes  rdquo  she wants to banish the quietism that too often clouds people rsquo s minds when technology is involved   ldquo we must resist the seductive narratives that portray ai as an unstoppable force beyond human control  narratives that strip us of our agency and render us passive in the face of technological change  rdquo  she declares  ai is made by people  and therefore it  ldquo is what we  people  make of it     the power to decide lies with us  rdquo     dignum rsquo s message is an empowering one  humans have a monopoly on true intelligence  ai is simply another tool  like an airplane or a car  and we can steer it in any direction we want     if the ai paradox had been published a decade ago  these claims would be easier to sustain  but the arrival of large language models  llms  mdash the computational systems that form the engine of generative ai mdash in 2018  and their rapid subsequent evolution  has cast doubt on some of dignum rsquo s assertions  while she concedes that  ldquo llms represent an incredible advancement  rdquo  they do not prompt her to revise her overall view of ai  in her account  llms have the same fundamental limitation as the ai systems that preceded them  they are incapable of  ldquo actual comprehension  rdquo   ldquo they do not  lsquo think rsquo  or  lsquo know  rsquo  rdquo  she writes   ldquo they merely simulate patterns extracted from their training data  rdquo     given dignum rsquo s career as a distinguished scholar who has worked in ai for decades     few people are as qualified as she is to offer a judgment on llms  but opinion within the field is far less settled than she suggests  because llms are more complex than their predecessors  they pose interpretative questions that are harder to answer  are they purely imitative  or do they exhibit  ldquo emergent rdquo  properties on account of their complexity  are they best understood as pattern matching machines  or can they engage in conceptual reasoning of certain kinds  among ai researchers and practitioners  these are matters of active debate  and this debate cannot be reduced  as some ai deflationists suggest  to a struggle between truth tellers and the marketing department of openai  there are genuine disagreements over how to characterize llms and their capabilities  in some cases  these involve empirical disputes over what an llm is actually doing at any given moment  at other times  the disagreements are more semantic or philosophical  centered on the meaning of terms like reasoning    and comprehension     the simplest way to describe an llm is as a system that tries to predict the next word in a sequence  based on the probabilities it has gleaned from its training set  an llm learns how to make these predictions through a series of baroque computations whose convolutions are not fully understood  we know why llms work mdash that is  we have a good sense of their basic mechanisms  what rsquo s less clear is how they work  even their creators can rsquo t say with precision why a model produces a particular response  this is the reason that the debates around llms are so vigorous and  perhaps  irresolvable  the technology is  in certain important respects  unruly and opaque     by contrast  cars and airplanes are not  you can open them up and see how they work  they are deterministic systems that do what you tell them to do  dignum frequently emphasizes that ai is made by humans  but just because something is made by humans doesn rsquo t mean it will remain within the ambit of human comprehension and control       if ai is not like a car or an airplane  then what is it  at one point  dignum describes llms as  ldquo a cognitive frankenstein rsquo s monster  rdquo  she means it in a minimizing way  llms work by  ldquo piecing together fragments of human language in a way that appears intelligent rdquo  but isn rsquo t   ldquo like frankenstein rsquo s monster  rdquo  she writes   ldquo they lack genuine understanding and intentionality  rdquo     i hope it is not too pedantic to point out that this is a misreading of mary shelley rsquo s novel  frankenstein rsquo s monster does indeed think  feel  and scheme  he teaches himself to read and loves paradise lost  he craves companionship and hates his creator for abandoning him  a hatred that moves him to kill the man rsquo s wife and brother     yet dignum rsquo s analogy does resonate  albeit for different reasons  frankenstein is a story about the relationship between human beings and their alien offspring  the monster is created by a human scientist and even assembled from human body parts  yet he is feared and hated by nearly everyone he encounters because of his  ldquo unearthly ugliness  rdquo  despite being wholly man made  he is somehow otherworldly     llms have a comparable set of qualities  they are  on the one hand  a product of human ingenuity mdash an achievement enabled by more than eight decades of research into computational models loosely inspired by the human brain  they are also a composite of human culture in the broadest sense  having been trained on large portions of the publicly accessible internet  along with books  academic papers  and other sources  yet for all the humanness of their inputs  llms are irreducibly nonhuman in their operation  they learn by studying large quantities of text and constructing elaborate mathematical maps of the semiotic relationships within them  this is not how the human brain works       accordingly  we might think of an llm as something like frankenstein rsquo s monster  an alien of human ancestry that is not wholly assimilable to our purposes  this metaphor must be handled with caution  it should not be taken to mean that ai is sentient or supernatural  i agree with dignum rsquo s assertion that we need to demystify ai and to construct a  ldquo simple  clear narrative rdquo  about the technology  in doing so  however  we should be careful not to efface the fundamental weirdness of llms     we should also be skeptical of the opposition that she sets up between humanity and technology  this is not a binary that feels supportable  least of all now  as our technological    entanglements become even more consuming than they were when donna haraway christened us  ldquo cyborgs rdquo  in 1985  llms may never  ldquo attain the full spectrum of human intelligence  rdquo  as dignum says  on account of their not being human  but they have clearly achieved a kind of hybridity with humanness that enables them to act in ways that most people perceive as at least quasi intelligent  rather than dismissing such a perception as delusional  we might see it as evidence of the technology rsquo s mongrel character  llms are an object lesson in the porousness of the human as a category  as well as our tendency to extrude ourselves into our artifacts mdash artifacts that can  in turn  exert influence over us  this is not necessarily a good thing  people are    having psychotic breakdowns from talking to ai chatbots  victor frankenstein dies filled with regret     you might be asking yourself why the way we interpret llms even matters  the answer is that it has consequences for how we respond to ai politically  a subject that dignum engages with throughout her book  if we think of the technology as a car  for instance  that implies a certain approach  cars provide certain benefits but also  ldquo cause accidents  rdquo  dignum notes  fortunately  they are  ldquo much safer and more efficient rdquo  than they were 50 years ago  thanks to regulation  today rsquo s ai is like  ldquo a car without brakes or seatbelts  rdquo  which means that we need to find the ai equivalents of such measures   ldquo just as we regulate cars to protect ourselves from accidents and misuse  ai also requires safeguards to prevent harm and ensure it serves humanity rsquo s best interests  rdquo  dignum advises     she believes such safeguards should be anchored in the  ldquo principles of ethical ai rdquo  mdash justice  accountability  transparency  and the protection of individual rights mdash and developed through an  ldquo ongoing dialogue rdquo  among  ldquo technologists  ethicists  policymakers  and communities  rdquo  only by  ldquo involving diverse stakeholders in the decision making process rdquo  can the correct balance be struck  it is very important to dignum that regulation not be seen as impeding ai rsquo s development   ldquo just as brakes and safety measures allow cars to go faster  regulation enables innovation to grow responsibly and sustainably  rdquo  she writes  more specifically  the absence of governance could cause  ldquo trust in ai  erode  leading to slower adoption or even rejection of the technology  rdquo  policymakers can help accelerate ai rsquo s integration into society while ensuring that it remains respectful of our rights and equitable in its distribution of benefits     these passages convey a faith in managed capitalism that feels distinctly european  the picture is one in which representatives from government  industry  and civil society come together to forge policy frameworks that    harmonize their interests  we might ask whether harmony is possible  or what kind of struggles might    need to be waged to compel the tech giants to submit to such a process   they are currently fighting eu regulators tooth and nail   but the deeper root of dignum rsquo s optimism is her view of ai itself  because ai is a tool  we can retool it   ldquo in whatever way we define ai  it is crucial to understand that it is an artifact  that is  something created by people  rdquo  she explains   ldquo since we build it  we control and are responsible for its trajectory and choices  rdquo     but what if ai is better understood as frankenstein rsquo s monster mdash a man made yet alien entity  by turns familiar and strange  unpredictable and not fully fathomable  semi obedient at best  not all ai fits this description  but llms do  and llms are what the tech industry is trying to make ubiquitous and indispensable  it seems unwise to adopt a policy agenda that promises to help the industry do so  even if the correct technocrats are    somehow put in charge  ai can be a tool  and a useful one  but it can also be something else  i am personally not someone who worries about ai killing us all  but i do think that granting such a technology unlimited power over the conditions of our life and work is likely to be a recipe for chaos and misery  our best hope  at least in the short term  might be to pursue a strategy of containment in which ai is restricted to certain spheres and functions on the theory that alien encounters can be fruitful  but alien invasions are bad<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/artificial-intelligence-ai-paradox/">What Is Artificial Intelligence Anyway?</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Mon, 06 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/artificial-intelligence-ai-paradox/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The Cost of Making Cesar Chavez the Face of a Movement]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/cost-of-cesar-chavez-face-movement/]]></link>
		<author>Julissa Natzely Arce Raya</author>
	<date>Apr 6, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The harrowing revelations about Chavez expose how much Latino history in the United States has been made to rest on one man.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["The harrowing revelations about chavez expose how much latino history in the united states has been made to rest on one man      a mural of cesar chavez is seen through a sculpture of the united farm workers  ufw  flag        sexual abuse allegations against cesar chavez  the chicano civil rights and labor leader  have reverberated across the latino community and beyond  a new york times investigation published in march includes accounts from two women who were 12 and 13 when chavez abused them  and from dolores huerta  chavez rsquo s longtime collaborator and cofounder of the united farm workers  in a statement  huerta said she had two sexual encounters with chavez  both of which led to pregnancies   ldquo the first time i was manipulated and pressured  the second time i was forced  against my will  and in an environment where i felt trapped  rdquo       these allegations are deeply disturbing and should not be minimized or explained away  they have rightfully prompted a reexamination of chavez rsquo s legacy  they also expose how much latino history in the united states has been made to rest on one man     for many americans  including latinos  chavez is the only latino civil rights leader they can name  that overreliance on a single  legible figure has flattened a much richer and more complex history  and we are seeing the consequences of that  when one man is made to stand in for an entire movement  the destruction of his legacy can be used to dismiss the movement rsquo s larger history and impact       chavez rsquo s legacy has long been more complicated than the mythology surrounding him  in a los angeles times review of miriam pawel rsquo s biography  he is described as  ldquo paranoid and dictatorial  rdquo  with the organization he built characterized as resembling a  ldquo cultish commune  rdquo  it was within that warped world that women like ana murguia and debra rojas say they were abused for years when they were girls     chavez also opposed undocumented workers  whom he viewed as threats to the labor movement  and in the 1970s he led efforts to report them to immigration authorities mdash a stark contradiction for a leader now widely remembered as a champion of the marginalized     and yet schools  streets  and chicana o studies departments all bear chavez rsquo s name  in a number of states  including california  arizona  and texas  cesar chavez day has been celebrated as a state holiday  hollywood has immortalized him     latinos have long struggled to have our contributions  history  and culture recognized  chavez mdash the charismatic leader who organized some of the country rsquo s most exploited workers  who prayed and fasted  who led the grape strikes that captured the country rsquo s attention mdash became a figure we could rally around  through him  we could be seen  so we organized  marched  and legislated to cement his place in us history  we rallied around a version of him that could be taught  honored  and defended mdash a version that was uncomplicated  but that came at a cost     one of the reasons many of the women who spoke to the times gave for their decades long silence was a  ldquo fear of tarnishing the image of a man who has become the face of the latino civil rights movement  rdquo  huerta kept her own experiences private because she  ldquo believed that exposing the truth would hurt the farmworker movement  rdquo  which she had dedicated her life to       that weight should never have been theirs to carry  and yet it was  it meant women who were harmed felt responsible for protecting the very man who harmed them   ldquo it makes you rethink in history all those heroes  rdquo  esmeralda lopez told the times   ldquo the movement mdash that rsquo s the hero  rdquo     she rsquo s right  the movement is what we must now continue to uphold  it was the collective effort of people who marched  organized  and stood alongside its leaders that made it possible for farmworkers to unionize  bargain for better wages  and secure safer working conditions  now  as some of those gains come under attack  and as latino contributions to this country are being broadly contested  the challenge is not just how we judge one man but how we expand the story beyond him mdash because our history and contributions are far bigger than any one figure     right wing politicians like texas governor greg abbott have already moved to halt this year rsquo s observance of cesar chavez day and signaled that they intend to remove the holiday from state law  chavez rsquo s name should come off schools and streets  but we cannot allow that removal to become another way our history disappears     this moment should push us to expand what we remember  it should push us to learn about the many leaders mdash within both the ufw and other movements mdash who were overshadowed because we placed so much weight on one man     some are already beginning to offer a way forward  in california  lawmakers quickly passed a bill to rename cesar chavez day as farmworkers day  shifting the focus away from one man and back to the people who made the movement possible       for years  i rsquo ve heard huerta stand before a crowd and ask   ldquo who rsquo s got the power  rdquo      ldquo we rsquo ve got the power  rdquo  the crowd would reply        ldquo what kind of power  rdquo  she rsquo d ask again      ldquo people power  rdquo     i hear it differently now  the farmworkers movement was never one man  it was never cesar chavez alone  it was always the people<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/cost-of-cesar-chavez-face-movement/">The Cost of Making Cesar Chavez the Face of a Movement</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Mon, 06 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/cost-of-cesar-chavez-face-movement/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Fact-Checkers Anonymous]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/new-yorker-fact-checkers-anonymous/]]></link>
		<author>Jasper Lo</author>
	<date>Apr 4, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Getting a job at <em>The New Yorker</em> felt like an arbitrary stroke of luck. Getting fired was quite the opposite.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Getting a job at the new yorker felt like an arbitrary stroke of luck  getting fired was quite the opposite      a woman retrieves a copy of the new yorker from her condominium cluster mailbox       on a wednesday evening last november  the staff of the new yorker gathered at a marble bar in tribeca to celebrate the retirement of a longtime  ldquo oker rdquo  mdash a kind of new yorkerism for a frocked copyeditor  david remnick  the fifth editor in chief of the magazine  addressed the crowd  praising the new retiree rsquo s fastidiousness and talent       one after another  longtime staffers recounted their stories of working with this dear colleague  all of them noted his careful kindness  when the remarks concluded  the audience rushed to order  taking advantage of the last half hour of an open bar  it was only after attendees had mostly departed that i received an unusually late call from my rep at the newsguild  the parent union of the new yorker union     i headed toward the door as i wondered why he was calling  a growing feeling of menace spread through my body   ldquo don rsquo t want to hide the ball  dude  rdquo  he said   ldquo they just fired you  rdquo  i scoffed  my voice echoing against the surrounding buildings  why me  i wondered  i had finished my three year term as the first vice chair of the new yorker union the week prior  conde nast had violated our collective bargaining agreement and broken labor law dozens of times  but it had never attempted something as reckless as illegally firing union leaders  as the magnitude of the violation set in  the world began falling away  and  with equal gusto  i began to sob     six years after my joining the new yorker rsquo s storied fact checking department  my career was reduced to a three sentence e mail  it cited  ldquo gross misconduct and policy violations  rdquo  and was signed by conde rsquo s head of labor relations  a figure whose compulsion for passive aggression has earned her a certain level of infamy among media unions  thankfully  this lack of justification was quickly filled by an outpouring of support from colleagues  frustrated messages that underscored the arbitrary nature of the ouster  it was a welcome surprise to see the many writers i rsquo ve worked with  who routinely confront power and describe it with such elegance  write in my defense  patrick radden keefe illustrated it perfectly in a collective action where staff replied all to an e mail sent to executives and staff  demanding my reinstatement   ldquo this feels like the sort of hasty decision that would be relatively easy to reverse in the near term mdash and more complicated to unwind the more time is allowed to pass  rdquo     the  ldquo misconduct rdquo  in question may have occurred earlier that day  on november 5  2025  i joined a dozen other shop members to ask an executive about the shuttering of teen vogue and about the many layoffs that had ensued as a result  when we encountered the head of hr  we asked if the company had closed the magazine to preemptively comply with the trump administration rsquo s campaign of dismantling american journalism  one of the participants of the march recorded the exchange  and the video made its way to social media  with the caption  ldquo brutally awkward  rdquo  it registered over 1 4 million views  in response to our question  the executive told us to go back to work in a convoluted  lawyer trained way  three of my colleagues at other conde nast publications  alma avalle  jake lahut  and ben dewey  were also fired  two of them former leaders of their union   there are two unions in the newsguild  the new yorker union and conde nast united      it has been maddening to watch a company discard me after years of our weathering the news together  since the fall  i have tried not to internalize its portrayal of me as a criminal  i know that i stood up for what i believed was right  our union celebrates stories of members doing this kind of thing  organizing to stop bullying bosses  negotiating wages and longer parental leave  i kept replaying the moment in the c suite hallway  i had stood quietly while union members posed a series of questions to an executive who had invited employees to bring him their concerns mdash searching for some act of gross misconduct  if that were even the incident in question  our contract has a  ldquo just cause rdquo  provision  which means that the employer must provide a burden of proof to dismiss an employee  furthermore  without evidence of my  ldquo misconduct  rdquo  the company violated the national labor relations act  which created the right to engage in collective action and protection against being fired for participation in those actions  but maybe the bosses simply saw an opportunity in the larger authoritarian entrenchment we have been witness to  where truth or fact  as hannah arendt wrote   ldquo depends entirely on the power of the man who can fabricate it  rdquo       every spring  columbia university rsquo s journalism school hosts a career fair where students are matched with publications that the program deems most likely to hire  it had long been a dwindling market by the time of this fair in 2019  i visited the tables for the military times  the daily news  and newsday  but i remember noticing the name michael luo on the vendor list  i recognized his name from a times article about the 2016 presidential election  in the piece  mike described being told to go back to china by a white woman on the upper east side  it was a catalyzing incident that cut through the mucky microaggressions that defined chinese american racism at the time     at the career fair  mike sat at a folding table behind a line that snaked around the expo floor  i had doubts about approaching him  after all  the school had made it clear that i had no business meeting him  but later that day  i saw him grab his sports jacket  i walked over and greeted him  and he introduced himself as an executive editor of the new yorker     mike and his colleague david rohde asked me what i wanted to do in journalism  nearly all my classmates were just out of college  while i was turning 31  my career deferred by a stint as a us army officer  i thought that delay had put me miles behind  i told mike and david that i was starting out in journalism and i was looking for a rigorous job to catch up for lost time  mike asked if i wanted to fact check   ldquo sure  rdquo  i said  having no idea what that meant  david drafted an e mail on his phone  turned it to me  and asked me to write myself a message  afterwards  i joined some friends at a bar in disbelief  did i just get hired at the new yorker     i hadn rsquo t  not yet  a few weeks later  i went to the world trade center to be interviewed  returning for the first time since shopping at the old century 21 in the spring of 2001  i was an outsider to the new yorker  but i had also felt that way in the military mdash a chinese kid from queens  i pitched myself as consummately responsible  by summer  i had completed two interviews but hadn rsquo t received an offer  so i started as a runner for the daily news  delivering stories like the women rsquo s world cup parade  a wind farm announcement  and a triple murder to reporters       during my first week  while sitting in the bronx with the family of a teenager who had suffered catastrophic burns from an apartment fire  i received a call from a 212 number  when i picked up  it was someone calling from the human resources department at conde nast  confused  i told him he had the wrong number and hung up  strange  i thought  then the same number rang again  i excused myself from the family and picked up   ldquo before you hang up  rdquo  the caller exclaimed   ldquo is this jasper lo  rdquo  even stranger  i thought   ldquo you recently applied for a job with us  rdquo  he said   ldquo i don rsquo t think so  rdquo  i replied  he continued   ldquo well i rsquo m here to negotiate your salary for the fact checking position at the new yorker  rdquo  i asked what conde nast had to do with the magazine  with some secondhand embarrassment  he explained     i began working as a checker for the new yorker rsquo s website in august 2019  in many ways  the daily news had been an easy off ramp from the army  both required wearing backpacks  walking all day  and a certain proximity to death  fact checking  somehow  felt isolating without that terrain     each day i built a world in the sonic landscape of source calls that vanished just as quickly with the churn of the web  in my first month  i was assigned to check a dispatch about the democratic crisis in hong kong  there was a short runway for it  but it was a thrill to get a serious assignment about a city so close to my heart  twenty four or 48 hours with most of the work at night  no problem  i thought  i had learned how to tackle this kind of work in the army  it was finally time to prove myself  i scheduled all my calls at the convenience of the sources in hong kong  would it be correct to say that  ldquo bonnie began to cry when she recalled a violent clash between protesters blocking legislators from passing the national security law  rdquo  i asked over the phone  i finished overnight  napping in between like it was a reconnaissance mission     shortly after i began checking  an assignment brought me to a call with the daily news  where a politics editor i had worked with picked up the phone  i said hello and told him i was calling from the new yorker  was it correct to say that the newsroom had moved twice  he said yes  then asked   ldquo how is it over there  rdquo  mdash and after a pause   ldquo bet they don rsquo t yell  lsquo motherfucker rsquo  across their newsroom as much as we do  rdquo  no  i replied  it rsquo s not really a  ldquo motherfucker rdquo  kind of place     a decade before i started as a fact checker  another new yorker staffer  dan baum  had gone viral for his description of the workplace  he tweeted   ldquo nobody leaves a new yorker job voluntarily  i was fired  and over the next few days  i rsquo ll tell that story here  rdquo  this was when the platform still limited posts to 140 characters  but he exploited the constraint  releasing the story mdash tweet by tweet mdash until it reached 4 323 words  describing the office environment  he wrote   ldquo nobody at the office seems very happy  the atmosphere is vastly strained  i rsquo d get back on the times square sidewalk after a visit and feel i needed to flap my arms  rdquo     by the time i arrived  i understood what he meant  i rsquo d often be stuck in the elevator with some of the country rsquo s most successful writers and editors  sharing a heavy silence   ldquo it rsquo s not exactly like being in a library  it rsquo s more like being in a hospital room where somebody is dying  rdquo  baum had written on twitter   ldquo like someone rsquo s dying  and everybody feels a little guilty about it  rdquo     the anxiety wore off the more i understood the new yorker and especially the more i worked with those editors  the copy and photo editors  and all the others that rounded out the office  magazine reporting  i learned  was unlike most other forms of journalism  there were no producers  no directors  no cinematographers  or gaffers  it was only the writer  their editor  and their talent for turning reporting into a single narrative   all my respect to the copyeditors who polished pieces into perfection   sometimes  when the story called for it  an impromptu investigative team formed  this happened often when i worked with editor david haglund and staff writer charles bethea  charles rsquo s stories were pulpy mdash the kind that garnered movie options  while still getting to the heart of a serious national subject  he had been writing about how rico was being used against atlanta rappers long before fani willis brought charges against then ex president trump     in another of his investigations   ldquo is this the worst place to be poor and charged with a federal crime   rdquo  charles dove into why the southern district of georgia was one of only two in the continental united states without federal or community defenders  the official line was that public defenders weren rsquo t needed since a panel of private attorneys fulfilled the requirements of the sixth amendment  the right to be represented by a lawyer  but it seemed like an open secret that this was known to be insufficient  real estate lawyers  for example  could not provide the robust defense needed for felony charges     charles discovered that a federal defenders rsquo  office had existed briefly in the 1980s but was closed after being deemed unnecessary  sources spoke of a rumor that the chief judge of the district had forced the office to close by making the head of the defenders rsquo  office sign a resignation letter before the office opened  leverage to close the office if he pleased  the problem was that charles couldn rsquo t reach the man who had allegedly signed it  and the judge was long dead     this is the curious thing about fact checking  sometimes  even after months of the reporter rsquo s trying to get in touch with someone  the checker gets through  after a few days talking to the sources in the piece  people who surrounded this uncooperative head of office  i got a call out of the blue  it was him  he had heard the voicemail i left  it outlined everything that charles had discovered and how the lawyer was being portrayed  the man had decided that he wanted to set the record straight  in the call  he told me that he had been a young and nervous attorney when he first met the chief judge  in the judge rsquo s chamber  he was trying to make a good impression when the judge unexpectedly presented a resignation letter  the lawyer didn rsquo t want to make a fuss and  though it struck him as strange  he thought it was customary to sign the document  this  in many ways  proved the overarching thesis of charles rsquo s piece  that local practices seemed to take precedence over federal law     fact checkers weren rsquo t there for factual accuracy alone  in a story like this one  we brought one last push of reporting that could crack the case  that year  citing charles rsquo s article  senator jon ossoff introduced legislation to require an office of public defenders in the district  as i learned more about reporting  i was making more sense of the magazine itself     i had never worked at an organization with a labor union before coming to the new yorker  and had neither the familial history nor the political education to understand it  still  when a steward asked me to support a collective action  i instinctively agreed  as a young officer in the army  i often had bad ideas called out by sergeants  through side eyes and tuts  they would guide me toward something more practical and often empathic  by the same token  they told me when to push back on stupid orders or how to subvert them  through them  i learned that there was a cost to making things go smoothly  or  ethically  there was almost always a way  but it was up to the officer to decide whether they were willing to pay for it  in hindsight  these noncommissioned officers were instructive in how i would confront my problems at the new yorker     my path to becoming a shop steward began with a mental health day  i rsquo d never had the self respect to ask for one before  but the news during the pandemic had become overwhelming  i called my boss at the time  explained the situation  and perhaps overshared  that afternoon  i received a notification that my sick day mdash of which i had an unlimited amount mdash had been reclassified  my boss had used my own words as justification for charging the day as personal time  i had been got     when i was later nominated to be a shop steward and then the first vice chair  i accepted both because i knew it was an opportunity to resolve my hangups with work  the way the workplace encouraged one rsquo s self worth to be tied to its success among them  volunteering with the union was a way to both transform and share the transformation  to help others along the way  the new yorker was a study in contradiction  a place that prioritized humanity while also being needlessly cruel  everyone agreed that working conditions needed to change  but few wanted to upset their manager  most people preferred the fantasy of the institution to its reality     in turn  organizers took on the sublimated resentment that workers carried  i came to understand that it was part and parcel of the organization  if you realized something wasn rsquo t right  you were made to feel alone  when overshadowed by one another rsquo s talent and accomplishment  you start to believe that you have more to lose than most  especially in an environment suggesting that a dozen smarter  more talented candidates stood ready to take your place     but the lengthy and acidic negotiation of our first collective bargaining agreement began to break this delusion  it forced the staff to confront this duality  and with each crisis  two rounds of surprise layoffs  for example mdash staffers learned the importance of our union and their individual responsibility within it  it was an education birthed from what seemed like random but grievous acts from conde nast  powerlessness turned into an effort to change the culture  and soon  collective action became the norm     during one of the layoffs in 2023  shop members marched together to demand an answer for this unprecedented bloodletting  by showing our displeasure with as many members as possible  we convinced conde nast to hold an extraordinary negotiation to expand layoff benefits mdash benefits that were immediately extended to nonunion staffers  these victories required constant vigilance       it became a regular affair to walk up to david remnick  who routinely answered our questions by claiming that he was unaware of the issue or powerless to change anything  consequently  we would seek out the ceo or the head of human resources to see if maybe the buck stopped there  with our hearts pounding  we often marched behind hannah aizenman  our unit chair  who stood nearly a head shorter than me  walking with her reminded me of the pre mission feeling of danger and anticipation mdash the kind of blitz that used to surge through me before we set out on missions  in those moments  you felt dizzy from the heady switch between the physical and metaphysical feeling of power  when we found the boss  hannah would calmly put forth our questions  when no executive was present mdash which was most of the time mdash she would deliver a rabble rousing speech detailing why the circumstances were so wrong  more importantly  she would tell us how we would fix them  together     our speedy musters and growing numbers were exhibiting the power we were building  a week before i was fired  i told the new officers beginning their term that the union had never been more powerful  but conde nast had never been more erratic  our strength seemed to grow  even as the magazine tried to suck it dry  the new yorker rsquo s leadership has been quiet about my firing  they ve acted like they have no power here  but the company rsquo s legal inability to fire me has been challenged by dozens of senior editors and department heads  including my boss  even they had the courage to speak up on my behalf  why couldn rsquo t their bosses       in the days after i was fired  i pleaded  to mike luo my case for not changing course and publishing two pieces i had written about the chinese community in new york city that i had worked on for a year  they were challenging endeavors  reported and written over a year  while i balanced organizing and fact checking  he told me that he wasn rsquo t sure if my termination would make it  ldquo inconvenient rdquo  to publish them  they were killed a week later  for  ldquo editorial reasons  rdquo     today  i find myself a beneficiary amid this steep ascent in organizing power  though our collective bargaining agreement stipulates that disagreements be mediated by arbitration  there is no provision against extending the process indefinitely by simply refusing dates  the company declined five of these meetings  prompting my union to fire off several more reply alls and to print a nearly life size cutout of me mdash the same image that appeared in the new york post  finally  the company agreed to a date this upcoming may     it rsquo s telling of the leadership at conde nast that nobody had thought through the consequences of firing union leaders  especially ones that had stewarded members through such a turbulent time  the labor relations department  for instance  has told our union that this is a corporation  not a democratic town square     this is a laughable business justification  the point isn rsquo t to workshop despotism  it rsquo s to make and sell a profitable magazine  in decision after decision  the company has a questionable record in proving its fiduciary duty  that rsquo s been a problem since some of the last successful magazines in america remain in the company rsquo s remit  by firing the four of us  conde nast has once again forced everyone to stop ignoring the company rsquo s ridiculous decisions and reckon with them  and in doing so  it has created a new kind of character in our unions  its members are a force that mobilizes more quickly  and they are ready to escalate actions if they are not being heard     my job at the new yorker felt like a dream as much as it ended like one  still  i remain astounded by the incredible talent and care from my coworkers who continue to meet the demands of publishing a weekly magazine while risking their jobs to advocate for their colleagues mdash of whom i have unexpectedly become the focus  i imagine that it must evoke some ambivalence among members  advancement requires competition  but an ethical contest requires collective action  in a workplace shaped by arbitrary power  those instincts collide     i am living in the aftermath of that collision mdash terminated by an arbitrary decision mdash yet conscious that i rsquo m the one who has to behave professionally to avoid retaliation and maintain a career as a writer  i share this position with hundreds of recently fired journalists who are forced to blame no one  allowed only to describe their careers as a result of whimsy and luck  what is left of long form narrative nonfiction now feels a lot like a house built precariously on the edge of a seaside cliff  the views are perfect  but the cliff is crumbling  it often seems like our unions are the only ones recognizing this and attempting to shore up the rock     my therapist often tells me to externalize my inner critics as demons with recognizable features like horns and sharp teeth  i realize now that i rsquo ve imagined them wrong  they are coiffed  glassy eyed  and pearly toothed  with the kind of plastic face that resembles a mask  one reason i kept my responsibilities in the union was to have real and external attacks  to separate my inner demons from the real ones  during a particularly memorable appointment with my psychiatrist last summer  i told him that i was feeling increasingly paranoid from fact checking pieces about the new administration and how the labor relations department was threatening me with discipline in response to our union rsquo s collective actions  he demurred and said he could not  in good conscience  prescribe anything that would dull my awareness of my surroundings  what i was telling him was real  you see  the problem wasn rsquo t in my head mdash it was in the facts<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/new-yorker-fact-checkers-anonymous/">Fact-Checkers Anonymous</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Sat, 04 Apr 2026 09:30:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/new-yorker-fact-checkers-anonymous/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Tiger Woods Plus Donald Trump: A Tragedy Made in the USA]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/tiger-woods-donald-trump-friendship/]]></link>
		<author>Dave Zirin</author>
	<date>Apr 3, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Woods and Trump’s famous friendship is built on a shared knack for accumulation, vacuousness, and power worship. It’s as American as apple pie.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<middle_image>https://www.thenation.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/tiger-woods-donald-trump-getty-680x430.jpg</middle_image>
	<description>
	<![CDATA["Woods and trump rsquo s famous friendship is built on a shared knack for accumulation  vacuousness  and power worship  it rsquo s as american as apple pie      president donald trump embraces tiger woods after presenting him with a presidential medal of freedom at the white house on may 6  2019       for anyone who believes that donald trump  in his infinite narcissism  has no empathy for anyone other than himself  think again  he may project nothing but apathy or glee concerning the pain he rsquo s inflicted on countless families around the world  including his own damaged  parasitic brood  he may threaten war crimes in a national televised address  he may promise to use federal troops to  ldquo force ourselves upon rdquo  los angeles during the 2026 world cup  but he does genuinely seem to love golfing legend tiger woods       the feeling is reciprocated  after woods almost died this week mdash rolling his car  opioids in his pockets mdash his first call was to trump rsquo s direct line  according to police body cam footage  woods said that he made this call even before the officer approached his car     what is this connection about  how does this openly ethnonationalist president mdash who offered preferential refugee admissions  to white south africans while enacting unprecedented violence against black and brown immigrants mdash relate to woods  woods  a trailblazing athlete who integrated countless country clubs  used to describe himself as cablinasian mdash caucasian  black  and asian  that is  until he got a call from nike telling him that he was just black        after that  you never heard the word  ldquo cablinasian rdquo  again  soon  the shoe giant released a commercial mdash based upon the iconic slogan of solidarity  ldquo i am spartacus rdquo  mdash in which a diverse group of children said defiantly   ldquo i am tiger woods  rdquo  it was rebellion without a cause  rebellion for market share  jackie robinson if robinson had been more interested in brand recognition than in civil rights  in fact  maybe woods and trump do have something in common  the vacuous nature of branding for the sake of accumulation isn rsquo t too far off from accumulation for accumulation rsquo s sake  perhaps this is what drew them together  nbsp     certainly  their attraction is linked to trump rsquo s obsession with golf  tiger is the historical apex of a sport that seems to hold trump rsquo s attention more than the war that has displaced millions of people in iran and lebanon  which he illegally launched  or perhaps it rsquo s because woods is always appropriately mdash and humiliatingly mdash sycophantic in trump rsquo s presence  he doesn rsquo t challenge trump  he adores him  and trump basks in his glow     it could also be that woods dates don jr  rsquo s ex wife  vanessa  whom trump always seemed to like more than his son  apparently  woods rsquo s presence in his life causes don jr  no end of distress  in the wake of the dui arrest  anonymous sources close to don jr  told the press   ldquo  is furious  those are his kids  full stop hellip   everyone else gave tiger the benefit of the doubt  but don always saw the red flags  always  rdquo  given don jr  rsquo s own erratic public behavior  his concerns feel more like an effort to shame daddy rsquo s favorite than a protective instinct for the next generation of damaged trumps     but what rsquo s most likely is that  as with all of trump rsquo s relationships  this is also largely transactional  as announced with great fanfare in 2014  tiger woods was set to design the trump world golf club in the human rights hellhole that is dubai  under orders from trump  woods is also now supposed to be redesigning washington  dc rsquo s public langston golf course  which opened in 1939 as the city rsquo s first course built specifically for black americans  there are widespread fears that  following woods rsquo s makeover  these public courses will go private  shutting out people who can rsquo t afford it and erasing the history of the black golfers that have used the course for generations  the irony will choke you if you think about it too hard       but whatever the reason for their mutual affection  trump took time away from his disastrous war and suffocation of cuba to express empathy for woods even before the golfer rsquo s very sad  very glazed over mug shot hit the press  on hearing the news  trump stopped threatening universally recognized war crimes  rushed to the nearest phone  and called his old friends at the new york post to jump to woods rsquo s defense  he said that woods  ldquo lives a life of pain rdquo  from old injuries but is  ldquo doing great  rdquo  trump also pointed out that woods is  ldquo under a tremendous physical pressure from his various ailments  you know  the back and the leg  rdquo     now he cares about people living in pain  the amputees of gaza  though  not so much     tiger woods is an american tragedy  he rsquo s the golf wunderkind who was on the mike douglas show  putting for grownups at age 2  he rsquo s the 15 time grand slam winner who fundamentally changed the audience of golf  growing it to unprecedented levels  he was the teenager whose future his late father  earl  said would be comparable to gandhi rsquo s     trump offers no such pressure to be gandhi or martin luther king or muhammed ali  just a smiling brand who dates the mother of his grandchildren  and now woods has had the kind of fall from grace that mirrors our current culture  rife with performance enhancers  opioids  depression  and decline     perhaps that is what rsquo s really at the root of this friendship  the death of hope  trump is the king of a country where hope goes to die  woods has become the mascot of a nation rsquo s crumbling greatness  american tragedy  this is american reality<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/tiger-woods-donald-trump-friendship/">Tiger Woods Plus Donald Trump: A Tragedy Made in the USA</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 03 Apr 2026 17:15:47 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/tiger-woods-donald-trump-friendship/</guid>
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  <item>
	 <title><![CDATA[Karma Meets Dogma]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/karma-meets-dogma/]]></link>
		<author>Steve Brodner</author>
	<date>Apr 3, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Willie and Joe.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<description>
	<![CDATA["Willie and joe<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/karma-meets-dogma/">Karma Meets Dogma</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 03 Apr 2026 15:15:04 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/karma-meets-dogma/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The Folly of Netanyahu’s War Against Iran]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/world/netanyahu-war-iran-israel-diplomacy-critique/]]></link>
		<author>Hillel Schenker</author>
	<date>Apr 3, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>A minority view from Tel Aviv.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["A minority view from tel aviv      israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu reacts while visiting the area destroyed by an iranian ballistic missile in dimona  israel  on march 22  2026        can we add netanyahu rsquo s war against iran to barbara tuchman rsquo s list of unwise and counterproductive policy decisions detailed in her book the march of folly     just a little more than a week before the beginning of the latest war  i was one of three israelis who participated in the public launch of an iranian israeli joint dialogue forum under the title  ldquo we are not our regimes  rdquo  hosted by the bruno kreisky forum for international dialogue in vienna  the iranians were all republicans  not the maga variety  but supporters of an iranian republic  who are opposed both to the islamist ayatollah regime and to the monarchists represented by reza pahlavi  the son of the last shah of iran  since it is impossible under the current circumstances for iranians who live in iran to participate in such a joint initiative  the iranians who participated all live in europe or the united states  though they all have family and friends who they are in contact with in iran itself  the israelis are all opposed to our current extremist  messianic government  led by prime minister netanyahu       although both the iranians and the israelis would like to see regime change in iran  they all agreed that a war initiated by external forces was not and could not be the way to achieve that goal  and regime change in both israel and the united states would also be very welcomed by them   the iranians emphasized that a desired regime change could only come from an internal struggle by the iranian people  they listed two possibilities for such a development  one was the fact that supreme leader ayatollah khamenei was almost 87  and not in good health  it was possible that his successor would be more pragmatic and flexible  creating an opening for a more liberal regime in iran  the second possibility was a renewed nuclear deal with the us  which would lead to a reduction of sanctions mdash a key to the development of a potent middle class in iran that would be the driving force behind a successful popular demand for change in the regime     instead  what we got was a renewed war against iran  this time a joint israeli american initiative  netanyahu apparently convinced trump that such an attack would galvanize the iranian people to rise up and demand regime change  as trump said after the war started   ldquo now is the time to seize control of your destiny  hellip  america is backing you  hellip  be brave  be bold  hellip  take back your country  america is with you  rdquo     well  it hasn rsquo t quite happened that way  instead  after ayatollah khamenei was assassinated by the israelis  his son mojtaba khamenei was chosen to be his successor mdash the candidate of the extremist islamic revolutionary guard corps  who have clamped down on any potential popular protest  his father didn rsquo t even designate him as one of his three potential successors  one of the designated potential successors was former iranian president hassan rouhani  the reformist who negotiated the effective jcpoa  iranian nuclear deal  with president obama and who  together with his foreign minister  mohammad zarif  made overtures to the west  they even made a hint toward the jews and  by implication  israel mdash a greeting on the rosh hashanah holiday  such an appointment as the successor to khamenei could have led to the realization of both the possibility of a more pragmatic and flexible supreme leader and a nuclear deal that would have led to sanctions relief and the strengthening of key middle class elements in iranian society     and to make matters worse  israel then assassinated ali larijani  secretary of the supreme national security council  who had actively opposed the appointment of khamenei rsquo s son as the successor       our joint forum  now officially called the iranian israeli peace forum  issued the following statement after the war began      the historical context of the present war is complex but highly relevant  the ideologically driven hostility of the islamic republic of iran toward the united states  the  ldquo great satan rdquo   and the state of israel  the  ldquo little satan rdquo   has long contributed to an atmosphere of confrontation and helped create the conditions that made this deadly conflict possible     at the same time  this hostility has also served as a convenient pretext for successive israeli governments led by benjamin netanyahu to sustain and escalate tensions  such escalation aligns with the agenda of israeli fundamentalist forces and coincides with the political imperatives of maintaining his current governing coalition     as for the united states  president donald trump did not seek congressional approval before launching the war  did not exhaust the negotiations track  and has been unclear about the war rsquo s objectives and what outcome would bring it to an end     the threats and provocations of the islamic republic do not justify the launch of a large scale war  it is a war of choice initiated by two leaders whose unfounded claims that iran posed an imminent nuclear threat to the united states and israel were invoked to legitimize military action undertaken in violation of international law     we therefore condemn this war unequivocally  military escalation will bring nothing but death  destruction  and suffering to the peoples of iran  israel  and the wider region  war will deepen insecurity rather than eliminate it     there is no doubt that iran is governed by a repressive  semi totalitarian regime  yet its overthrow cannot be imposed from outside  the struggle for peace  freedom  democracy  and human rights must ultimately be waged by the citizens of iran themselves     recent history offers sobering lessons  foreign military interventions have repeatedly failed to deliver liberation or democracy  instead  they have too often produced devastation  social fragmentation  and the danger of state collapse     for these reasons  we call for an immediate end to the military hostilities and a renewed commitment to diplomacy  international law  and peaceful political transformation      netanyahu clearly wanted this war to distract attention from gaza  to delay his trial for fraud  bribery  and breach of trust that he is afraid will result in a conviction and jail sentence  and to boost his standing in the polls toward the israeli elections that must be held by october 2026     the ma rsquo ariv daily publishes a poll every friday indicating what the results would be if elections were held that day  ever since the gaza war began on october 7  2023  and even beforehand during the period of the mass protests against the government rsquo s attempt to undermine the independence of the courts  the results have been that netanyahu rsquo s extremist government would lose to the right center left opposition  therefore  i was very anxious to see the results of the first friday poll after the war began the previous saturday  the result was that netanyahu rsquo s coalition gained just one seat  from 50 to 51 out of 120 seats in the knesset  parliament   the combined opposition of the jewish and predominantly palestinian israeli parties had 69 seats  by the following week  netanyahu rsquo s coalition had already lost that seat     it is true that unlike the majority american public opposition to the war  the overwhelming majority of the jewish israelis support the war  though as it completes its fourth week  support for continuation of the war has declined from 81 percent to 68 percent  even many liberal analysts are gung ho for this  ldquo necessary war  rdquo  this is primarily because netanyahu and his associates have convinced the israeli public that iran  with its nuclear program  ballistic missiles  and proxies like hamas and hezbollah  poses an existential threat to israel  statements by iranian leaders such as ayatollah khomeini and president ahmadinejad that  ldquo israel must be wiped off the map rdquo  have reinforced this fear  as the son of a historian  netanyahu is very concerned with his legacy  he does not want to be remembered as the leader who failed to prevent the murder of 1 200 israelis by hamas on october 7 but as the man who successfully dealt with the iranian threat  an issue that has always been at the top of his agenda       yet support for the war has not translated into support for netanyahu  the majority of the israeli public still holds him responsible for october 7 mdash for having encouraged qatar to send  30 million a month to prop up hamas  which supposedly would be satisfied with just governing gaza and wouldn rsquo t attack  while ensuring there was no need to negotiate with president mahmoud abbas  the head of the plo and palestinian authority  about a political compromise  they hold him responsible for not taking responsibility for this policy and for heavily subsidizing the ultra orthodox part of his coalition mdash about 14 percent of the population mdash who don rsquo t share in the burden of military service     sixty israeli civil society organizations have twice published an ad in haaretz calling for an end to the war  and weekly demonstrations have begun in tel aviv and other locations calling for an end to the war  the police  under the authority of fascist minister of national security ben gvir  attacked and dispersed the demonstrators in tel aviv and haifa for violating wartime crowd regulations  supposedly  ldquo for their own safety  rdquo         with the midterm elections drawing near  rising gas prices  and a fear of being dragged into a vietnam afghanistan iraq quagmire scenario  my hope is that president trump will soon declare  ldquo we won rdquo  and end the war  netanyahu wouldn rsquo t dare to continue the war against his wishes     meanwhile  people are dying and homes are being destroyed in both tehran and tel aviv<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/world/netanyahu-war-iran-israel-diplomacy-critique/">The Folly of Netanyahu’s War Against Iran</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 03 Apr 2026 15:08:26 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/world/netanyahu-war-iran-israel-diplomacy-critique/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Meet the Immigrant Workers Who Launched the First Major Meatpacking Strike in Decades]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/jbs-strike-meatpacking-colorado/]]></link>
		<author>Ella Fanger</author>
	<date>Apr 3, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Amid the Trump administration’s assault on immigrant workers, thousands at the country’s largest meat processor organized across nationalities to launch a historic work stoppage.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<description>
	<![CDATA["Amid the trump administration rsquo s assault on immigrant workers  thousands at the country rsquo s largest meat processor organized across nationalities to launch a historic work stoppage      workers picket outside of the jbs meatpacking plant on march 16  2026  in greeley  colorado       olga barrios has been working at the beef processing plant in greeley  colorado  long enough to remember the morning in 2006 when ice agents stormed in and arrested 260 of her coworkers  she watched as they were rounded up  restrained with cellophane wrap and chains  and marched out of the facility  recounting that time to me  she grew emotional as she described how a local church took in children whose parents had been detained  to this day   ldquo it rsquo s in the back of my mind  rdquo  she said   ldquo the company  instead of protecting the workers  was actually turning them in  rdquo       the owner of the greeley plant at the time  swift  was the target of six simultaneous ice raids across the united states in  ldquo operation wagon train  rdquo  the largest single worksite immigration enforcement action in us history  some 1 300 workers were detained in all  depleting swift rsquo s overall workforce by 10 percent  the company struggled to recover  and a year later it was acquired by jbs  a brazilian company and the world rsquo s largest meat producer     since the raid  jbs has rebuilt its workforce by partnering with refugee resettlement agencies to recruit migrants with work authorization  as of 2020  an estimated 80 ndash 90 percent of workers at the greeley plant were foreign born  workers speak over 50 languages on the disassembly line as they slice  debone  trim  and grind up to 6 000 carcasses a day  kim cordova  the president of united food and commercial workers  ufcw  local 7  which represents workers at the plant  said jbs rsquo s reliance on immigrant labor is strategic   ldquo they rsquo re really good about bringing in folks from different countries that don rsquo t know their rights yet or are here seeking asylum  rdquo  she said  jbs knows that precarity and fear means  ldquo they can run those chain speeds fast  rdquo     but on march 16  barrios and her 3 800 coworkers reached a breaking point  walking off the job to launch the first ever strike at the greeley plant and the first major strike in the us meatpacking industry in four decades  members have been working under an expired contract since last july  and have struggled to come to an agreement with jbs on issues including pay and adequate safety equipment  according to the union  jbs has offered wage increases of less than 2 percent per year on average  lower than the rate of inflation  the strike is scheduled to end today after stretching into a third week as the union said jbs refused to come to the table     meatpacking is among the most dangerous industries in the united states  with workers standing shoulder to shoulder using industrial tools and sharp knives to make thousands of repetitive cuts in a shift  workers don personal protective equipment including hard hats  with colors indicating their level of seniority   safety goggles  boots  metal mesh gloves  arm guards  aprons  and more  but when that gear is inevitably damaged or worn down  jbs garnishes the cost of replacement directly from workers rsquo  checks  which can cost up to  1 100  the plant rsquo s average wage is just  26 an hour       amid the trump administration rsquo s assault on immigrant workers  jbs employees organized across nationalities and languages to launch a historic work stoppage  many workers in meatpacking plants have temporary protected status  which trump has eliminated for millions from countries including haiti  venezuela  and afghanistan  last june  the administration paused ice raids in agriculture and meatpacking after pressure from the industry  but reversed course just days later  in july  ice raided a glenn valley foods meat processing plant in omaha  nebraska  detaining more than 50 employees  and leaving the plant without most of its workforce  and ice rsquo s terror campaign across the country puts workers at risk  regardless of their immigration status   ldquo it doesn rsquo t matter whether you rsquo re born in this country or not  rdquo  said cordova   ldquo we rsquo ve had us citizens killed by ice  rdquo     even in this hostile political climate  workers in greeley are fighting back  cordova said   ldquo because you can die at that plant  rdquo  in 2021  osha cited jbs after a worker fell into a vat containing chemicals used to process animal hides and died  that same year  a worker was pulled into a conveyor belt and had to have his arm amputated   ldquo our union gave us an opportunity to speak up for ourselves and that rsquo s what we rsquo re doing  rdquo  said nathaniel mann  who has worked at jbs for one year   ldquo pay us for our work  people are losing their hands  people are losing their lives  rdquo     you may not have heard of jbs  but you likely have seen their products sold under brand names like blue ribbon beef and certified angus beef sold at costco  kroger  and stop   shop and supplied to mcdonald rsquo s  burger king  and more  jbs is the largest player in the highly concentrated us meatpacking industry  85 percent of which was dominated by just four companies in 2019  the flagship greeley plant alone accounts for 5 percent of the country rsquo s beef processing capacity     jbs is the largest employer in surrounding weld county  and has built a workforce of migrants from mexico  somalia  myanmar  and more  by 2007  greeley rsquo s foreign born population had swelled to 12 000  constituting more than 12 percent of the total population and a 60 percent increase from 2000  other companies emulated jbs rsquo s model and as of 2020 more than 45 percent of all meatpacking workers were foreign born       jbs relies on a stream of migrant labor constantly replenished by high turnover in its grueling slaughterhouses  according to local 7  a new hire class of up to 60 workers go through training at the plant every week   ldquo the company would benefit if they took better care of the ones that are there  have been there long  and know the job  rdquo  said barrios     to meet its labor demand  jbs has allegedly turned to increasingly unscrupulous hiring methods  the company currently faces a class action lawsuit by over 1 000 haitian workers who say they were recruited to greeley via tiktok with the promise of jobs and housing nearby  instead  they were packed into squalid motel rooms with up to 11 other people  and thrown into hazardous disassembly work without training in their native language       ldquo we strongly disagree with the claims made in the recently filed lawsuit  rdquo  said a jbs spokesperson   ldquo our employees choose to work with us  understand the terms of their employment  and are free to leave at any time  rdquo     jbs rsquo s market size allows it to set industry standards for pay and conditions  especially for newly arrived immigrant workers who lack other options for entry level jobs that don rsquo t require english proficiency  from greeley  an amazon warehouse that could provide similar work is over an hour away   ldquo jbs is doing whatever they want because they don rsquo t have competition  rdquo  said bienvenue hovozounkou  a union steward who has worked at jbs since he moved to the united states from benin in 2019  jbs paid  55 million to settle a 2024 lawsuit alleging that it colluded with other big meatpackers to suppress wages across the industry     jbs is trying to pressure workers at greeley to accept the same terms it negotiated with 14 other plants last year   ldquo we presented a strong  fair offer consistent with the historic national contract reached in 2025 in partnership with ufcw international  ndash  an agreement that has already delivered higher wages  a secure pension  and long term financial stability for team members at our other major facilities  rdquo  said the jbs spokesperson  but local 7 says that contract doesn rsquo t account for the higher living expenses in colorado  compared to other worksites in places like nebraska and texas   if workers in greeley win more  it could open the door for tens of thousands of workers at other plants to demand the same when their contracts expire       mann works on the cleaning team  sweeping away discarded innards and cuts of meat that fall to the floor and spraying the conveyors and work surfaces clean of blood  he wears a wetsuit to protect him from the 180 degree water in the pressurized hose he uses  during a recent shift  he heard screaming behind him and turned around to see that the hose rsquo s back end had exploded  spraying scalding water on everyone on the line  who aren rsquo t given protective suits   he watched it burn through a woman rsquo s boot down to her shoe  two days later  management hadn rsquo t properly patched the hose  and it exploded again     this time mann saw it happening and jumped on top of the hose as if to block the impact of a bomb  covering the geyser with his suited body  he felt the scorching water seeping through the seams of his suit until another coworker realized what was happening and turned the water off  mann rsquo s story isn rsquo t uncommon  jbs has been fined by osha for failing to provide proper protective equipment to workers handling the hot water lines and exposing them to severe skin and eye injuries from hazardous chemical cleaners     a lack of proper equipment can turn a dangerous job into a deadly one  the union says jbs keeps a low inventory of personal protective equipment  which is often given to workers damaged or in the wrong size  workers use dull  thinned down knives to cut through hide  muscle  and bone  when they ask for a replacement  workers say jbs garnishes the cost directly out of their paychecks  ranging from around  100 for gloves to over  1 000 for mesh gowns   ldquo our policy is mdash and has long been mdash that team members are only responsible for paying for personal protective equipment if the equipment is lost or maliciously damaged  rdquo  said the jbs spokesperson     even if they avoid the most gruesome accidents  workers often suffer from repetitive motion injuries  nesly pierre  one of the plaintiffs in the class action suit by haitian workers  was assigned to  ldquo slaughter intestines rdquo  on the kill floor  which required him to stick two fingers into the belly of a cow carcass and pull the intestine out with his fingers  after a few days  his fingers locked in a clawing position and his hand swelled so big that he couldn rsquo t close it     the pace of work is set by an overhead chain that launches carcasses toward workers who rush to carve them using heavy saws  knives  and power tools  as of 2024  jbs rsquo s crewing guide had a maximum speed of 390  ldquo heads rdquo  per hour  but hovozounkou monitors chain speeds as a union steward  and has seen them reach 420 in the last year  the usda is currently considering a proposal to allow for even faster chain speeds in pork and chicken processing plants  which jbs has publicly applauded       a week before the strike began  workers say jbs management brought them into rooms in groups and told them the company couldn rsquo t guarantee that they rsquo d keep their jobs if they went on strike   ldquo because we hadn rsquo t seen  before  there was definitely fear and a lot of questioning as to what are going to be the consequences of all this  rdquo  said barrios  but  she added   ldquo we all agreed that this is going to have to happen for hellip ourselves and also for the future and the betterment of the community  rdquo     the specter of trump rsquo s immigration crackdowns functions as a means of control to scare workers out of taking action   ldquo the company is doubling down on their threats and intimidation to try to force people to come to work in really bad working environments  rdquo  said cordova  images from greeley have captured a striking defiance against the trump administration rsquo s campaign of fear  on the lively picket line  workers danced and sang in spanish  french  haitian creole  burmese  somali  rohingya  and more   ldquo for many of the workers  this is the first time they rsquo ve ever got to experience democracy  is having the right to vote on their contract  rdquo  said cordova   ldquo a strike represents democracy  rdquo     by striking  workers are hitting back not just at jbs management but also the trump administration rsquo s embrace of the company  pilgrim rsquo s pride  a chicken processing subsidiary of jbs  was the single largest donor to trump rsquo s inauguration fund  giving  5 million  just months later  the sec approved jbs rsquo s listing on the new york stock exchange over the protests of lawmakers and activists based on the company rsquo s history of bribing brazilian officials  deforestation in the amazon  and child labor violations  including at the greeley plant  where investigators found that migrant children as young as 13 were working overnight shifts     hovozounkou sees jbs rsquo s donations to trump as an insult to workers   ldquo they have money to support someone else who is not even working for them  rdquo  he said   ldquo we are the ones who are suffering  making money for them  putting our lives in danger  rdquo  workers believe jbs will ultimately come to the table because it can rsquo t generate its record profits without them   ldquo without the employees  there is no company  rdquo  said hovozounkou   ldquo we want jbs to listen  to hear from our voice what we want and then give it to us  rdquo<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/jbs-strike-meatpacking-colorado/">Meet the Immigrant Workers Who Launched the First Major Meatpacking Strike in Decades</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 03 Apr 2026 15:07:08 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/jbs-strike-meatpacking-colorado/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The All Too Predictable Reason Trump Fired Pam Bondi]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-fire-pam-bondi/]]></link>
		<author>Chris Lehmann</author>
	<date>Apr 3, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The president has surrounded himself with cronies and sycophants. But even they keep failing to meet the level of servility he demands.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["The president has surrounded himself with cronies and sycophants  but even they keep failing to meet the level of servility he demands      president donald trump speaks to then ndash attorney general pam bondi during a press conference on recent supreme court rulings in the briefing room at the white house in june 27  2025       the second trump presidency has been a through the looking glass parody of executive branch accountability  from its brazen agenda of self enrichment to its lawless war making and campaigns of civilian murder  but trump rsquo s ouster of attorney general pam bondi represents an especially grim moment in the white house rsquo s backward spooling approach to compliance with the law  in prior modern presidencies  attorneys general flamed out in office after touching off major scandals mdash such as alberto gonzales rsquo s now quaint seeming bid to hand over us attorney gigs to political hacks  in nobler circumstances  they might have resigned in protest over oval office tampering with the justice department rsquo s independence  as elliot richardson did during the nixon white house rsquo s saturday night massacre  bondi  by contrast  was cashiered for failing to slow walk and downplay the raging epstein files scandal to the president rsquo s satisfaction mdash while also  in a betrayal of trump rsquo s model of government by retribution  allegedly tipping off democratic california representative eric swalwell to the release of materials from the long closed fbi investigation into his purported relationship with a chinese spy       in other words  bondi lost her job for displaying insufficient fealty to her oval office boss mdash even after going to enormous lengths to transform the justice department into an outlet of maga agitprop  from firing doj attorneys who had prosecuted january 6 rioters to pursuing shoddy and baseless prosecutions of trump rsquo s political enemies  to threatening hate speech prosecutions of people who didn rsquo t mourn charlie kirk rsquo s death to the administration rsquo s satisfaction  yet the larger irony is that trump rsquo s vanity and his demands for cringing loyalty have always been unquenchable  bondi rsquo s trespass wasn rsquo t so much a function of her seeking to assert her own independence mdash as any minimally competent attorney general should mdash as of her inability to appease trump rsquo s demands telepathically     the debacle of the epstein files rsquo  release is the purest illustration of her flailing courtiership  during his 2024 reelection campaign  trump pledged to support the full release of the federal files on the late pedophile sex trafficker as a sop to the q pilled wing of the maga base  but after trump won reelection  his interest in going public with the sick predations of his former south florida crony plummeted mdash most notably after bondi briefed him that he was a frequent presence in the files  the white house went rapidly into overdrive in an effort to downplay the scale of the epstein scandal  fbi director kash patel and his deputy dan bongino both issued statements asserting that  despite the extremely suspicious circumstances surrounding epstein rsquo s death while in custody  he had taken his own life  patel also walked back bondi rsquo s initial claim that the files contained  ldquo thousands rdquo  of shocking videos showing epstein with underage sexual partners and child pornography   meanwhile  elon musk  then on the outs with the trump white house over its massive tax and spending bill  took to x to proclaim that trump was suppressing the full release of the files because he was all over them   through it all  the president shrugged off disclosures relating to his close friendship with epstein mdash including the gross and salacious entry he evidently composed for a book commemorating the pedophile rsquo s 50th birthday     it was bondi rsquo s misfortune to directly botch the rollout of the epstein files rsquo  release  when the administration first made a tranche of documents available to the public  it turned out mostly to be material that was already available  and after bondi touted the existence of a full roster of epstein rsquo s clients in a fox news interview mdash one that is  ldquo sitting on my desk right now to review right now  rdquo  as she put it mdash the administration then walked that claim back as well  a memo from bondi rsquo s own doj proclaimed that its  ldquo systematic review revealed no incriminating  lsquo client list  rsquo  there was also no credible evidence found that epstein blackmailed prominent individuals as part of his actions  rdquo     this incompetent to incoherent message is indeed the calling card of someone who had no business being anywhere near the department of justice  let alone in charge  but more than that  bondi rsquo s flagrant mishandling of the epstein disclosures underlines the untenability of the prime directive of all trump white house flunkies  to appease both the whims of the king and the restive spirits of maga conspiracy mongering  trump has managed throughout his career to direct his following to disregard the plain evidence before their senses with the elan of obi wan kenobi masking the presence of embattled droids in the empire rsquo s sights  but the epstein scandal simply occupies too great a space in maga rsquo s mindscape for management by trump rsquo s conventional strategy of grandiosely changing the subject  and as we now know  it rsquo s simply impossible for any of trump rsquo s appeasers mdash even one with the lickspittle credentials of pam bondi mdash to keep up with the flailing directives of the maga monarch     so just as the fork in the road abruptly arrived for former dhs director kirsti noem when she seemed to show the temerity to actually blame trump for his own actions and decisions in her testimony before congress  it was all but foreordained that bondi was on the path to defenestration when she proved unable to square all the many circles leading back from the epstein files to trump rsquo s well documented history of ugly sexual predation  the ironies here  too  are hard to adequately describe  bondi came into the job  after all  only after trump rsquo s first pick  ex ndash florida representative matt gaetz  proved too toxic on the basis of charges stemming from his own alleged sexual fraternization with underage partners     meanwhile  the reported front runner to replace bondi is epa administrator lee zeldin  who senate democrats charge has lied to them under oath about the cancellation of climate grants  zeldin also was the house rsquo s most vocal defender of trump during his first impeachment  and voted against certifying the results of the 2020 election  there is  in short  no trump authored lie too big for him to swallow mdash which in this debased phase of the american imperial presidency  appears to be the chief requirement for the job<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-fire-pam-bondi/">The All Too Predictable Reason Trump Fired Pam Bondi</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 03 Apr 2026 14:11:54 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-fire-pam-bondi/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Pete Hegseth Is Scapegoating Career Soldiers for His Own Failures]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/pete-hegseth-randy-george-firing-purge/]]></link>
		<author>Jeet Heer</author>
	<date>Apr 3, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Trapped in a disastrous war, the defense secretary is intensifying a purge of the military. </p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Trapped in a disastrous war  the defense secretary is intensifying a purge of the military       pete hegseth speaks during a news conference at the pentagon on march 19  2026        two prominent government officials were fired on thursday  a civilian and a military commander  donald trump removed attorney general pam bondi  long the subject of presidential displeasure because of her politically maladroit handling of the jeffrey epstein case  which has only served to embarrass the president  and her failure  despite the president rsquo s wishes and her own servility  to fully weaponize the department of justice against trump rsquo s partisan enemies  the bondi firing is symptomatic of trump rsquo s increasing frustration at his inability to implement his agenda  it follows the ouster of homeland security secretary kristi noem last month  and trump may not be done wielding the axe  politico reports that commerce secretary howard lutnick and labor secretary lori chavez deremer might also be on the chopping block  with trump eager to find replacements while the gop still controls the senate       but the political purge of trump rsquo s cabinet is less significant than what is happening in the pentagon  where defense secretary pete hegseth is intensifying his campaign to get rid of officers who disagree with him  as axios reported in august   ldquo decades of experience have been wiped from the highest levels of the u s  military  the result of retirements and removals in the first year of the second trump administration  rdquo  and on thursday  hegseth added to this brain drain  firing three generals  including gen  randy george  the top ranking general in the army  the news site military com called it  ldquo one of the most significant wartime leadership shakeups during active u s  combat operations in recent years  rdquo     these moves take place against the backdrop of a flailing military campaign in iran  both trump and hegseth appeared to think the war would be a cakewalk that would take just a few days to wrap up  in fact  the war has lasted more than a month  and in a speech on wednesday night that was alarmingly detached from reality  trump offered no plausible account of how it could end  although he predicted another two or three weeks of fighting     but while the iran debacle was a factor in the firing  it was also not the only factor  in truth  hegseth rsquo s entire tenure as defense secretary has been marked by an ideologically motivated campaign of high level firings and refusals to promote deserving candidates  a right wing zealot who first made his mark as a fox news host  hegseth strongly believes that the military has been infested by what he calls  ldquo woke rdquo  ideology  which he has fought by removing officers he suspects of being excessively liberal or supporters of dei hiring     among those purged under hegseth were lt  gen  jeffrey kruse  gen  charles  ldquo cq rdquo  brown jr   gen  tim haugh  adm  lisa franchetti  adm  linda fagan  gen  james slife  vice adm  nancy lacore  vice adm  shoshana chatfield  and adm  jamie sands     the officers targeted by hegseth tend to be women  people of color  or trans  on thursday  nbc reported that  ldquo hegseth has taken steps to block or delay promotions for more than a dozen black and female senior officers across all four branches of the military  some of whom are seen as having been targeted because of their race  gender or perceived affiliation with biden administration policies or officials  rdquo       an additional political factor in the case of randy george is that hegseth is engaged in a feud with army secretary daniel p  driscoll  who would be one of the top candidates to replace hegseth if he himself were fired   george is known to be a driscoll ally  both george and driscoll refused hegseth rsquo s orders to remove four officers  two black men and two women  from a promotion list     beyond these internal pentagon politics  hegseth has good reason to fear he is on shaky ground  recent leaks from the pentagon have depicted him as an unprepared leader who went into the iran war with the faulty belief that it would be a quick and easy victory     in its latest cover story  time reported      key trump officials  including defense secretary pete hegseth  were surprised by the barrage of retaliatory attacks tehran launched against u s  and israeli targets across the region  including in countries long assumed to be off limits  kuwait  bahrain  saudi arabia  the united arab emirates  and qatar  a state that had both harbored iran rsquo s terrorist proxies and served as a conduit for backchannel diplomacy between the u s  and hamas  the response shattered the assumption that tehran would confine itself to performative retaliation  in internal deliberations before the war rsquo s launch  hegseth had pointed to iran rsquo s muted reaction to trump rsquo s past attacks as evidence that calibrated force could impose costs on tehran without triggering a broader war      one unnamed source told time that hegseth  ldquo was caught off guard  there rsquo s no question  rdquo  the same source added   ldquo he was expecting the iranians to fight back in some form  when they started attacking virtually the entire region  it sort of hit him like   lsquo whoa  we rsquo re really in this now  rsquo  rdquo     leaks of this sort should unnerve hegseth  if the war continues to go badly and drags down the us economy  he would be an easy fall guy for trump  hegseth would be following in the footsteps of defense secretary donald rumseld  who fell on his sword in 2006 when the iraq war turned into a political catastrophe  aside from his long running vendetta against the career military  hegseth is intensifying his purge as a preemptive attack  he wants to undermine his possible replacements and scapegoat them  before he becomes the scapegoat<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/pete-hegseth-randy-george-firing-purge/">Pete Hegseth Is Scapegoating Career Soldiers for His Own Failures</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 03 Apr 2026 13:47:01 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/pete-hegseth-randy-george-firing-purge/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Women]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/women-3/]]></link>
		<author>Anita Kunz</author>
	<date>Apr 3, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[Living history.]]></teaser> 
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	<description>
	<![CDATA["Check out all installments in the oppart series<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/women-3/">Women</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 03 Apr 2026 12:30:11 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/women-3/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[How Gaza Broke Big Tech’s Campus Pipeline]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/gaza-big-tech-campus-berkeley-google-amazon-microsoft-israel/]]></link>
		<author>Khadeejah Khan</author>
	<date>Apr 3, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Big Tech’s complicity in Israel’s genocide in Gaza has pushed STEM students to organize for a more ethical tech industry.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Big tech rsquo s complicity in israel rsquo s genocide in gaza has pushed stem students to organize for a more ethical tech industry      former google employees speak out against big tech at uc berkeley rsquo s pro palestinian encampment         stem graduates once clamored for jobs in big tech  but not so readily anymore  since israel began its genocide in gaza  it has relied on ai and surveillance systems developed by once dream job companies like google  amazon  and microsoft  today  many students and workers  uncomfortable with the prospect of fortifying the israeli war machine  are engaging in a concerted effort to build alternative futures in technology       at the center of this organizing are uc berkeley students  who are just miles away from silicon valley  on august 27  2025  berkeley department of electrical engineering   computer sciences lecturer peyrin kao launched an open ended hunger strike to protest the use of technology in israel rsquo s genocide in gaza     the hunger strike  which lasted 38 days  demanded that the university acknowledge its role in israel rsquo s genocide and occupation of gaza and the west bank  pledge to sever material or financial relationships with the us military  and institutionalize ethical standards aligned with international human rights law     while kao suspended his hunger strike because of health concerns  his demands highlighted the university of california rsquo s long standing entanglement with the military industrial complex  in may 2024  the uc system disclosed that they had  32 billion invested in assets that palestine solidarity protesters called for divestment from  research across uc campuses has received  5 6 billion from 2005 to 2022 from the department of defense  lockheed martin  raytheon  general atomics  boeing  and the israeli ministry of defense  from 2017 to 2022  uc campuses received 1 428 total military funded research grants      ldquo there are a lot of moral questions behind what we make and whether they are being used for good or for occupation  apartheid  and genocide  rdquo  kao said   ldquo these things are happening with companies that our students aspire to work for  like google  amazon  and microsoft  and with our university investment  when you don rsquo t say something  you rsquo re making a political choice to say that you rsquo re ok with all of this going on  rdquo     during the hunger strike  students and staff across berkeley joined kao on day long solidarity strikes and a collective of students formed stem for palestine  a group that has been organizing for their labor to be used for social good  rather than state violence  the group has hosted teach ins with former tech workers and has organized mutual aid efforts to support palestinians in gaza       a month after kao rsquo s hunger strike was announced  uc berkeley released the names of 160 students and staff who allegedly organized for palestine to the trump administration  kao rsquo s name was included on the list     in an e mailed statement to the nation  uc berkeley spokesperson dan mogulof wrote that the university  ldquo maintains an unwavering commitment to free speech and diversity of perspective  rdquo  however  in december  uc berkeley administration suspended kao for the spring 2026 semester without pay  claiming that he  ldquo misused the classroom for the purpose of political advocacy  rdquo     since his suspension  stem for palestine has launched an  ldquo open letter for peyrin rsquo s reinstatement  rdquo  which has reached nearly 2 000 signatures  mostly from faculty  students  and community members      ldquo my impression of uc berkeley as a premier research institution has been greatly altered  rdquo  said leela mehta harwitz  a student and member of stem for palestine  mehta harwitz attributes their reappraisal to an  ldquo increased realization of how much of that research is directly going into improving bonds  aircraft  and facial recognition systems mdash everything that allows the israeli and us governments to directly target palestinians and undocumented immigrants  rdquo       to promote accountability  stem for palestine activists have been compiling research about uc finances on their website  mapping uc investments  listing uc employee wages  and developing a searchable boycott  divest  and sanctions list  stephen okita  a uc berkeley student and member of stem for palestine  believes making this research more accessible is critical to keeping divestment alive      ldquo when the encampments happened  it was the first time that i had hope that we could actually make real change  because we could target the money  which is what you need to target in any movement  rdquo  okita said     at berkeley  stem for palestine has held teach ins with former tech workers like abdo mohamed to inform students about big tech rsquo s complicity in apartheid and hosted alternative career fairs to provide different possibilities in tech  in 2024  mohamed was fired for organizing a vigil for palestinians outside microsoft rsquo s headquarters alongside members of no azure for apartheid      ldquo every cs student  before they decide where to work  needs to go through and understand the political role of tech  because the only information we receive when we are students is that tech is good  rdquo  mohamed said   ldquo tech can be good  but we don rsquo t receive the information that tech can be evil  tech is mostly evil  rdquo       to support ethical alternatives  the tech for palestine incubator backs projects and start ups that either directly or indirectly advocate for palestine through the form of marketing  mentorship  funding  and networks  upscrolled  founded by palestinian australian entrepreneur issam hijazi  is a social media platform supported by the incubator  the app  which aims to create a platform free of shadow banning and censorship  has surpassed 2 5 million users globally       tech for palestine also works with former tech workers to provide avenues for workers and students to organize  hasan ibraheem  a former google employee who was fired and arrested during the no tech for apartheid sit in in google rsquo s new york city office  began building tech for liberation  a network to provide students in tech and student organizers resources to connect with former tech workers to build ethical alternatives in the field      ldquo one of the things that tech liberation is trying to do is convince students to keep the mindset that organizing is not something that ends once you graduate  rdquo  ibraheem said   ldquo hopefully  we can chip away at the culture that these large companies are seen as the place to go and instead see what they really are  companies that are taking contracts regardless of any real concern for human rights  rdquo     despite active attempts at suppression  students and workers continue to organize  for peyrin  it is the belief and necessity in a liberated future that continues to be his moral compass      ldquo the road to an alternative future  as with many other social justice issues right now  leads through palestine  rdquo  kao said   ldquo palestine really is a litmus test for these tech companies and these universities in terms of what they rsquo re willing to stand up for  the reason why so many of us are here organizing and putting our careers or our bodies on the line for this issue is because of the continued steadfastness and resilience of the palestinian people  rdquo<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/gaza-big-tech-campus-berkeley-google-amazon-microsoft-israel/">How Gaza Broke Big Tech’s Campus Pipeline</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 03 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/gaza-big-tech-campus-berkeley-google-amazon-microsoft-israel/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Hasan Piker Threatens the Establishment. That’s Why They Want to Destroy Him.]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/hasan-piker-attacks-antisemitism/]]></link>
		<author>Daniel Denvir</author>
	<date>Apr 3, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Critics are leveling baseless charges of antisemitism and bigotry at the mega-streamer. But they’re really scared of the challenge he poses to their power.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Critics are leveling baseless charges of antisemitism and bigotry at the mega streamer  but they rsquo re really scared of the challenge he poses to their power      hasan piker       over the past few weeks  democratic establishment figures and the israel lobby have come together to denounce mega streamer hasan piker and to demand that left wing democrats shun his extremely popular platform  their charge is that he rsquo s an antisemite  the reality  of course  is that piker is not an antisemite  but he is a trenchant critic of israel rsquo s oppression of the palestinian people  of us warmongering  and of a democratic establishment that supports both  what rsquo s more  he rsquo s an unmatched online warrior against maga and an american far right that is increasingly open about its fascism and antisemitism       seeing someone like that rise in stature and influence is an inherent threat to democratic bigwigs and pro israel hardliners  which is why they are working so hard to destroy piker rsquo s reputation  but their moment is passing  and their power is fading  this time  piker and the american left will not be silenced     in attacking piker  the centrists and zionists are reaching for a playbook that once seemed foolproof  for decades  any criticism or protest of israel rsquo s occupation and apartheid system was met with an accusation of antisemitism  those accusations did the trick  driving dissonant notes out of mainstream media and politics mdash or even from their jobs  it didn rsquo t matter when the critic was jewish mdash or even  as in the case of scholar norman finkelstein  the son of holocaust survivors     with the onset of the genocide in gaza in 2023  such accusations accelerated and intensified  as the global movement against the genocide grew  so did the scale of the disinformation campaign mounted by israel and its allies  above all else  the attacks were meant to make people forget that large numbers of jewish anti zionists  particularly youth  were active leaders in the movement mdash and that the us left  like many lefts  has always been profoundly jewish   the myth that communism was a jewish conspiracy was a core feature of 20th century fascist ideology  that shouldn rsquo t obscure the fact that being on the left in the united states and elsewhere has long meant being in community with large numbers of jewish people dedicated to universal human emancipation      democratic politicians from new york mayor eric adams to president joe biden nonetheless condemned this substantially jewish movement as antisemitic  such bogus charges were credulously regurgitated by the new york times and cnn  democrats cheered the repression of the movement on campus  a crackdown more severe than that meted out against any such student movement in recent us history  then democrats lost the election to donald trump  the dnc found  in a still secret autopsy of the 2024 election  that palestine cost harris a lot of votes  upon taking office  trump took the bogus charge  legitimized by democrats and the liberal media  that campuses were infested with antisemitic leftists as a pretext to engage in its ongoing attacks on higher education and academic freedom       but the smears that might have worked before 2023 found much less purchase amid the genocide  ordinary democrats could clearly see that it was unacceptable to blindly support a state committing such unspeakable atrocities  today  67 percent of democrats sympathize more with palestinians  and just 17 percent with israelis     that hasn rsquo t stopped the attacks from coming  during zohran mamdani rsquo s campaign for mayor  andrew cuomo and his allies on the center and right wings constantly and falsely claimed that mamdani was antisemitic  whipping up a fake scandal around his refusal to condemn the phrase  ldquo globalize the intifada  rdquo  cuomo allies also charged that he was an islamist jihadist  the sort of islamophobia toward which false charges of antisemitism often lead  even mamdani rsquo s resounding win hasn rsquo t quieted the slander  there rsquo s currently a new wave of fake outrage over his wife rsquo s past social media likes  mamdani has  by and large  never taken the bait  which is wise     it is in this context mdash of a centrist and zionist movement straining to keep a grip on its political power mdash that the attacks on hasan piker have emerged  piker has also become a stand in for the broader fight to define the future direction of the democratic party  and to keep the left outside the party rsquo s borders      every day seems to bring another hysterical establishment figure scaremongering about piker  his appearance at a rally with abdul el sayed  a left wing senate candidate in michigan  became a major issue on the campaign trail  cnn rsquo s jake tapper hosted a lengthy segment about piker rsquo s supposedly malign influence on the democrats  jonathan cowan  the president of centrist democratic group third way  cowrote an op ed in  the wall street journal charging that democrats were  ldquo too cozy rdquo  with piker  in an interview with the bulwark on thursday  cowan went even further  comparing piker to david duke       it would take too much space to go through all of the specifics behind these claims mdash but any serious examination of them reveals their flimsiness  and ignores piker rsquo s long history of denouncing antisemitism  to use just one example  piker rsquo s critics say that he referred to jews as  ldquo inbred  rdquo  in fact  he referred to some far right haredi jews as inbred  this is precisely how  with great frequency  he has described various far right americans  it rsquo s not a very nice thing to say  and it might not be your preferred political discourse  but it has nothing at all to do specifically with jews     in reality  the antisemitism smears rsquo  greatest impact is to generate actual antisemitism mdash not on the left but on the far right  increasingly  far right leaders and commentators are breaking with the zionist consensus  in the case of figures like nick fuentes  they are leaning in to breaking the taboo against antisemitism  the reason there are special rules against criticizing israel  fuentes charges  is because a transnational jewish conspiracy controls the levers of power  fuentes doesn rsquo t care about being called an antisemite  he knows that there rsquo s a growing audience that is asking questions about the us israel relationship that mainstream politics and media refuse to provide answers to      the left provides a critique of israeli settler colonialism  occupation  apartheid  and genocide grounded in anti racist universalist principles  the far right offers classical antisemitism  every establishment effort to shut down left wing anti zionism cedes ground to the most dangerous forces in american society     the anti antisemitism push isn rsquo t about stopping antisemitism  it rsquo s about protecting the state of israel from legitimate criticism  in fact  it prioritizes the latter over the former  hasan piker dedicates his enormous platform to winning the hearts and minds of young men who are otherwise being courted by the likes of fuentes or by misogynists like andrew tate  the attempt by the democratic establishment and israel lobby to drive piker from the public square is a direct attack on one of the most powerful anti fascist  anti racist  feminist forces on the internet       despite these efforts  the evidence shows that leftist forces are getting bolder  not more afraid  when it comes to israel and palestine  on march 31  for instance  alexandria ocasio cortez responded to movement demands and called for a full arms embargo on israel mdash including banning funding for so called  ldquo defensive rdquo  weapons systems like the iron dome  a position she had previously shied away from  the move was belated but historic  ocasio cortez  a leading figure on the democratic party left  has drawn a new line in the sand that every aspiring democrat will have to answer to  the move will also consolidate her leadership of a fractious left that demands principled stands on palestine  and it will spark no real backlash from a larger liberal voter base who understands that israel  like apartheid south africa  can only be democratized through the global imposition of an arms embargo and sanctions       after kamala harris lost in 2024  the liberal mediasphere was awash in hand wringing over the need for a  ldquo joe rogan of the left  rdquo  it soon became clear that we already had one in piker  but he is unacceptable to the democratic powers that be because he supports palestinian liberation  he rsquo s also unacceptable  however  because he provides a platform for an ascendant socialist left that is challenging the entire oligarchic order mdash starting with the militarist and business aligned democratic party establishment  they want to shut him up because he is a potent force in a movement to end their careers  but he rsquo s not shutting up  and the left wing politicians who are being called upon to defend him are standing firm  the democratic party base has changed  its establishment leaders will apparently be the last to find out<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/hasan-piker-attacks-antisemitism/">Hasan Piker Threatens the Establishment. That’s Why They Want to Destroy Him.</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 03 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/hasan-piker-attacks-antisemitism/</guid>
  </item>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The AI Boom Is a Climate Bust]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/environment/ai-climate-disinformation-waste/]]></link>
		<author>Mark Hertsgaard</author>
	<date>Apr 3, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>It’s not just the massive amounts of water and energy data centers require—AI is also spreading climate misinformation across the Internet. </p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["It rsquo s not just the massive amounts of water and energy data centers require mdash ai is also spreading climate misinformation across the internet       a google data center in henderson  nevada  on july 24  2025          ldquo ithink ai will probably  like  most likely  sort of lead to the end of the world  rdquo  sam altman said in 2015  the year he cofounded open ai  the artificial intelligence company that made him a billionaire  but not to worry  he added   ldquo in the meantime  there will be great companies created with serious machine learning  rdquo        as if to confirm altman rsquo s dystopian prediction  recent scientific research has documented that ai chatbots increasingly lie  cheat  and disregard direct instructions from humans  that rsquo s bad enough when the issue is whether e mails should be deleted  it rsquo s another thing entirely when the future of humanity is at stake  in simulated war games  ai ordered nuclear strikes in 95 cases out of 100  researchers at kings college london found     bill gates has said that ai  ldquo will make it easier to fight climate change  rdquo  but more and more evidence suggests that ai actually makes it harder   ldquo our investigations have documented that big tech is now increasingly embracing the climate crisis denial rhetoric of big oil  rdquo  geoff dembicki  the global managing editor of desmog told covering climate now  scientific american has reported that elon musk rsquo s ai chatbot has been spreading climate denial      ldquo targeted ai has become a key tool in spreading climate change disinformation  rdquo  observes a report by the ngo forum on information democracy   ldquo ai algorithms can help craft highly personalized messages hellip  more persuasive and  shared  rdquo  ai driven microtargeting affects 34 percent of social media users globally  enabling  ldquo disinformation campaigns to outpace traditional countermeasures such as fact checking or public rebuttals hellip   as a result  even authentic reporting can be misinterpreted or dismissed  contributing to public confusion  skepticism  and apathy  rdquo     then there rsquo s the mind boggling amounts of electricity and water ai demands mdash no small concern when rapidly phasing out fossil fuels is imperative to avoid climate breakdown   ldquo a single ai focused data center consumes as much electricity as 100 000 households  rdquo  the international energy agency has determined  and  ldquo the largest ones under development are expected to use 20 times as much  rdquo  much of that electricity has come from burning gas  further overheating the planet  heat released by the data centers rsquo  processes also  ldquo create  lsquo heat islands  rsquo  warming the land around them by up to 16 degrees fahrenheit  and making life hotter for up to 340 million people  rdquo  concluded a new study summarized by cnn  meanwhile  even as rising global temperatures are increasing the frequency and severity of drought  more than two thirds of the thousands of data centers being built in the us have been in water scarce regions  where each center can consume 300 000 gallons of water a day  enough to supply 1 000 households     no wonder the ai boom is encountering fierce grassroots resistance across the us political spectrum mdash left to right  rural  urban  and suburban  for journalists  the breadth of that backlash makes ai rsquo s effects on the planet much more than a tech or even a climate story  it should now be on the radar of newsrooms everywhere  a new quinnipiac poll found that americans by a three to one margin  65 percent to 24 percent  oppose having an ai data center built in their community  their leading concern is skyrocketing electric bills  indeed  bills for households in the vicinity of a data center have gone up as much as 267 percent in the last five years  bloomberg reported       like fossil fuel executives  ai titans have long insisted that their technology is inevitable  that  too  seems not to be true  some 100 communities across 14 states have imposed moratoriums on building data centers  last week  us senator bernie sanders and representative alexandria ocasio cortez introduced legislation calling for a six month nationwide moratorium to buy time to evaluate ai rsquo s impacts on environmental  labor  and other issues  including ai rsquo s ability to  ldquo create big brother type surveillance rdquo  of citizens exercising their first amendment right to protest  ocasio cortez said     the ai boom  if it continues  is shaping up as a bust for climate survival  a few days after sanders and ocasio cortez introduced their bill  the new york times reported that the ai industry  aided by former trump adviser taylor budowich  plans to spend  ldquo at least  100 million dollars rdquo  to make sure the midterm elections go its way in november  perhaps ai is not so inevitable after all<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/environment/ai-climate-disinformation-waste/">The AI Boom Is a Climate Bust</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 03 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/environment/ai-climate-disinformation-waste/</guid>
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  <item>
	 <title><![CDATA[Trump Is in His Own Universe—but He’s Still Wrecking Ours ]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-iran-speech-delusions/]]></link>
		<author>Sasha Abramsky</author>
	<date>Apr 3, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Give the man a second opportunity to address the nation, and it’s entirely possible he could throw the whole world into a Great Depression.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Give the man a second opportunity to address the nation  and it rsquo s entirely possible he could throw the whole world into a great depression      donald trump departs following a prime time address to the nation in the cross hall of the white house  on april 1  2026       earlier this week  a panicked would be fuhrer trump  looking for an exit ramp to a war he should never have started  threatened to blow up iran rsquo s oil wells  water desalination plants  and power generation infrastructure unless the iranians ceded immediately to american demands     the united states  trump announced on social media  would wrap up its  ldquo lovely stay rdquo  in the region with an orgy of violence that  experts noted  would surely constitute a serious war crime  his fetid words  so dismissive of the lives lost and the broader pain caused by saturation bombing  are worth quoting in full   ldquo we will conclude our lovely  lsquo stay rsquo  in iran by blowing up and completely obliterating all of their electric generating plants  oil wells and kharg island  and possibly all desalinization plants    which we have purposefully not yet  lsquo touched  rsquo  rdquo       in his live address to the nation on wednesday  trump repeatedly tried to convince the american public that a war which the iranians show no sign of having lost mdash and which  by the closure of the strait of hormuz  is crippling the global economy and risks diluting americans rsquo  purchasing power through years of high inflation mdash has actually already been won  and won in a nature unprecedented in human history   ldquo we are unstoppable as a military force  rdquo  trump crowed  the rest of the world  ldquo can rsquo t believe the brilliance of the united states military  rdquo     if by that  trump mdash who had spent his morning scowling at the supreme court justices as they heard arguments in the case that the maga leader hoped will end birthright citizenship mdash meant that every european ally has said  ldquo thanks but no  thanks rdquo  to participating in what is clearly an illegal war  or to granting us bombers flight rights over their territories  then he rsquo s right   not even viktor orban  the embattled far right hungarian prime minister whom trump and his minions have lavished praise on in recent weeks in an effort to help him win an upcoming election  has expressed support for this insane war   but if trump meant that they were dancing with joy at the display of american pyrotechnics  then  um  no     this was authoritarian delusion  fueled by the misleading reports given to trump of the war rsquo s progress by the sycophants surrounding him  taken to a whole new level  think of bruno ganz  in downfall  the powerful movie about hitler rsquo s final days in the bunker  it was delusional  in the same way that this week rsquo s patently unconstitutional executive order mandating states to curb mail in voting  implement strict voter id laws  and pass lists of qualified citizen voters to the feds and also to the us postal service was delusional  it was the same sort of narcissistic claptrap that has led trump to go on a spree to convince cultural centers  government institutions  and legislatures to place his name and his physical image on a growing array of monuments  federal buildings  coinage  parks passes  military ships  and mdash the latest outrage mdash the palm beach international airport  now renamed the president donald j  trump airport     for much of his rambling  incoherent address to the nation  trump just seemed an utterly exhausted  befuddled old man  his strongman boasts rang hollow  his attempts to describe the nature of the iranian threat sounded like they had been written by an out of sorts  frumpy chatgpt  his braying about the well being of the american economy came off as beyond tone deaf  and his energy level was that of eeyore after he had sat on a thistle       but when trump started talking about what the us military would do to iran if it didn rsquo t immediately cave to his demands  he came fiercely alive   ldquo we rsquo re going to bring them back to the stone age where they belong  rdquo  he threatened  his itch for slaughter suddenly scratched  there was almost a twinkle in his dead fish eyes  the united states would  he promised  destroy every power plant  quite possibly simultaneously  and if he so chose   ldquo could hit rdquo  the oil wells also  thus destroying whatever is left of the iranian economy after five weeks of nonstop bombardment     at times  it seemed that trump was competing with his israeli wingmen in bloodcurdling  war criminal bombast  israel has  this week  embarked on an explicit campaign of ethnic cleansing in southern lebanon that will displace many hundreds of thousands of shiite muslims from their homes  and  as if that isn rsquo t a big enough moral stench  this week  too  israel rsquo s parliament passed a law essentially creating a selective death penalty  with death by hanging reserved for palestinians in the west bank who are convicted in a military court of deadly efforts to destroy the state of israel  trump rsquo s speech  larded with an authoritarian rsquo s contempt for human life and dignity  seemed to say   ldquo i rsquo ll see your war crimes and i rsquo ll raise them twofold  rdquo     of course  in doing so  trump spooked the markets that he has been so desperate to calm  in the minutes after he opened his mouth  dow futures plummeted by nearly 400 points  and the price of oil soared  give the man a second opportunity to address the nation  and it rsquo s entirely possible he could throw the whole world into a great depression     not that that matters a whole heap to trump rsquo s cohort  an increasing number of whom seem to have been playing the markets by using their insider knowledge of upcoming political and military decisions to turn a tidy profit  the most recent allegation  that  ldquo secretary of war rdquo  pete hegseth rsquo s stockbroker apparently bet big on defense industry investments in the days leading up to the opening of hostilities against iran     i wonder how these gangsters  so void of the sense of public good  will try to rake in the cash should trump follow through on his threat this week to pull the us out of the  ldquo paper tiger rdquo  nato and leave eastern europe to putin rsquo s tender mercies  maybe they rsquo ll just sit back and watch as one country after another falls to the conflagrations accompanying the end of the pax americana  simply sending instructions to their brokers every so often to buy more hot stock in the latest military company sensation<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-iran-speech-delusions/">Trump Is in His Own Universe—but He’s Still Wrecking Ours </a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 03 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-iran-speech-delusions/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The Cost of the Iran War]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/the-cost-of-war-iran/]]></link>
		<author>The Nation</author>
	<date>Apr 3, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>“It takes money to kill bad guys,” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said as he sought $200 billion in funding for the Iran war in March. But the cost far exceeds money.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<description>
	<![CDATA["Ldquo it takes money to kill bad guys  rdquo  defense secretary pete hegseth said as he sought  200 billion in funding for the iran war in march  but the cost far exceeds money            human cost    175    number of iranians killed in the february 28 us missile strike on the shajarah tayyebeh elementary school  most of whom were children    3 291    number of iranians killed as of march 24 since the united states and israel started the war    1 072    number of people killed in lebanon as of march 24    22    number of people killed in the gulf states as of march 25    18    number of people killed    in israel as of march 25    13    number of us service members killed as of march 16    3 2m    number of iranians who have been displaced as of march 12    1m    number of people in lebanon who have been displaced as of march 23    financial cost     16 5b    amount spent by the united states during the first 12 days of the war     5 6b    estimated value of munitions used during the first two days of the war     3 5m    estimated cost of one tomahawk cruise missile    20     portion of the world rsquo s oil and natural gas that passes through the strait of hormuz    30     portion of the world rsquo s fertilizer exports that    pass through the strait    of hormuz     119    cost of a barrel of oil as of march 19    30 ndash 40     expected rise in the cost of fertilizer for farmers    global cost    12    number of countries iran has struck in retaliation    5m    co2 amount  in metric tons  emitted in the first two weeks of the war    56     portion of americans who disapproved of the war two weeks after its start<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/the-cost-of-war-iran/">The Cost of the Iran War</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 03 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/the-cost-of-war-iran/</guid>
  </item>
  <item>
	 <title><![CDATA[The Iran War Is Built on Bush-Era Lies]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/world/iran-war-iraq-war-bush-trump/]]></link>
		<author>Helen Benedict</author>
	<date>Apr 2, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>All this we heard in 2003, and all this we are hearing again now.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<description>
	<![CDATA["All this we heard in 2003  and all this we are hearing again now      men watch from a hillside as a plume of smoke rises after an explosion on march 2  2026  in tehran  iran     this article originally appeared at tomdispatch com  to stay on top of important articles like these  sign up to receive the latest updates from tomdispatch com       i rsquo m writing this piece well into president donald trump rsquo s new war with iran  which  with the help of israel  has already killed more than 2 000 civilians  including 175 schoolgirls and staff  displaced some 3 2 million people  and is costing the american taxpayer at least  1 billion a day  all of which is tragically reminiscent of the last time a republican president led the united states into a war on a river of lies and greed  i rsquo m thinking  of course  about george w  bush and the invasion of iraq in 2003       weapons that don rsquo t exist  threats to this country that aren rsquo t real  liberation for a people that the us will never win over  freedom for women about whom nobody in power cares a jot  a war that will bring total victory in only a few days or weeks  all this we heard in 2003  and all this we are hearing again now     i spent many years writing about the iraq war  even though it took me some time to figure out how to begin  i was sickened by the muslim baiting that had been going on since the 2001 attacks on new york city and the pentagon in washington  dc  and disgusted with the hollywood movies and legacy press articles glorifying our vengeful wars in afghanistan and iraq  while deifying our soldiers  i wanted to tell a different story  i just didn rsquo t know how     then  in 2004  i came across the blog baghdad burning  by a 24 year old iraqi woman who called herself riverbend  she was the first iraqi i had ever read on the war  and she taught me that those in an occupied country tell a very different story than do the occupiers     back then  if iraqi men showed up in american books  movies  or journalism at all  it was usually as an enemy or a clown  meanwhile  iraqi women were depicted as little more than incomprehensible black clad figures hovering in the background or wailing over the dead  but riverbend was none of those  she was a computer technician in a sophisticated city who sounded like an american college student  i was hooked     over the next few months  i read her blog religiously  riverbend rsquo s language and thoughts sounded no different than those of my own daughter  except that she was describing what it was like to live  hour by hour  through the overwhelming  heart freezing violence of a us bombing campaign and the occupation of her country       today  we can get the same sense of immediacy by reading or listening to brave civilians and journalists in gaza  but during our post 9 11 wars on afghanistan and iraq  hearing any voice from the  ldquo other side rdquo  was rare  so  riverbend rsquo s blog was not only eye opening  but it made readers like me feel as though we were experiencing the war right beside her  she wove the mundane moments of her days mdash jokes  lighthearted observations  conversations with her family mdash in with her terror at the falling bombs and her feelings about the united states as she watched us tear apart her country  her blog was eventually collected into a book and published by the feminist press in 2005     soon  i began reading other iraqi blogs  too  along with every translation i could find of iraqi poetry and fiction  i also followed videos by iraqis that were appearing online  telling stories remarkably different from those i was hearing here in the united states  some of those iraqi civilians did indeed want democracy  although they didn rsquo t believe it could be forced on anyone by a foreign power or bombs  some had been satisfied living under saddam hussein rsquo s autocratic rule  many were too focused on their daily struggles to find food and avoid bombs to think about politics at all  but all of them  whatever their thoughts and opinions  were suffering horribly  not only from our bombs  but from wounds  illnesses  malnutrition  starvation  and threats of all kinds  as well as from bullying  kidnappings  rape  and murder at the hands of the gangs and militias our war had unleashed     one of the most eye opening of those iraqi videos was made by an anonymous woman early in the war  who put on a burqa  hid her handheld camera under it  and drove around the countryside interviewing women about their struggles and poverty  as she explained  what she was doing was so dangerous that she had no doubt her video would only remain up on youtube for a day or so  sure enough  it quickly disappeared  i only hope that she didn rsquo t disappear with it     a bloody mess    president bush rsquo s war in iraq quickly became a bloody mess  as i  and many others  documented  the united states might have toppled saddam hussein  but in the first five years of our war  we killed at least half as many iraqis as he had in his 35 years of brutal dictatorship  by 2011  our war had slaughtered some one million iraqis  orphaned at least a million children  and displaced four million people within or outside iraq  according to body counts by the medical journal the lancet  physicians for social responsibility  and others  in short  one of every five iraqis was forced from his or her home  a chilling foreshadowing of what we have since seen in gaza  and that we are now beginning to see in iran and lebanon       the us not only killed and displaced all those people  it bankrupted iraq with sanctions  poisoned it with depleted uranium  destroyed its infrastructure and middle class  and dismantled its achievements  before we invaded  iraq had the best medical system in the middle east  and women there had more rights than in any muslim country other than turkey  making up 50 percent of students and 40 percent of the workforce  by the time we left  all of that  including women rsquo s rights  had been undone     today  women rsquo s rights in iraq have eroded even further and women are now relegated to second class citizenship  just this march 2  the most prominent women rsquo s rights advocate in iraq  yanar mohammed  was shot to death by men driving by on motorcycles  nobody has claimed responsibility for her assassination  nor has anybody yet been arrested mdash and that was just one of many political assassinations there since our war     while the us war machine was busy destroying iraq and we were hearing all too little from iraqis themselves  americans at home were being bombarded with ever more movies  think hurt locker and american sniper  for instance   books  tv series  and news stories about the heroism of us soldiers at war  as well as their traumas and struggles on returning home     harry potter    seeking relief from such a myopic view of war  i set out to meet iraqis who had lived through the war themselves  i wanted to hear the other side  the side we were not telling   so  when i found out that several hundred iraqis had been resettled in albany  new york  on the special visas  called sivs  reserved for those who had worked for two years or more as interpreters for the us military or government officials  i decided to seek them out  that is how i came to meet several women i will never forget  among them a young poet named nour  and a mother of three named hala   i rsquo m withholding their last names for their safety      nour told me she had been imprisoned and tortured in the city of abu ghraib at the age of 16 for writing a poem that saddam hussein didn rsquo t like  after her release  she taught herself english and later became a translator for a freelance american journalist  in 2005  she and the journalist were kidnapped in the city of basra and shot  the journalist was killed  but thanks to several surgeries  nour survived and came to the united states with the help of his widow     nour and i met in new york city and had lunch a few times  small and slight  with an angular face and haunted eyes  she was reserved and visibly fragile  but her bravery was unmistakable  she refused to be pitied and  in spite of all she had been through and the dangers she would face there  wanted more than anything in the world to go home     hala  the other unforgettable iraqi woman i met  had fled baghdad with her husband and children about a year before we met in 2010  the day i arrived at their apartment in a suburb of albany  new york  he was at his job far away in new jersey  work he had found only after 10 months of searching  but hala  who was working as a substitute schoolteacher  was at home with her daughter  hiba  who was 20  and her son  mustafa  who had just turned 9  as i speak no arabic  i was grateful that they were all fluent in english      ldquo come in  come in  rdquo  hala said when she opened the door  ushering me in with a smile and showing me to a chair in her immaculate  if somewhat bare  white living room  a round  energetic woman with a kind  if worn  face  she settled onto her sofa and sent her daughter to make the chai tea   ldquo mustapha  rdquo  she said to her serious eyed son   ldquo this lady is a writer  she is from england  rdquo   i am british and sound it  although i have lived in the united states for many decades      his eyes grew big   ldquo you wrote harry potter  rdquo  he declared  it was not a question  i tried to disabuse him of the idea but he refused to believe me   ldquo i rsquo m a writer  too  rdquo  he said   ldquo want to see  rdquo  he ran out to fetch his book mdash a sheaf of stapled papers he had made in school   ldquo it rsquo s about bad gis and good gis  rdquo  on each page  he had drawn soldiers and a sky raining with bombs     after we had settled down comfortably with our tea  hala told me that she and her husband had both been engineers  a highly respected profession in iraq  and had hated saddam hussein  but had lived a pleasant enough life  her daughter hiba had been studying to be a dentist  and their two young sons were in school   ldquo baghdad was beautiful to us then  rdquo  hala told me wistfully   ldquo looking back now  it was like that movie avatar  that world of paradise before the invasion  rdquo     but then the us did invade  their jobs disappeared  and money ran low  so her husband became an interpreter for us officials  soon afterward  hala rsquo s brother was killed in retribution  then  their middle child was kidnapped and murdered  by whom they never knew   he was only 15      ldquo every day for a year  hiba dreamed that she went home and found her brother there  rdquo  hala told me quietly  while hiba listened without saying a word   ldquo she could not eat or get up or get dressed  rdquo  so  in the end  they fled to jordan to escape the violence and find hiba therapy  eventually obtaining a visa to the united states  where hala and her husband hoped their children would be able to forge better and safer futures      ldquo and how is that going  rdquo  i asked      ldquo i like school  rdquo  mustafa told me with confidence  but hiba said she was mostly ostracized by the other students at her albany college  feelings against iraqis ran high in those days mdash against all arabs  in fact mdash and she was spared little of it      ldquo some of them don rsquo t like me because they know i rsquo m an arab and muslim  and some because they think i rsquo m hispanic  rdquo  she said  her pretty face rueful  and with a shrug  she pushed her long hair over her shoulder  her only friend  she added  was a young woman who had moved here from india       the visas that are no more    today  in donald trump rsquo s america  neither nour  hala  nor any of the other iraqi women and men i met would even be admitted to this country  no matter how much they sacrificed to help americans and no matter how much they might be targeted at home for having done so  indeed  the chances of any refugee finding asylum in the us now are just about zero  the trump administration has banned refugees  asylum seekers  or any immigrants from 75 countries mdash including iraq       in light of this  i look back with nostalgia on the time i spent with riverbend  nour  and hala  when barack obama was still president and donald trump had yet to loom all too large in our lives  and i can rsquo t stop thinking about what hala said when i apologized for what my country had done to hers     she looked at me and nodded   ldquo mustafa  come sit on my lap  rdquo  she motioned to her son   ldquo listen to this lady  so you will know that not all americans wanted that war  rdquo     he nestled into her lap  his sister sat on another chair  and they all gazed at me  waiting     disconcerted by such an unexpected responsibility  i took refuge in addressing mustafa  looking into his little face  i attempted to apologize on behalf not only of the united states  but of england  too  for destroying his country and killing his brother  and then  like an idiot  i began to cry     hiba handed me a kleenex  but neither she nor her mother and brother cried with me  i was mortified  what did i want from them  weeping like this  it wasn rsquo t my son and brother who rsquo d been killed  it wasn rsquo t my life that had been torn away  it wasn rsquo t my country that had been ruined     yet they continued to be kind  after i had recovered and we had spoken for a few hours  i asked hala   ldquo how can you stand living here with your former enemy  aren rsquo t you angry at us americans  rdquo     she shook her head   ldquo no  no  my friend  rdquo  she smiled at me kindly   ldquo we lived under saddam  we understand that there are people  and there are leaders  and that the two are not the same  rdquo     i wonder  as we rain bombs down on the people of iran today  if they would be able to find it in themselves to be quite so forgiving<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/world/iran-war-iraq-war-bush-trump/">The Iran War Is Built on Bush-Era Lies</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 02 Apr 2026 16:22:18 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/world/iran-war-iraq-war-bush-trump/</guid>
  </item>
  <item>
	 <title><![CDATA[The Supreme Court Absolutely Shredded Trump’s Birthright Citizenship Case]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/supreme-court-birthright-citizenship/]]></link>
		<author>Elie Mystal</author>
	<date>Apr 2, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>But this also begs the question: why is this facially unconstitutional case before the court in the first place?</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["But this also begs the question  why is this facially unconstitutional case before the court in the first place      demonstrators rally in support of birthright citizenship outside the supreme court on april 1  2026        on wednesday  donald trump rsquo s executive order challenging birthright citizenship got its day at the supreme court  in honor of the occasion mdash or  more likely  in a foolish attempt at intimidating his handpicked justices mdash trump briefly attended oral arguments  marking the first time in recorded history that a sitting president has come to a supreme court hearing       the case pits trump rsquo s deeply held anti immigrant bigotry against the clear language of the 14th amendment and nearly 130 years of supreme court precedent  at its heart is the question of whether the president can change the meaning of the constitution to prevent children born on us soil to undocumented immigrants and temporary travelers from being citizens  it rsquo s the highest profile case of the court rsquo s term mdash and trump got crushed  he will not lose 9 ndash 0  as he should  his crusade against immigrants and their children will continue in other forms  but i believe trump will lose this case  and given the republican and maga aligned composition of the supreme court  that will have to be enough for now     the case is called trump v  barbara mdash with  ldquo barbara rdquo  being a pseudonym for a plaintiff represented by the aclu who challenged trump rsquo s executive order  the aclu rsquo s argument is simple  birthright citizenship is conferred on all people who are born within the territory of the united states by virtue of the 14th amendment  the first sentence of the first section of that amendment states   ldquo all persons born or naturalized in the united states  and subject to the jurisdiction thereof  are citizens of the united states and of the state wherein they reside  rdquo     this is all the evidence the plaintiffs need  pointing to this clause of the 14th amendment is like tom brady responding to the question  ldquo were you a good quarterback  rdquo  by pointing to the super bowl rings on his fingers  still  the plaintiffs have even more law on their side if they want it  a 1898 case by the name of united states v  wong kim ark  in that case  the citizenship of a child born in the united states to chinese american parents was challenged  the court ruled that the child was a citizen because he was born in san francisco  which is where his parents were living at the time of his birth  in terms of birthright citizenship  that case should be game  set  match     in response  the trump administration  as represented by us solicitor general john sauer  made a series of wild arguments steeped in bigotry and xenophobia  first  the administration argued that the 14th amendment was a narrow  time specific intervention that applied only to the enslaved people freed by the civil war  while it is true that the 14th amendment directly overturned the dred scott decision  which held that no slave mdash and  indeed  no black person mdash could become a citizen   the text  which i just quoted for you  makes it unequivocally clear that trump and sauer are wrong  it does not say   ldquo all formerly enslaved persons rdquo   it says   ldquo all persons  rdquo     next  the trump administration tried to get around the obvious implications of the wong kim ark ruling by arguing that it applied only to children born to parents who are either  ldquo domiciled rdquo  in the united states or who owe  ldquo allegiance rdquo  to the united states  in court  sauer argued that undocumented immigrants and temporary foreign visitors can never be lawfully  ldquo domiciled rdquo  in the us nor owe allegiance to this country  and therefore their children cannot be citizens       this argument is bollocks  during oral arguments  six of the justices ripped it apart     the ripping started almost immediately  with chief justice john roberts telling sauer that the sources he was using as evidence were  ldquo quirky  rdquo  justice elena kagan followed up by observing that sauer was using some  ldquo pretty obscure sources  rdquo  roberts and kagan were actually being nice  those  ldquo sources rdquo  were not merely  ldquo quirky rdquo  and  ldquo obscure rdquo   they were the writings of straight up white supremacists who tried to undermine the 14th amendment by arguing openly for a white ethno state where chinese americans could never be citizens  sauer relied in particular on the work of alexander porter morse  a white supremacist lawyer who argued plessy v  ferguson on behalf of the segregationists  he also argued against wong kim ark  saying that  ldquo transient rdquo  people are not sufficiently connected to the united states to confer citizenship onto their children  the fact that roberts and kagan noted  however politely  that sauer rsquo s sources are reprehensible racists  is significant     later in the hearing  roberts also questioned one of trump rsquo s stated reasons for rewriting the constitution  trump and his maga allies have repeatedly said the executive order is needed to stop  ldquo birth tourism rdquo  mdash which is the idea that tourists come to the united states to have children specifically so their children can have us citizenship  roberts asked if sauer had any evidence that birth tourism is really a thing  sauer cited  not making this up  unnamed chinese media reports  roberts did not sound impressed  he responded by asking sauer to agree that such reports should not impact the legal analysis of the 14th amendment or wong kim ark  sauer  amazingly  said it should  because we rsquo re  ldquo living in a different world rdquo  from wong kim ark  where citizenship is potentially a mere  ldquo plane ride away  rdquo     that led roberts to proclaim a phrase that will probably be etched onto his tombstone   ldquo it rsquo s a different world  but it rsquo s the same constitution  rdquo       i do not think roberts is on board with rewriting that constitution to appease trump and his chinese media sources     assuming the liberals agree  and  just trust me here  there is nothing that justices kagan  sonia sotomayor  and ketanji brown jackson said that suggested they were even slightly interested in sauer rsquo s arguments   that brings us to four votes to uphold birthright citizenship     a fifth vote can almost surely be found from justice amy coney barrett  she really homed in on the difference between two jargony terms  jus sanguinis versus jus soli  jus sanguinis  right of blood  is the idea that citizenship flows from the citizenship status of your parents  jus soli  right of soil  is the idea that citizenship flows from where you are born  sauer and maga have been arguing that we should do citizenship by right of blood  but barrett rsquo s questions heavily favored the right of soil approach  and she  along with justice jackson  seemed to be trying to show that sauer rsquo s position was not just antithetical to how citizenship has always been done in the us since the 14th amendment essentially invented the concept of a us citizen  as opposed to a citizen of an individual state   but is also unworkable     barrett took particular issue with sauer rsquo s formulation of  ldquo allegiance  rdquo  questioning how the trump administration could know whether a parent  ldquo owed allegiance rdquo  to the united states or not  she then brought up the case of captured africans  illegally brought here even after the slave trade was officially outlawed  she said that  under sauer rsquo s reasoning  those people could not be lawfully  ldquo domiciled rdquo  in the us  since they were brought here illegally  she also argued that the captives would obviously want to  ldquo escape rdquo  back to their home countries as soon as possible  thus proving that they owed no allegiance to the us  and yet  the us treated their children as citizens     sauer responded  and  again  i couldn rsquo t possibly make up this level of idiocy  that former slaves always had the  ldquo intent to remain rdquo  in the us  thus proving their allegiance to the country  pro tip for any white people out there  when your argument requires inventing apocryphal black people who love their captors  you rsquo ve lost  you should shut up  sit in a corner  and rethink your life rsquo s choices     and that wasn rsquo t even the best line by barrett  in a different colloquy with sauer  she asked about  ldquo foundlings rdquo  mdash children  ldquo found rdquo  in the us whose parents cannot be identified  sauer said that there were  potentially  statutory protections for these children  and she cut him off by saying   ldquo yeah  yeah  yeah  but what about the constitution  rdquo  sauer did not have a good answer for that whole  ldquo constitution rdquo  thing  and this is where i gently remind you that barrett is the mother of adopted children and probably does not put a lot of weight behind the idea that  ldquo blood rdquo  determines  ldquo citizenship  rdquo     barrett likely brings us to five votes in favor of birthright citizenship  but wait  there rsquo s more  because justice neil gorsuch was also triggered  gorsuch rsquo s first question was about the issue of what  ldquo domiciled rdquo  actually means  and he seemed unsatisfied with sauer rsquo s various answers  then sauer really stepped in it when gorsuch asked   ldquo would native americans be citizens under your standards  rdquo  sauer said   ldquo i rsquo d have to think about it  rdquo  folks  if you know one thing about neil gorsuch  it should be that he cares deeply about the rights of native americans  it is borderline malpractice to go before the supreme court and not be prepared to answer a question from gorsuch about how your argument impacts native americans     this doesn rsquo t mean gorsuch is a definite  ldquo yes rdquo  for birthright citizenship  he seems like a little less of a sure thing than roberts or barrett  because he was more concerned with the domiciled question than they were and pushed the aclu rsquo s lawyer  cecilla wang  who did an excellent job  on the point  he didn rsquo t seem to like wang rsquo s answers to his questions either  but i think gorsuch will ultimately uphold birthright citizenship because he considers even out of status immigrants as domiciled in the us  at least until congress explicitly says they rsquo re not       friends  six votes is more than enough for me in this case  but there rsquo s a chance we could get to seven  depending on which way the wind is blowing through alleged attempted rapist brett kavanaugh rsquo s empty head  on the one hand  kavanaugh seemed to try to argue that  while congress probably can change the constitutional definition of citizenship  trump probably cannot  on the other  kavanaugh was also the one of the justices who brought up the part of the case i thought would be front and center if trump were going to win  the difference between people lawfully in the country  if only temporarily  versus people unlawfully in the country  regardless of how long they rsquo ve been here     i expected the republican justices to harp on this point ad nauseam  arguing that  no matter what the constitution or wong kim ark say  a parent who is not allowed to be here can never confer citizenship on a child subsequently born here  but only kavanaugh  and alito  brought it up  and only to wang  he didn rsquo t throw it out there to help sauer while he was floundering   and even then he didn rsquo t belabor the point  i won rsquo t know kavanaugh rsquo s vote until i see it  but if you want to argue that he rsquo s actually a seventh vote to uphold birthright citizenship  with one of his classic four paragraph concurrences where he tries to appease all sides   it would be a reasonable bet     getting to eight votes will be harder  but not impossible  that rsquo s because i don rsquo t think justice clarence thomas fully bought trump and sauer rsquo s argument  thomas asked three questions  which is a lot for him   and only one was obviously helpful to sauer  thomas seems to agree with sauer rsquo s initial point about the 14th amendment  that it applies to former slaves and former slaves only  he pointed out  correctly  that immigration was not really a focus in the discussions surrounding ratification of the 14th amendment  but his first question was whether sauer rsquo s position would lead to different citizenship status depending on the state you rsquo re born in  which i think thomas thinks would be bad   and he really didn rsquo t give any opinion on the argument over wong kim ark and whether birthright citizenship for all was confirmed in that case  over and above what the 14th amendment offered  i wouldn rsquo t say thomas is a likely vote to uphold birthright citizenship  but he didn rsquo t sit there like a troll under the bridge who thinks history ended in 1865 like he usually does     but that rsquo s where the winning streak ends  there is no chance that we rsquo ll get to nine votes  because justice samuel alito rsquo s brain remains entirely pickled by fox news  late stage alito is always good for one absolutely insane analogy  and  in this case  it was about the specter of an  ldquo iranian immigrant rdquo  who comes to this country to give birth to a child so that child can eventually be raised as some kind of sleeper cell agent waiting to be deployed against america     alito is gone  there is no hope for him  but there surely is hope for the rest of us  trump will lose  5 ndash 4 at least  and it rsquo s not beyond reason that he could lose by a stunning 8 ndash 1       which raises the question  why is this stupid case even here in the first place  trump rsquo s arguments bear almost no relation to the law or how the law has been interpreted for over 100 years  trump repeatedly lost this case in lower courts  meaning the supreme court didn rsquo t even have to grant him a hearing  why are we being dragged through this spectacle to fight the facially unconstitutional proposition that trump can change the meaning of the constitution through executive order     my best guess  after listening to the oral arguments  is that roberts wanted to make a bit of a show of  ldquo standing up to trump rdquo  on a fundamentally easy case  roberts and his cabal want to say no to this argument  and then bathe in all the  ldquo the supreme court is an independent institution rdquo  stories that will surely follow  defeating trump in this case  loudly and thoroughly  gives the republican justices cover  they think  for all the other times they capitulate to the trump administration  trump rsquo s birthright citizenship argument is a straw man  a device designed to be beaten so the court can show how strong it is     it will probably work  the media is just addled enough to make it work  trump will lose birthright citizenship  then have a complete meltdown  and the court rsquo s republican supermajority  which is just about to gut the voting rights act  will be made to seem reasonable by comparison     sadly  i rsquo ll take it  because there have been other easy cases that the court should have smashed  i rsquo m thinking of trump rsquo s immunity argument  that trump actually won  this case never should have gotten to the supreme court  but it rsquo s here  trump should lose 9 ndash 0  but he won rsquo t  the media shouldn rsquo t praise the roberts court for ruling against trump on this ludicrous argument  but it will     still  trump will lose  in trump rsquo s america  that has to be enough for me  i will take the  ldquo w rdquo  when it comes down  likely in june  and then move on to the next fight against the fascists<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/supreme-court-birthright-citizenship/">The Supreme Court Absolutely Shredded Trump’s Birthright Citizenship Case</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 02 Apr 2026 14:00:30 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/supreme-court-birthright-citizenship/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[How Washington’s Iran Groupthink Led to a Global War]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/world/washington-iran-groupthink-war-accountability-us-policy/]]></link>
		<author>Sina Toossi</author>
	<date>Apr 2, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>And why accountability matters.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["And why accountability matters      members of the national guard patrol the tidal basin as tourists visit the cherry blossoms in washington  dc  on march 30  2026       the war now engulfing the middle east is already making americans less safe and less prosperous  yet it is exactly where washington rsquo s approach to iran has led       what makes this moment so troubling is not just the scale of the conflict  but how it grew out of years of distorted debate  where iran was reduced to simplistic  fear driven narratives and serious warnings were brushed aside     americans were not calling for a war with iran  polling showed clear opposition  including among many republican voters  yet for years  washington rsquo s foreign policy establishment mdash the officials  think tanks  and media voices that shape us policy toward other countries mdash moved in the opposite direction  this was not a misunderstanding of public will  it reflected the kind of debate americans were given  one that had already been narrowed to favor confrontation over restraint  at its core  the question was not simply which policy to pursue  but whether diplomacy would be allowed to work at all     on one side were those trying to make it succeed  on the other were those determined to unravel it  leaving pressure and ultimately war as the only path forward  the 2015 nuclear deal  negotiated under barack obama  was the clearest example of what diplomacy could achieve  it placed verifiable limits on iran rsquo s nuclear program  rolled back uranium enrichment  and subjected it to the most intrusive inspections regime ever negotiated  effectively closing off its pathways to a nuclear weapon and significantly reducing the risk of war     that framework was dismantled in 2018 when donald trump scrapped the deal  dismissing it as  ldquo the worst deal ever negotiated rdquo  and replacing it with sweeping sanctions  isolation  and the constant threat of war     this was not simply a change in strategy  it reflected years of sustained pro israel political pressure and the influence of powerful donors  most notably sheldon adelson  the late gambling magnate who was the largest financial backer of trump rsquo s 2016 campaign and a fierce opponent of the deal  closely aligned with benjamin netanyahu rsquo s hardline stance on iran       the collapse of the agreement was  in many ways  the culmination of netanyahu rsquo s long running campaign to kill it  he broke with diplomatic norms to address congress in 2015 in an effort to undermine the deal  continued pressing aggressively once trump took office  and in a leaked 2018 video later claimed credit outright  saying that  ldquo we convinced the us president rdquo  to abandon the agreement     this is how the path to war was set  it was not driven by public demand or a clear national interest  but by a small circle of political actors  donor influence  and a washington ecosystem that rewarded hawkish thinking  ordinary americans had little say as diplomacy was sidelined and the country was steered toward conflict  over time  the narrowing of choices hardened into policy  placing the united states on a collision course with iran that reflected the preferences of those with access and influence far more than the interests of the public     for years  those who supported diplomacy warned exactly where this path would lead  they argued that abandoning the deal and relying on pressure alone would strengthen hardliners in iran  accelerate its nuclear program  and make conflict more likely  not less  that is precisely what has happened  iran rsquo s nuclear advances resumed  its political system hardened and grew more repressive  and the space for diplomacy shrank as tensions escalated  what was dismissed as overly cautious or alarmist has proven to be the most accurate reading of events     this moment should force a simple lesson  when the same people in power rely on the same assumptions and reinforce each other rsquo s views  something has gone wrong  that is a decision making structure primed for failure  it means choices are being made in an echo chamber  where information that fits the narrative is amplified and anything that challenges it is pushed aside  over time  that kind of thinking leads to worse decisions  it breeds a false sense of confidence  where risks are brushed aside and warning signs are ignored       that is what happened with iran  instead of questioning their assumptions  many of the officials  analysts  and think tanks influencing foreign policy in washington doubled down on them  iran was treated as weaker than it was  easier to pressure than it was  and less capable of pushing back than it proved to be  alternative views were not seriously weighed  they were sidelined  the result was a distorted picture of reality that made escalation seem manageable  it was not     the costs of this war are already staggering  and they extend far beyond the battlefield  iran has taken heavy hits  but it has also achieved what it set out to do  survive  absorb pressure  and impose costs in return  disruptions to the strait of hormuz have thrown global energy markets into turmoil  driving up prices and putting pressure on households far from the region  at the same time  the united states is stuck in a conflict it cannot easily win or exit  iran rsquo s leadership remains in place  its capabilities are degraded but far from gone  and its ability to disrupt the global economy has given it real leverage  despite the damage it has suffered  iran may be holding the stronger hand by denying the united states a quick victory and turning the conflict into a costly stalemate that strengthens its bargaining position in any future negotiations         when washington gets something as consequential as iran wrong  the effects do not stay contained  they ripple outward into the global economy and into people rsquo s daily lives  and yet  even now  there is little accountability  many of the same voices that pushed the policies leading here still shape the conversation  and the same institutions that narrowed the debate continue to define its limits     in most lines of work  mistakes of this scale would carry real consequences  in washington  they are more often absorbed and moved past  setting the stage for the same patterns to repeat     this is why accountability matters  when failures this serious come and go without consequences  the system does not correct itself  it carries on  the same assumptions and incentives remain in place  making it more likely that the next crisis will unfold in the same way     the lesson here is bigger than any single policy  it is about how decisions get made  on an issue as important as iran  the united states cannot afford a system where proximity to power matters more than being right  where familiar talking points replace critical thinking  and where dissenting voices are pushed aside  a healthier approach would reward honesty  encourage real debate  and take competing views seriously before decisions are locked in     it also means being clear about what actually serves american interests  this war has not made americans safer  it has not made the economy stronger  it has done the opposite     but change does not happen on its own  accountability for decisions this costly requires pressure from voters  from the media  and from movements willing to challenge the status quo  without it  washington has little incentive to learn from failure     this war did not have to happen  it grew out of decisions  assumptions  and a way of thinking that failed to match reality  the question now is whether those failures will be confronted  or whether washington will once again move on without reckoning  leaving the conditions for the next crisis firmly in place<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/world/washington-iran-groupthink-war-accountability-us-policy/">How Washington’s Iran Groupthink Led to a Global War</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 02 Apr 2026 13:58:14 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/world/washington-iran-groupthink-war-accountability-us-policy/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Trump’s Iran Speech Showed the Desperation of a Loser]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-iran-speech-analysis-reaction/]]></link>
		<author>Jeet Heer</author>
	<date>Apr 2, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The president’s war is an ever-escalating disaster. He is increasingly reviled. And his speech won’t change either of those things.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["The president rsquo s war is an ever escalating disaster  he is increasingly reviled  and his speech won rsquo t change either of those things      donald trump walks from the blue room to speak about the iran war from the cross hall of the white house on wednesday  april 1  2026       narcissist that he is  donald trump needs an audience fawning over him at public events  otherwise  he gets bored  when he has to read a prepared speech without the aid of an audience  his soul seems to leave his body     thus  when trump addressed a group of supporters and regime friendly media in a press conference on wednesday  he was ad libbing  relaxed  and animated  but there was no adoring crowd on wednesday evening  when trump gave a much touted prime time speech on the iran war       polls show lagging support for the war  and trump rsquo s approval rating is hitting historic lows  if there were ever a time when the president needed to bring some energy and focus to his communication with voters  this speech was it  instead  we got the version of trump that always emerges when he has to read from prepared remarks and pretend to be a dignified holder of his office  groggy  droning  and disengaged  anyone looking for a coherent explanation of why the us is at war and where the conflict is headed would have been left badly wanting     in the press conference  trump was asked about what he planned to say  he replied   ldquo basically  i rsquo m going to tell everybody how great i am  what a phenomenal job i rsquo ve done  rdquo  this got a laugh from the maga fans  but it was also quite revealing       despite trump rsquo s loud  shameless tooting of his own horn mdash always a go to for this most self obsessed of men mdash he must know that his war of choice is damaging his presidency     everyone can see that the war is not the quick victory trump promised  as he himself admits  he  ldquo predicted rdquo  the war  ldquo was going to be over in three days  rdquo  in fact  the war has gone on for a month and is increasingly looking like a major failure     the us and israeli military have inflicted massive damage on iran  assassinated many of its leading politicians  and killed thousands of civilians  but this carnage has served little strategic purpose  the iranian state has proven remarkably resilient and has retained the capacity to inflict damage on israel  us troops  and us allied gulf states  most importantly  by blockading the strait of hormuz  iran has demonstrated that it possesses a potent economic weapon  iran rsquo s ability to close the strait has led to rocketing oil prices  sinking stock markets  and the possibility of a global recession     trump desperately needs to explain to people why any of this bloodshed and hardship is necessary  but instead  he keeps inadvertently showing americans just how disconnected his war aims are from their daily lives       one moment from the press conference underscored just how little trump seems to have a handle on the politics of the moment  asked about federal funding for daycare  trump responded   ldquo the us can rsquo t take care of daycare  that has to be up to a state  we rsquo re fighting wars  medicaid  medicare mdash they can do it on a state basis  we have to take care of one thing  military protection  rdquo  even a political party as feckless and incompetent as the democrats often are should be able to exploit trump rsquo s confession that paying for this wildly unpopular war means the government can rsquo t provide basic services to the public     trump rsquo s speech is unlikely to persuade a skeptical nation to support the war  rather than offering anything new  he hit some of his stalest talking points and rehashed the contradictory arguments that have already fallen flat with voters  thus  we got the greatest hits   ldquo barack hussein obama rdquo  made a bad deal with iran  which trump was right to tear up  iran was on the cusp of getting nuclear weapons  previous presidents were too weak to do what trump did  regime change was not the goal but has been achieved  the iranian government is eager to negotiate  but if they don rsquo t  the us and israel would bomb them  ldquo back to the stone ages  rdquo     this mix of boasting and barbarism was typical of trump  but it couldn rsquo t mask the gaping holes in his presentation  notably  trump was unable to answer the question of how the strait of hormuz is to be reopened  at one point  he said   ldquo when this conflict is over  the strait will open up naturally  it rsquo ll just open up naturally  rdquo  this is pure magical thinking  and as chris hayes noted on ms now  echoed comments trump made about covid in april of 2020   ldquo but i think what happens is it rsquo s going to go away  this is going to go away  rdquo  needless to say  covid did not just  ldquo go away  rdquo  despite the intermittent lockdowns and vaccines  it is still with us  without a political solution involving negotiating with iran  the blockage of the strait of hormuz is also likely to be a problem that persists for years     aside from his indulgence in fantasy  trump rsquo s other solution to the blocking of the strait was to ask other countries to solve the problem he had created  his deeply irresponsible words are worth quoting at length         the united states imports almost no oil through the hormuz strait and won rsquo t be taking any in the future  we don rsquo t need it  we haven rsquo t needed it  and we don rsquo t need it  we rsquo ve beaten and completely decimated iran  they are decimated both militarily and economically and in every other way  and the countries of the world that do receive oil through the hormuz strait must take care of that passage  they must cherish it  they must grab it and cherish it  they could do it easily  we will be helpful  but they should take the lead in protecting the oil that they so desperately depend on     so to those countries that can rsquo t get fuel  many of which refuse to get involved in the decapitation of iran mdash we had to do it ourselves mdash i have a suggestion  no  1  buy oil from the united states of america  we have plenty  we have so much  and no  2  build up some delayed courage  should have done it before  should have done it with us as we asked  go to the strait and just take it  protect it  use it for yourselves  iran has been essentially decimated  the hard part is done  so it should be easy      needless to say  opening the strait is not going to be  ldquo easy  rdquo  if it were  ldquo easy  rdquo  then the united states and israel would be able to do it  nor are other countries likely to take up trump rsquo s offer  given that he is showing every day how foolish it is to go to war with iran     behind all his bluster  trump rsquo s speech reeked of desperation  he has trapped himself into a war he doesn rsquo t know how to end  especially since the iranians have every good reason to inflict as much pain as they can to secure genuine concessions  including ironclad guarantees against future attacks        trump rsquo s flop sweat was most evident in how he addressed the question of the length of the war  he said it would be over in  ldquo two or three weeks  rdquo  that in itself will do much damage  but he also tried to wave away the problem of the war going on far longer than expected by comparing it to other conflicts such as world war i  world war ii  the korean war  the vietnam war  and the iraq war  trump noted that the vietnam war went on for  ldquo 19 years  five months  and 29 days  rdquo  this is not in fact a reassuring comparison  since the worry is that  like vietnam  the iran war will become a quagmire the us can rsquo t extricate itself from     trump might get a little dopamine hit from gloating about how well the war is going  but even his tawdry sales pitch can rsquo t hide the fact that he rsquo s a desperate man who knows he has created a catastrophe<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-iran-speech-analysis-reaction/">Trump’s Iran Speech Showed the Desperation of a Loser</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 02 Apr 2026 13:54:12 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-iran-speech-analysis-reaction/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Ayatollahs]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/ayatollahs/]]></link>
		<author>Michel Kichka</author>
	<date>Apr 2, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[In waiting.]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Check out all installments in the oppart series<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/ayatollahs/">Ayatollahs</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 02 Apr 2026 12:30:12 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/ayatollahs/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Alejandro Cartagena’s Mexico in Flux]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/alejandro-cartagenas-sf-moma/]]></link>
		<author>Caroline Tracey</author>
	<date>Apr 2, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Reminiscent of the New Topographics, the photographs of Cartagena and others captures a country in the midst of a geographic transformation.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Reminiscent of the new topographics  the photographs of cartagena and others captures a country in the midst of a geographic transformation      alejandro cartagena  rivers of power  71  from the series rivers of power  2010 ndash 16    robert adams rsquo s photograph adams county  colorado  1974 shows a line of nearly identical one story homes running on a diagonal to the frame of the image  it hints at prefabricated newness  the homes  as evidenced by the irrigation canal and dirt road in the image rsquo s bottom right corner  have been constructed recently on former farmland  there are no cars passing by  a sense of loneliness and isolation pervades the photo     adams county is one of dozens of solemn black and white images that adams made of the denver suburbs between 1968 and 1974  born in new jersey in 1937  he moved as a teenager to wheat ridge  colorado  a farming community in the process of suburbanization  although he initially found it  ldquo desolate  rdquo  adams soon learned the details of its natural beauty   ldquo the coming of doves up from mexico  the blooming of chicory hellip hundreds of wonderful things  rdquo  coming of age in this place  he saw denver rsquo s suburban growth in its nascent form     adams left the area for college and graduate school in 1962  when he finally returned to become a literature professor at colorado college  he found the state further transformed  between the construction of interstate 25  the cold war ndash era defense spending that put more people in denver on the federal payroll than in any city besides washington  dc  and an oil boom  the region was in the midst of an unprecedented urban expansion   ldquo i came back to colorado to discover that hellip the places where i had worked  hunted  climbed and run rivers were all being destroyed  rdquo  he later recalled   ldquo for me the desperate question was  how do i survive this  rdquo       adams turned to photography  he began making images of the new denver suburbs in 1968 and soon dropped to part time employment at the university to give himself more time for the work  as much as this was his search for a means of survival  it was also an effort to find new forms of beauty in a changing world  inspired by the 19th century cadastral survey images of timothy o rsquo sullivan  adams conceived of his work in series  taking cues from the photographs of dorothea lange  he sought to identify the components of a new american vernacular  the anomie of his images  meanwhile  channeled the edward hopper paintings he had first seen at the denver art museum as a teenager  the result was chilling mdash simultaneously a chronicle of the destruction of a stunning landscape and the aestheticization of its seemingly banal replacement     adams wasn rsquo t the only one who came up with the idea to photograph the postwar suburban housing boom  which the historian adam rome has called  ldquo one of the most profound environmental transformations in the nation rsquo s history  rdquo  in 1975  adams participated in a photography exhibition at the george eastman house in rochester  new york  that brought together the chroniclers of the country rsquo s new built landscape mdash lewis baltz  frank gohlke  nicholas nixon  and others mdash and that christened their work the  ldquo new topographics  rdquo  though it was a  ldquo relatively modest exhibition rdquo  at the time  robert silberman wrote in 2011  it  ldquo looms ever larger in the history of photography  rdquo     in 1990s mexico  a similarly profound transformation took root in the country rsquo s built environment  in 1917  the mexican constitution had enshrined the right to  ldquo dignified and decent housing  rdquo  the national fund for workers rsquo  housing  or infonavit  had been created as the guarantor of this right  throughout the ensuing decades  infonavit and other state agencies constructed housing for formal sector workers in the form of large apartment complexes called unidades habitacionales  habitational units   the buildings were integrated into the urban fabric  today  many of them remain desirable middle class housing       however  by the 1990s  the mexican government had moved to reduce the state rsquo s role in public life and the national economy through a series of privatizing measures  these neoliberal reforms allowed communally held  agricultural rural lands to be parceled and sold  simultaneously  the work of infonavit shifted to a privatized model  real estate developers  not the government  would now construct housing  the state agency would simply finance the mortgage  ensuring that the homebuilders had a steady stream of buyers  the result was a mushrooming of massive complexes of small  tightly packed row houses situated in urban peripheries across the country     journalistic investigations revealed that shoddy construction and predatory financing went hand in hand with the shift to the private sector  the los angeles times published a five part series claiming that mexico rsquo s  ldquo levittown moment rdquo  had  ldquo devolved into a slow motion social and financial catastrophe  rdquo  yet like the rapid suburbanization of the united states decades earlier  the new developments also sparked a wave of photographic exploration  since the early 2000s  a generation of photographers has developed a body of work that transposes and extends that of the new topographics  one of these  alejandro cartagena  is the subject of a retrospective   ldquo ground rules  rdquo  that is currently on view at the san francisco museum of modern art     just as the artists of the new topographics movement largely hailed from the fast growing american west  the nuevos topograficos like cartagena  jorge taboada  and livia corona benjamin have their roots in mexico rsquo s north  a region composed of open  arid landscapes that carries a similar cultural mythology  cartagena was born in the dominican republic and moved to the northern mexico city of monterrey when he was 13 years old   his mother is from mexico and his father is dominican   this meant that  like adams rsquo s coming to denver  he arrived at a place on the precipice of change  monterrey has doubled in population since cartagena rsquo s migration there     it rsquo s this demographic and environmental change that the mexican photographers have sought to capture  another monterrey born photographer  jorge taboada  for instance  created a series of photographs of the developments titled alta densidad  high density   the houses spill off the edges of the frame  their eerie geometry appearing to expand endlessly  their bright colors and the white gray of the newly paved streets around them become an abstract tessellation  closer to one of agnes martin rsquo s painted grids than any genre of landscape photography       in the series two million homes for mexico  meanwhile  the photographer livia corona benjamin  originally from baja california  allows her viewers a sliver of horizon  in one emblematic image  47 547 homes  ixtapaluca  mexico  the horizon line sits high in the frame  but its thin fringe is pastoral  the sweep of a wide  green valley and tall  gray mountains surrounded by clouds  below  on what was once the valley floor  stretches a rough surface of orange mdash an expanse of rectangular rows splaying out between two boulevards     though the small  identical orange homes spill off the left and right edges of the frame just as they do in taboada rsquo s images  the mountains in the distance place them in an earthly context  meanwhile  the pink  red  and blue awnings of street vendors are visible at the bottom of the image  creating a ribbon through the scene whose slight chaos suggests that one day  the eerie order may become as variegated as any ordinary neighborhood       cartagena lowers the horizon line even further  many of the filings of homes that appear in his 2005 ndash 10 series suburbia mexicana are built into the skirts of mountain ranges  their strings of white boxes contrasting with dramatic rock faces and green thornscrub  those that lack geology make up for it with ample skies filled with enormous cumulus clouds  a subseries  suburbia mexicana  lost rivers  shows the waterways desiccated by the homes rsquo  rapid construction mdash but with their rich vegetation and lush colors  they don rsquo t immediately look like images of destruction     as cartagena illuminates the environment that holds these subdivisions  the existence of a seemingly impossible quotidian life also flickers into being  this is what distinguishes cartagena rsquo s work  he brings together landscape and portrait photography to capture the new ways of life that mexico rsquo s 21st century suburbs have engendered  where other suburban photography can let its balance of disdain and compassion fall on the side of the broken world  cartagena is rooting equally or more for the homebuyer seeking a nest  this searing compassion is the denouement of the retrospective  indeed  he has managed to depict not only the transformation of a landscape but the unforeseen life rhythms of the new suburbs and the millions of people for whom they have become normal     alejandro cartagena rsquo s carpoolers  21  from the series carpoolers  2011 ndash 12     ldquo ground rules rdquo  opens with identidad nuevo leon  a series of portraits taken in 2005 ndash 06 by cartagena in collaboration with ruben marcos  the two photographers spent months traversing the state in the north of mexico  setting up a white background wherever they thought passersby might be willing to pose  as curator shana lopes points out in her catalog essay  the two men took their cues from richard avedon rsquo s 1985 in the american west  a series of 124 portraits mdash also placed uniformly against a white background mdash taken at the region rsquo s  ldquo rodeos  mining camps  cattle ranches  and slaughterhouses  rdquo  but among cartagena and marcos rsquo s nuevoleonenses  there are as many school uniforms  disney prints  and black clad goths as there are cowboy getups  cartagena saw the series as proof that  despite the state rsquo s cowboy reputation  there was no single nuevo leon identity     when the exhibition turns to landscape  it looks to the us mexican border  seeking to capture the essence of the line from a variety of different approaches  one series  border camera  consists of screenshots that cartagena took from a us national parks service webcam pointed at mexico  between borders documents rural life in an ejido  or ranching community  at mexico rsquo s very northern limit  an invisible line captures the us mexican border wall as it delineates the division between california  in the united states  and baja california  in mexico     some of these border images feel unremarkable in the context of the abundant artistic production that the united states rsquo  enforcement infrastructure has provoked  including long term projects by photographers like richard misrach  david taylor  and miguel fernandez de castro  but in the following room  these bifurcated forays into portraiture and landscape come together with an incisive tenderness     flanking the striking images of suburbia mexicana are photographs that capture the daily routines of the working class people who inhabit the series rsquo  exurban developments  one portrait  taken through the window of one of the minibuses that serve the far flung suburbs  depicts a woman who walks her husband to the bus stop every morning  another  also taken from within a bus mdash the backs of heads crowding the frame mdash follows the tired eyes of a woman as she boards and searches fruitlessly for a seat  the effect of these mexican cities rsquo  rapid  privatized sprawl mdash in contrast to the state agency rsquo s earlier model of condominium towers mdash is that the homeowners spend hours in traffic  crammed into the few buses that serve the extreme periphery  going to and from the places where they make their living     this leads to carpoolers  cartagena rsquo s piece de resistance  over the course of a year  he stood on a pedestrian bridge above a four lane highway and photographed the men traveling to work in the backs of trucks  like the topographical surveys and the work of the new topographics  carpoolers is most powerful when seen in sequence  at sfmoma  its images are mounted in a grid that occupies an entire gallery wall  some trucks and men appear multiple times mdash  ldquo i learned that the city needs repetition  rdquo  cartagena told me  some read a newspaper  while others pick their teeth  they try to make themselves comfortable while surrounded by ropes  shovels  cabinet doors  and extension cords  many attempt to sleep  some see cartagena rsquo s camera above them and smile     search carpoolers on instagram and you rsquo ll see that the series has gone viral more than once  set to music and sometimes accompanied by a text overlay explaining the project  the reels offer another way to experience the power of this work in sequence mdash one that is accessible to the very individuals that cartagena depicts  commuters packed into buses hoping to make the time pass more quickly  women who stay behind in the developments during their husbands rsquo  workdays  and children growing up as the descendants of mexico rsquo s new rural to suburban and urban to exurban migrations trying to make sense of their lives     this kind of egalitarian circulation of images has helped photographers from the periphery to build careers in the opposite direction  developing platforms on instagram and jumping from there to gallery representation  one such artist is sonia madrigal of ciudad nezahualcoyotl  a city adjacent to mexico city that was settled  largely informally  in the middle of the 20th century and has been dubbed  ldquo the largest slum in the world  rdquo  sharing the spirit of carpoolers  madrigal rsquo s photographs take place inside buses and on the edges of highways  her series tiempos muertos  dead times   for instance  includes an image of a woman napping in the concrete alcove of a metro station and another of a man with his face painted as a clown mdash likely headed to perform for tips at a busy intersection mdash resting his head against the metal wall of the bus  the city passing behind him     as these artists take up the mantle of the nuevos topograficos  cartagena has shifted his focus to studying the circulatory pathways of the images themselves  the most recent works in  ldquo ground rules rdquo  come from his series accumulations  2018  and we are things  2020   both use elements of collage to draw attention to the way that photographic tropes move across time and place mdash something evident to anyone on social media who spends time seeing dozens  if not hundreds  of images per day  take out the faces  as cartagena does  and they become effectively indistinguishable     while cartagena investigates the proliferation of images made possible by the internet and social media  he avoids the impulse to fatalistically bemoan the changes to art and photography they foretell  instead  he offers an opening for their propagation to continue  for the sfmoma retrospective  he developed an ai algorithm in collaboration with the montreal based technologist hughes bruyere that allows visitors to feed in sheets of colored paper and watch as it builds housing developments based on the typologies found in suburbia mexicana  cartagena has made it clear that he is leaning into change mdash an approach that is perhaps the one most loyal to the people who are the subjects of his work<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/alejandro-cartagenas-sf-moma/">Alejandro Cartagena’s Mexico in Flux</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 02 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/alejandro-cartagenas-sf-moma/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Solidarity Under Siege]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/world/cuba-humanitrian-aid-sanctions-latin-america/]]></link>
		<author>David Montgomery</author>
	<date>Apr 2, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Humanitarian aid convoy members returning from Cuba stopped, searched, and questioned by US Customs and Border Protection officers.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Humanitarian aid convoy members returning from cuba stopped  searched  and questioned by us customs and border protection officers      cubans and international solidarity organizers look on as one of the two sailboats carrying humanitarian aid arrive in havana  cuba  on march 28  2026       the potential penalty for trying to help the cuban people amid the trump administration rsquo s unprecedented economic crackdown  bellicose threats  and oil blockade became clear for two dozen american citizens returning home last week after participating in an international humanitarian aid convoy  arriving from havana to make connecting flights at the miami international airport  they were stopped  searched and questioned about their activities in cuba for more than two hours by us customs and border protection officers  at least 18 travelers had their cell phones  tablets  laptops  and kindles seized  while agents returned a handful of devices at the airport  they retained the bulk of the electronics  saying they rsquo d mail them in the coming days       it bears repeating that travel to cuba and carrying desperately needed medicine and food is entirely legal  a record 638 000 americans traveled to the island in 2018 for any of several permitted purposes enshrined in us law  including  ldquo support for the cuban people  rdquo  nevertheless  certain restrictions mdash tourism must not be the purpose of the visit  americans can stay only in private homes or the few hotels approved by the us government  they must not bring home rum or cigars mdash have become settled law  unless congress acts  since activists lost a series of legal challenges going back to the 1980s  according to human rights and immigration lawyers     however  the apparent targeting of convoy participants seeking to support the cuban people amid the current heightened tensions suggests that border police are focused on something beyond ferreting out contraband bottles of havana club  lawyers say        ldquo it is clearly meant to harass  rdquo  said stanley cohen  a human rights and criminal defense lawyer in new york city whose name and number were carried by many members of the convoy  speaking to the nation   ldquo this is designed to intimidate and hellip to send a political message from law enforcement and from the us department of justice  rdquo      ldquo i regard a lot of this as just harassment  rdquo  added ira kurzban  an immigration lawyer in miami   ldquo it rsquo s sending a message  if you go to cuba and come back  we rsquo re going to harass you  rdquo     the maximum civil penalty for  say  staying in a prohibited havana hotel  is  111 000  with the criminal maximum set at  250 000 and up to 20 years in prison mdash though lawyers say actual sentences would likely be far lower  yet the price of losing a phone or laptop for several days or weeks when so much of our lives depends on data stored there can feel steep indeed  convoy participants were stranded in miami without access to contacts  flight reservations  or documents they might need for work when they got home      ldquo it is absolutely disgusting  when you go on a humanitarian mission  that your computer and your phones are taken away from you  rdquo  said medea benjamin  cofounder of the human rights advocacy group code pink  which had helped arrange the trip for many of those interrogated in miami   ldquo what kind of totalitarian government do we live in that does that kind of thing  rdquo  benjamin  who has made numerous previous missions to cuba  was not questioned this time  she was scheduled to return to cuba this week with 2 500 pounds of lentils     besides the 18 whose devices were taken  five others associated with code pink who passed through miami on a different day were led aside for questioning  though their devices weren rsquo t examined  in addition  ldquo several rdquo  participants in the let cuba breathe brigade organized by the people rsquo s forum were detained and questioned in miami  according to the group  and brazilian activist thiago avila  who led a separate delegation of 32 activists and journalists who arrived in cuba on a boat carrying solar panels and bicycles  was temporarily detained at an airport in panama on his way home  according to convoy organizers       all were participating in the nuestra america convoy  which was coordinated by progressive international and included more than 500 participants from 33 countries who delivered an estimated 35 tons of medicine  food  and other supplies  the convoy came in response to the oil blockade of cuba that president donald trump announced in late january  the blockade has caused widespread blackouts  household water cutoffs  and reductions of the school day and workplace hours  economic conditions in cuba have deteriorated markedly since trump rsquo s first term when he canceled president barack obama rsquo s easing of tensions and ratcheted up sanctions  which president joe biden did not reverse  code pink had arranged for 170 people to bring 6 300 pounds of medical supplies and other aid as part of the nuestra america convoy      ldquo solidarity is not a crime  rdquo  said katie halper  journalist and host of the katie halper show and cohost of useful idiots on youtube and via podcasts  whose phone and laptop were examined by border agents   ldquo what our government is doing to cuba is illegal and immoral and unjust and criminal  and this is the domestic front of that same war  rdquo     customs and border protection officers seemed to be ready and waiting for the cuba travelers  olivia dinucci  a code pink organizer from washington  dc  heard her name called as she was still standing in line to show her passport  cory lee stowers  a mural artist also from the dc area  found an officer already had his photo displayed on a tablet before he said a word     in response to questions from the nation  a spokesperson for customs and border protection said by e mail that border searches are a routine part of the agency rsquo s  ldquo national security mission  rdquo  the spokesperson added that  ldquo for travelers arriving from cuba  rdquo  agents consider existing sanctions  ldquo and regulations that permit travel under specific licenses but impose strict restrictions on financial transactions  lodging  and the importation of certain goods  rdquo  the spokesperson didn rsquo t respond to questions about why phones were seized and why nearly everyone from one group was scrutinized         the officers seemed interested in more than hotels and cigars  they asked what conditions in cuba are like  whether the travelers had met cuban president miguel diaz canel  and what group they were part of  according to six interviewed by the nation  the officers also paged through diaries and papers they found in travelers rsquo  backpacks and luggage      ldquo this will not deter us  rdquo  said dinucci  who had traveled to havana aboard the convoy rsquo s  ldquo flotilla rdquo  boat that motored from mexico   ldquo our solidarity has to escalate as the  government escalates  and that means going back to cuba  bringing more people  exposing the everyday hardships  rdquo     benjamin said that in the future  code pink will advise cuba travelers to carry only burner phones  lawyers cohen and kurzban said that while border police have broad discretion at the border  travelers who are american citizens are still within their rights not to answer questions  they don rsquo t have a right to an attorney unless they are suspected of a crime  but they can rsquo t be held for an extended period and must be granted entry into the us the laws governing cellphone searches at the border are murkier  kurzban said  while cbp asserts the right to examine devices      ldquo this was like kicking the hornet rsquo s nest  rdquo  caroline kingsbury  a registered nurse from new york city  said of her border experience  she was planning to talk about cuba to raise awareness at a community meeting this week   ldquo i rsquo m only going to double down and get more intense about it  rdquo     asked by agents what they had been doing in cuba  mural artists stowers and francisco letelier  from venice  california  recounted collaborating with cuban artists and art students to cover a chipped wall overlooking havana rsquo s malecon seawall with a vibrant work of art that includes giant letters spelling the word  ldquo humanidad  rdquo     the border search shows  ldquo we rsquo ve been effective  rdquo  letelier said   ldquo they rsquo re worried about us  about the international outcry for humanity and for finding peaceful methods and for allowing countries to have self determination  in no way am i deterred  rdquo<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/world/cuba-humanitrian-aid-sanctions-latin-america/">Solidarity Under Siege</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 02 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/world/cuba-humanitrian-aid-sanctions-latin-america/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Why Black People Can’t Earn Our Way Out of Racism in Maternal Care: A Q&amp;A With Khiara Bridges]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/interview-khiara-bridges-expecting-inequity/]]></link>
		<author>Regina Mahone</author>
	<date>Apr 2, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>In her new book, Bridges found that healthcare provided through private markets leaves more room for discrimination and unequal care to take root than in a public program like Medicaid.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["In her new book  bridges found that healthcare provided through private markets leaves more room for discrimination and unequal care to take root than in a public program like medicaid            khiara m  bridges rsquo s newest book  expecting inequity   ldquo has been a long time coming  rdquo  the uc berkeley law professor told the nation in early march  bridges  who earned a phd in anthropology at columbia university  where she also received her jd  first studied the roles of class and race in maternal healthcare in her 2011 book reproducing race  offering what she now calls a  ldquo scathing critique of medicaid and its program of prenatal care hellip that completely disregards the desires of the pregnant person and also completely disregards the discretion of the provider  rdquo  especially compared with people who receive commercial insurance and can make a lot more choices about their care  this system treats the poor  she wrote  as a  ldquo fictional uniform population rdquo  and erases their unique desires and needs  undermining their agency while allowing inequality  and racial inequality in particular  to continue unabated  but people attending her book talks questioned whether the dehumanization that low income people of color experience is really due to their race or primarily a function of their poverty  they were right  bridges says  that poor people in the united states are treated unjustly   ldquo but implicit in that question was the assumption that racism doesn rsquo t show up when you have class privilege mdash that you  escape dehumanization and negative outcomes if you are a person of color with some degree of wealth or affluence  rdquo  expecting inequity is bridges rsquo s investigation into whether that is possible     the answers are surprising  as bridges was reviewing cdc data on pregnancy related deaths  she noticed  as she writes in her new book  that while  ldquo black people with less than a high school education are 1 8 times as likely as white people with less than a high school education to die from a pregnancy related cause hellip black people with a college education or more were 5 2 times as likely as white people with a college education or more to die from a pregnancy related cause  rdquo  in other words  the disparity in maternal mortality rates between educated black people and their educated white counterparts is greater than the disparity between uneducated black people and their uneducated white counterparts      the result of two years of investigation  expecting inequity exposes structural inequities within the healthcare system that are inescapable no matter your income or wealth      bridges conducted studies at two san francisco hospitals mdash golden health  a world renowned private hospital  and the nearby  ldquo poor people rsquo s hospital  rdquo  the zuckerberg san francisco general hospital mdash and interviewing 200 pregnant or newly postpartum people  including 75  ldquo unicorns rdquo  or class privileged black people  residing in san francisco  she found that when the healthcare is provided through private markets mdash as it is in commercial insurance programs mdash there rsquo s more room for racism and unequal care to take root  while black people with class privilege can access a higher tier of healthcare than the medicaid system  which comes with standards and regulations that overemphasize the medicalization of pregnancy  the lack of government oversight of the  ldquo profit maximizing  discretion packed processes found in the profit generating side rdquo  is leaving  ldquo socioeconomically fortunate black people susceptible to race based harm  rdquo  meaning that  for example  their concerns about life threatening conditions may be dismissed as they are subjected to anti black discrimination due to racist assumptions and stereotypes made by providers  as bridges says  black people are not able to earn or educate our way out of anti blackness  still  in our conversation  bridges discussed why she remains hopeful about the united states getting this right  this interview has been edited for length and clarity      mdash regina mahone      regina mahone   in explaining why maternal and infant health disparities are starker for people with commercial insurance mdash who are  on average  higher income mdash than for those who are on medicaid  you write that  ldquo medicaid delivers a uniform program of prenatal care for the poor hellip   while this standardization problematically limits patient and provider autonomy  it also reduces racial disparities in infant and maternal mortality  in doing so  medicaid serves antiracist goals  rdquo  can you talk more about this finding and how  as you say  medicaid makes  ldquo race matter just a little less rdquo  when we look at infant and maternal mortality data       khiara bridges   i rsquo m so fascinated by contradictions  and that was one of the contradictions that motivates this project  when i was researching this book  the contradiction became apparent  the rates at which black and white pregnant folks   as well as the babies that they birth  die are actually closer than the rates at which black babies and black parents and their white counterparts die when there is class privilege  so the gaps are actually higher at the higher end of the socioeconomic ladder  the critiques that i made in reproducing race about medicaid are valid critiques  but how do i reconcile that with the fact that these features that one ought to criticize are actually producing outcomes that are more racially equitable than what we see with regard to the commercially insured  it is the program of prenatal care that one can rsquo t opt out of mdash medicaid mdash that reduces the racial disparities in maternal and infant mortality and morbidity  the question that i ask in the book is  given that fact  what does racial justice look like  should we be fighting for medicaid for all  even though that means that we will be denied choices around what care to receive and who to receive it from and what procedures to undergo  i don rsquo t resolve this tension in the book  but it rsquo s a question that we need to ask ourselves  if we are fighting for a world in which one rsquo s ability to survive does not depend on one rsquo s race  what sort of institutions should we produce  and it seems like when we rsquo re talking about maternal and infant mortality and morbidity  we need to be thinking about the universal healthcare that removes some of the discretion that providers make in our current kind of regime     rm   you write about how the healthcare system is profoundly segregated  but not only that  the hospitals that primarily serve uninsured patients or patients receiving medicaid make it possible for hospitals that serve class privileged patients to offer superior care  you draw a parallel between healthcare and housing  and how redlining and other forms of housing discrimination have made it possible for wealthier neighborhoods to exist  why was it important to you to make those connections and the observation that  in general   ldquo poor people make it possible for wealthier people to have nice things rdquo      kb   one of the things that i wanted to do with this book was to denormalize the fact that there are poor people rsquo s hospitals and hospitals for everybody else  people in the us tend to think that it is just normal and natural for there to be institutions for poor people and institutions for nonpoor people  we have poor neighborhoods  we have the ghetto  and then we have the suburbs and we have nice neighborhoods  that geography is present in every single region in the united states  even though the book is set in san francisco  it could have been set anywhere     we also know that the hospitals for poor people are delivering  in a lot of ways  substandard care  and that rsquo s just something that should strike all of us as a fundamental injustice  that your health is compromised when you are poor because of the environments in which you rsquo re forced to live  you re living next to a highway  which spews pollution on you  you don t have access to healthy foods  perhaps because you live in a food desert  and even if you don t  fresh fruits and vegetables are expensive  your health is compromised when one is poor in this country  that is a fundamental injustice that i m trying to denormalize in this book       but the other thing that i wanted to do was to make explicit that there is a symbiotic relationship between the two  the features that make the institutions that cater to those with class privilege in this country nice are made possible by the chaos and the lack of nice things that are found in the institutions that cater to low income people     in the book  i describe how  when i was researching reproducing race  one of the most obvious features of the public hospital  where i was working and observing was that the pregnant folks would wait hours for their appointments  and then when i got to golden health  the well resourced institution where i did the research for this book  waiting times were nonexistent  if patients had to wait for their provider  it was no more than 15 minutes  or 20 minutes on a bad day  i was trying to figure out why this is  and i found that it isn t because  oh  it s just that golden health and these institutions that cater to high income people are just better organized or the patients are just better in terms of showing up on time  but rather  it is a matter of fiscal survival for the places that see low income people to accommodate folks who are late  the hospitals desperately need to be reimbursed for the care that they provide because of their shoestring budgets  and these hospitals care for low income people whose lives are made more contingent because of their poverty  which makes it difficult for them to show up to their appointments on time  so the low income hospitals are caring for these people  and that allows the places that care for wealthier people to not see those low  shy income people  therefore  those spaces can be orderly  and those places can be non chaotic and can promise that you rsquo ll be seen by your provider within 20 minutes of your arrival     at the end   i invite the reader to think about how all the nice things that wealthier people have are contingent on low income people s discomfort  if you live in a nice neighborhood  how is the clean air and clean water and lead free soil found in your neighborhood made possible by the unclean air and unclean soil and unclean water found in low income communities  how are the benefits that you get at your job  whether it s paid vacation days or health insurance  made possible by the contingency found in these low wage jobs  you re lucky if you have access to some healthcare at low income jobs      rm   yet even when wealthier people have nice things  black people with class privilege cannot escape racism in healthcare  can you talk about the role of neoliberalism and the market based approach to healthcare in the united states in the black maternal health crisis     kb   when one rsquo s health insurance is medicaid  the government regulates medicaid very strictly  but when one has class privilege  one enters into this commercial insurance realm that is not regulated to the extent that medicaid is and where market logics dominate     the idea is that the market is going to generate exceptional healthcare at the lowest cost  but as i talk about in the book  the us is falling short on both accounts  our healthcare is incredibly expensive  it rsquo s more expensive than the nations that we like to consider our peers in western europe  canada  and new zealand  but also our outcomes are dicey at best  and especially dicey when we re talking about maternal health  we re failing all people in the us  but it s especially bad for black people     the statistic that drives the book is the one that shows how these racial disparities in maternal mortality persist across income levels  so even if one is incredibly privileged  if one has a high educational level  if one has status  as a black person  you re still three to four times as likely to die from a pregnancy related cause as your white counterpart  that means  to me  that black people are not able to educate themselves out of anti blackness  we rsquo re not able to earn ourselves mdash in terms of our income mdash out of anti blackness  we rsquo re not able to acquire status that will allow us to escape anti blackness  and so it rsquo s true that low income people make it possible for wealthier people to have nice things  but then the ability to acquire those nice things for black people is made difficult by racism     what i show in the book is that black people with class privilege lean on that class privilege in order to try to buy themselves out of racism and escape from anti blackness  and so they pay gobs of money for doula care so that they can have an advocate in the labor and delivery room that can hopefully help them avoid dehumanization or  in worst case scenarios  death  i tell stories about black women who i interviewed whose fingers were swollen from pregnancy  they re in their second and third trimesters  but they refuse to remove their wedding rings because they don t want to be a black pregnant person who is perceived as unmarried  this is in society generally  but also in their appointments when they go to the doctor  they don t want their doctor  they don t want their midwives  they don t want their healthcare providers to perceive them as black and unmarried and pregnant because they know that that might have consequences for the healthcare that they receive     one of the chapters is titled  ldquo going to the doctor in yale sweatpants  rdquo  people dress up to go to the doctor because they rsquo re trying to signal that they are not low income  that they are educated  that they are deserving of quality healthcare  i argue that this is consistent with neoliberalism mdash this idea that the government has no obligation to care for vulnerable people  no obligation to provide goods or services for its citizenry as a general matter  neoliberalism argues that freedom is to be found in strong  robust markets  and you have to purchase your freedom in the market  and when black folks are forced to participate in this neoliberal logic  they rsquo re trying their damnedest purchase freedom in the market  they re trying their damnedest to buy all the doula care and all the yale sweatpants and all the accoutrements of privilege that will allow them to survive their pregnancies  and the point i make in the book is that people shouldn rsquo t have to do that  it s such a failure of the us to require people to attempt to survive a natural biological process mdash one that needs to happen if humanity is to persist mdash by expending resources and strategizing about how to receive healthcare that will allow them to survive pregnancy  we should be embarrassed as a country     rm   can you talk about how hospitals are profiting from the black maternal health crisis       kb   what became apparent to me when i was conducting research for this book is that it is not inaccurate to think of the healthcare ecosystem in any particular region as a market  and just like with other markets  institutions are in competition with one another and hospitals are in competition with one another for patients and patient dollars  medicaid reimburses at a fraction of the rate   so hospitals aren t really competing for low income patients  instead  they re competing for commercially insured patients  and how do they compete for these patients  they offer amenities  state of the art care  luxurious birthing rooms  postpartum suites  and all of those things     when i was observing the healthcare ecosystem in san francisco  i started thinking about this analogy to hbcus  so i went to an hbcu  i went to spelman  but when i was in high school  thinking about what college to attend  there were certainly folks who were advising me  go to harvard  go to columbia  go to yale  don t go to spelman  don t go to howard  because while they might be great black colleges and universities  they re not great colleges and universities in the grand scheme of things  i would get more opportunities by being able to rub elbows with the folks who attend and teach at schools like harvard  yale  columbia  so on and so forth  but the reality is that spelman was the best choice for me for many  many reasons  one of those reasons was that it was an institution that was designed for black women  it gave me an opportunity to not think about my race and gender all the time while trying to get an education     so spelman was the best choice for me  even though when you compare spelman s endowment with the endowments of harvard and yale and columbia  spelman s endowment pales in comparison  when you compare some of the amenities found at spelman to the amenities found at columbia  harvard  yale hellip  i m laughing because it wasn t until i got to columbia that i was like  wow  y all got options around food     so spelman can t match up in a lot of ways with these well funded  well resourced institutions  but spelman is still the best choice for many  many  many black women      i was thinking about that in conversation with these healthcare systems in san francisco and just generally in the us  while it s true that institutions like golden health and these hospitals that cater to wealthier folks might have more amenities and more resources  and while they might even be able to offer more technologically sophisticated care  are they really better for black people and other people of color  because i can tell you  they re not orienting themselves to care for black people and other people of color  they re not designing themselves as institutions for black people and other people of color  meanwhile though  the low income hospitals  the hospitals that cater to low income folks in san francisco  the general   the general is like  we are here for people of color  what do people of color need  we will give it to you  we take racism seriously  we take xenophobia seriously  we take heteronormativity and cis normativity       these are institutions that have as their kind of reason for existence caring for marginalized people  so i ask the question  are black people really better off at these institutions that cater to wealthier folks  however  as a strategy for surviving the black maternal health crisis  black people are avoiding institutions that cater to people of color and low income people  and i question whether they actually would receive better outcomes if they went to these institutions that actually are designed for marginalized people  how does that speak to the profit motive  well  that means that these institutions that are catering to wealthier people  they have kind of a captured audience essentially  they have a patient population who might be better served elsewhere  but they re going to come to these institutions that cater to wealthier folks because they think that that is their best chance for survival  it helps these hospitals compete for patients and accrue the sort of wealth that comes from the patient or that comes from the insurance reimbursements that these patients bring  so yeah  the black maternal health crisis  i argue in the book  it s good for the bottom line for wealthier institutions     rm   you also raise important questions about ongoing news coverage of the maternal health crisis  which can start to feel like  ldquo trauma porn  rdquo  can you elaborate on your argument that  ldquo the nation exists in the space between raising awareness and action rdquo        kb   one of my favorite chapters to write was the chapter on media coverage of the black maternal health crisis  while i was researching the book  i had a google alert that would notify me of stories about black people dying or nearly dying during pregnancy  it was overwhelming the number of stories that would come through  and i would read the stories and learn nothing new      why was so much coverage of black maternal deaths or near deaths just so bad  i make this structural argument about the contraction of news media generally  we just lived through the washington post reducing its staff by a third  when that happens  these outlets hire fewer people and the people that they do hire might not have expertise in  areas  these structural issues contribute to subpar reporting on many issues  but specifically very complex issues including maternal health in the us and black maternal health and healthcare      but two other things were happening while i was researching this book  the first thing that was happening was this war on critical race theory  i don t talk about this in the book  but one of my books is called critical race theory  a primer  i had written this book before the right discovered critical race theory  and so to reporters  great credit  they would reach out to me and ask me  what exactly is critical race theory  i would give these really  i would say  good answers about critical race theory  the origins of the theory and its arguments  and yet the stories that would come out about critical race theory that i had contributed to  again  were not very good  i was disappointed  and then i was like   quot so why are you writing these stories if they re not going to be nuanced and sophisticated and honest about what the right was doing with critical race theory  rdquo  and it seemed to me like that the label of clickbait described some of it  it s like these outlets wanted to run a story so that they could get the eyes on their site so that advertisers know that people are coming to their sites or to advertise their wares so that the outlet can make money  so  really  it wasn t about disabusing the public of these incorrect notions of critical race theory  rather  it was to talk about critical race theory so that people would click on it and the advertising dollars would flow from it     the second thing that was also happening was black deaths at the hands of police officers and the proliferation of these videos of black people dying  getting shot  or otherwise killed by police officers  and the reality is that the existence of those videos is good for media outlets because people click on it  they want to see the video  it s salacious coverage  it s disturbing coverage  those videos are also good for social media platforms because it drives up user engagement      i started to think about black maternal deaths in conversation with this critical race theory hullabaloo  as well as with the ubiquity of these videos of black people being killed by police  and i concluded that a lot of outlets are just going to run stories on black maternal deaths because it drives up user engagement  these stories are heartbreaking  but they re also trauma porn when not done well  it s trauma porn when the structural conditions that produce black maternal deaths are not made explicit  it doesn t do good if a reader reads a story and they learn another black lady died while pregnant  but they don t learn why     but the other thing that makes me sad is that black people who are pregnant or desiring pregnancy have to live within this onslaught of being told that they are more likely to die  it rsquo s so cruel to  pregnant or to want to be pregnant and then have to read constantly about your lower likelihood of surviving the event  and it s also bad for your health  i mean  we ve known for at least a generation now that stress has negative physiological consequences  and we are creating conditions under which black people are going to have to endure chronic stress just because of racism generally  but then black pregnant people particularly have to live with the fact that they re less likely to survive their pregnancies  then we turn around and are surprised that black people have higher rates of maternal mortality and morbidity  it s like  of course they do  we are creating the conditions under which we should expect as much      so yeah  i m calling out media outlets that are doing check the box journalism that are just writing these stories and posting them as clickbait  but it s also a call to action to media outlets to do the work  hire the people who will be able to write nuanced  smart  well researched stories about black maternal health  so that audiences can actually learn about what s causing this phenomenon and we can actually do something to eliminate the phenomenon     rm   finally  we have to address the dei of it all  you share an example of what researchers call a ldquo racially concordant care system rdquo  that allows black patients to see black providers  which data shows can have a positive impact on birth outcomes  but programs like this are few and far in between  and becoming fewer  we are currently in the midst of a profound rollback of initiatives to address unequal and racially discriminatory care and the structural issues that have brought us to this point  it rsquo s another indication that centering black experiences is really  really hard for this country  yet  you remain hopeful  or at least suggest that you haven rsquo t yet given up hope that we can one day get this right  tell me why     kb   i think that it would be disrespectful to my ancestors for me not to be hopeful  my grandmothers on both my mom s and dad rsquo s side were maids in the jim crow south  they rsquo re not alive today  but i think if they were  they would look at me and this book and conclude that their wildest dreams had come true  and so i think it s disrespectful to them for me to look at the way things are and say   quot i have no hope  quot  because if they had hope and they got to see mdash they both were alive when i was born and they got to see what was possible  they got to dream about what was possible through my little tiny body and i can dream about what is possible     i was attending a talk two weeks ago by loretta ross  one of the primary founders of the reproductive justice framework   i take what she says as gospel truth  loretta ross described this particular sociopolitical moment as the last gasp of a particular form of white supremacy  the description of it as a last gasp gave me reason  mdash i was like  so loretta ross is optimistic  she doesn t think that this is inaugurating a new normal  but rather that this is aberrational and it will die  and then we will have a future in which we at least don t have to wrestle with the old forms of white supremacy  all of that to say  i am optimistic      i think that a lot of people are going to die unnecessary deaths  and a lot of suffering is going to be inflicted  but i also do believe that this sociopolitical moment will come to an end  and then we will have this opportunity to create something new and better  i hope that we are thinking about a universal healthcare system  if not that  i hope that we are thinking about pouring funding into medicaid  in the book  i say that if we really wanted to solve the black maternal health crisis  we would start taking racism seriously  we have to stop denying that it exists      i m excited to see what comes next  what i m worried about is that we re just going to try to restore what was before  we need to be afro futuristic with this  let s imagine a future that we ve never seen and then let s take steps towards realizing it<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/interview-khiara-bridges-expecting-inequity/">Why Black People Can’t Earn Our Way Out of Racism in Maternal Care: A Q&amp;A With Khiara Bridges</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 02 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/interview-khiara-bridges-expecting-inequity/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[What Made This Seder Different From Any Other Seder?]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/zohran-mamdani-seder-speech/]]></link>
		<author>D.D. Guttenplan</author>
	<date>Apr 2, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Answer: The presence of New York’s first Muslim mayor.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Answer  the presence of new york rsquo s first muslim mayor      zohran mamdani on march 31  2026         one of the few genuine pleasures i can recall from the five years i attended three day a week hebrew school in northeast philadelphia was the model seders mdash child friendly  radically slimmed down versions of the annual jewish celebration of our people rsquo s deliverance from slavery and subsequent exodus from egypt  the food served during these events was lighter than my mother rsquo s notoriously heavy cooking  even her matzoh balls were  ldquo sinkers rdquo    while the presence of my school friends provided opportunities for horsing around undreamt of during the strict recitation of the entire haggadah  in hebrew  by my father and uncle       yet over time  the full fat version of passover i had once yearned to escape became my favorite jewish holiday  maybe it was my mother rsquo s desserts mdash still not light  but very tasty mdash or the chance to hang out with my older cousins  or our loud singing  both of traditional seder songs like  ldquo dayenu rdquo  and  ldquo chad gadya rdquo  and also of the spiritual  ldquo go down moses  rdquo  by the time we got invited to a model seder at union temple in brooklyn  where my oldest son was in nursery school  i was happy to go     but that was over 30 years ago  and although our family eventually developed its own set of rituals for the holiday mdash sephardi lamb instead of ashkenazi brisket  abridged versions of the hebrew songs mdash and even our own haggadah  i assumed my model seder days were in the past     until monday  when i learned that mayor zohran mamdani would be attending an adult version mdash a downtown seder mdash at city winery that evening and asked if i might come along  city winery owner michael dorf  who has been a macher in new york rsquo s arts scene since he founded the knitting factory in 1987  has been hosting these gatherings for over 30 years  the event was once described by the new york times as  ldquo a cross between a jewish summer camp in the catskills and a progressive jazz concert  rdquo  past incarnations have featured laurie anderson  philip glass  lou reed  cast as  ldquo the wise child rdquo  in the hagaddah   and peter yarrow  the lineup this time included the indie rock trio betty  david broza  jesse malin  meg okura and yola  economist and podcaster stephen dubner  and  in a video reprise of his in person 2024 appearance  al franken singing  ldquo go down moses  rdquo       but it was the political performers who provided the draw for many of those present  besides former cnn host don lemon  offering a riff on the four questions  which  as the 60 year old youtuber noted  is a task traditionally assigned to the youngest person present  and mamdani  council speaker julie menin and former nyc comptroller brad lander were also on the program     not everyone was thrilled to see the mayor  on the way to my seat  a woman  noticing the media badge around my neck  asked me which outlet i was from  when i told her  she asked if the nation had supported mamdani rsquo s campaign  and when i confirmed we had endorsed him  responded   ldquo so you rsquo re one of those jews who supports antisemites  rdquo  at least she had turned up  mamdani rsquo s mere presence was sufficient to prompt the israeli american orthodox comedian modi rosenfeld  also listed on the program  to withdraw from the event   i will leave it to more skilled talmudists to explain how to square the torah rsquo s condemnation of gay sex with modi rsquo s life as a married gay man      in the event  the mayor rsquo s drash on  ldquo the broken middle matzo  a physical reminder of the ruptures that have defined so much of jewish history  a physical reminder of how much of our world today remains broken and incomplete  rdquo  was both respectful and timely     condemning  ldquo the rising tide of antisemitism  has caused enormous pain for so many jewish new yorkers  rdquo  mamdani called on his audience to  ldquo build a city where every new yorker is accorded the dignity of rest  where even the poorest among us know their cup will be filled  and we all know that if they seek shelter  they will find it  if they are hungry  they will be fed  rdquo      ldquo there is a crack  a crack in everything  rdquo  he concluded   ldquo but as passover teaches  and as leonard cohen sings   lsquo that is how the light gets in  rsquo  though things may be broken  so too do they become whole again  rdquo  heckled even before he started speaking  mamdani handled the interruptions deftly  quipping   ldquo we know that if there was complete decorum anywhere that we were  we would have to ask ourselves if we had left the city that we love  rdquo  by the end of his remarks  mamdani drew warm applause from the room       at the time he spoke  the mayor and council speaker menin were not yet in open warfare over the budget  those hostilities didn rsquo t break out until wednesday  when the council released its own plan to balance the city rsquo s finances mdash without either raising taxes on the wealthy or  the mayor rsquo s threatened alternative  increasing property taxes      ldquo any proposal that claims we can close this gap without significant new revenue is unrealistic  rdquo  mamdani said in a statement  adding that the council proposal  ldquo would force the city to cut services  rdquo  he also tried to lean on one of his most potent weapons mdash his ability to create viral content mdash by releasing a scathing video denouncing menin rsquo s plan  that particular drama still has several months to run  but at least now we know the lines of battle     in her remarks at the seder  the speaker allowed herself a brief victory lap celebrating the council rsquo s recent passage  by a veto proof 44 ndash 5 margin  of her bill to establish  ldquo buffer zones rdquo  around the city rsquo s houses of worship mdash a bill the mayor has not supported  citing concerns over the right to protest  but that bill mdash originally submitted in response to protests outside park east synagogue in november mdash was just a small symptom of a larger fracture between mamdani and even many of his supporters present on monday night     for decades  jews on the left have applied a  ldquo palestine exception rdquo  to our calls for social justice  as it happens  the most sophisticated rationale  both for the flattering claim that our history gives jews a special role in liberation struggles  and for the belief that somehow the palestinian cause is exempt from such demands  was articulated by the political philosopher michael walzer in his 1985 book exodus and revolution  like many of the speakers on monday  walzer sought  ldquo to trace a continuous line from exodus to the radical politics of our own time  rdquo     but for anyone who actually reads the bible  there are serious problems in deriving your politics from exodus  not just the slaying of the egyptian firstborn celebrated in the passover story  but the divine injunction to exterminate all the indigenous inhabitants of the lands the israelites go on to conquer       mamdani was too polite mdash or perhaps to politic mdash to puncture his audience rsquo s comfortable illusions  or even to mention the word  ldquo palestine  rdquo  which was probably the right call  since  as he has often said  his responsibility is to be the mayor of all new yorkers  including some who will never be reconciled to his presence in office owing to his religion or his support for the palestinian cause       so  on the evening of the very day the israeli knesset passed a law to hang palestinians for killings classified as  ldquo acts of terrorism  rdquo  it was left to brad lander to reckon with the ghosts of zionism   ldquo since october 7  i feel broken in ways in which it is very hard to imagine being put back together  rdquo  he said  recalling the progressive zionist values of his own upbringing  lander said he  ldquo just can rsquo t square that with israel rsquo s destruction of schools and hospitals quot  in gaza  in his anguish  at last  could be heard the note of prophecy     as for me  i went home and picked up edward said rsquo s  ldquo canaanite reading rdquo  of exodus mdash a thoroughgoing demolition of walzer rsquo s moral evasions and philosophical pretension that remains bracingly relevant 40 years after its publication     said rsquo s argument is worth reading in full mdash especially if you still harbor illusions about the future of  ldquo liberal zionism  rdquo  or view the jews as mere interlopers in the middle east  but if i had to pick out one line  it would be this   ldquo exodus may be a tragic book in that it teaches that you cannot both  lsquo belong rsquo  and concern yourself with canaanites who do not belong  rdquo     a tragic book  indeed  by the time you read this i will be on my way to my son rsquo s house outside philadelphia  where we will tell the story of slavery and redemption  break matzoh  sip wine  and sing dayenu mdash along with  ldquo go down moses  rdquo  i rsquo m told the mayor will also be holding an actual seder for his staff this week  for all of those who celebrate with us  i wish you a zissen pesach  and for all of us  since we are allowed to dream  peace and justice in our lifetimes<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/zohran-mamdani-seder-speech/">What Made This Seder Different From Any Other Seder?</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 02 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/zohran-mamdani-seder-speech/</guid>
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  <item>
	 <title><![CDATA[The Olympics Is Repeating One of Its Worst Mistakes]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/olympics-women-athletes-testing-history/]]></link>
		<author>Michael Waters</author>
	<date>Apr 2, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The IOC’s new anti-trans testing regime revives some of the most discredited and discriminatory policies in the history of the games.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<description>
	<![CDATA["The ioc rsquo s new anti trans testing regime revives some of the most discredited and discriminatory policies in the history of the games      ioc president kirsty coventry speaks during the olympic opening ceremony at the 2026 winter olympics  in milan  italy  on february 6  2026       in 1967  a polish sprinter named ewa k  obukowska sat for a mandatory dna test  k  obukowska  a rising track star  had won a gold and a bronze medal at the 1964 olympics in tokyo  now  a new policy required all women track and field athletes to be screened for the presence of x chromosomes  k  obukowska was probably shocked to learn that the test had placed her on the wrong side of the gender binary  exactly what happened is hazy mdash news reports claimed that k  obukowska was discovered to have  ldquo one chromosome too many  rdquo  without further explanation mdash but the consequences were immediate  k  obukowska was banned from the olympics  her sporting career was over       track and field officials framed this as an unmitigated triumph  proof that dna testing had weeded out an athlete who was  ldquo not truly female  rdquo  but even at the time  some onlookers could see that the international olympic committee  ioc  was going down a dark road of gender policing  weeding out women who had always understood themselves as female based on some arbitrary biological marker  the head of the polish olympic committee  perhaps radicalized by the dismissal of one of his top athletes  called dna testing a  ldquo form of discrimination rdquo  as well as something of a gender delusion  how could the ioc hope to split up athletes into biological binaries when  ldquo there are no generally accepted criteria of sex for woman athletes rdquo   sex  after all  is a spectrum     these critiques did not stop the ioc from expanding its testing requirements  from 1968 on  all women athletes had to sit for chromosome exams ahead of the olympics  only at the end of the 1990s  when the chorus of critical voices became unavoidable  did the ioc ditch this sex testing regime     now  though  amid a rising global tide of transphobia  the olympics is retreating into the past  last week  the ioc announced it was banning trans women from competing in women rsquo s events and embracing mdash what else  mdash chromosome testing  in her statement  ioc head kirsty coventry insisted that she wanted to  ldquo ensure the fairness  safety  and integrity of all competitions within the games  rdquo  what she did not mention was her organization rsquo s sordid history with dna testing mdash or the widespread condemnation that this experiment had once drawn     it would be simply inconvenient to admit that  two and a half decades ago  a coalition that included the american medical association  the government of norway  and then ndash first lady hillary clinton helped to unravel these very same policies  or that the ioc rsquo s chosen dna test  the sry test  has failed before  the sry test detects the presence of y chromosomal material  but many people who are not men  including a number of cis women  have y chromosomal material  the ioc knows this firsthand  when it rolled out the sry test in 1996  at the atlanta olympics  the test famously backfired  eight women tested positive and risked getting kicked out of sports  until they were eventually reinstated after further review   these women were never publicly identified      the test has not changed in the 30 years since  neither has the science around human biology  but the olympics is forging ahead regardless       just as it did in 1968  the ioc is insisting that the new regime is about preventing men from breaching the barriers of women rsquo s sports  saying that  ldquo it is absolutely clear that it would not be fair for biological males to compete in the female category  rdquo  and  just as was true all those decades ago  this excuse doesn rsquo t hold up to scrutiny  instead  the ioc is playing a linguistic jiu jitsu with us  lumping intersex and trans women into the categories of  ldquo biological males  rdquo  even though they are not men and do not have the same athletic advantages as men     clearly  this new policy has little to do with science or fairness mdash and everything to do with the metastasizing right wing panic against trans women  instead of dealing with the occasionally messy work of including gender diverse athletes in a binary sports infrastructure  the ioc seems to have decided that it rsquo s more convenient simply not to try  that the global right has made trans women athletes into a fixation  a proxy for their much wider ranging campaign to disenfranchise trans people  has proven to be a convenient cover for a return to the 20th century  it rsquo s also only the latest example of the regressive gender politics that have defined the olympics for their entire history     skepticism of women rsquo s athletics is encoded into the olympics itself  pierre de coubertin  the founder of the modern olympics  thought women rsquo s sports were  ldquo impractical  uninteresting  unaesthetic and improper  rdquo  and limited the competitions that could be available to women  the women who did make it to the olympics were often thought to have unfair physical advantages  when the american sprinter helen stephens won gold in 1936  newspapers pointed to her deep voice and big arms and accused her of being a man     right wingers and fascists have often tapped into these anxieties around women rsquo s sports to platform their ideologies  nazi officials shepherded the first sex testing policy in women rsquo s sports  which the track and field federation passed in 1936  as i wrote in my book the other olympians  fascism  queerness  and the making of modern sports  meanwhile  america rsquo s cold war rivalry with the ussr mdash and its consistent losses in the women rsquo s sports category mdash sharpened the push for expanded dna testing policies in the 1960s       similarly  it is hard to explain the ioc rsquo s retreat into dna testing today without acknowledging the global political context mdash particularly the specter of donald trump  who has made anti trans hate a central part of his governing agenda  while coventry has insisted that banning trans and many intersex women from sports is not a reaction to trumpism mdash  ldquo this was a priority for me way before president trump came into his second term  rdquo  she said mdash olympic officials told the guardian that trump was certainly on their mind  los angeles is hosting the next olympics in 2028  and trump  after successfully pressuring the ncaa and the us olympic committee to ban trans women athletes  has made his stance known to ioc leaders  last february  trump vowed to pressure the ioc to ban trans women athletes  his administration even threatened to block trans women athletes from entering the united states if they arrived intending to compete in women rsquo s sports     by embracing the trumpist war on trans women  the ioc has become party to a vitriolic right wing feedback loop  where major institutions that ban trans women athletes are held up as examples of the righteousness of this project  during a recent us supreme court hearing in a case challenging bans on trans women and girls in school sports  justice brett kavanaugh pointed to the olympics as proof that sports leaders agreed with the bans   ldquo a variety of groups who study this issue  rdquo  including  ldquo some states and the federal government and the ncaa and the olympic committee  rdquo  kavanaugh said   ldquo think that allowing transgender women and girls to participate will undermine or reverse that amazing success rdquo  of women athletes  in this way  the right wing fearmongering of trans athletes and the ioc rsquo s new policy have become indelibly intertwined  what rsquo s lost in all of this is that a basic human rights issue mdash who has access to playing sports according to their gender mdash has been completely obfuscated       if history is any guide  what will happen next is a slow thinning out of gender diverse athletes from elite sports  in 1967  the ioc responded to k  obukowska rsquo s very public dismissal from women rsquo s sports by taking dna testing underground  going forward  women athletes who failed chromosome tests were no longer publicly named  often  they simply dropped out  claiming an injury  never to be heard from in professional athletic settings again  we don rsquo t know how many athletes were disqualified because of these chromosome tests mdash the ioc never counted mdash but it is probably not a negligible number  tellingly  in 1967  the head of the track and field federation  david burghley  boasted that he had  ldquo managed to keep out six who were hermaphrodites rdquo  and was on track to  ldquo frighten the doubtful ones away  rdquo       that latter part of burghley rsquo s statement speaks to one consequence of the ioc rsquo s revived dna testing policies  in the latter half of the 20th century  many women who might have tried to compete in women rsquo s sports simply dropped out when it became clear that they would fail their sex tests  the scholar lindsay pieper recently unearthed a 1980s letter from a finnish geneticist about a young female skier who would have failed a chromosome test  the woman rsquo s coach  ldquo had told her she should not try to make a career in skiing  and i could do little to help her  because she would indeed always  lsquo fail rsquo  in the ioc rsquo s tests  rdquo  the geneticist wrote   ldquo this woman represents the invisible part of the iceberg  those numerous unfortunate women who are subjected to sex chromatin screening and eliminated from sports long before they reach a major competition  rdquo     these quiet expulsions  where athletes are steered away from sports because of fear of the scrutiny  are probably where we are headed next  that is  if this new policy holds  there are real roadblocks to the full rollout of the ioc rsquo s new dna testing policies  some countries  like france  ban genetic testing unless it is medically necessary  france rsquo s top sports minister  marina ferrari  has already called the new ioc policy a  ldquo step backwards  rdquo  a similar law in norway  which was passed in the 1990s and which helped to topple the original dna testing regime at the olympics  is still on the books  as in the 1990s  human rights experts  as well as scientists  widely oppose the new testing regime  a panel convened by the un human rights council lambasted the policy as a human rights violation  legal experts tend to agree  caster semenya  the south african gold medalist who was recently barred from olympic sports because of her testosterone levels  called the policy a  ldquo disrespect for women  rdquo  while andrew sinclair  the scientist who discovered the sry gene  denounced it as  ldquo ill advised rdquo  and  ldquo overly simplistic  rdquo     the backlash makes clear that the ioc rsquo s new policy is a purely political decision  and will have political spillover  anti trans sports policies are rarely ever just about sports  and the new olympics testing regime will probably bolster efforts to isolate and disenfranchise trans people globally  already  sex testing is gaining traction on the anti trans right in america  conservative activists in washington state are currently gathering signatures to introduce  ldquo genital inspections rdquo  in school sports  indiana republicans recently killed a bill that would have banned genital inspections in their state  political leaders and olympics officials have whipped themselves up into a kind of hysteria  where evidence and history and human rights barely hold water  all women  but particularly trans and intersex women athletes  will bear the burden<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/olympics-women-athletes-testing-history/">The Olympics Is Repeating One of Its Worst Mistakes</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 02 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/olympics-women-athletes-testing-history/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[My Years-Long Fight to Say “They”]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/they-pronoun-writing-journalism/]]></link>
		<author>Daniel Allen Cox</author>
	<date>Apr 1, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Over and over again, I would use the pronoun in my writing. Over and over again, editors would try to remove it.</p></div>
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	<![CDATA["Over and over again  i would use the pronoun in my writing  over and over again  editors would try to remove it      a protester at a rally in st  paul  minnesota  on march 6  2022       in 2019  i finished revisions on an essay about growing up as a jehovah rsquo s witness  the first of many i would write about those bizarre years knocking on doors and warning neighbors that they rsquo d die in a fiery armageddon unless they accepted the sweat stained tract i held and whose every lie i believed  i put everything into that essay  recreating the public and private apocalypses that would dog me long after i stopped shilling for jehovah        in the little magazine circuit  first you submit your essay to the threepenny review  then you send it to everybody else  the rumor is that it rsquo s easier to get into harvard than into threepenny  a rejection from them is a rite of passage  the proof that you rsquo re a real writer  i duly sent my piece to threepenny  expecting to be turned down  instead  i was gobsmacked to get an acceptance  i was also excited  this kind of visibility could attract an agent and help get my memoir published  and i could finally warn people about a dangerous cult that had labeled me an apostate  one who  ldquo must build their own library of contraband texts  rdquo  as i rsquo d written in the piece  now  thanks to threepenny  one such text mdash my essay mdash would no longer be contraband     but i rsquo d used the singular  ldquo they rdquo  throughout the piece  which didn rsquo t sit well with my editor  who made clear that threepenny doesn rsquo t use that grammar construction   ldquo i am confident that other solutions will arise as time goes on  solutions that all of us  grammar mavens and human rights advocates  can live with more comfortably  rdquo  she attached a copyedit with the singular they changed alternately to he or she wherever it occurred  we were undoubtedly heading into conflict  one that kicked off an important process for me  learning to push back  in my writing  against the necessity of a binary world     i responded objecting to her edits and noting that the use of they had become much more widespread than before  we rsquo d come a long way since 2013  when the atlantic rsquo s jen doll dubbed the pronoun an  ldquo ear hurting  eye burning  soul ravaging  mind numbing syntactic folly  rdquo  and added   ldquo  stop the singular they  stop it now  rdquo   doll was clear that she objected to the pronoun being used generically  not when referring to a specific nonbinary person   by 2019  the associated press  the washington post  and the new york times had begun to allow the singular they in their copy  albeit not without grumbling  twenty nineteen was also when merriam webster made they its word of the year  and when sam smith used the pronoun to come out as nonbinary to fans and haters alike     i hinted that  if the new york times could change its policy  so could threepenny  this was a miscalculation on my part  because my editor  it turned out  already had a beef with the times for using like instead of as   ldquo threepenny is aware of what some other journals are doing  but we are not about to violate the longstanding rules of grammar to accommodate this particular political moment  rdquo  she replied  she told me that  though threepenny was an ally to the queer community   ldquo i can rsquo t help feeling that my defense of the english language is an important one  even if  or because  everyone else is giving the store away  rdquo     giving the store away       when is a moment not political      ldquo i do not think i have prevented anyone from being represented as non binary  because i have made the adaptation that allows gender to be interpreted multiply  rdquo  she continued  referring to her generous offer of alternating he and she   this overlooked the fact that  while some nonbinary people may use these pronouns  many others are deathly allergic to them    ldquo i have simply prevented you from using a grammatical construction that i do not think needs to be the only way to represent these things  rdquo  her point seemed to be that  because i wasn rsquo t referring to any specific nonbinary person  no one was harmed mdash and that  as a cis person  i shouldn rsquo t mind anyway     but i minded  i fired back from my soapbox of unchecked wokeness   ldquo if you will not make the exception for me  i wonder if you will make it for other authors  when representing a nonbinary identity is at stake  rdquo  i thought about all the nonbinary people who  according to magazine policy  couldn rsquo t be written about without being misgendered mdash that is to say  gendered  and i found the magazine rsquo s stance incongruous with a 2012 interview where the editor  perhaps unwittingly  uses the singular they in response to a question  proving that it can be done naturally     she offered a compromise  to convert the nouns in question to plurals  for example  if  ldquo apostate rdquo  became  ldquo apostates  rdquo  then they would no longer pose a problem for threepenny  i refused  withdrew the essay  and watched a golden opportunity vanish  wondering if my story would ever be published   ldquo i will take it very ill if you share our communication on the internet  or anywhere else that is public   especially if you do so in any redacted way  rdquo  she said in closing       this collision with threepenny and the silence my editor demanded was painful in a house with a trans person in it  my nonbinary partner wes is misgendered multiple times a week and often bears it silently  they pick their battles  when pronoun mix ups deny them necessary medical care  it rsquo s worth the fight  when jordan peterson drops his latest tautology ridden manifesto against pronouns  it isn rsquo t  quebec  where we live  has barred official communications from using gender inclusive language  which they say is confusing  the government now has no pronoun to refer to wes  fantastic  the last thing we need  on top of that  is for their pronouns to be banned in my own writing     my essay ultimately found a home at roxane gay rsquo s the rumpus  offending pronouns and all  but the problem kept happening  in 2020  an editor at conjunctions accepted another piece from the same jehovah series  with caveats   ldquo i rsquo m a traditionalist enough to be bothered by the agreement problem with  lsquo a stutterer rsquo  and  lsquo their hellip  rsquo  maybe change to  lsquo stutterers can say their own names rsquo   rdquo  he also wanted me to replace the word  ldquo homo  rdquo  i never got into it with him  since the malahat review had already accepted that same essay without any qualms     in a 2025 piece for geist   a copyeditor scolded me for referring to a sculpted figure in the montreal metro using they  writing   ldquo in 1986 when the mural was made this  lsquo someone rsquo  would have been assumed to be a girl  rdquo  i replied that the timeline doesn rsquo t change anything  nonbinary and gender nonconforming people have always existed  in art and in life  geist apologized  and the cement figure remains genderless  both in the metro cement and in my essay     and i am far from alone  in 2019  the same year i was battling threepenny  canary lit mag refused to let author sim kern use their pronouns in their own bio  the editor proposed using s he instead  and even  ldquo  sic   rdquo  kern later publicly took joyce carol oates to task for tweeting that  ldquo they will not become part of general usage  rdquo  oates apologized  then  in 2022  the new york times ran an interview with author maia kobabe  but despite naming kobabe rsquo s e em eir pronouns  strangely refused to use them     there are many other examples  but for most writers to whom this happens  we rsquo ll never hear about it  making a living as a freelancer means meekly accepting the requested edits and moving on  this is how queerness and gender nonconformity wind up being controlled in elite literary circles  if you can rsquo t use someone rsquo s pronoun  they can rsquo t be written about  their life is quietly stricken from the record  gatekeepers don rsquo t outwardly shun gays and theys  we rsquo re welcome to the banquet  but there are rules about how we can refer to ourselves  and hidden trip wires  we rsquo re supposed to be grateful and comply with this erasure of queer life     linguistics has always sent humans into paroxysms  as soon as we figured out that we could talk  words were part of how we recognized and protected one another  an awkward grammatical construction or strange word meant an impostor  or even a predator  had infiltrated the group  as our communication grew more sophisticated  we developed in group talk  and our idiolects began to circumscribe wealth  class  and social standing  grammatical awkwardness was a slip of the tongue that betrayed poverty  a lack of education  or worse   ldquo thus emerged the  lsquo grammar anxiety rsquo  we still see today  rdquo  write anne lobeck and kristin denham in navigating english grammar  a guide to analyzing real language  tied to the idea that  ldquo language  or more specifically grammatical change and variation  can be overcome and controlled  rdquo   call it conversion therapy for the pronoun challenged      now we rsquo ve become prehistoric once again  fingers curled around messaging devices  afraid to say the wrong word lest our tribe deletes us with a single click  we live in an age when anyone can enact the practice of banishing people guilty of incorrect speech   ldquo language is the key means by which all degrees of cultlike influence occur  rdquo  argues amanda montell in cultish  describing how manipulators use jargon to both create a fuzzy feeling of belonging and extinguish every wisp of independent thought       sometimes the tribe is transphobic and prescribes the in speak accordingly  trans exclusionary radical feminists  terfs  fear that the very existence of nonbinary people threatens to erase women  manosphere podcasters have the same fear about men  you could make a claim that i rsquo m doing this very kind of policing  maybe the difference is that one agenda expands the scope of a language  whereas the other limits identities  if i have any cultish tendencies  they come from the jehovah rsquo s witnesses  a throng of millenarian prescriptivists who have words for everything  ostensibly  i was disfellowshipped for being queer  but the more likely reason was that i muddied the language of theocracy with that of queerness       in some quarters  it doesn rsquo t matter that the singular they dates back to a middle english poem  or that shakespeare  charles dickens  and jane austen all used it without anybody caring  it doesn rsquo t matter that every long standing grammar rule eventually falls  after all  saying you are for one person was categorically incorrect until the 13th century  but an ungendered pronoun tears at the fabric of a binary world  and we just can rsquo t have that     the supposed awkwardness of the pronoun is a smokescreen for this fear  there rsquo s no corner of english that isn rsquo t nonsensical if you pick at it long enough  we speak in paradoxes and spell in enigmas  and yet we simultaneously believe that grammar is inviolable  our meanings infallible  most writing jobs exist only because english is hardwired to be confusing  we pay the rent by chasing clarity over the edge and into the abyss     i don rsquo t know why the best progressive literary magazines in the world were comfortable  at least at the time we spoke  with this retrograde stance on pronouns  but i do know that a literary editor familiar with the grammar of gender nonconformity no longer finds it awkward to use the singular they in a sentence  they don rsquo t infantilize their readers and assume they won rsquo t  ldquo get rdquo  it  they don rsquo t think that someone rsquo s very identity is a political fad  they not only allow agender pronouns but encourage them  they know that descriptivism makes for better literature than prescriptivism  they know that english evolves not to terrorize but to survive     we all worship at the altar of words  i want language to serve the people i love  not the other way around     i would give the store away for them every time<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/they-pronoun-writing-journalism/">My Years-Long Fight to Say “They”</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Wed, 01 Apr 2026 12:54:29 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/they-pronoun-writing-journalism/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Alt Man]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/alt-man/]]></link>
		<author>Peter Kuper</author>
	<date>Apr 1, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[The changing morals of OpenAI’s CEO.]]></teaser> 
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	<description>
	<![CDATA["Check out all installments in the oppart series<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/alt-man/">Alt Man</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Wed, 01 Apr 2026 12:30:20 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/alt-man/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The Supreme Court Just Condemned Countless Kids to Psychiatric Abuse]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/supreme-court-conversion-therapy-ban/]]></link>
		<author>Elie Mystal</author>
	<date>Apr 1, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The court’s 8–1 ruling overturning Colorado’s ban on conversion therapy is a disaster for LGBTQ+ kids—and also for the healthcare profession.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["The court rsquo s 8 ndash 1 ruling overturning colorado rsquo s ban on conversion therapy is a disaster for lgbtq  kids mdash and also for the healthcare profession      the facade of the supreme court building       in an 8 ndash 1 ruling on tuesday  the supreme court overturned colorado rsquo s ban on conversion therapy  in so doing  it not only condemned countless children to a form of psychiatric abuse but also likely consigned the nation to a future of substandard medical care     i rsquo m not the only one who thinks this  in her solo dissent  justice ketanji brown jackson summarized the court rsquo s opinion this way   ldquo o put it bluntly  the court could be ushering in an era of unprofessional and unsafe medical care administered by effectively unsupervised healthcare providers  rdquo       the case at the heart of the ruling is called chiles v  salazar  and it involves colorado rsquo s minor conversion therapy law  mctl   which bans conversion therapy for young people  conversion therapy is the practice of telling gay or transgender children that they rsquo re not really gay or transgender and they can choose to be cis hetero normative if they just really  really try  the  ldquo therapy rdquo  has been debunked as a medical practice  it is not only ineffective  turns out  you cannot  ldquo pray the gay away rdquo   but it has also been consistently shown to be harmful to children  colorado is one of more than 20 states that ban conversion therapy from being practiced on children  the ban applies only to state licensed medical professionals  and leaves religious groups free to shame and abuse children as their gods allow     kaley chiles is a licensed therapist  she is also an evangelical christian who brought the challenge against colorado rsquo s mctl because  notwithstanding the medical evidence  she still wants to practice conversion therapy  she claims that she doesn rsquo t want to  ldquo change rdquo  or  ldquo convert rdquo  children but rather  ldquo help rdquo  them achieve  ldquo their own goals  rdquo  i cannot speak to chiles rsquo s intent  because she filed the lawsuit before colorado even attempted to enforce the law against her  it would have been reasonable to wait for chiles to practice something banned by the state before hearing this lawsuit  then we rsquo d be able to look at the facts of her practice rather than rely on mere conjecture about what she rsquo d like to say but allegedly can rsquo t  but the republicans on the supreme court no longer wait for facts when there is a culture war to be won     chiles challenged the law on first amendment grounds  she is a  ldquo talk therapist rdquo  and argued that the first amendment protects her right to talk about whatever the hell she wants  including  apparently  debunked  unsound  unscientific  and harmful medical practices     from a certain point of view  you can see chiles rsquo s point  the first amendment protects  ldquo speech  rdquo  and telling children wrong and horrible things about themselves is  technically  speech  i do not know why people would want to use their speech to abuse children  but the first amendment does and arguably should protect your right to tell little kids that they suck       but chiles is not using her first amendment rights to menace children as an ordinary citizen out in the wild  she rsquo s not shouting  ldquo hey  stop being gay  rdquo  at little kids unfortunate enough to hit a baseball into her yard  she rsquo s doing it from her position as a medical professional with a license from the state of colorado  that means that when she tells kids to stop being gay in a therapy session  she rsquo s not merely expressing her personal views or those of her god  she rsquo s speaking as an expert recognized by the state of colorado     colorado  like other0000 states  has a right to regulate what licensed professionals can say to make sure that the treatments they rsquo re providing represent the best and safest ideas the medical and scientific community has come up with  that is the point of requiring medical professionals to get a license in the first place     or rather  states had a right to regulate the speech of licensed professionals until the court rsquo s ruling in chiles v  salazar  in his majority opinion  justice neil gorsuch ruled that medical professionals have an absolute free speech right  just like everybody else  even when they are speaking as a medical professional  gorsuch  the originalist when convenient  essentially ignored the centuries of history and tradition regarding medical licenses  and instead came up with a brand new formulation of the first amendment that cannot be saddled by things as petty as  ldquo scientific facts rdquo  and  ldquo best practices rdquo  when it comes to medical care  gorsuch basically erased the distinction between dr  sanjay gupta and dr  dre     that rsquo s why the decision will have such a large impact mdash even beyond the torture gorsuch thinks it is acceptable to subject lgbtq  children to  the new free speech right gorsuch has invented will potentially destroy the entire concept of medical licensing  if medical professionals can say whatever they want  it becomes nearly impossible for states to hold medical  ldquo advice rdquo  to any kind of agreed upon standard     gorsuch says that the first amendment protects  ldquo unpopular rdquo  speech  which it certainly does  but  again  we rsquo re not talking about some person spewing unsound and uninformed medical advice on twitter  we rsquo re talking about a health professional peddling a debunked medical treatment  if gorsuch and rfk jr  want to drink raw bear milk  that rsquo s their business  but a licensed doctor should not be allowed to tell you that drinking nonpasteurized products makes your penis stronger     what really seems to piss gorsuch off is not just the fact that colorado rsquo s law bans conversion therapy but that it allows  and in some sense requires  affirmation therapy  chiles cannot say  ldquo don rsquo t be gay rdquo  but she can say  ldquo it rsquo s ok to be gay  rdquo  this  gorsuch says  is evidence that colorado rsquo s law is a form of viewpoint discrimination  it means that colorado is forcing chiles to accept its viewpoint  that being gay or trans is fine   which is an unconstitutional suppression of chiles rsquo s viewpoint  that being gay or trans can be changed      gorsuch is right  after a fashion  colorado does have a viewpoint here  and it is counter to chiles rsquo s  but the key difference is  or should be  that colorado rsquo s viewpoint is backed up by medical and scientific evidence  while chiles rsquo s viewpoint is  essentially  quackery  gorsuch would have you believe that the jury is still out on conversion therapy  but it rsquo s not  the science is in  gorsuch  chiles  your priest  and the guy shouting at gay kids from his ford f 150 are all equally wrong  the only distinction that matters is that chiles wants to be an idiot while licensed mdash and that is a distinction that gorsuch entirely misses or doesn rsquo t care about     the whole point of medical licensing boards is to distinguish acceptable medical viewpoints from conjecture and bunk mdash and that does  often  require regulating what doctors can and cannot say  you can rsquo t  for instance  tell a child  ldquo go kill yourself rdquo  as a medical therapy  even if that is your monstrous viewpoint  you can rsquo t tell a kid to start smoking cigarettes to fit in with the other kids at school  you can rsquo t tell a kid who is falling asleep in class to buy some cocaine and have a bump in the bathroom during free period  you can rsquo t do these things even if you are a talk therapist and all you do is talk about it instead of prescribing the smokes or the coke  you can rsquo t give medical advice that is wrong  no matter how much you pray that it is right     apparently  the only person on the supreme court who understands this is justice jackson  she writes      stated simply  the majority has failed to appreciate the crucial context in which chiles rsquo s constitutional claims have arisen  chiles is not speaking in the ether  she is providing therapy to minors as a licensed healthcare professional  hellip   ldquo here is a long established history of states regulating the healthcare professions  rdquo  and  until today  the first amendment has not blocked their way  for good reason  under our precedents  bedrock first amendment principles have far less salience when the speakers are medical professionals and their treatment related speech is being restricted incidentally to the state rsquo s regulation of the provision of medical care        jackson correctly points out that the court rsquo s decision doesn rsquo t just invalidate the ban on conversion therapy  it opens the floodgates for all manner of junk science and medically unsafe therapies to be carried out under the guise of free speech        indeed  it is not at all clear how  or to what extent  state regulation of medical care involving practitioner speech can survive this holding  we are on a slippery slope now  for the first time  the supreme court has interpreted the first amendment to bless a risk of therapeutic harm to children by limiting the state rsquo s ability to regulate medical providers who treat patients with speech  what rsquo s next  in the worst case scenario  our medical system unravels as various licensed healthcare professionals mdash talk therapists  psychiatrists  and presumably anyone else who claims to utilize speech when administering treatments to patients mdash start broadly wielding their newfound constitutional right to provide substandard medical care     it is baffling that we could now be standing on the edge of a precipitous drop in the quality of healthcare services in america  but the court sees fit to bring us one step closer to that fate today      what is baffling to me is that this new right to administer substandard medical care was approved by the court 8 ndash 1  justices elena kagan and sonia sotomayor signed on to this ruling  with a short concurrence written by kagan and joined by sotomayor     if i squint hard enough  i understand kagan rsquo s concurrence  because i am afraid of exactly the same thing she is afraid of  if the court gives its blessing to bans prohibiting therapists from trying to convert lgbtq  kids  what happens when a red state requires therapists to attempt conversion  if free speech doesn rsquo t protect chiles  can it protect a therapist who wants to affirm a child rsquo s gender or sexuality  kagan writes   ldquo consider a hypothetical law that is the mirror image of colorado rsquo s  instead of barring talk therapy designed to change a minor rsquo s sexual orientation or gender identity  this law bars therapy affirming those things  as ms  chiles readily acknowledges  the first amendment would apply in the identical way  hellip  once again  because the state has suppressed one side of a debate  while aiding the other  the constitutional issue is straightforward  rdquo  what she rsquo s saying is that if the first amendment allows for conversion therapy  it must also allow for affirming therapy     it rsquo s a noble thought  and i understand her point  but kagan is wrong in at least two ways  first  she rsquo s making the exact same mistake that gorsuch is  suggesting that conversion therapy is still a matter of medical  ldquo debate  rdquo  there is no debate  conversion therapy is harmful  so say the medical professionals with the authority to draw that conclusion  we shouldn rsquo t have to allow something that is harmful in order to protect something that is helpful  you don rsquo t have to let people bring an emotional support leopard on a plane because you let them fly with their house cats  different things are different and can be treated differently       the other mistake is more subtle  and more classically kagan if you rsquo ve paid attention to her rulings  she is  in my view  ceding this case  which i simply have to believe she knows is wrong  because she rsquo s keeping her eye on the next one  she rsquo s trying to lock her colleagues into an intellectually consistent position  if the republicans agree that a medical professional can tell a patient it rsquo s not ok to be trans  then the republicans must also agree that a medical professional can tell a patient it rsquo s ok to be trans  if a therapist can menace an lgbtq  child looking for help  then a different therapist is also constitutionally allowed to help that child  no matter what texas or florida or idaho say in the future     the problem with this reasoning is that kagan rsquo s colleagues have proven time and again that they are hypocrites and will reverse themselves on a dime whenever the republican agenda requires them to  already  with this very case  we have the same justices who told us that gun licensing laws are invalid unless they can be tied to the history and traditions of gun licensing laws from the 18th century telling us that the history and tradition of medical licensing laws do not matter when it comes to conversion therapy  there rsquo s no intellectual consistency from the republican justices  they do not care about intellectual consistency  they care about prosecuting their culture war and winning  that rsquo s all they ever care about     when states begin banning gender affirming talk therapy  the republican supermajority will flip their position  kagan  no doubt  will write a stirring opinion  calling out her colleagues for their hypocrisy  but it will be a dissent  and gorsuch will dismiss kagan rsquo s pleadings and laugh at the suffering of others as he always does  kagan will retain her intellectual honor  but it will not get her to five votes     kagan rsquo s republican colleagues will let her down  again  in the meantime  as jackson noted  the entire medical profession will enter an era of grave uncertainty and heightened stupidity     thanks to this ruling  a medical license means hellip  nothing going forward  getting the advice of a doctor is now the same as asking the internet or tuning in to  ldquo dr  phil  rdquo  according to the supreme court  doctors have just as much of a first amendment right to offer untested and untrue medical theories as politicians  uber drivers  or your grandma from the old country     this ruling will damage the quality of healthcare for all americans  and it was made because a quack therapist in colorado really wants to spew abusive claptrap at lgbtq  kids forced to sit on her gross couch by their parents  it rsquo s stunning  really  whenever you step back and contemplate how much harm this country is willing to endure in order to protect bigotry<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/supreme-court-conversion-therapy-ban/">The Supreme Court Just Condemned Countless Kids to Psychiatric Abuse</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Wed, 01 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/supreme-court-conversion-therapy-ban/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Lust for Luxury]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/ultrarich-real-estate-billionaires-wealth-tax-housing-crisis/]]></link>
		<author>Michael Massing</author>
	<date>Apr 1, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The real estate gluttony of the superrich is truly eye-popping.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["The real estate gluttony of the superrich is truly eye popping      billionaires have accumulated vast tracts of real estate across the country  including in indian creek village  florida  pictured here       on sunday  bernie sanders brought his tax the rich road show to the bronx  attracting another large and enthusiastic crowd  but as the support for a wealth tax grows  so does the opposition  in california  a group of tech and business leaders have contributed nearly  80 million to a campaign to block a ballot initiative that would impose a one time 5 percent levy on the net worth of residents with at least a billion dollars  in washington state  the recent adoption of a 9 9 percent tax on millionaires has spurred predictions of an outmigration by tech executives  and on march 11 starbucks founder howard schultz announced that  after more than four decades in seattle  he and his wife were moving to miami  though he didn rsquo t mention the new tax   in new york city  executives have flocked to cnbc to issue apocalyptic warnings about a mass exodus of the megarich should mayor zohran mamdani succeed in increasing the income tax rate on city residents earning more than a million dollars  and the partnership for new york city  a business advocacy group  has raised the specter of financial firms decamping for florida and texas       in light of all this  it rsquo s worth examining how the ultrarich actually spend their money  and how much of a crimp in their lifestyle such taxes might impose  their most visible perks are private planes  the must have model is the gulfstream g700  which has seating for up to 19 passengers  20 panoramic windows  a master bedroom with a shower  a range of 7 750 nautical miles  and a price tag of  80 million     then there are the yachts  they range in size from super  100 to 200 feet  to mega  200 to 300  to giga  above 300   many feature swimming pools  jacuzzis  saunas  gyms  movie theaters  and garages for jet skis and other playthings  some have smaller support vessels that offer additional storage space and room for crew members  a more exclusive accessory is the private submarine  hedge fund billionaire ray dalio has not one but two submersibles and regularly invites scientists and journalists to go down with him to explore the ocean deep     but there are only so many jets  yachts  and subs that one person can own  it is in real estate that the consumption of the superrich is most conspicuous  there used to be talk of the trophy wife  now it rsquo s the trophy property mdash or properties  the ultrarich do their best to conceal their portfolios  often using obscurely named limited liability companies to conceal the transactions  they rsquo re concerned about not only security but also appearances  for the level of gluttony on display is truly astounding  a look at the palaces of the patriciate drives home the staggering scale of their wealth mdash and the hollowness of their complaints about having to pay more tax on it     aerial view of the warner estate  which was owned by david geffen until 2020  when he sold it to jeff bezos for  165 million       take david geffen  he rsquo s venerated among the culturati for his generous philanthropy  he rsquo s endowed the david geffen wing at the museum of modern art  the david geffen school of drama at yale  the david geffen school of medicine at ucla  and david geffen hall at lincoln center  but geffen has spent just as much on real estate  in 1990  he paid  47 5 million for the fabled 10 acre beverly hills estate of hollywood tycoon jack warner  with its 13 000 square foot georgian style mansion  14 bedrooms  two dozen bathrooms  terraces  pool complex  and nine hole golf course  geffen then spent  45 million to remodel it  including  20 million on landscaping alone  during the renovation  which lasted eight years   he stayed at his oceanfront estate in malibu  which once belonged to doris day and which sits on carbon beach  a mile and a half long strip also known as billionaires rsquo  beach   geffen sold it in 2017 to mark walter  the ceo of guggenheim partners and controlling owner of the los angeles dodgers  for  85 million  which proved prescient  given that the place burned down during the paradise fire      in 2020  geffen sold the warner estate to jeff bezos for  165 million  which was the most ever paid for a california home mdash until the following year  when venture capitalist marc andreessen and laura arrillaga andreessen paid  177 million for a seven acre  13 structure compound in malibu rsquo s paradise cove  also known as billionaires rsquo  bluff   in march 2022  the couple paid  44 5 million for another home on malibu rsquo s escondido beach  less than a mile away   geffen also owns a two acre estate on star studded lily pond lane in east hampton  for which he paid  70 million in 2016  and a multistory penthouse on fifth avenue overlooking central park  after buying the penthouse  geffen embarked on a gut renovation that caused so much noise  vibration  and damage to adjoining apartments that aggrieved shareholders filed more than a dozen lawsuits and claims against him     for a may 1993 profile in the new york times magazine  bernard weinraub  interviewing geffen aboard his gulfstream 4  asked whether all of his  ldquo extravagant homes rdquo  were really necessary  geffen was indignant   ldquo you say extravagant mdash well i rsquo m a very wealthy man  i rsquo ve earned all this money  i rsquo ve worked for it  i didn rsquo t cheat anybody hellip  and i live relatively modestly given my level of success and wealth  rdquo       geffen rsquo s modest lifestyle includes the rising sun  a  590 million  454 foot yacht that features a basketball court and showpieces from his  2 billion art collection and on which he has hosted such celebrities as julia roberts  paul mccartney  tom hanks  oprah winfrey  and bradley cooper  in march 2020  as the world was shutting down because of covid  geffen was on his boat in the caribbean  from which he posted a series of stunning photos on instagram   ldquo sunset last night hellip isolated in the grenadines avoiding the virus  i rsquo m hoping everybody is staying safe  rdquo  the response was so virulent that geffen took his account private     bezos  in buying the warner estate from him  undertook his own extensive makeover  which included the construction of a shimmering silver structure modeled on the nosecone of apollo 11  reportedly to house a sauna  and not one but three pickleball courts  to make sure that he would never have to wait for a game     the warner estate joined a bezos portfolio that was already bloated  it included three adjacent properties on indian creek island in miami  costing  200 million   a 27 000 square foot mansion in washington  dc  the city rsquo s largest home   for which he paid  23 million in cash in 2016 and which has a dozen or so bedrooms and twice as many bathrooms  a four bedroom house across the street from that mansion  a 20 600 square foot  four bedroom house on a 5 3 acre compound on lake washington in medina  outside seattle  a 17 000 square foot  12 bedroom triplex penthouse in a building in manhattan rsquo s flatiron district  four linked apartments in a landmark art deco condo on central park west  and corn ranch  a 400 000 acre expanse in the west texas town of van horn  which also serves as a launch site for blue origin  his space transport company     bezos  of course  is known for his extravagance  his 417 foot  three deck yacht  the koru  cost about  500 million to build  its 246 foot chase vehicle  the abeona  has a helipad for use by his wife  lauren sanchez  a helicopter pilot  their wedding in venice cost as much as  50 million  lasted three days  featured entertainment by usher and dj cassidy  and had a guest list topped by tom brady  oprah winfrey  leonardo dicaprio  and bill gates     in 2020  bill gates paid  43 million for this oceanfront estate in del mar  california     one would expect gates mdash the crusader against polio  the cofounder of the giving pledge  the cassandra about climate change mdash to be immune to such grandiosity   ldquo bill gates isn rsquo t like those other tech billionaires  rdquo  declared a new york times headline on a story last year about his new memoir  stressing his modest tastes and public service  in fact  when it comes to real estate  gates is exactly like those other billionaires  his main home  located in medina  washington  down the road from bezos rsquo s estate   may well be the most opulent dwelling in the country  covering a staggering 66 000 square feet  it has seven bedrooms  24 bathrooms  a 60 foot swimming pool with an underwater sound system  a 2 500 square foot gym  six kitchens  a 1 000 square foot dining room that can seat more than one hundred  a private library that includes leonardo da vinci rsquo s codex leicester  for which gates paid more than  30 million   and a hillside garage where gates keeps his collection of luxury porsches and mercedes  the property also has an artificial stream stocked with salmon and trout and a beach on lake washington that is landscaped with sand reportedly shipped from hawaii or the caribbean  the estate is known as xanadu 2 0  after the fever dream palace in citizen kane         when it gets cold in medina  gates can repair to his home in indian wells  california  outside palm springs  which he bought in 1999 for  12 5 million and which covers 13 573 square feet  has six bedrooms and nine bathrooms  and borders a golf course operated by the exclusive vintage club  of which he is a member  gates can also travel to his 7 234 square foot home in wellington  florida  which has four bedrooms  six bathrooms  and a 20 stall barn used to support the equestrian activities of his show jumping daughter jennifer  to further accommodate her  gates in 2014 paid  18 million for a 228 acre thoroughbred training center in rancho santa fe  near san diego  six years later  he paid  43 million for an estate in del mar  less than five miles away   which has six bedrooms  a 10 person jacuzzi overlooking a fire pit  and a deck set on 120 feet of beach     to shuttle between these estates  gates has not one but two gulfstream g650ers  which can sleep 10 people and which burn up to 500 gallons of fuel an hour  he also has two helicopters serviced by a floating heliport moored near seattle     an aerial view of hedge fund billionaire ken griffin s 25 acre estate on billionaires  row in palm beach  florida  he is building a home that  when completed  is expected to be the most expensive in the world     as compulsively acquisitive as gates  bezos  and geffen are  they are all eclipsed by kenneth griffin  the founder and ceo of citadel  the financial colossus  griffin is worth about  50 billion  and he has used it to assemble a continent spanning archipelago of properties  among them      a four level penthouse on n  michigan avenue in chicago  for which he paid  58 75 million in 2017 mdash the most ever for a residence in that city  units of which he has recently unloaded as part of his highly publicized relocation to miami      an oceanfront property at the four seasons hualalai resort on the kona coast of hawaii     a pair of adjacent homes in aspen  colorado  with a combined total of a dozen bedrooms     a seven acre oceanfront estate in southampton that he bought from fashion designer calvin klein  for which he paid  84 4 million and which sits on meadow lane  aka billionaires rsquo  lane   where his neighbors include henry and marie josee kravis  robert kraft  and leon black     a georgian style mansion near buckingham palace in london  for which he paid  122 million     a quadruplex penthouse at 220 central park south in new york  for which he paid  238 million in 2019 mdash still the largest sum paid for a residence in the united states     and a collection of lots extending over more than 25 acres on palm beach rsquo s billionaires rsquo  row  for which griffin paid  350 million and on which he is building a 50 000 square foot estate  including a clay tennis court for his mother  and which when completed is expected to be the most expensive home on the planet      a view of the spelling manor in holmby hills in los angeles  which eric and wendy schmidt bought in august 2025 for  110 million  at 56 500 square feet  it is the largest privately owned home in california     one could go on  cataloguing the properties of eric schmidt  more than a dozen  stretching from montecito and yellowstone to miami beach and london   larry ellison  the owner of 87 000 acres on the hawaiian island of lanai  constituting 98 percent of its area   laurene powell jobs  the owner of at least seven high end properties  including a sprawling beachfront compound in paradise cove in malibu  purchased through four llc transactions totaling  172 million  as well as a mansion in san francisco that cost  70 million  a record for that city   and sergey brin  who last july paid  42 million for an eight bedroom house on a five acre cliffside property on lake tahoe in nevada  which features two glass enclosed funiculars that transport guests down the hill to a guest house     that purchase has fueled speculation that brin is abandoning california  he has donated  45 million to the block the billionaire tax campaign in that state  and he has filed documents to move or terminate 15 california based llcs  including one linked to a superyacht and another to a private air terminal  in july 2025  however  the google cofounder bought an 8 000 square foot  six bedroom mediterranean style villa in malibu  for which he paid  49 75 million  it rsquo s just a short walk from the 6 000 square foot  six bedroom estate that he bought in 2023 for  35 million   ldquo he will likely use the smaller house as a guest house and move into the bigger one  rdquo  a source told the new york post     this voracity for luxury homes seems all the more egregious at a time when the united states faces an acute housing shortage  of 5 5 million units  according to the national association of realtors    ldquo blue collar america struggles with housing crunch  rdquo  declared a recent headline in the financial times  which described how since the 2008 financial crisis  ldquo too few new homes have been built in the u s   contributing to a surge in prices that has outstripped wages and left people struggling to find a place they can afford  rdquo  currently  about 770 000 people in america are homeless  increasing numbers of whom have jobs  as brian goldstone documents in his recent book  there is no place for us  working and homeless in america mdash the result of soaring rents  low wages  and a lack of tenants rsquo  rights  in new york city  a record 154 000 children in the public schools experienced homelessness during the 2024 ndash 25 school year  child care in the city costs an average of  20 000 per child  consuming about 20 percent of the median family budget  however many rich people might flee the city if their taxes increase  more than a half million residents have already left it since 2020  many of them driven out by the high cost of living     the wealthy defend this state of affairs by claiming that they pay more taxes than everyone else  but that is not the case  according to a recent study published by the national bureau of economic research  the effective tax rate of the top 0 0002 percent of the population  more or less the forbes 400  averaged 24 percent from 2018 to 2020  compare with 30 percent for the full population and 45 percent for top labor income earners  propublica  analyzing leaked tax returns  found that from 2014 to 2018  the 25 richest americans paid just  13 6 billion in taxes mdash an effective tax rate of 3 4 percent on  401 billion of income     a one time wealth tax such as the one proposed in california would actually have a negligible redistributive effect  it would not address the structural realities of an economy that has kept wages low in order to keep corporate earnings high and drive stock prices up  thereby swelling the portfolios of the very rich   at his rallies  bernie sanders likes to point out that elon musk rsquo s net worth exceeds the combined wealth of the bottom 53 percent of american households   and that makes the protests of the superrich all the more unconvincing  it reveals an axiom of modern day moguls  the more they have  the more they want  one can only wonder  has their covetousness caused a breakdown in their value system  making them incapable of understanding their responsibility to their fellow citizens as part of the social contract<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/ultrarich-real-estate-billionaires-wealth-tax-housing-crisis/">Lust for Luxury</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Wed, 01 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/ultrarich-real-estate-billionaires-wealth-tax-housing-crisis/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The Hidden Crisis of Addiction Treatment]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/shoshana-walter-rehab/]]></link>
		<author>Zoe Adams</author>
	<date>Apr 1, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>In <em>Rehab, Shoshana Walter</em> investigates the corruption and abuse rife in the business of drug rehabilitation.  </p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["In rehab  shoshana walter investigates the corruption and abuse rife in the business of drug rehabilitation        a billboard in st  paul  minnesota  2025        shoshana walter rsquo s rehab  an american scandal opens with the search for a body  but there are no homicide detectives on the scene  in the spring of 2014  family members  local volunteers  and a retired crime scene investigator set out to find the remains of 21 year old donovan doyle  a former patient at the above it all treatment center in skyforest  california  doyle had disappeared eight months earlier and was presumed dead  when he initially went missing  the police did not try to find him  one law enforcement official told a local newspaper that he was considered a  ldquo voluntary missing adult rdquo  and thus  ldquo did not meet the criteria to send our search and rescue and put them in danger  rdquo  no foul play was suspected  and the police closed the case       the night before doyle disappeared  he had threatened to kill himself  upon hearing this news  the rehab rsquo s supervisor  kory avarell mdash a mormon businessman with no training in addiction treatment mdash ordered a concerned employee not to call 911  he said doyle was merely courting attention  this went against above it all rsquo s policy mdash employees were supposed to contact authorities if a patient might be in danger  when doyle refused to go to a counseling session the next morning  avarell immediately kicked him out of the program  which meant that he had to leave the facility  avarell did not notify doyle rsquo s family or arrange a way for him to reach the nearest bus station  it had begun to snow heavily   doyle left the facility angry mdash he threw his belongings into a trash bag and attempted to punch his counselor on the way out  he then walked off into the san bernardino national forest  that rsquo s where a search party member found his wallet  his tattered sweats  and then his skull     doyle rsquo s death at above it all is one of several preventable deaths that walter investigates in rehab  in opening her book with doyle rsquo s story  walter  a staff writer for the marshall project  signals to readers that the stakes go beyond arguments over what constitutes effective addiction treatment in america  rehab is fundamentally concerned with life and death  revealing how the places where we might send our loved ones for help when they are at their most in need are not just ineffective but rife with exploitation  fraud  abuse  and mortal danger       walter characterizes the rehab industry as  ldquo america rsquo s other drug crisis  rdquo  one in which residential treatment mdash which abruptly ends after 30  90  or 365 days mdash often leaves patients worse off than they were before  walter holds rehabs to account in the way that patrick raden keefe exposes the malfeasance of the sackler family and purdue pharma in empire of pain  but walter is also more exacting  she calls purdue pharma an  ldquo easy villain to blame for the opioid epidemic  rdquo  implying that the pharmaceutical dynasty rsquo s outsize profile conveniently obscures other forces that have contributed to the public health crisis     unlike the sacklers  rehabs are faceless  these extra medical facilities hide behind names that signal moral uplift  above it all  future promises  harmony place  we use rehab as shorthand for addiction treatment  but this implies a degree of standardization  one rehab may offer medications for addiction  counseling  and access to licensed health professionals  another might put you to work for no pay  overmedicate you  or discharge you for using your cell phone  as walter writes   ldquo unlike other forms of medical treatment  there  no real standards or even a proven addiction cure  rdquo  and what rsquo s worse  these centers are intertwined with the legal system  legal entities known as drug courts often send people arrested for drug related crimes and who want to avoid prison sentences to punitive rehabs for months   the judges presiding over these courts  who have no training or experience in addiction medicine  are allowed to dictate treatment plans without any input from medical professionals      so what happens when the treatment itself is rotten mdash when it exploits the most vulnerable for profit and manages to evade accountability  and how have these facilities continued to operate for decades without oversight  in unearthing the stories of the people who have suffered inside addiction treatment centers  walter shines a harsh light on an epidemic of apathy toward people who use drugs       rehab revolves around four characters  each of whom introduces readers to a disturbing  little known facet of addiction treatment in america  chris koon was at cenikor  a nonprofit rehab with locations across texas and louisiana that forced its participants to perform labor for no pay  rehabs like cenikor say that the act of work mdash specifically physical labor mdash can help cure addiction  cenikor patients were ordered to work at industrial laundromats  exxon  shell  and walmart  among other for profit companies  laying steel in more than 100 degree heat and moving boxes in a warehouse were considered core tenets of therapy   robert f  kennedy jr   the current secretary of the department of health and human services  is a fan of work camps for addiction treatment  which he calls  ldquo healing farms  rdquo   cenikor then pocketed the wages that patients earned at these offsite locations  claiming that it went toward the cost of their treatment  walter devotes a large part of her book to cenikor mdash she has been covering the company since 2017  and she was also the lead reporter for a podcast series for reveal that focused on cenikor and other rehabs that use  ldquo work therapy rdquo  to treat patients     walter rsquo s reporting is damning  cenikor is perhaps the most egregious example of a rehab where work seemed to  ldquo usurp any other feature of the program  rdquo  including counseling or the use of evidence based medications  koon rsquo s story is emblematic of how rehabs like cenikor mdash where cigarettes were used as compensation for 80 hour workweeks mdash can make patients feel even more disempowered and isolated  koon told walter that his bosses would  ldquo talk about you like you were just inventory  like you weren rsquo t even a person  i rsquo ve heard bosses talking  being like   lsquo yeah  we need to order like five more cenikors for tomorrow rsquo  hellip people just disregard you like that  no one should have to feel that  rdquo     koon  a young  middle class white man  was raised in pinesville  louisiana  and developed an addiction to pain pills in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis  he was unemployed and socially anxious  drugs made him feel less alone  koon quickly transitioned from taking oxycontin to injecting heroin  because it was cheaper and stronger mdash his whole life began to revolve around avoiding withdrawal  in 2015  he was arrested for drug possession and agreed to appear before a drug court  where the judge decided to send him to cenikor  when koon asked people in jail whether they rsquo d heard of cenikor  a fellow inmate said   ldquo man  you might just want to go to prison  rdquo     president ronald reagan visited cenikor in 1983 and found its philosophy to be in perfect alignment with his politics  proclaiming to the participants   ldquo this center is self sufficient  just like all of you will soon be  rdquo  addiction wasn rsquo t considered a medical issue  it was a problem that could be solved by pulling yourself up by your bootstraps  cenikor barely offered therapy to its patients  one counselor had over 70 patients in her caseload  more than three times what was allowed by state law in louisiana  most cenikor counselors were also trainees without formal degrees mdash unable to deal with such large  complicated caseloads  in 2019  regulators in texas found cenikor guilty of a litany of violations  the exploitation of patients for financial gain  sexual harassment and assault  overdoses  and unsafe facilities  cenikor was fined over  1 million  but the case ended in a settlement  with the company paying just  125 000  cenikor continues to operate to this day       after enduring nearly two years at cenikor  koon was expelled from the program  in a letter to his drug court judge  cenikor rsquo s program manager stated that koon was  ldquo unresponsive to treatment  rdquo  the program manager cited the messiness of his room  koon rsquo s  ldquo reading a book while in behavior management  rdquo  and two relapses as evidence to support this claim   relapses  in fact  are a normal part of recovery and should not necessarily be met with punishment   because he  ldquo failed rdquo  the program  koon had to go before the judge and face sentencing mdash potentially up to five years in prison  koon caught the judge on a good day  he was offered three years of supervised probation in lieu of prison time  although koon had dreamed of going to law school and holding cenikor to account for its civil rights violations  his life began to move forward in a more basic way  he began taking buprenorphine to address his opioid cravings  proposed to a woman he used to date in high school  and got a job as a welder in austin  texas     koon rsquo s story dovetails with that of wendy mcentyre  a mom from the suburbs of los angeles whose son had died of an overdose in a  ldquo sober living home rdquo  called safe house  sober living homes are places where many people go after stints in inpatient rehab  sober living homes are even less regulated than rehabs because they do not offer treatment  just a place to sleep  mcentyre rsquo s increasingly extreme fight to hold rehabs and sober living homes to account mdash advocating for her deceased son and hundreds like him when no one else would mdash ultimately led to her arrest for felony kidnapping   mcentyre had helped a teenager escape from a juvenile mental health facility      mcentyre rsquo s activism veered into the illegal mdash she routinely surveilled rehab facilities and harassed their leadership mdash but she adopted these tactics because no one would listen  she gave a voice to people like koon  who suffered inside these facilities with no resources to speak up for themselves  mcentyre became a lifeline for families  helping donovan doyle rsquo s parents search for their son rsquo s body in the san bernardino forest  she then launched a statewide investigation into above it all after yet another patient died at the facility from an overdose under circumstances in which a nurse had ordered medications using a doctor rsquo s prescription pad  other than the passage of a law that now requires detox facilities in california to employ medical staff  most of mcentyre rsquo s efforts did not result in legislative wins  despite the criminal charges she has faced  mcentyre continues to pressure state agencies to uncover abuse at rehabs nationally       walter rsquo s reporting on cenikor and above it all raises the question of how all these rehabs came into existence in the first place  the bush and obama administrations responded to the first wave of the opioid overdose crisis mdash which began in the 1990s after a dramatic rise in the use of prescription drugs like oxycontin mdash with an expansion of addiction treatment  mandating that insurance companies cover addiction like any other medical condition  both nonprofit and for profit rehabs proliferated  especially after the passage of the affordable care act in 2010  turning addiction treatment into a  53 billion per year industry  but there were too many rehabs and not enough state and federal regulators  leaving conditions at these rehabs to continue unchecked     despite their religious overtones and little to no data proving their efficacy  12 step programs reign supreme at rehabs across the country  and while 12 step programs may be helpful for some patients  they tend to abjure medication  which flies in the face of proven opioid addiction treatment  few rehabs offer what works  a 2020 survey of residential treatment programs across the us revealed that only 29 percent of these facilities offered medications like methadone and buprenorphine  these two medications are the only treatment interventions proven to significantly reduce overdose rates and opioid use  addiction treatment is also most effective  with medication or not  when a patient is housed  has childcare  and can tap into a social support network  some rehabs fall short on this front to an egregious degree  financially exploiting patients and discharging them to the street  where many people relapse  as a recent wall street journal investigation revealed     it rsquo s through the story of april lee that walter explores the  ldquo post rehab trap rdquo  mdash where patients who lack a social safety net drift in and out of rehab facilities for months  even years  lee  a black woman from philadelphia  struggled with addiction from an early age and spent much of her adult life cycling through rehabs and sober living houses  lee often did not have a home to return to after she left these programs  prompting her to relapse  get arrested  and inevitably end up back in rehab  lee rsquo s story reveals how treatment systems fall especially short for poor women and people of color  she was already a mom and pregnant with her second child when she was looking to enroll in treatment for her heroin addiction  but only 2 percent of rehab facilities nationwide allow women to bring their children  making rehab for mothers without social support virtually impossible     lee rsquo s experience navigating the treatment system also invites us to consider whether rehabs are actually therapeutic or simply places that provide temporary housing and minimal support  was lee  ldquo getting better rdquo  at each rehab she entered  or did these facilities just provide a bed for her to sleep in at night  after lee finished a 28 day program  she would be  ldquo expected to walk out the door a new woman  rdquo  walter writes  a  ldquo new woman rdquo  in just one short month     walter doesn rsquo t only cover rehabs and sober living homes  the physical spaces that house patients with addictions  she also critiques the rollout of buprenorphine  a highly effective and safe medication to treat opioid addiction  buprenorphine  colloquially known by its most common brand name  suboxone  became available to patients in 2003  a time when a treatment for opioid addiction was urgently needed  reckitt benckiser pharmaceuticals  the company behind suboxone  stalled its public release by applying for orphan drug status through the food and drug administration  thereby prohibiting generic competition and maximizing profits  all while keeping the medication out of the hands of the people who needed it most     not only did reckitt benckiser make suboxone difficult to access  the drug enforcement administration also became obsessed with regulating it  unleashing droves of  ldquo diversion investigators rdquo  to surveil the physicians and clinics that prescribed the medication  that rsquo s how we meet walter rsquo s last subject  dr  larry ley  an addiction doctor who opened a buprenorphine clinic in rural indiana in 2004  ley was one of the few buprenorphine prescribers in the state  and patients often drove upwards of four hours to get to his clinic     the dea regarded buprenorphine as  ldquo just another drug  like another form of heroin  rdquo  walter writes  and dea officials seemed to struggle with the concept that buprenorphine was in fact quite different from heroin or oxycontin  buprenorphine was an fda approved treatment that curbed cravings and prevented overdose  not a  ldquo drug of abuse  rdquo  when some patients began to sell buprenorphine on the street  however  the dea ramped up its crackdown  diversion investigators began surveilling clinics  leading doctors to panic  a buprenorphine clinic owner in ohio closed his facility after the dea dropped by  posting the following note on his clinic rsquo s door      heroin is killing people every day  and physicians are being scared out of the ability to help  this is an epidemic  addicts need physicians  clinics  and pharmacies  and everybody helping them fight to stay alive      the dea began targeting ley in a similar fashion  but he was steadfast in the face of threats for nearly a decade  in 2014  dea agents raided his clinic and arrested him and his entire staff   ley was eventually acquitted   the officer who arrested ley told local reporters during a press conference that  ldquo this type of ruse of a clinic perpetuates the problem because people are still addicted to a drug  rdquo  this is a tragic misunderstanding  buprenorphine reduces the mortality rate from opioid related overdoses by more than 50 percent and significantly decreases non prescribed opioid use  fearful of the dea and of people who use drugs  physicians today still hesitate to prescribe it  even though buprenorphine is easier than ever to prescribe       as an early career doctor  i rsquo ve chosen to specialize in addiction medicine  a subspecialty that has existed for only about a decade  i see patients in diverse clinical practice settings mdash from methadone clinics and street outreach vans to hospitals and jails mdash but i have never stepped inside a rehab  clinical rotations at the kinds of rehabs that walter profiles in her book are not part of my curriculum  because few doctors work in any  these rehabs lie so far outside my scope of practice that they are not even considered to be a site for reform  and that rsquo s a problem  why don rsquo t i know what goes on in rehabs  the primary site of addiction treatment in the united states  and is this perhaps intentional     walter doesn rsquo t go that far in her analysis  but i rsquo d like to interrogate the idea that people with addiction need to be put away in the first place  to achieve  ldquo recovery rdquo  mdash a term that inaccurately implies finality mdash must people be separated from their families and subjected to infantilizing  often humiliating rules  given the scale of our overdose crisis  shouldn rsquo t rehab facilities be on the cutting edge of addiction treatment  the rehab facilities of today feel closer to 19th century sanatoriums mdash where seclusion was considered the key to recovery mdash rather than an extension of medical care     i recently saw a patient in the hospital who had relapsed on methamphetamine  the patient had been sober for many years prior to this relapse  had a strong support network  and was financially stable  but she wanted to go to rehab and found a place near los angeles  it looked nice from the website mdash palm trees  reading nooks  the ocean  another doctor even joked that he rsquo d want to go on a vacation there  when i asked what kind of addiction treatment was offered at this facility  no one on our team knew  we ultimately supported the patient rsquo s decision to go  but as i scrolled through the photos on the rehab rsquo s website  i began to worry  why were we so quick to rubber stamp a treatment plan we knew so little about  is medical treatment in an idyllic setting just a mirage  i rsquo ll never know  and i can only hope that she is ok<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/shoshana-walter-rehab/">The Hidden Crisis of Addiction Treatment</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Wed, 01 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/shoshana-walter-rehab/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The Anti-Intellectualism of the Silicon Valley Elite]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/peter-thiel-marc-andreessen-silicon-valley-anti-intellectualism/]]></link>
		<author>Elizabeth Spiers</author>
	<date>Apr 1, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>How the self-styled know-it-alls atop the knowledge economy want to dismantle the pursuit of knowledge for its own sake</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["How the self styled know it alls atop the knowledge economy want to dismantle the pursuit of knowledge for its own sake     silicon valley rsquo s new man is the same old self enamored business jerk       on instagram  there rsquo s an activist named brian patrick   pano dime  who has dedicated his account to  ldquo posting an insane thing an ai executive said every day in 2026  rdquo  i can rsquo t stop thinking about his entry for day 15  quoting the ceo of a company called suno  mikey shulman  as he claimed that musicians hate the process of making music   ldquo it rsquo s not really enjoyable to make music now  rdquo  he said   ldquo it takes a lot of time  a lot of practice  you need to get really good at an instrument or really good at a piece of production software  i think a majority of people don rsquo t enjoy the majority of the time they spend making music  rdquo       this would be news to every professional musician i know  and i live in a part of brooklyn that rsquo s adjacent to a neighborhood i think of as dad band land because it rsquo s populated by a disproportionate number of aging indie rockers with kids  but it rsquo s not the ludicrousness of shulman rsquo s statement that sticks with me  it rsquo s the swaggering know nothing elan behind it  which is symptomatic of silicon valley rsquo s deep seated anti intellectualism     as the historian richard hofstadter noted  a fierce anti intellectual spirit has long animated american culture  but it has typically targeted the knowledge elite from below  what rsquo s striking about today rsquo s brand of anti intellectualism is that it infuses the american knowledge elite  it stems from the bedrock conviction among tech oligarchs that they have mastered everything and have nothing left to learn  in this cloistered vision of tech driven learning  they believe that deep intellectual work mdash the kind you do when you author a complex piece of music  for example mdash has little or no inherent value  their disdain for it has fueled their attacks on higher education  the humanities  and learning for its own sake  which they believe has no purpose beyond its inevitable digitization and monetization     the examples are everywhere  peter thiel rsquo s crusade against college attendance and his program that subsidizes high school students who want to forgo it  marc andreessen rsquo s boasts that he actively avoids introspection  the gleeful prediction of thiel rsquo s palantir colleague alex karp that ai will hurt educated women the most  that all of these scourges of learning for learning rsquo s sake are themselves beneficiaries of privileged educations doesn rsquo t matter  as ardent monopolists  they rsquo ve managed to believe they rsquo ve cornered the market on critical thinking  everyone else needn rsquo t be troubled by the rigors of learning  since they exist solely to serve as drones in the tech regimes of the future     the irony of this posture is that there rsquo s almost no sector of american life mdash with the notable exception of the tech world rsquo s political retainers in the trump white house mdash that is less welcoming to rigorous thinking than silicon valley  the apostles of algorithmic dominance cheerlead chatbots and technocratic shortcuts for thinking and reasoning  and use them extensively themselves  even though the models hallucinate and have a baleful tendency toward sycophancy   ldquo researchers found that nearly a dozen leading models were highly sycophantic  rdquo  a recent new york times story on the explosion in ai chatbots reported   ldquo taking the users rsquo  side in interpersonal conflicts 49 percent more often than humans did mdash even when the user described situations in which they broke the law  hurt someone or lied  rdquo  the obsequious intellectual concierges of the ai revolution also reduce cognitive strain on users  which further weakens their capacity for thinking  an mit media lab study titled  ldquo your brain on chatgpt rdquo  found that llm users  ldquo consistently underperformed at neural  linguistic  and behavioral levels  rdquo  the tech oligarchs have somehow managed to enshittify thinking     this shouldn rsquo t come as any great surprise to students of the dismally incurious and claustral mindscape of silicon valley  tech oligarchs have erected a new cognitive technology designed to fry users rsquo  brains after they rsquo ve effectively lobotomized themselves with a real world version of the same process  our tech lords have long made a practice of outsourcing their thinking to the many people  and technologies  devoted to digesting difficult material and summarizing it for them  in their working lives  they then proceed to surround themselves with yes men and peers who affirm everything they say  the beta version of the cringy displays of great leader sycophancy that break out in every trump cabinet meeting was perfected in the boardrooms of silicon valley       this lovingly tended bubble of privilege makes it easy for tech oligarchs to avoid any of the discomfort that comes with questioning their modes of existence or confronting even minor levels of adversity  a tweet from a few years ago neatly summarized the mental costs of this lifestyle   ldquo being a billionaire must be insane  you can buy new teeth  new skin  all your chairs cost 20 000 dollars and weigh 2 000 pounds  your life is just a series of your own preferences  in terms of cognitive impairment  it rsquo s probably like being kicked in the head by a horse every day  rdquo     the tech lords rsquo  ethos of intellectual secession is also rooted in two key maladies of american society  a general disdain for the intellectual class  and the overclass rsquo s wariness toward mdash and not infrequent open hostility to mdash upward class mobility  which still largely rests on access to higher education     hofstadler rsquo s 1964 pulitzer prize ndash winning book anti intellectualism in american life has aged in certain ways  but it brilliantly traces the dogmas of anti intellectualism to our founding mythologies mdash most especially  to the veneration of the self made man by the business class  the self made man was always a self serving fable meant to conceal the deep fissures of rule by a business aristocracy  now that much of america rsquo s wealth is inherited or the product of luck and equity appreciation that is wildly disproportionate to the material contributions of any founder or ceo  our billionaire entrepreneurs and business owners are even less self made than they used to be     still  the myth persists  and you can see it in the tech oligarchy rsquo s insistence that they owe the rest of society nothing as a consequence of their own promethean genius  that rsquo s the logic behind silicon valley rsquo s vision of complete oligarch defection from the grubby dictates of social existence in common with fallen humanity and the dawn of a utopian  ldquo networked state rdquo  created by and for the tech elite  less grandiosely  it rsquo s also the tech oligarchs rsquo  rationale for not paying their fair share of taxes  and their attempts to extract resources from the public sector via school vouchers  privatization  and regulatory capture       on some level  our tech lords are aware that their wealth is built on the backs of others  and like other moguls who rsquo ve built fortunes by extracting wealth from the commons  they fear what would happen if workers manage to transcend their preordained social class or otherwise become more difficult to control because they rsquo ve used their brains to organize against their owners and managers     you can trace the modern history of this fear in the tension between purely academic disciplines and vocational education  which arrived on the american scene alongside the advent of the modern business school  business education canonized the training of aspiring managers to commandeer the redoubts of industrial age capitalism and paid little more than lip service to intellectual development     even under this charter solemnizing an aggressively instrumentalized pursuit of knowledge  early business schools were wary of any instruction that might cause workers to evaluate the competency of the managerial class  as hofstadter writes   ldquo when dean wallace donham of the harvard graduate school of business suggested to one such school in the middle west that it offer a course on the problems of trade unionism  he was told  we don rsquo t want our students to pay attention to anything that might raise questions about management or business policy in their minds  rdquo     the same self inflicted myopia courses through the bold pronouncements of the tech oligarchs as they forecast a frictionless social order operating on the diffusion of knowledge designed to promote their own class interests  after all  much of silicon valley rsquo s wealth is built on the intellectual work of others  often produced in universities and funded by the government  the stem disciplines they hail as the vanguard of social progress are rooted not just in the sciences but the humanities as well  yet since the unfettered quest for knowledge is anathema to them  they never acknowledge this particular intellectual debt  instead  they hire linguists to improve the large language models of their burgeoning ai empires while disparaging the kind of people who become linguists     they also enjoy a bit of jd vance ndash style working class larping on the side  again following the faux populist lead of the maga movement  tech oligarchs will wax whitmanian on the virtues of america rsquo s forgotten workers without of course ever sending their own children to welding school or encouraging them to become hvac technicians  and as a matter of course  the oligarchs of silicon valley  who have presided over one of the most unyielding labor cartels in american enterprise  all viciously oppose unionization for tradespeople     as the daughter of an ibew local lineman who was still climbing power poles well into his 60s and doing contracting work on the side  i recognize a telltale attitude of patronizing condescension here mdash particularly when these venture capitalists mouth the words  ldquo respectable work  rdquo  it is respectable work  but it rsquo s also work that is physically exhausting and destructive at a certain age  and has a ceiling for maximum income  absent union organization  work in these trades offers little security or protection in a country with a weak social safety net mdash one that the same oligarchs would happily destroy altogether  but these oligarchs need workers more than workers need them  and they know it  despite andreessen rsquo s recent statement that  ldquo without us  there rsquo s nothing but stagnation  rdquo     this emphasis on trades and their value to working class men in particular is also of a piece with another vance ian strain within the tech set  the oligarchs rsquo  reactionary insistence that gender hierarchies are simply a function of meritocracy and not patriarchy  now that women are getting more master rsquo s degrees than men  it has to follow that graduate education is useless     a clear corollary of this reactionary gender ideology is the tech bros rsquo  widespread obsession with physical strength mdash they view it  childishly  as a power that women cannot replicate or exceed  and treat it as a vector for measuring themselves against other men  this is not new either  in summarizing the 19th century view toward the life of the mind  hofstadter writes that  ldquo it was assumed that schooling existed not to cultivate certain distinctive qualities of mind but to make personal advancement possible  for this purpose  an immediate engagement with the practical tasks of life was held to be more usefully educative  whereas intellectual and cultural pursuits were called unworldly  unmasculine  and impractical  rdquo       the tech bros rsquo  cult of advancement serves to do much more than safeguarding the moat they rsquo ve erected around membership in their own class  knowledge directed toward goals other than self advancement is a threat  for the simple reason that an informed populace is a civically active populace  you can rsquo t preach automatic deference before a caste of tech savants to a group of workers schooled in understanding their own role as agents of social progress     this is the other irony of the disingenuous posturing of silicon valley rsquo s knowledge elite  the same people who like to tout their own high iqs  bemoan the lack of critical thinking in society  and complain that everyone else is too emotional betray an astounding failure to confront their own cognitive makeup  what separates humans from animals is our ability to contemplate our own existence and transfer complex knowledge down through generations  this species perpetuating endeavor is rooted in complex neurological processes that involve the kind of intellectual capacities that these guys hold in dogmatic and ill informed contempt     emotion  after all  is an evolutionary adaptation that feeds into pro social behavior  not a just silly dispensable quality women have   it rsquo s also on lavish display among the self styled logic only apostles of the tech brotherhood  as any cursory consultation of their grievance addled social media accounts will readily confirm   but in its preferred modes of public discourse  the tech elite rallies behind the clueless bromides of their chief  and literal  egghead  marc andreessen  who openly brags that he actively avoids utilizing any of these various forms of meta cognition to contemplate anything at all  this presumably empties his brain of all troubling reflections beyond the central organizing theme of the greatness of marc andreessen  and whatever constitutes the future of marc andreessen rsquo s legacy and bank accounts       we need intellectualism because we need liberal democracy  and that is precisely why these guys mdash they rsquo re all guys mdash don rsquo t like it  the poster boy for valley bred anti intellectualism is the self styled neoreactionary blogger curtis yarvin  an andreessen  vance  and thiel favorite  yarvin openly embraces racist psuedo science and promotes a tech baron rsquo s vision of autocratic rule that in his telling would transform california into a kind of feudal monarchy where a ceo slash king runs everything as a benevolent authoritarian  inasmuch as tech oligarchs have a favored thinker to outsource their thinking to  he rsquo s it  here rsquo s how yarvin would evaluate his model head of state   ldquo we can define responsibility in financial terms  if we think of california as a profitable corporation  a capital asset whose purpose is to maximize the production of cash  we have a definition of responsibility which is not only precise and unambiguous  but indeed quantitative  rdquo  in this view  the raison d rsquo etre of the state and its government should be profit making  and a tech ceo should control all of it  the pesky volk are granted roles only as grateful vassals of their overlords  otherwise  any effort on their part to understand their own lives as meaningful would upend yarvin rsquo s kingly reveries  dictatorship  but make it business     it rsquo s not too hard to understand why andreessen and his cronies think the guy who says a tech ceo should be the dictator of california is a genius  but it is darkly funny that  at the individual level  they all assume the authoritarian in this scenario would obviously be someone like themselves mdash not another wealth hoarder who might find their existence and their monopolist empires a threat  a single political theory or philosophy class at the intro level would force them to spend five minutes thinking about the pros and cons of this scenario and its historical precedents  but you can rsquo t possibly expect the harried lords of silicon valley to spend time reading very long books and examining complex nuances and contradictions when there are podcasts to go on and memes to tweet  time is money  after all     in yarvin rsquo s view  the sinister forces of democracy are represented in a numbing bloc of consensus he calls  ldquo the cathedral rdquo  mdash educational institutions  journalists  culture makers  this presumably includes me  a middle class writer living in brooklyn who believes in liberal democracy and sends her kid to public school  yarvin would argue i am brainwashing you into rejecting things like his  ldquo chief executive dictator rdquo  idea  which cannot be dismissed on its own merits  but only via conspiracy     ultimately  this is the core of it  the anti intellectual yarvinites of the tech world value order over change mdash specifically  an order where they are in control and do not have to worry about nettlesome things like changing demographics  competition  or being wrong about anything at all  they pay lip service to innovation but hate the deep mental work and creativity that produces novelty and original thought  they care about such things only if they can be turned into a  20 a month subscription service and then parlayed into mission critical enterprise software     this model of mental rentiership will make them still more galactically rich  which will continue to underwrite their endless regress of techcrunch summits and ted talks where they can do the only tangible work they care about  one upping each other like kindergarteners on a playground bragging about who has the best toys  they do not want to think  and when they exchange ideas  they recycle the same ones that have already won inert allegiance among their fellow members of the overclass  if they were somehow to stumble into an unfamiliar  and therefore original  thought formation  it would in all likelihood succumb to the degraded rounds of elite gossip that they rsquo ve managed to elevate into the omniscient discourse of self congratulatory moguldom     this is  to put it mildly  a terrible state of affairs because these people have far too much power and they countenance far too few constraints on what they can do with it  they value their own expertise  but reflexively deride that of others mdash especially anyone who has the temerity to demand a voice in public life and a say in how our society is constructed without wealth as the arbiter of every social good  but for now  at least  they keep showing their hand mdash a useful weakness to exploit for those who wish to outsmart them<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/peter-thiel-marc-andreessen-silicon-valley-anti-intellectualism/">The Anti-Intellectualism of the Silicon Valley Elite</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Wed, 01 Apr 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/peter-thiel-marc-andreessen-silicon-valley-anti-intellectualism/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The World Is Watching a Genocide]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/the-world-is-watching-a-genocide/]]></link>
		<author>Anonymous,Peter Kuper</author>
	<date>Mar 31, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[Gaza isn’t an old news story.]]></teaser> 
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	<description>
	<![CDATA["Check out all installments in the oppart series<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/the-world-is-watching-a-genocide/">The World Is Watching a Genocide</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 31 Mar 2026 12:30:15 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/the-world-is-watching-a-genocide/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The Whodunit Investigating the Death of “Roe”: Q&amp;A With Amy Littlefield]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/amy-littlefield-killers-of-roe-interview/]]></link>
		<author>Sophie Mann-Shafir</author>
	<date>Mar 31, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Our abortion access reporter’s new book reports on the grassroots social movement that amassed enough power to overturn legal abortion, despite being a minority point of view.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Our abortion access reporter rsquo s new book reports on the grassroots social movement that amassed enough power to overturn legal abortion  despite being a minority point of view            when the supreme court lurched rightward in the wake of ruth bader ginsburg rsquo s death  veteran reproductive rights reporter amy littlefield knew what was coming  there were now enough conservative votes to overturn roe v  wade  sure enough  under two years later  the court revoked the constitutional right to abortion  paving the way for 13 states to ban the procedure entirely  littlefield rsquo s new book  killers of roe  investigates the decades long effort to end legal abortion via an unlikely angle  the book is framed as a whodunit  setting out to track down the culprit responsible for overturning legal abortion and discern how they succeeded when the right had always held most americans rsquo  support  from the roe v  wade turning point in 1973 to its dismantling nearly 50 years later  littlefield rsquo s book offers an account of the anti choice movement rsquo s rise  and the amalgam of political tactics and righteous belief that undergird it     the contradictions that emerge as littlefield probes this  ldquo spiritual civil war rdquo  demand nuance in what can otherwise seem like a coldly polarized dispute  nancy reagan was quietly pro choice  former republican senator bob packwood was a womanizer who  ldquo cared about abortion rights  even as he took advantage of women rsquo s lower social status  rdquo  littlefield surveys fractures within the pro choice movement  too  frances kissling  the former head of catholics for choice and otherwise on littlefield rsquo s  ldquo side  rdquo  questions the use of gender inclusive language when talking about abortion  her investigation becomes a character study in the interests of broader historical revelation  as she awaits roger craver  the pioneer of progressive organizations rsquo  direct mail programs that historians have argued led to a focus on issues most relevant to the donor class  littlefield writes   ldquo i felt as if i was about to confront not just a person  but a phenomenon  rdquo     that tension of scope between the role of individuals and structures is one littlefield takes on with an inveterate reporter rsquo s mind  she calls politicians to account for the legislation they rsquo ve collectively effected  fits specific victims like rosie jimenez into a broader expose of abortion as fundamentally a class issue  channels her own bursts of anger into the energy of the pro choice movement at large  she finds footholds in the granularity of one on one meetings with anti choice figureheads mdash and even a skinny dip in mexico with kissling mdash to draw out decades of political meaning  in writing this book  littlefield told me  she investigated anti abortion luminaries as suspects in the format of a thriller mdash accessible like the mysteries that have always brought her satisfaction and comfort  she called into this interview from a lactation room in baltimore  and hung up to find a fellow nursing mom had left her a business card scrawled with a thank you      mdash sophie mann shafir      sophie mann shafir   what did writing this book make you think about how and why roe was overturned  is there a single answer     amy littlefield   i think it rsquo s a complicated  multilayered answer  a lot of us who have covered this topic understand that the balance of power on the supreme court and the legal organizing work of groups like alliance defending freedom played a huge role at the macro level  but i was interested in digging into the more grassroots level to examine the behind the scenes figures that you haven t heard of  i think one of the tough realities to confront as someone who supports the right to abortion is that abortion opponents built an incredibly impressive grassroots social movement  and they did so even though they represented a minority point of view  pretty quickly after roe v wade happened  more people supported legal abortion than not  and yet  despite holding a minority viewpoint  this movement succeeded in the monumental victory of overturning a constitutional right  and they did so because of the famous strategists and supreme court justices  but also because of quieter people in the shadows       sms   did you have to shift the way that you thought about abortion opponents as you sat across from pioneers of the anti abortion movement     al    in almost every interview i conducted  there was a moment when the person i was talking to  after i asked them about their motivations  would say some version of   ldquo well  i hope when i get to the gates of heaven  the work that i ve done against abortion causes me to get a ticket in  rdquo  i heard it first from this man named paul haring  who played an early role in the hyde amendment  first passed in 1976  which banned federal funding of abortion  he was trying to convert me to catholicism  so for him  it was like an elevator pitch     i rsquo d been thinking of the alliance that brought about the end of roe as a collaboration between believers and opportunists  there were times when there was so much discussion of heaven that the lines began to blur  and the believers seemed to be seeking the greatest opportunity of all  which is eternal life       sms   let rsquo s talk about how you chose to frame your book  we more commonly encounter charges of murder deployed by the right mdash which generally considers abortion and even emergency contraception to be murder  can you talk about your choice to use this framework from such a different political angle     al    it started out because i was a new mom when ruth bader ginsburg died  and i understood that roe was going to fall not long after  i had been covering abortion access and the slow  incremental decimation of abortion access for many years at that point  so i knew it was coming  and i knew that people were going to die as a result  at the time  in this fog of new motherhood mixed with anger about the erosion of abortion rights  about the only media i could consume was murder mysteries  which had been my comfort when i was a teenager  too  so that format began as a way for me to entice myself to tell a really challenging story     i am also trying to play with flipping the script on anti abortion folks  who talk about people who support the right to abortion as murderers  i m trying to look at the question of what responsibility the proponents of these policies bear for people who have died as a result of their policies  whether we re talking about rosie jimenez  who died in the 1970s  becky bell in the 1980s  or moving forward to today  with all of the women whose deaths have been reported by propublica       sms   what did your research make you think about what those responsibilities are  did any kind of revelation come from talking to the  ldquo culprits rdquo      al    i was pretty taken aback by the level of denial from the men i talked to who were involved in these policies  and the ways that they managed to decline responsibility  to shift the blame onto doctors or onto the women themselves  and to deny that these abortion bans had anything to do with deaths that resulted pretty clearly and directly from anti abortion policies  i tried to follow the murder mystery format  where there s some dramatic resolution  where you get the sense that the person feels bad about what they did  the killer repents or expresses remorse  or they re dragged away in handcuffs  in real life  it turns out that doesn t happen  there s no justice for the killers of roe  there s no big moment of dramatic confession over any of these preventable deaths of women who died from anti abortion policies  although i tried my best to get one     sms   you connect anti abortion legislation to decades of forced sterilization campaigns against people of color  beginning in the early 1900s and lasting into the  rsquo 80s  they rsquo re somewhat opposite practices  but they re both fundamentally about control of people s bodies  the us has a notorious track record of infringing on the liberties of some while protecting others rsquo   how do you conceive of the anti choice movement relating to other us power structures     al    i use the hyde amendment as sort of a rosetta stone to talk about the intersection of racism  classism  and sexism  and restrictions on abortion  they all come together in that policy  which was about abortion opponents understanding they couldn t ban abortion for everyone mdash that wasn t politically possible  so  they were going to ban it for poor people  who were disproportionately women of color  i talk about how the word  ldquo taxpayer rdquo  did a lot of heavy lifting in that debate   ldquo taxpayer rdquo  has always meant the right of white men not to have to pay for things that women of color need to survive  abortion being one of them  i saw that word as a red herring that recurred frequently in this history  including around justifications that were used for the forced sterilization of women of color  that  of course  is crucially tied into this history  because it s also about infringements on bodily autonomy     sms   you write about politicians rsquo  wishy washiness when it comes to abortion  like reagan and biden and trump  do you perceive those changing stances as an actual change in belief or strategy     al    when you look at the shifting loyalties of democratic and republican politicians alike on abortion  it s often been a matter of political opportunity mdash donald trump being only the most recent and dramatic example  he rsquo s someone who once declared himself to be  ldquo very pro choice  rdquo  and who then appointed the supreme court justices who overturned roe v wade  and now  to the frustration of anti abortion activists  he isn t acting as quickly as they would like to stop the mailing of abortion pills at home     in some of the internal records that i found mdash communications between the reagan campaign and anti abortion groups mdash his campaign understood that it was a minority point of view  but they had a crucial contingent of people who were willing to vote on a single issue of abortion  they figured out how to mobilize that contingent to elect republicans and build this alliance that got republican politicians interested in the cause  i document this manufacture of abortion as a political cause  especially in the late  rsquo 70s and  rsquo 80s       sms   apropos that successful manufacturing  you document a disagreement with frances kissling  former president of catholics for choice  over the reasons for the pro choice movement rsquo s struggles and defeats  she thinks it rsquo s been too bold  you think not bold enough  what does the pro choice movement have to learn from the anti abortion movement       al    one thing is learning to be bold and incremental at the same time  the anti choice side was incredibly radical in some ways  and very patient and strategic in other ways  they had groups that were working incrementally through the courts  and then groups like operation rescue that were blockading clinics  making abortion a stigmatized and controversial thing  even though it s long been popularly supported     and as a result  often the overton window was drawn to the right  that rsquo s why the example of all above all  and the movement to repeal the hyde amendment  is such a hopeful example  they really pushed the overton window to the left on the question of public funding of abortion  which had been so stigmatized for so long  even within the pro choice movement and among democratic politicians  there were a lot of doubters asking why you would you touch this third rail  why you would talk about public funding  they had just come through a bruising fight over the affordable care act  and republicans were calling that policy socialism  it was like  didn t we just resolve this  i think the result is that we need to change the way that we think about and talk about that issue     sms   you spent a lot of time face to face with anti choice advocates  not finding the neat murder mystery denouement of confession or resolution  where did that leave you thinking about hope for common cause  or hope at all  moving forward     al    i think it looks like people making justice for themselves  and i think we re actually in a really difficult and yet hopeful moment for that process  there are anti abortion culprits like monica migliorino miller  who stored fetuses in her closet and still does stints in jail for her activism  but those people exist on the right side of history too  and they rsquo re really having a moment right now  i think about minneapolis  moms and dads driving minivans and filming federal agents out the window mdash all those who are doing the quiet and deliberate work of justice  there was a new momentum to those efforts within the abortion rights movement in the wake of the dobbs decision  one of the most meaningful forms of activism that i see is the way that medical providers protected by shield laws in blue states are mailing abortion pills into states where abortion is banned  at great personal risk  i think in the absence of big  dramatic moments where the detective delivers a sense of justice  grassroots activists have found ways to make it for themselves<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/amy-littlefield-killers-of-roe-interview/">The Whodunit Investigating the Death of “Roe”: Q&amp;A With Amy Littlefield</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 31 Mar 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/amy-littlefield-killers-of-roe-interview/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Rock and Roll’s Dutch Old Master]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/anton-corbijn-photos/]]></link>
		<author>Andrew Holter</author>
	<date>Mar 31, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>How Anton Corbijn’s photographs shaped the history of rock music. </p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["How anton corbijn rsquo s photographs shaped the history of rock music       anton corbijn        in the beginning  the rock star was an alluring figure  and a subversive one  teenagers screamed at him  their parents resented him  no one thought about him       now rock stars are people  pronouns  any  whose life stories win national book awards and oscars  we look at them differently than we did when the archetype first emerged sometime in the middle of the 20th century  their aspects reward close examination  we rsquo ve decided  photographers and filmmakers  much more than music critics  have elevated rock musicians to the status of serious cultural figures  whether or not this was inevitable  it rsquo s worth remembering that it was not always the case     the dutch photographer anton corbijn has probably done more than anyone mdash any nonmusician  at least mdash to effect this transformation  best known for his pictures of joy division  u2  depeche mode  tom waits  and nick cave  among others  corbijn stood out from the generation of rock photographers that preceded him in the pages of magazines like rolling stone  creem  and the new musical express        ldquo anton is a cross   between a russian   spy  a gigolo  a priest   and a painter  rdquo  waits writes in some verse contributed to corbijn  anton  a new book that accompanies a career spanning retrospective last year in stockholm   ldquo if he did not   have his camera on   him  he could take   your picture with   a cigar box and   you would love it  rdquo     the classic corbijn image is a black and white portrait in which the black runs very deep in places  like charcoal  and contrast is operative  ink costs meant that only the really popular bands had their pictures printed in color in the rock press of old  so corbijn rsquo s style developed as a kind of diy gesture in itself  his first great insight  when he was still in his mid 20s  was to recover the expressiveness of black and white photography and its possibilities for evocative composition and interpretation where rock was concerned     this approach was also well suited to the look of the musicians corbijn matured alongside and photographed for british outlets starting in the late  rsquo 70s  these were pale men  mostly  who wore dark clothes and called themselves fad gadget  echo and the bunnymen  einsturzende neubauten  which means  ldquo collapsing new buildings rdquo    he would do for depeche mode what rembrandt did for the drapers rsquo  guild of amsterdam       corbijn rsquo s backgrounds  meanwhile  are usually outdoors mdash if not city streets  like the cover of nick cave rsquo s the boatman rsquo s call   then striking  expansive natural landscapes  like u2 rsquo s the joshua tree   grain is not unwelcome  nor is the subject being just out of focus  on the right side of one of corbijn  anton rsquo s spreads  sinead o rsquo connor is folded over herself and snarling like a furious  torsoless sprite  on the left side  she rsquo s a blurry  beautiful floating skull     corbijn rsquo s rockers aren rsquo t the pinups of wood paneled basements and teenagers rsquo  bedrooms  in other words  rarely do they hold their instruments  the actress samantha morton calls them  ldquo ghosts from the future or the past rdquo  and likens them to  ldquo drawing in an ancient cave  rdquo  while corbijin likely engaged most of these subjects in the midst of a pr cycle  his renderings recall the interesting weirdos stumbled upon by mid century american documentary photographers like robert frank  many look encountered as much as posed  on their way to some mysterious business     most of all  though  they look like actors in stills from old film digests like cahiers du cinema mdash memorable characters in movies that never existed  only their soundtracks     a woman at the exhibition  ldquo anton corbijn mdash the living and the dead rdquo  at the bucerius art forum in hamburg  germany  2018      in the case of one musician  though  the movie was made  because corbijn did it himself  ian curtis of joy division mdash whose death by suicide in 1980  at age 23  received little notice in the united states at the time mdash haunts these pages  indeed  curtis rsquo s legacy and corbijn rsquo s career have been joined since the day in november 1979 when the photographer met joy division at a london tube station  a well known frame from that shoot appears in this book  curtis stands slightly apart from his bandmates at the top of a staircase  half turned toward corbijn while the rest of them face away     joy division rsquo s influence on other musicians and on corbijn rsquo s own aesthetic can be seen in later photos  like an afterimage  even before curtis died  corbijn rsquo s pictures  along with the inspired graphic design of peter saville  helped establish the band rsquo s mystique  in another contribution to this book  the u2 bassist adam clayton recalls the appeal of corbijn rsquo s  ldquo early images of joy division  who were from the provinces  alienated misfits in their neo european uniforms  rdquo  clayton rsquo s band was not the only young group to seek out corbijn at least in part because they hoped to look as serious as joy division had mdash to absorb some of that paint left in corbijn rsquo s brush         in 1980  corbijn photographed curtis sitting alone on a smoke break  he looks exhausted  like a man at the end of a long workday  it is one of the very few pictures in the book that seems truly candid  and corbijn rsquo s reminiscences of this period suggest why  his english was still so poor that he could hardly have directed joy division even if he rsquo d wanted to   ldquo i couldn rsquo t understand what they were saying  couldn rsquo t express myself  rdquo  corbijn later admitted   ldquo i never had a real conversation with ian curtis  rdquo     and yet curtis stayed with him  in 1988  corbijn mdash now in demand as a director of music videos mdash returned to his images of joy division for the rerelease of their 1980 single  ldquo atmosphere  rdquo  in the video  figures cloaked in black and white robes  like monks  carry massive enlargements of corbijn rsquo s pictures through the desert  the effect is bizarre and poignant  the filmmaker appropriating his old photos as religious icons     corbijn would go on to make dozens more videos for nirvana  coldplay  metallica  and others  but with  ldquo atmosphere rdquo  he demonstrated  as no one before him had done quite so explicitly  that the rock photographer could be more than a documentarian  just as the studio producer was more than a technician  corbijn was joy division rsquo s collaborator  photography  filmmaking  and music don rsquo t just complement each other  he knew  but compound one another to make something greater than the sum of their parts  myth  in this case     the last image of curtis in corbijn  anton is actually of sam reilly  the actor who played him in the biopic called control that corbijn made in 2007  in  ldquo atmosphere  rdquo  corbijn revisited his joy division photos in the shadow of curtis rsquo s death  while control allowed him to step inside those images  as it were  and move around again in curtis rsquo s life  it also gave him the chance to do what his english couldn rsquo t in 1979  talk to joy division  direct them     the result this time was more uncanny  almost like the  ldquo generative fill rdquo  function of ai that expands the borders of still images beyond their original dimensions  control is more tasteful and informed than that  the director had firsthand knowledge of the material he was reanimating  something was lost  though  in the mastery that corbijn now wielded over his subjects  the pictures in 1979 were a collaboration between a photographer and a band set at some distance from each other by language mdash the sublime product of mutual incomprehension  control was all corbijn  which meant that it was beautifully shot  in black and white   ldquo because that rsquo s how i remember that time rdquo    and punishingly serious     many fans welcomed control as a sober corrective to 24 hour party people  michael winterbottom rsquo s earlier film that treats curtis rsquo s death within a comedy about the manchester music impresario tony wilson  played by another corbijn portrait subject  steve coogan   winterbottom rsquo s depiction is reverent mdash it even incorporates the  ldquo atmosphere rdquo  video mdash but the lens of control is fixed on curtis rsquo s pain   corbijn rsquo s version of wilson has negative charisma  as if levity were an anachronism or an intrusion to be cropped out      as a service to its subject rsquo s memory  control was an act of what the catholic church calls  ldquo supererogation rdquo  mdash beyond what is necessary  fans  critics  and corbijn himself were pleased with it  but a line in this book sounds like self incrimination   ldquo looking back at my body of work from the  rsquo 70s and  rsquo 80s  rdquo  he says   ldquo i feel that it could not be bettered  by me in any case  rdquo     in 2018  a set of old snapshots showing an office christmas party surfaced on a manchester area facebook group  they were taken at the macclesfield manpower services committee  a civil service agency to assist people with disabilities in finding employment  ian curtis is in them mdash this was his day job mdash grinning and making merry with affectionate colleagues who look straight from 1970s central casting  no less cinematic than the cast of control  it isn rsquo t just curtis rsquo s suicide that makes these photos so touching  but their contrast with nearly every other extant image of him  including corbijn rsquo s  they are glimpses of a man unencumbered by his illness or his legacy     it is a strange irony of corbijn rsquo s relationship with curtis that  having applied such vision to commemorating this man who suffered and dignifying his pain  corbijn inadvertently gave so much meaning to a few snapshots of curtis taken in a moment he was happy     annie lennox      one of corbijn rsquo s criteria for a worthy portrait is that it has to be different from anything that already exists  he will follow this standard to high drama and occasionally  at the same time  to whimsy  presenting his subjects as familiar strangers   corbijn does have a sense of humor  in a group portrait here of the rolling stones  they wear tall  crooked stovepipes borrowed from the cat in the hat  like whoville rsquo s newest hitmakers      a second criterion is that the portrait must say something about its subject  for the viewer  the achievement of this is instant  a vibe  history  memory  and the viewer rsquo s own experience with the subject rsquo s work are all involved  corbijn rsquo s genius for collaboration lies here  the original kodak slogan was  ldquo you press the button  we do the rest  rdquo  corbijn does a lot more than press the button  but john lydon  tina turner  kris kristofferson mdash they rsquo ve done plenty too  and we see  and hear  it in their faces     finally  corbijn believes a good portrait must say something about anton corbijn  reviewing this half century of photographs  you understand the qualities of light and dark that appeal to him  you also see an artist who has always known that rock stars are so much more than idols  they endure like movie characters  and they die just like us<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/anton-corbijn-photos/">Rock and Roll’s Dutch Old Master</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 31 Mar 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/anton-corbijn-photos/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[On Chavez, People, and Power]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/cesar-chavez-legacy-marshall-ganz-power-accountability/]]></link>
		<author>Marshall Ganz</author>
	<date>Mar 31, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Letter to friends, students, colleagues, and collaborators.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Letter to friends  students  colleagues  and collaborators      a san fernando city worker covers a mural of labor leader and civil rights activist cesar chavez at the cesar e  chavez memorial park in san fernando  california  on march 20  2026       last wednesday  i was confronted with a shattering reality  a person whom i had known  learned from  and worked with for many years had  at the same time  been inflicting devastating harm on girls and women vulnerable to his assaults  to ana murgia  in particular  whom i knew then  i ask your forgiveness for not seeing you  and i want to thank you and your companions for finding the courage to speak out about your abuse and share your deep pain  choices that we can only meet with care and respect       like many of you  i was shaken by what came to light about cesar rsquo s abusive behavior  so i want to offer my own perspective mdash not because it settles anything  but because i lived some of this history and want to speak honestly of what i saw  what i didn rsquo t see  and what i believe we now must reckon with together     i first met cesar in 1965  i worked alongside him  learned from and with him  and served beside him for seven years mdash on the union rsquo s national executive board mdash and admired him deeply for many years  the movement that thousands of us had built had  for a time  transformed the lives of thousands of farmworkers and their families across california  florida  texas  and beyond  boycotts we organized across north america united urban supporters  people of faith  labor activists  civil rights veterans  opponents of the vietnam war  veterans of the civil rights movement  students  and many others  and the movement brought recognition  dignity  pride  and power to the latino community  many were immigrants or the children of immigrants  inspired not by political  military  or business leaders but by a movement in which one rsquo s grandmother  working in the fields near fresno  was now  suddenly  on a ufw picket line fighting for her rights  for the first time in history  a movement effectively challenged the system of exploitation rooted in california agriculture       the movement also became a school of leadership  organizing  and action in which so many found the courage and the mentorship to risk  to try  and to learn  any survey of california unions  community groups  elected leaders  educators  and more would reveal so many people who got their start as volunteers with the farmworkers  i was no exception  i got my first lesson in electoral politics when assigned in 1968 to getting out the latino vote in east la and winning the june 6 california primary for bobby kennedy     the people who built the movement also paid the price mdash not only by surviving on donated food or serving as full time volunteers supported at only  5 per week mdash but some had their lives taken  the first person who lost her life was an 18 year old college student from boston  nan freeman  crushed to death by a truck while picketing a sugar plant in florida  naji daifullah  a strike leader  an immigrant from yemen  beaten to death by a kern county deputy sheriff  juan de la cruz  an immigrant from mexico  shot by a sniper on a picket line south of bakersfield two days later  and rufino contreras  from mexicali  murdered by a foreman supervising strikebreakers in imperial valley     one day  almost five years ago  a young woman earning her master rsquo s at harvard rsquo s ed school dropped by my office  she had come  she said  to deliver a greeting from her grandparents  they had been farmworkers  had helped to build the movement mdash a movement that had everything to do with her getting to graduate school     cesar rsquo s leadership contributed enormously to all of this  but it was never  ldquo his rdquo  movement  it belonged to all of us  it was real  it mattered  and it must not be erased     the truth is always more complex than the mythology  by the mid 1970s  as the union was growing rapidly  something had broken in him and the cesar we thought we knew became a negative of himself  vision gave way to paranoia  courage to fear  relationships to isolation  and curiosity to suspicion  organizing gave way to purges  witch hunts  and absolute personal loyalty  and within a few short years much of the organization we had built was in shambles       what most of us did not know mdash or did not see mdash was that his abuse of women and girls had been present far earlier  enabled by a small inner circle  so that as his pathology and power grew  so would his circle of harm  to those who have now come forward mdash and to ana murgia  whom i named at the start of this letter mdash your courage is profound  your pain is real  and you deserved so much better  i am sorry it has taken this long for the world to hear you     after his death in 1993  a chavez  ldquo industry rdquo  had emerged  marketing his image  his deeds  and his story such that one man was portrayed as the source of everything the movement had achieved  in the end  it cheapens the movement that thousands built and allows a leader to cause immense harm without accountability  so today  40 years after his death  the discovery of this terrible evil in his life mdash and the pain it caused the most vulnerable mdash has landed with seismic force  in the last few days  people pulled books from shelves  renamed streets  and threw away 40  or 50 year old pictures that were an honored part of a family rsquo s heritage     cesar chavez was a flawed human being of genuine and historic consequence who caused profound harm mdash harm that demands accountability  care for those he hurt  and honest reckoning  our challenge now is not to choose between the good and the harm but to hold both  unflinchingly  that is harder than hagiography  and harder than exorcism  but it is the only path that honors the full truth mdash including the truth of everyone whose lives were changed for the better by what the movement built  and everyone whose trust  dignity  and humanity he betrayed     this is the work i hope we can do together         with love and respect     marshall<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/cesar-chavez-legacy-marshall-ganz-power-accountability/">On Chavez, People, and Power</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 31 Mar 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/cesar-chavez-legacy-marshall-ganz-power-accountability/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The Norwegian Billionaire Who Broke the Iditarod]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/iditarod-billionaire-expedition-class-rokke/]]></link>
		<author>Colin Warren</author>
	<date>Mar 31, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Alaska’s last great race has struggled to keep up its finances and increase participation. Now, a $300,000 gift from an “expedition musher” promises to transform the event.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Alaska rsquo s last great race has struggled to keep up its finances and increase participation  now  a  300 000 gift from an  ldquo expedition musher rdquo  promises to transform the event      kjell inge rokke mushes his dog team across the bering sea         jessie holmes and his alaskan huskies tugged their way over the frozen bering sea  he had spent the last nine days riding nearly 1 000 miles over some of the most inhospitable wilderness on earth  where temperatures reached as low as 50 degrees below zero  as part of the iditarod  now  holmes was on the last stretch  about to complete the brutal race once again in a stunning back to back victory following his breakout win in 2025  as the sun set in nome  alaska  his team pulled onto front street as throngs of people cheered and chanted his name  he bent over his lead dogs  polar and zeus  with a reddened  frost nipped face   ldquo i want to cry so bad  rdquo  said holmes   ldquo i rsquo m so happy  rdquo  he rsquo d won the race mdash along with its  80 000 top prize       but holmes wasn rsquo t the first musher to cross the finish line  kjell inge rokke  a norwegian billionaire  had completed the journey around 33 hours before as a member of the iditarod rsquo s inaugural  ldquo expedition class  rdquo     rokke  who made his money primarily from corporate raiding and oil  paid more than  300 000 for the expedition honor  as a noncompetitive musher  he started with the traditional racers but wasn rsquo t bound to the same rules  during the race  expedition participants mdash who also included thomas w aelig rner  a fellow norwegian and the winner of the 2020 iditarod mdash could swap out their tired dogs for new ones  ignore mandatory rest periods  and  ldquo receive outside assistance in any form  rdquo  w aelig rner traveled with rokke as a guide  accompanied by a crew on snowmobiles that helped set up camp  cook meals  and care for their dogs  and while expedition mushers were barred from interfering with the actual competitors  holmes and other racers said that they were shouted at mdash and nearly run off the trail mdash by rokke rsquo s posse  coming out of the first camp  holmes said  w aelig rner insisted on passing him  and w aelig rner rsquo s dogs nearly became entangled with his own team   ldquo after that  rdquo  said holmes   ldquo i told w aelig rner i was coming for him  rdquo       rokke rsquo s donation was the latest scheme to help fix the iditarod rsquo s struggling ledger  since becoming ceo in 2019  rob urbach has pitched a range of solutions to keep the event solvent and relevant mdash including upgrading the subscription platform that allows supporters to watch the race online and the creation of a cryptocurrency called  ldquo iditacoin  rdquo  the formation of the expedition class  however  has gained the most attention  and there are already plans to expand  in the future  urbach said  the rapper snoop dogg could potentially join the race as an expedition member     why turn to stunt mushers  in 2025  the iditarod saw the lowest number of participants since its inception in 1973  the race has faced hardships for nearly a decade mdash primarily  fewer sponsors and a declining mushing base  since the pandemic  the price of kibble and veterinary services have nearly doubled from inflation     thanks to rokke rsquo s contribution  this year rsquo s entrants paid half the usual entry fee   2 000 instead of  4 000  the number of participants also increased by 12 percent   ldquo we need to evolve  rdquo  said urbach   ldquo or the race will evaporate  rdquo     though noncompetitive  rokke beat the iditarod rsquo s current northern route record of eight days  11 hours  20 minutes  and 16 seconds  which was set in 2016 by six time champion dallas seavey  while the iditarod emphasized that rokke was  ldquo not part of official race standings rdquo  and  ldquo not eligible for prize money or special awards  rdquo  norwegian media nevertheless celebrated him as a new record holder  sirens announced rokke rsquo s arrival in nome  but there was little fanfare  only a couple dozen people  mostly his own crew  watched his approach  as he sipped champagne at the end of the race  rokke was asked if he would stick around to see the real winner arrive  no  he said  he had plans in the bahamas      ldquo we currently live in a world where billionaires can run countries if they want to  rdquo  said jeff deeter  a veteran iditarod musher and this year rsquo s third place finisher   ldquo have enough money  you can do what you want  iditarod is no exception  rdquo     kjell inge rokke sipping champagne after completing the race     before becoming the iditarod rsquo s first expedition musher  kjell inge rokke grew up in an average home in molde  norway  he dropped out of high school after struggling with dyslexia and became a fisherman  moving to the us in 1980 and eventually landing on a trawl boat in dutch harbor  alaska  less than a decade later  his company  american seafoods  controlled 40 percent of the american pollock harvest in the bering sea by aggressively purchasing competitors rsquo  boats and loans  his success was bolstered by introducing alaska to modern factory trawlers that processed fish at sea  these massive ships could stay on the water through winter storms  often catching a fishery rsquo s whole year rsquo s quota before local boats had even left the shore       rokke was forced to sell the company following the implementation of the 1998 american fisheries act  led by senator ted stevens  for monopolizing the lucrative bering sea pollack harvest  the factory trawls introduced to the region have contributed to the decimation of yukon river salmon runs  on which native villages have long relied  and moved the bulk of pollack profits  which generated  2 5 billion in economic activity in 2023  out of alaska  the iditarod trail passes through several villages starving for salmon  but  unlike most mushers  rokke camped outside them during the race     during his last years in alaska  rokke took over the norwegian conglomerate aker asa  whose primary interests are energy  seafood  marine biotechnology  artificial intelligence  and asset management  in 2005  he was sentenced to 120 days in jail for bribing a norwegian official to falsify a captain rsquo s license for his yacht  but spent only 25 days behind bars  in 2017  with his net worth hovering around  2 5 billion  rokke signed the giving pledge  joining bill gates and warren buffett in promising to donate the majority of their wealth  according to bloomberg rsquo s billionaires index  rokke rsquo s net worth was estimated at  6 89 billion the day that he started the race on march 8  by the time he crossed the finish line on march 16  it had jumped to  7 56 billion     in 2022  aker asa became one of the largest private industrial employers in norway  and rokke moved to switzerland  seemingly to avoid a wealth tax  he appeared in the recently released epstein files in an fbi tip along with several prominent norwegians  he rsquo s currently building the world rsquo s largest superyacht  a 639 foot boat that would double as a research facility with a mission to  ldquo improve the health of the ocean  rdquo  meanwhile  aker bp is drilling for oil at sea  and aker qrill sucks krill out of the antarctic ocean with a proprietary vacuum like machine at alarmingly high rates  this krill is then sold to salmon farmers  when farmed salmon eat it  the fish turn bright red  a color usually only found on wild salmon  this krill is also sold as a high nutrient product for mushing dogs  holmes  with a smile  said that his dogs use rokke rsquo s brand   ldquo guess i won rsquo t get that sponsor  rdquo     rokke said that he rsquo s aware of the criticism   ldquo i mean that rsquo s just life in general  that rsquo s good  we all need to be criticized and questioned  hellip  it rsquo s almost a compliment that people are questioning it  rdquo  rokke said that his goal was to complete the course in six and half days  and when he realized that he couldn rsquo t do that  he aimed for eight   ldquo i know we rsquo re doing the right thing  the right reasons  rdquo  said rokke   ldquo we are bringing money to the sport  bringing money to the villages  rdquo  he said that the final stretch of the race gave him the same feeling that he had originally coming to dutch harbor as a fisherman   ldquo in my heart is america  rdquo  he said   ldquo really  alaska  too  rdquo     jessie holmes taking home the top prize at the 2026 iditarod     kattijo deeter  an iditarod musher  said that rokke disrespected the race by buying his way in  competing  she said  is the reward for years of hard work that goes into building a dog team  holmes  for instance  trained his dogs over the winter by running them around 4 500 miles  hugh neff  another iditarod finisher  said that mushing is about dogs and humans becoming one spirit  and he wondered if rokke had felt that connection  at the start of the race  rokke admitted that he wasn rsquo t  ldquo necessarily a dog person  rdquo       another expedition class musher  canadian investor steve curtis  donated  50 000 to support village youth sports to join the race  he only made it halfway down the trail before quitting   ldquo those that challenge the dilution of the integrity of the race  rdquo  urbach said of the creation of the expedition class   ldquo i think it is a pretty shortsighted view  rdquo  around 25 000 people have summited mount everest  he said  but  ldquo there rsquo s only 841 humans that have done the iditarod trail  rdquo     iditarod rsquo s rules forbid competitors from speaking poorly of the race  and those that do can be barred from future events and funding  without the money from iditarod  it is nearly impossible for mushers to afford their kennels   ldquo if i was a billionaire  rdquo  said jason mackey  10 time iditarod finisher   ldquo we would be racing for millions of dollars  not just a  100 000 added to the purse  rdquo     but many mushers  including holmes and deeter  still expressed gratitude towards rokke for the decreased entry fees  around  100 000 of rokke rsquo s  300 000 payment went to increasing the race purse  which is split amongst all official participants  about  75 000 helped reduce the entry fees  the largest chunk mdash around  170 000 mdash is set to be divided equally between the 17 villages along the race rsquo s route for children rsquo s dental care     the final  25 000 went directly to the iditarod trail committee  a nonprofit organization that operates the race  last year they reported a net loss of  146 753  the year before  the committee posted a net loss of  660 739  as ceo  urbach brings in more than  200 000     libby riddles  the first woman to ever win the iditarod in 1985  agrees the race needs to find new ways to survive  the alaskan mushing community  she said  should be thankful that rokke brought his ideas  team  and money to the iditarod mdash especially when he could have done something similar in norway  where mushing is also very popular   ldquo he rsquo s done a lot to help the race  rdquo  said josi shelley  2025 rookie of the year   ldquo it might open up the opportunity for people who don rsquo t want to run the race competitively to see that this is how you could do it  rdquo     what price is the iditarod willing to sell itself for  urbach deflected the question  saying they were still figuring out the details of the new expedition program   ldquo watching billionaires go down the trail rotating dogs  disrespecting the integrity that this race was founded upon  rdquo  said holmes   ldquo that rsquo s not the way to inspire more people to run  rdquo<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/iditarod-billionaire-expedition-class-rokke/">The Norwegian Billionaire Who Broke the Iditarod</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Tue, 31 Mar 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/iditarod-billionaire-expedition-class-rokke/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The Bottomless Stupidity of House Republicans]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/gop-dhs-funding-airports/]]></link>
		<author>Chris Lehmann</author>
	<date>Mar 30, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Somehow, they’ve managed to top themselves in the crisis over TSA funding. Who knew that was even possible?</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Somehow  they rsquo ve managed to top themselves in the crisis over tsa funding  who knew that was even possible      mike johnson holds a press conference in the us capitol on march 27  2026       it rsquo s a bit too on the nose  metaphorically speaking  that the latest example of the utter prostration of our national legislature before an unhinged and power mad executive branch concerns the failure to competently manage air travel  senseless holding patterns  traffic bottlenecks  unscheduled delays  and pointless marathon waits in line mdash the many indignities of flying almost perfectly mirror the business model of congress in the trump 2 0 era       just consider the ludicrous series of feckless legislative self owns that have produced the present crisis at us airports  in response to ice rsquo s nationwide reign of terror  congressional democrats blocked additional money for the department of homeland security  dhs  as the latest government funding deadline approached  their quite reasonable demand was for some basic reforms to tamp down ice rsquo s most egregious abuses mdash for example  requiring agents to wear bodycams and banning them from wearing masks   in reality  nothing about this corps of brownshirts mustered to implement stephen miller rsquo s punitive racist fantasies is reformable  but that is a sermon for another occasion      house republicans refused to go along with this plan and approved their own dhs funding bill without the ice restrictions  that bill predictably ran aground in the senate  where it couldn rsquo t surmount the filibuster requirement of 60 votes in the face of unified democratic opposition     meanwhile  with american airports increasingly resembling soviet era supermarkets and polling showing that a majority of americans correctly blamed republicans for their latest non governing clusterfuck  the trump white house intervened as only the trump white house can  by mobilizing ice agents to replace the tsa workers left unpaid by the dilatory gop  not only was this an act of ludicrous political symbolism mdash deploying the very despicable and authoritarian vigilante force whose actions touched off the whole dhs funding battle in the first place mdash it was also an operational nonstarter  since ice agents aren rsquo t even properly trained to perform their own jobs  let alone to take on the responsibilities of security screening at airports  so in addition to airports rsquo  being overrun with irate passengers  they rsquo ve also taken on legions of ice workers standing around  looking like bored yet heavily armed hotel concierges     faced with this spiraling chaos  senate republicans took on the disorienting task of actually doing something  after weeks of rejecting viable plans to fund the tsa while tabling ice rsquo s budget  they abruptly reversed course and accepted the basic framework put forward by democrats  gop senators ted cruz of texas and john kennedy of louisiana mdash lawmakers who are pretty much the polar opposite of apostles of bipartisan moderation mdash sponsored a bill to continue funding the dhs  while arranging to move through the budget line for ice on a separate reconciliation vote that would no longer have to meet the 60 vote threshold imposed by the filibuster  it was a partial capitulation to democratic demands  sure  but it was also a way out of the gop rsquo s hilariously extended streak of rake stepping on the issue  after the proposal won passage with the blessing of senate majority leader john thune  the senate not unreasonably adjourned for two weeks  figuring that at least one major headache for the gop had been palliated     cue the next executive branch power grab  trump abruptly announced that he would bring tsa workers back on payroll  by simply redirecting ice rsquo s lavish budget line in last year rsquo s tax and spending law into the airport security arm of the dhs  this represented yet another completely illegal executive branch end run around congress rsquo s fundamental spending authority mdash yet with congress permanently asleep at the wheel  it scarcely seemed to matter       but all this maneuvering failed to account for a key factor  the bottomless stupidity of the house gop conference  notified of a provisional governing win out of the senate  house speaker mike johnson  the maga clown who couldn rsquo t think straight  promptly and inaccurately disowned it as the handiwork of senate minority leader chuck schumer   in fairness  one probably can rsquo t expect johnson  who was a critical house strategist in the effort to overturn the results of the 2020 election  to offer anything like a good faith account of how the senate works   and since johnson owes his house leadership perch to the most militant anti government wing of the chamber rsquo s magafied gop majority  he appeased it with a meaningless new house measure to lock in eight weeks of dhs funding with the ice budget at full strength  in other words  the house has met a prospective resolution of the dhs shutdown with the very same brand of legislative wishcasting that provoked the funding impasse in the first place  then  naturally  johnson gaveled his own chamber into a two week recess of its own     it rsquo s hard to imagine how one could draw up a more farcical parody of legislative governance  in a weird aberration  the senate stumbled into acting as it was originally intended to mdash brokering a compromise deal on a key budgeting failure that was wreaking havoc with a basic mode of transportation and sparking public outrage  yet a house that has made it a point of ideological pride to refrain from doing its job in any sphere proceeded to do something worse than nothing mdash it reinscribed the basic terms of the original failure for no discernible reason other than to dramatize its own contempt for governing  as noah berlatsky of public notice writes  the whole episode encloses on itself  origami style  as a textbook illustration of maga incompetence   ldquo trump made sure all travelers knew he was responsible for airport delays by sending hated ice agents to stare at them while they wait in line  then senate republicans publicly blamed trump for scuppering a deal  then trump  illegally  declared he could have funded tsa anytime he wanted  then republicans in congress had a massive internal fight which ended with them refusing to fund tsa and going on vacation  rdquo     at the same time  the white house rsquo s still greater self inflicted calamity mdash the  ldquo excursion rdquo  into iran mdash continues  the pentagon is reportedly planning to deploy ground troops for an engagement projected to last at least several weeks  this move would represent a dire escalation of an already illegal and unauthorized war  it rsquo s the very sort of executive abuse that congress is supposed to exercise fundamental oversight over  yet a national legislature that can rsquo t even govern its way out of airport delays isn rsquo t about to reclaim its constitutional responsibilities in wartime  the scandal here isn rsquo t so much that congress is on recess at this parlous moment but that  to paraphrase dorothy parker  it rsquo s no longer possible to tell the difference<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/gop-dhs-funding-airports/">The Bottomless Stupidity of House Republicans</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Mon, 30 Mar 2026 17:50:21 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/gop-dhs-funding-airports/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[What Are Your Obligations When Your Country Is the Villain?]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/are-we-the-baddies/]]></link>
		<author>Aaron Regunberg</author>
	<date>Mar 30, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Under Trump, the US is unequivocally a force for evil in the world. It can seem morally intolerable to embrace happiness as our government massacres children.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Under trump  the us is unequivocally a force for evil in the world  it can seem morally intolerable to embrace happiness as our government massacres children      the destroyed building of shajareha rsquo ye tayyibe primary school is seen after a us israel strike in minab that killed 185 people  including dozens of students and teachers  most of them children  in hormozgan  iran  on march 21  2026       iwas on a family hike when i learned that our country had obliterated the shajareh tayyebeh girls rsquo  elementary school in minab  iran  using tomahawk missiles developed and produced with the taxes that you and i pay  the united states executed a double tap strike mdash a tactic designed to kill emergency responders mdash that murdered at least 168 people  most of the victims torn apart by these us bombs were 7 to 12 year olds  later reporting would describe the scene of the massacre   ldquo children rsquo s bodies lying partly visible rdquo  under the rubble  a  ldquo very small child rsquo s severed arm rdquo  being pulled from the debris     i thought of a sketch from the british comedy duo mitchell and webb  the bit opens on a bunker with two ss officers  one walks worriedly over to the other   ldquo hans  i rsquo ve just noticed something  rdquo  the nazi says nervously   ldquo have you looked at our caps recently  rdquo        ldquo our caps  rdquo      ldquo the badges on our caps  have you looked at them  rdquo        ldquo what  no  i don rsquo t hellip  rdquo      ldquo they rsquo ve got skulls on them  rdquo  the nazi interrupts   ldquo have you noticed that our caps have actually got little pictures of skulls on them  rdquo  he pauses  looking anxious  then he asks the question that rsquo s become immortalized in meme form   ldquo hans hellip  are we the baddies  rdquo     trump rsquo s nihilistic war on iran is not the first disaster that rsquo s made me think the united states might be a baddie  my first time cursing our government was when george w  bush officially killed the kyoto climate treaty  as a freshman in high school  i marched against the war in iraq  i rsquo m used to thinking of the united states as a dangerous actor on the world stage     and yet  that was never all we were  there were always redeeming qualities  these counterpoints are exactly what the trump regime has spent the last year stripping away mdash ending lifesaving international aid programs  clawing back the inflation reduction act rsquo s climate investments  blowing up any remaining commitments to democratic principles and international law     and then came the war on iran  there rsquo s just no way to tell a story in which a character launches a surprise attack on an elementary school during a busy school day mdash tearing apart tiny bodies that were just hours earlier hugging parents and grandparents and siblings mdash and not have that character be the baddie       in my algorithmic circles  there was a genre of social media post that would pop up every few months during the course of israel rsquo s war on gaza  someone would share a picture of israelis enjoying themselves mdash maybe a clip of a busy tel aviv beach full of good looking young people sunbathing or playing matkot  and then someone else would repost the image with some version of the caption   ldquo this is the zone of interest  rdquo  a reference to the oscar winning 2024 film by jonathan glazer     the zone of interest depicts rudolf hoss  the commandant of the auschwitz concentration camp  and the disquietingly banal domestic life he and his family enjoyed in their flower filled estate located just outside the walls of the nazi rsquo s most infamous extermination camp  at various points in the movie  we see telltale signs of the horrors being committed next door mdash a plume of crematoria smoke visible through the bedroom window  a stream of ash flowing into the river in which rudolf and his kids are paddling  a distant rat tat tat of gunfire on the other side of the garden wall that only the family rsquo s dog seems to notice  but throughout the film  the focus of the camera remains squarely on the hoss family and the cheerful life they insist on living in the shadow of humanity rsquo s most evil crime     it rsquo s a disturbing movie to watch  and intentionally so  as glazer said in his oscar acceptance speech   ldquo all our choices were made to reflect and confront us in the present mdash not to say   lsquo look what they did then rsquo   rather   lsquo look what we do now  rsquo  rdquo     though glazer was clear mdash and courageous in his moral clarity mdash about the applicability of his film to the genocide in gaza  i always had a conflicted reaction when i rsquo d see those  ldquo crowd of happy israelis   zone of interest rdquo  posts  on the one hand  part of me would think   ldquo well  wait  some of these people probably oppose what rsquo s happening in gaza  are they really not allowed to enjoy a day in the sun because their government is committing war crimes that they rsquo re not in a position to stop  rdquo  but another part of me would recoil at this joyful embrace of life   ldquo if my country were directly committing atrocities  i hope i rsquo d at least have the good grace to be deeply depressed about it  rdquo  i rsquo d think     well  here we are     of course  we shouldn rsquo t make false equivalencies  what rsquo s happening in iran right now is not  or at least not yet  as damnable as what happened in gaza  and none of these abominations even come close  in quantitative terms  to the catastrophe of the holocaust  but the kaleidoscope of nightmares that our government is conjuring today mdash the children attempting suicide in federally run concentration camps  the hundreds of thousands of deaths caused by the shutdown of usaid  the unadulterated malevolence of white house propaganda videos that intersperse actual kill shot footage from iran with clips from braveheart and gladiator mdash is enough to make the united states of a kind with depravities of the past     so the question remains  are we obligated to at least have the good grace to be depressed  is it acceptable to embrace happiness when surrounded by so much evil     there rsquo s a short story by anton chekhov that grapples with precisely these questions  the story   ldquo gooseberries  rdquo  has a very simple plot  two men out hunting are forced by a rainstorm to seek shelter at a friend rsquo s estate  they arrive just as the friend is bathing in his pond  all three have a swim  then  while they are lounging together after dinner  one of the visitors  ivan  argues to his friends that the embrace of happiness in a world of suffering is wrong     in this passage  chekhov has ivan deliver a profound statement       ldquo we see those who go to the market to buy food  eat during the day  sleep during the night  who talk their nonsense  get married  grow old  complacently drag their dead to the cemetery  but we don rsquo t see or hear those who suffer  and the horrors of life go on somewhere behind the scenes  everything is peaceful and quiet and only mute statistics protest  so many people gone out of their minds  so many gallons of vodka drunk  so many children dead from malnutrition  and such a state of things is evidently necessary  obviously the happy man is at ease only because the unhappy ones bear their burdens in silence  and if there were not this silence  happiness would be impossible  it is a general hypnosis  behind the door of every contented  happy man there ought to be someone standing with a little hammer and continually reminding him with a knock that there are unhappy people  that however happy he may be  life will sooner or later show him its claws  and trouble will come to him mdash illness  poverty  losses  and then no one will see or hear him  just as now he neither sees nor hears others  but there is no man with a hammer  the happy man lives at his ease  faintly fluttered by small daily cares  like an aspen in the wind mdash and all is well  rdquo      so what does it mean to realize your country is the baddie  what are the obligations of a citizen of such a nation  obviously there rsquo s a responsibility to do what we can to oppose the vile acts of our state mdash to vote against our current government  to protest its war  to work to hold our leaders accountable  but what about in between the moments when we can take useful action  my immediate question mdash standing there in the woods  caught between the nightmarish fact of those murdered children and the reality of my own kids getting farther and farther up the trail ahead mdash was how can one justify living a full and happy life in such a morally intolerable context     what rsquo s perhaps most interesting to me  reading this passage in the year 2026  is that we actually do have the option now mdash in a way chekhov never could have imagined while writing those words in 1898 mdash of enlisting our own personal man with a hammer  in the form of x or instagram or tiktok  depending on your algorithm  scrolling across these social media platforms can be a continual reminder that there are unhappy people  that our government is blowing up children and raining cancer down on civilians and reveling in that violence and destruction  meanwhile  i rsquo m out here enjoying the fresh air on a hike  looking for a good spot for the family to picnic     what might chekhov have thought of such doomscrolling  certainly one could read the above passage and confidently conclude that here is a russian literary genius firmly on team  ldquo be depressed  rdquo  but in  ldquo gooseberries  rdquo  it rsquo s not actually clear what chekhov rsquo s position on ivan rsquo s man with a hammer strategy really is  i mentioned that before we get to the big moralizing speech at the heart of his story  chekhov rsquo s three characters bathe in a pond mdash a scene that the author george saunders named his lovely 2021 book a swim in a pond in the rain after  and who do you think chekhov has enjoying that swim the most      ivan went outside  plunged into the water with a splash  and swam in the rain  flinging his arms out wide  he stirred the water into waves which set the white lilies bobbing up and down  he swam to the very middle of the millpond and dived  and came up a minute later in another place  and swam on  and kept on diving  trying to touch the bottom   ldquo by god  rdquo  he kept repeating delightedly   ldquo by god  rdquo  he swam to the mill  talked to the peasants there  then returned and lay on his back in the middle of the pond  turning his face to the rain  the others were dressed and ready to go  but he still went on swimming and diving   ldquo by god  rdquo  he kept exclaiming   ldquo lord  have mercy on me  rdquo        well now  pond ivan doesn rsquo t sound like a guy who believes that embracing joy in a world of suffering is all bad  chekhov seems to say through his character rsquo s conflicted relationship with happiness that yes  there rsquo s a connection between ignoring suffering and maintaining it  and likewise between the embrace of happiness and the avoidance of the unhappy mdash but at the same time  it rsquo s a wonderful thing to jump in a pond and dive to the bottom and lie on your back while the rain falls  and why should we deny ourselves that experience     so how do we reconcile these contradictory feelings  the easy answer is moderation mdash a middle way that steers clear of extremes on either end  but i rsquo m not sure moderation is really what this moment calls for  we should feel sadness and anger at the actions of our government mdash and honestly there should be an extremity to those feelings  the horrors being committed in our name merit mdash demand  even mdash some extremes  at the same time  unrelenting misery will not motivate action mdash and action should be the ultimate goal here  the hero in the zone of interest isn rsquo t a nazi who  unlike the hosses  has the good grace to be depressed  rather  it rsquo s a polish girl mdash based on a real person  alexandra bistron kotodziejczyk  whom glazer dedicated his oscar to mdash that the film shows sneaking up to auschwitz in the dead of night  hiding apples across a worksite for the starving prisoners to find the next day  in glazer rsquo s words       ldquo that small act of resistance  the simple  almost holy act of leaving food  is crucial because it is the one point of light  i really thought i couldn rsquo t make the film at that point  i kept ringing my producer  jim  and saying   lsquo i rsquo m getting out  i can rsquo t do this  it rsquo s just too dark  rsquo  it felt impossible to just show the utter darkness  so i was looking for the light somewhere  and i found it in her  she is the force for good  rdquo      the objective for each of us is to be a force for good  to create some light in the darkness  perhaps  as glazer found  that requires finding some light for ourselves  to keep things from getting too dark  maybe it even justifies an intense embrace of those lighter moments mdash a jump in the pond  as chekhov envisioned     which brings me back once more to our hike  standing paralyzed on the snow dusted trail  scrolling  i didn rsquo t look up from my phone  even as my 5 year old turned around to shout   ldquo hurry up  dad  rdquo  my country had just murdered dozens of children  now was not the time for family fun     a minute later  he shouted again  even louder   ldquo dad  it rsquo s picnic time  rdquo  and this time the words punched through the fog in my head  indeed  my stomach grumbled  a reminder that as sad as i was  i was also hungry  i dropped my phone back into my pocket and hurried up the trail  because my son was right  of course  it was picnic time<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/are-we-the-baddies/">What Are Your Obligations When Your Country Is the Villain?</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Mon, 30 Mar 2026 15:43:53 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/are-we-the-baddies/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Bernie Sanders: “This War Must End Immediately!”]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/bernie-sanders-no-kings-speech-iran/]]></link>
		<author>John Nichols</author>
	<date>Mar 30, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The senator delivered a powerful message on Iran at the No Kings Rally in Minnesota.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["The senator delivered a powerful message on iran at the no kings rally in minnesota      bernie sanders speaks during the  ldquo no kings rdquo  rally concert at the minnesota state capitol on march 28  2026       st  paul mdash bruce springsteen closed his remarkable performance at the no kings rally on the steps of the minnesota state capitol saturday with a bold cry of  ldquo no kings  no war  rdquo     he was not alone       the minnesota rally  like so many of the more than 3 300 no kings events that drew at least 8 million americans nationwide to pickets  marches  and demonstrations saturday  featured loud and clear opposition to donald trump rsquo s wars in general mdash and  in particular  to the president rsquo s disastrous assault on iran     public citizen president rob weissman set the tone for the day  telling the cheering rallygoers   ldquo we have to persist to end this illegal  unconstitutional  and devastating war on iran mdash and make sure that congress does not give a penny more to pay for or extend this war  rdquo  when he chanted   ldquo no kings  no ice  no war  democracy is what we rsquo re fighting for   rdquo  there came a thunderous echo from the crowd   the minnesota state patrol estimated a turnout of 100 000  while organizers with indivisible twin cities said it was closer to 200 000  whatever the precise number  it was widely described as the largest protest rally in minnesota history      those who attended the st  paul rally and others like it nationwide had plenty to protest  from the abuses of operation metro surge mdash the trump administration rsquo s assault on civil society that saw armed and masked federal agents flood into minneapolis and other minnesota cities mdash to trump rsquo s broader anti immigrant  anti workers  anti ndash civil rights  anti ndash civil liberties agenda  but the war with iran  which has metastasized into a deadly regional conflict with daunting international economic implications  became a vital theme of the latest no kings day rallies     in st  paul  signs with the message  ldquo healthcare not warfare rdquo  mdash distributed by social security works to highlight the administration rsquo s warped priorities mdash were ubiquitous  homemade signs announced   ldquo fund education  not war  rdquo   ldquo no more war  dump trump  rdquo  and  ldquo the epstein files aren rsquo t in iran  rdquo  speaker after speaker  performer after performer  expressed opposition to trump rsquo s misguided militarism        ldquo under the so called  lsquo anti war president  rsquo  we have now seen the launching of military operations in iran and venezuela  and in ecuador  they are floating an illegal takeover of places like cuba and greenland mdash like it is some kind of real estate deal  rdquo  said us representative ilhan omar  the minnesota democrat invoked the bombing of the shajareh tayyebeh girls rsquo  school in minab  iran  which left at least 175 dead on the first day of the war  and said   ldquo trump rsquo s idea  liberating women in iran is to bomb and murder school children  rdquo     saturday rsquo s most detailed comments on the war came from the main speaker in st  paul  us senator bernie sanders  i vt      the two time presidential candidate ripped apart trump rsquo s agenda  saying   ldquo it is an orwellian vision which says that we must live in a constant state of fear  that we must always have an enemy and that we must always be at war  it is a vision which says that we have unlimited amounts of money for bombs and guns and killing  but never enough money to feed our children  provide affordable housing or enable our parents to retire with dignity  rdquo      https   www youtube com watch v koib56qvvwe     sanders was scathing in his analysis of us militarism   ldquo let rsquo s be honest  rdquo  he declared   ldquo the american people were lied to about the war in vietnam  we were lied to about the war in iraq  and we are being lied to today about the war in iran  this war must end immediately  rdquo     sanders rsquo s fierce denunciations of the war were interrupted  repeatedly  by thunderous applause        ldquo one month ago  trump and his partner  israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu  started a war with iran  this war is unconstitutional  trump did not seek or receive authorization from congress  this war is in violation of international law  one sovereign nation cannot simply go about attacking another sovereign nation for any reason it chooses  rdquo  said sanders  who continued       since this war began  13 american soldiers have been killed and hundreds have been wounded mdash including another 12 yesterday  in iran  nearly 2 000 civilians have been killed and many more wounded  and 498 schools have been attacked by american and israeli missiles     in lebanon  more than 1 000 people are dead and more than one million lebanese people mdash 15  of their population mdash have been displaced from their homes  in israel  20 people have been killed and over 5 000 have been wounded     in the west bank  israeli vigilantes are burning down homes and killing palestinians     at a time when gas prices are soaring  when many americans cannot afford the basic necessities of life  it is estimated that this war has already cost us a trillion dollars     at a time when the american people are politically divided  there is one issue that is bringing us together  conservatives  moderates and progressives are speaking out in unison  end this war         ldquo end this war  end this war  rdquo  chanted the crowd  as sanders promised to fight trump administration demands for another  200 billion to fund the war and said that  ldquo supplemental appropriation for the war in iran must be defeated  rdquo       the chants and the cheers grew even louder as the senator joined his critique of trump to a critique of netanyahu   ldquo i will be forcing a vote on legislation to block the sale of nearly a billion dollars in weapons to the israeli military for bombs and bulldozers  rdquo  said sanders   ldquo a nation that has committed genocide in gaza does not need more military support from american taxpayers  we must block the bombs and block the bulldozers  rdquo<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/bernie-sanders-no-kings-speech-iran/">Bernie Sanders: “This War Must End Immediately!”</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Mon, 30 Mar 2026 15:13:25 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/bernie-sanders-no-kings-speech-iran/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Pete Hegseth’s Holy War Is an Unholy Nightmare]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/pete-hegseth-iran-holy-war/]]></link>
		<author>Jeet Heer</author>
	<date>Mar 30, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The defense secretary is talking about Iran in bloodcurdling tones of religious extremism—and underscoring how much of a dangerous fanatic he is.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["The defense secretary is talking about iran in bloodcurdling tones of religious extremism mdash and underscoring how much of a dangerous fanatic he is      pete hegseth speaks during a news conference at the pentagon  on march 19  2026       at a worship service at the pentagon on wednesday  secretary of defense pete hegseth  who likes to style himself the secretary of war  delivered a prayer that was bloodcurdling in its extremist belligerence and invocation of religion to justify mass slaughter       at one point in the prayer  hegseth asked god to      ldquo give  wisdom in every decision  endurance for the trial ahead  unbreakable unity  and overwhelming violence of action against those who deserve no mercy  preserve their lives  sharpen their resolve  and let justice be executed swiftly and without remorse that evil may be driven back and wicked souls delivered to the eternal damnation prepared for them hellip   we ask these things with bold confidence in the mighty and powerful name of jesus christ  king over all kings and amen  rdquo      perhaps the best thing that can be said about this prayer is that  although it was delivered in a sectarian spirit  it might yet have an ecumenical effect  since it has something to offend just about everyone      https   www youtube com watch v erz6a5wmy00     secular americans and those who belong to non christian religions  of course  will be rightly angered by the fact that hegseth violated long standing norms that prayers in public services should avoid proselytizing for a particular faith  but the the iran war is massively unpopular with most americans  it has also seen the us commit horrific war crimes  including the bombing of an elementary school at minab that killed at least 175 people  mostly children  many  or quite possibly most  christians will be affronted at the idea that their faith should be used so crudely to justify such violence       pope leo xiv condemned war in a palm sunday mass in the strongest terms  in his homily  leo said   ldquo brothers and sisters  this is our god  jesus  king of peace  who rejects war  whom no one can use to justify war  he does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war  but rejects them  rdquo  the contrast between the pope rsquo s words and hegseth rsquo s prayer could not be greater     beyond theological objections  there are obvious pragmatic reasons why a defense secretary shouldn rsquo t utter a sectarian prayer  the us army has many non christians of all stripes  so hegseth is in effect alienating them even as he is sending them off to war  further  hegseth rsquo s prayer is a great gift to the islamic republic of iran  whose leaders are claiming to defend the muslim world from  ldquo the great satan rdquo  of the united states  it lends credence to the idea that the us is launching a new crusade  one that muslims must unite to fend off  with us military bases and embassies in the middle eastern countries already under siege and allies such as qatar and oman openly pondering the reliability of the us as an ally  hegseth is helping splinter an already fraying war effort     the fact that hegseth cast aside prudence in making his pugnacious prayer is testimony to how much of a true believer he is mdash not only in his particular brand of born again christianity but also in far right identity politics  in his 2024 book the war on warriors  hegseth argued that liberal culture in the form of dei had destroyed the military  making white men ashamed of joining the army  according to hegseth  too many military leaders were  ldquo whores to wokesters  rdquo   ldquo the left captured the military quickly  rdquo  he claimed   ldquo and we must reclaim it at a faster pace  rdquo  his anti woke agenda included getting rid of dei and purging the military of trans soldiers     the washington post reports that hegseth rsquo s strident and aggressive prayer is part of a larger attempt to reshape the military to fit his own brand of muscular evangelical christianity and right wing politics      every month at the pentagon  hegseth hosts evangelical worship services that legal experts say are unprecedented  his social media profile and public comments routinely espouse his understanding of christianity  which is one that would dominate american life and cast those who disagree with him as god rsquo s enemies  he has brought clergy from his small christian denomination to preach at the pentagon  including a prominent pastor who says women shouldn rsquo t have the right to vote        hegseth has been working hard to make the pentagon a bastion for straight  white men  as michael klare noted in the nation in january of 2025  hegseth rsquo s earliest move as defense secretary included purging prominent black and female officers  this purge continues  on friday  the new york times reported that hegseth was blocking the promotion of four officers slated to become one star generals  two of the officers are black and two are women       the newspaper also recounted a troubling incident that occurred last summer involving ricky buria  hegseth rsquo s chief of staff and army secretary daniel p  driscoll      mr  buria chastised the army secretary for selecting maj  gen  antoinette r  gant  a combat engineer who served in iraq and afghanistan  to take command of the military district of washington  said three current and former defense and administration officials familiar with the exchange  the command provides security and performs ceremonial duties in the nation rsquo s capital  and its commander often appears alongside the president at arlington national cemetery     mr  buria told mr  driscoll that president trump would not want to stand next to a black female officer at military events  the officials said      hegseth rsquo s combination of religious fanaticism and right wing grievance politics is dangerous both at home and abroad  as seamus malekafzali persuasively argued in the nation  the us is losing the war in iran  the only path forward for ending this catastrophe is a negotiated settlement that accedes to iran rsquo s desire for long term security guarantees  but neither donald trump  whose ego is heavily invested in the idea that he rsquo s a winner  nor hegseth is well equipped to make the compromises necessary  in particular  the fact that hegseth sees the world in manichaean terms means he rsquo ll not be willing to make deals with forces he sees as metaphysically and categorically evil     domestically  by making the military into a maga force  hegseth is exacerbating the culture wars in ways that could lead to internal strife  speaking to the washington post  mikey weinstein of the military religious freedom foundation  a group that promotes the separation of church and state in the military  said   ldquo one side is very pro maga and the other is not  if you have something like another jan  6  now we rsquo re looking at a military that will start fighting itself  it rsquo s a recipe for a civil war with military on both sides  rdquo  hegseth rsquo s holy war is shaping up to be an unholy nightmare<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/pete-hegseth-iran-holy-war/">Pete Hegseth’s Holy War Is an Unholy Nightmare</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Mon, 30 Mar 2026 13:55:52 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/pete-hegseth-iran-holy-war/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Courage: Dolores Huerta]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/courage-dolores-huerta/]]></link>
		<author>Andrea Arroyo</author>
	<date>Mar 30, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[Huerta has stated that she is a survivor of abuse by César Chávez, amid broader claims by other women within the movement.]]></teaser> 
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	<description>
	<![CDATA["Check out all installments in the oppart series<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/courage-dolores-huerta/">Courage: Dolores Huerta</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Mon, 30 Mar 2026 12:30:20 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/courage-dolores-huerta/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[I Was AIPAC’s Number 1 Target—and I Beat Them. Here’s How to Do It.]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/daniel-biss-aipac-elections/]]></link>
		<author>Daniel Biss</author>
	<date>Mar 30, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>During his primary campaign, Daniel Biss called out AIPAC repeatedly, through the press, paid advertising, and in living rooms and public places across the district. It worked.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["During his primary campaign  daniel biss called out aipac repeatedly  through the press  paid advertising  and in living rooms and public places across the district  it worked      evanston mayor daniel biss speaks to supporters after celebrating the democratic nomination in the ninth congressional district race during an election night watch party on march 17  2026  in evanston  illinois       when i started running for congress  i kept hearing the same advice  stop the american israel public affairs committee  aipac  from coming after me  if i failed  they rsquo d spend millions of dollars attacking me  and i rsquo d lose     and  sure enough  i failed  aipac did spend more than  5 million supporting my opponent and attacking me  in fact  they spent more money attacking me than any other candidate in illinois primary  but i won  and our playbook can give progressives the tools to fight back and beat aipac rsquo s dark money       i was aipac rsquo s top target for two reasons  first  i refused to back their hard line agenda  i support peace  self determination  and justice for all mdash that rsquo s why i endorsed the block the bombs act and have called for the recognition of palestinian statehood  these steps are necessary starting points if we are serious about the dignity and human rights of palestinians       second  i rsquo m the grandson of holocaust survivors  my mother is israeli  my extended family lives in israel  aipac knew that they couldn rsquo t dismiss me as anti israel or antisemitic     aipac rsquo s extreme policy agenda of unconditional military aid to israel  even as it perpetrates an ongoing horror in gaza  is indefensible  that rsquo s why instead of trying to win a policy argument  they prefer to silence and marginalize their critics  but because of my own story and identity  they won rsquo t be able to do that to me     instead of playing into aipac rsquo s worldview  my position acknowledged the complexity and competing narratives surrounding these issues  i spoke plainly about what i believe as a jewish person and rooted those beliefs in my own family history  i knew jewish voters aren rsquo t a monolith  and that they were looking for thoughtfulness and nuance from their representative  voters felt  as i do  that it is utterly incoherent for democrats mdash or anyone mdash to call israel rsquo s conduct unacceptable but then decline to use the economic and diplomatic tools at our disposal to try to change it       aipac knows that they are toxic  which is why they went to great lengths to hide both their identity and their agenda throughout this race  they created shell organizations  brand new super pacs with benign sounding names like  ldquo elect chicago women  rdquo  they exploited loopholes in campaign finance law to avoid disclosing their donors until after the election     aipac raised millions for their candidate  while spending millions more through these shell super pacs  but declined to formally  ldquo endorse rdquo  anyone mdash a distinction which meant nothing  except that it allowed them to tell reporters that they hadn rsquo t endorsed a candidate in the race  the point wasn rsquo t to effectively hide what they were doing  the object was to create enough confusion to distract from the underlying reality     their ads didn rsquo t mention israel  palestine  or anything about foreign affairs at all  they didn rsquo t even try to defend their right wing positions     my strategy to beat all this back started with my confidence that if voters understood what aipac was doing  they would recoil     i called aipac out clearly and repeatedly  through the press  paid advertising  and in living rooms and public places across the district  i made sure voters knew three things  who was funding my opponent  aipac and trump donors   why they were doing so  to get a representative who would vote for no strings attached military aid to israel   and how hard aipac was working to conceal it       our campaign did this day after day  relentlessly finding new and different ways to highlight aipac rsquo s activities  each new piece of information mdash whether it was a statement by my opponent  a development overseas  a campaign finance disclosure  or something else mdash became an opportunity to hit back against aipac and tie them to my opponent  we ran a television ad calling attention to my opponent rsquo s aipac support  we didn rsquo t shy away from the issue or dumb it down for our voters  we knew and trusted that they were paying close attention  once voters recognized what was happening  aipac rsquo s candidate saw her favorability collapse  on primary day  she came in a distant third       this is a playbook for beating aipac  first  stand firm in your values  voters recognize when a candidate is speaking with conviction about a tough issue  even doing so with nuance on an intensely controversial subject  second  call out aipac directly mdash but don rsquo t just name them  explain who they are  what they rsquo re doing  and why  draw bright lines connecting aipac and their affiliated entities to their chosen candidates  do this day after day after day     and finally  do not try to negotiate with aipac  even if it rsquo s to keep them out of your race  if you have taken a position against unconditional military aid to benjamin netanyahu rsquo s government mdash aipac rsquo s litmus test mdash there is nothing you can do to stop the attacks  and aipac will weaponize any conversations you have with them against you  selectively leaking details to friendly media to paint you as a hypocrite  and undercut you with your own base     all that money is intimidating  but it can be beaten  if the electorate truly understands where it rsquo s coming from  every ad aipac buys can do its preferred candidate more harm than good     i am certain that at this very moment there are candidates across the country being confronted with the same choice i was given last year  get aipac to stand down or lose  we now know there rsquo s a better path  be yourself  tell voters the truth about what you rsquo re up against  and win<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/daniel-biss-aipac-elections/">I Was AIPAC’s Number 1 Target—and I Beat Them. Here’s How to Do It.</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Mon, 30 Mar 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/daniel-biss-aipac-elections/</guid>
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  <item>
	 <title><![CDATA[The Enigma of Gertrude Stein]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/gertrude-stein-afterlife-wade-review/]]></link>
		<author>David Schurman Wallace</author>
	<date>Mar 30, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Why do we misunderstand one of modernism’s great writers? </p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<description>
	<![CDATA["Why do we misunderstand one of modernism rsquo s great writers         no one understands gertrude stein  for this  we should all give thanks  it is almost a cliche to emphasize her work rsquo s difficulty  but her writing remains imposing  both due to its sheer volume mdash her unpublished writings were originally collected in eight volumes  to say nothing of the numerous books published during her life mdash and its style       the style  of course  is what made her both famed and ridiculed  striking out from conventional narrative and often even the conventional meanings of words  if you ever find yourself absorbed in stein  there is almost a natural desire to imitate her rhythms  nobody ever entirely nails her peculiarities  though  the flat  dry vocabulary  the off kilter blend of abstraction and table talk  and perhaps most of all the repetition mdash sentences that extend themselves and double back and fill up space with their insistence  as francesca wade quotes stein in her new biography  gertrude stein  an afterlife   ldquo repeating is the whole of living  and by repeating comes understanding  and understanding is to some the most important part of living  rdquo  maybe the reverse maxim here is that we can never repeat enough  so we can never really understand     stein rsquo s work staked out the boundaries of what was possible for writers to do with language in the 20th century  our idea of the literary avant garde is unthinkable without her  understandably  stein also wanted credit for this innovation  to be seen as a central figure  as she frequently claimed she was  and not simply someone expanding the margins  readers  however  have been more ambivalent  and to this day stein is often considered a catalyst or foil for other  more celebrated male moderns  picasso  hemingway   an interesting experiment that perhaps need not be repeated     t s  eliot warned that if later writers did copy her  a  ldquo new barbarian age rdquo  of literature would follow  a handful of stein rsquo s books are still widely read today  the autobiography of alice b  toklas  tender buttons  three lives   but the majority are not  much of stein remains undiscovered  at least for the common reader  even as she figures as a known quantity in the imagination   ldquo a rose is a rose is a rose  rdquo   ldquo there is no there there  rdquo  and so on  despite her reputation for inscrutability  few modern writers had such a knack for catchphrases that could be plucked from their work     curiosity and mockery garnered stein attention and eventually celebrity  which she harnessed  transforming herself into a public personality  she presented the image of the brash american abroad  the witty ringleader of the mythological parisian salon with her partner  alice b  toklas  always hiding just behind her in the shadows  she drove fast  wore monkish robes  and walked her poodle basket along the seine  biographies are made for lives like hers  perhaps because stein satisfies two desires inherent in the form  gossip and controversy  she agitates the old  inevitable question of how the life interlocks with the writing  and perhaps the dangerous biographical question of the life overtaking the work   after all  shouldn rsquo t we love the work first to want to know the life   her experiences had everything to do with it   ldquo facts of life make literature  rdquo  she wrote  while also denying that the texts meant anything beyond the words on the page  a real understanding of the two poles remains blocked  elusive  and so all the more intriguing  but why try to hold together both knowledge mdash one service a good biography can offer us mdash and the mystery of incomprehension  as stein wrote   ldquo nobody knows what you mean no matter what you mean  nor how clearly you mean what you mean  rdquo  perhaps it is a testament to her greatness that  within her fame  she can be as little known as she is     wade rsquo s biography approaches this gap between fact and reputation with a formal decision  dividing her account of stein rsquo s life into two halves mdash  ldquo life rdquo  and  ldquo afterlife  rdquo  wade rsquo s own sense of the two parts is instructive        the first is the narrative she crafted carefully in her autobiographies  lectures and interviews  where her long struggle to find readers leads triumphantly to success  hellip  the second  filling in some of the first version rsquo s deliberate gaps  is a story that could only be told posthumously  taking account of the archive rsquo s secrets  the unpublished texts  the private jottings  the people mdash mostly women mdash stein purported to have forgotten  the two stories mirror and complement one another  one cannot be told without the other      from the outset  this view casts some doubt on the first account  if it needs to be adjusted later  then we know from the start that we shouldn rsquo t trust it completely  still  it rsquo s a charming picture  the book rsquo s opening half is a tight  controlled narrative of stein rsquo s life  it covers all the major moments  beginning with her california childhood and the creation of the wealth that would largely sustain her literary career  stein rsquo s brother helped create san francisco rsquo s cable car system   then on to radcliffe and the important work she would do in william james rsquo s psychology lab  where wade convincingly draws connections between the experiments stein ran and her later interest in spontaneous writing  after a failed bout with medical school  where her supervisors discouraged women students  stein exited for paris and the bohemian milieu  surging upward and scarcely looking back     these early years are of particular interest  as it becomes clear that stein rsquo s narrative of her own life became more controlled as she developed as a writer mdash the autobiographical is always near to hand in stein  even at her most abstract  an account of the all important meeting and merger with toklas remains sketchy  almost certainly by stein rsquo s choice   but the reader is introduced to the intermediary figure of annette rosenshine  a cousin of toklas rsquo s  ldquo whom stein saw daily for psychological interrogation rdquo  in paris  stein seems to have mildly tortured rosenshine  perhaps as the friend of a potential love interest  then dropped her completely as the relationship with toklas blossomed  neither biographer nor reader ever gets to quite touch the quick of this famous partnership  but it lends a sense of how important omission is to the construction of the persona     once stein is settled at 27 rue de fleurus  her famous residence  and determined to produce great works of literature  the narrative flows from one book to the next  all shepherded by toklas rsquo s devoted typing and editing  the hunt for fame was dogged  and then suddenly it came  these are the iconic scenes of stein  the witty talk and status jockeying of the salon  the volunteer ambulance driving in the first world war  the opera four saints in three acts  and her triumphant american tour  the amusing quips in interviews and on the lecture circuit  the idyllic life in the south of france  the second world war and the german occupation  complete with a flight from paris with a cezanne and a picasso stashed in her car   and the illness that claimed her soon after the armistice mdash it rsquo s a life so full that it rsquo s almost surprising there were things to hide       with what level of skepticism  then  should we take this story as re presented by wade  it rsquo s hard to say that it is exactly stein rsquo s version of things mdash after all  she had already written several accounts  most famously the autobiography of alice b  toklas  1932   the commercial breakthrough that gave her the taste of success she craved but also triggered further doubts about her ability  written almost as a joke at the reader rsquo s expense  it quickly came to overshadow all her previous labors  to stein rsquo s chagrin  she freely admitted that she hungered for adulation  and wade rsquo s biography suggests that the pr routine  while thoroughly enjoyed by stein  was also secondary to the pursuit of serious writing and the effort to get it into the hands of readers  stein took considerable trouble in her life to get her work published  whether it was cultivating important friends to advocate for her  or else working with toklas to self publish the less accessible work in her plain editions imprint  the first half of wade rsquo s book spends time on these doubts and frustrations  along with the other messy tangles of life that stein preferred to conceal     two controversies in particular have  over time  been integrated into stein rsquo s legend  the first is her early relationship with the bluestocking may bookstaver  a woman stein met and befriended while she was a medical student at johns hopkins  entering a coterie of modern lesbian women for the first time  stein fell hard for bookstaver  and wrote a manuscript that explored her yearning in a love triangle in which she was ultimately the loser  the manuscript remained in the drawer  as with many of stein rsquo s projects  when the work was dug up and given to toklas  it triggered jealousy and conflict in their seemingly airtight relationship mdash after all  it disturbed the public image of the pair as perfectly bound together  inseparable  wade rsquo s biography  in both halves  traces the complicated path to publication of a text ahead of its time         the second controversy  perhaps more unsettling to the contemporary reader  is stein rsquo s friendship with the french americanist scholar bernard fay  who went on to become a rather sinister operative of the vichy regime mdash his particular interest seems to have been executing freemasons mdash and who protected stein in southern france during the war and insulated her from the horrors of the holocaust  accusations of collaboration have become a tarnished spot on stein rsquo s legacy  and it is still unclear how much she knew and how naive she let herself be     the second half of wade rsquo s book takes an epistemological turn  working to show how the myth of stein was born in all of its complications  as parul seghal put it recently in an essay on contemporary biographers   ldquo the biography of today recoils from stuffing its subject into a straitjacket of interpretation  with all contradictions smoothly reconciled into a unified self  instead we find an emphasis on the fragility and provisionality of identity  on performance  on motive being mysterious and many tentacled  rdquo  while this is hardly a new idea mdash digging in the archives among the scheming biographers helped make the career of janet malcolm  for one  with gertrude stein as one of her subjects  no less  mdash it speaks to a gradual change in the writing of biography  both formally and in sensibility  biographies have become more self consciously literary  with some of them self indulgently leaning toward memoir  presuming the author is on an equal footing with their subject  and more wary of promising a complete picture of a life  wade rsquo s book is somewhere between public facing and academic  seeking to bolster an authoritative account of a life with deeper questions of process  how  exactly  did we learn about bookstaver or fay  someone had to do the legwork of finding out  wade likens it to a kind of detective work mdash stein rsquo s favorite kind of fiction to read     much of the  ldquo afterlife rdquo  section concerns the battle to secure the writer rsquo s reputation after her death in 1946 from stomach cancer  stein rsquo s friends and disciples edge toward center stage  notably the writer and impresario carl van vechten  a somewhat controversial figure himself  he falls somewhere between booster and tokenizer of the harlem renaissance  another of his causes   van vechten struggled with the burden of acting as literary executor  an unglamorous task for someone who would rather have lingered in the spotlight  next came the scholars  who quickly began entering stein rsquo s archives at yale to chase the enigma  the most notable of these is leon katz  who was memorably depicted by malcolm in an essay for the new yorker that was collected into two lives  her own attempt at dissecting the stein myth  katz is the spitting image of the diligent yet diffident scholar  brilliant  eccentric  and ultimately avoidant of the spotlight  given unprecedented access  he delayed for decades in publishing his work  infuriating his colleagues and becoming a minor enigma himself     gertrude stein and  alice b  toklas  1937      it was katz who discovered the apparently forgotten notebooks that stein kept while she was writing her biggest and most forbidding novel  the making of americans  1925  though probably finished in 1911   widely considered to be a landmark in stein rsquo s work mdash she considered it her masterpiece mdash not just because of its length  my edition is 925 pages  and supposed impenetrability  the making of americans was a milestone in stein rsquo s journey of ambition  it is both a rearranged account of stein rsquo s family history and a defiant challenge to the tradition of the 19th century novel  beginning with two families and spinning itself out into an attempted history of everyone who ever lived  the making is like no novel that has existed before or since  in the notebooks  katz found complex diagrams describing and linking together the many people stein knew and attempting to classify them into different types of fundamental character mdash perhaps the residue of her medical training  influenced by otto weininger rsquo s sex and character  a popular psychological text of the time that allowed stein to view herself as a  ldquo masculine rdquo  genius  the notebooks are a window into the creation of a work that certainly was not written  ldquo automatically rdquo   a process of spontaneity often associated with her   but with much effort and deliberation  they also provided ample biographical grist for a scholar to dig into  as stein was essentially giving up the clues as to which character was based on whom     these insights were monumental for the cloistered field of stein studies  but for laymen  katz rsquo s research also shows the limits of biographical understanding  what does it tell us that a character in the making was based on a cousin of stein rsquo s  we don rsquo t know that cousin  and we rsquo re not really interested in her  it rsquo s enough to know that stein was trying to draw precise insights from her acquaintances  an effort closer to what we might call realism than we might otherwise acknowledge  wade rsquo s investigation helps us tease out the specifics here  and to try to think about when and why background makes the text richer  does it help to know that the references in stein rsquo s erotic writing to  ldquo having a cow rdquo  have to do with the regularity of toklas rsquo s bowel movements  honestly  i think it does  but it is to be expected mdash and perhaps it is even a source of pleasure mdash that source and signification can never line back up completely     the  ldquo afterlife rdquo  does have its hero  the indomitable alice b  toklas  she is a somewhat recessive figure in the first part of wade rsquo s biography  partly by designation in the myth  but she emerges after stein rsquo s death as a living testament to her  fiercely guarding her turf  toklas rsquo s story is a bit disheartening  as it is one of gradual diminishment  as her house grows colder  she is unable to heat the rooms of the apartment on the meager allowance provided in stein rsquo s will   toklas grows forgetful  and the cubist paintings that provided the background to this parallel life are taken away for safekeeping under a court order by stein rsquo s relatives  katz managed to ingratiate himself with toklas and recorded their conversations   his notebooks of these conversations seem to have been a spur for wade rsquo s book   toklas rsquo s account of their life together may be no more reliable than any other  but it also humanizes stein in a way that no other perspective can  in a letter after stein rsquo s death  she writes   ldquo i can rsquo t tell the casual stranger that i loved baby and that is all i seem to know now mdash that i love her and that she is gone  rdquo  toklas rsquo s love for her partner is the simplest vision of stein we can be given  but it is no less difficult to understand this mdash another mystery that can never be unlocked     wade writes in the introduction that stein rsquo s  ldquo work is always about the conditions of its own creation  the process  to her  was more important than the finished text  rdquo  a distinct ambiguity hovers in this observation  there is  of course  something contemporary about a focus on process mdash or at least we associate it with the avant garde of the later 20th century  as wade projects stein forward into john cage and fluxus  but to go back to the first part of that sentence  what  really  are the conditions of that creation  the answer seems to split immediately into two possibilities  on the one hand  maybe the conditions are simply the conditions of an open imagination  we see stein at her desk all night  hour after hour  letting the words flow out of her  this seems to be an idea that stein endorsed at times mdash though there is a case to be made that her explanations of her process came retroactively mdash and she has often been associated with automatic writing  though there is considerable evidence that she revised at least some of her work extensively    ldquo everything i write means exactly what it says  rdquo  stein told us helpfully   but the mystery of creation adds something seductive to the writer rsquo s power  as much as scholars would like to explicate the process  it is very often in the writer rsquo s interest not to reveal it     but anyone who has read enough of the more  ldquo difficult rdquo  stein notices her life bleeding in all the time  a sudden appearance of basket  or what clearly comes across as salon talk snapped up for its idiosyncratic cadences  wade later notes the research of the scholar ulla dydo into stein rsquo s daybooks  all of her peculiar language sprang from direct  even quite literal experience  even as she worked later to efface the connection  this in itself exposes the shallowness of certain ideas about where  ldquo value rdquo  comes from in literature  recording daily life is a kind of meditation  both automatic and deliberate  it passes through the mind and comes out as something willed  but not quite expected  as william gass puts it in his brief foreword to the making of americans  which attempts to close read just one sentence from the book   ldquo style is consciousness  rdquo     there has always been a fundamental hostility in some corners to stein rsquo s writing  why work to understand what it means  what will we do with ourselves if we find  in the end  that it means nothing at all  for many  the idea that difficult works of literature are a kind of code mdash full of references  secret messages  and schemas that we struggle to understand mdash is the pleasure and the purpose  but stein underlines literature rsquo s fundamental instability  its dance with the great zero of nonsense  the threat of the charlatan  access to her biography might help decode some of the hidden meaning  but that lens  we know  has its limits  every reader comes to a work with their own knowledge and assumptions  and they enjoy it or they do not  that framework can change with knowledge  but it never quite gets to the bottom of a writer rsquo s idiosyncrasies  if an interesting life were all it took  the literary canon would look quite different than it does     one thing wade rsquo s biography emphasized for me was stein rsquo s vocation as a fundamentally erotic writer  some of her overtly sexual work  like the long poem  ldquo lifting belly  rdquo  are described and given their due  the biography also outlines the complex history of the early novella q e d  mdash the work about bookstaver that so angered toklas mdash parts of which were later revised into three lives  particularly for  ldquo melanctha  rdquo  it also includes the story of the revision of stanzas in meditation  stein rsquo s book length poem that is one of her most esoteric and brilliant works  bookstaver still lingered over the imaginations of stein and toklas long after she had left the scene  to the extent that  supposedly  toklas forced stein to cross out every instance of the word may in the text and replace it with can  this is a crucial speculation as to what extent toklas was in some sense a co creator with stein  but it also goes beyond lived experience mdash in stein rsquo s work  there is a fundamental promiscuity of language  a shifting and slippery quality to her sentences and paragraphs  and a charge in seeing how the new parts might fit together  sex may have aspects that are involuntary  but if it is good  it is never automatic  stein rsquo s gift is the power of deep affinity  a writer rsquo s ability to believe that words can be newly arranged  new sentences can be conjured  and that there is a wonder in discovering what meaning might be disclosed     historically speaking  fiction did not follow the path stein indicated  the same commercial imperatives that she struggled with are just as present today  if not intensified  look to poetry  instead  for stein rsquo s influence mdash her discombobulation of the sentence has permanently entered its dna  maybe this is part of why so much contemporary poetry finds itself little read  even as it longs for an audience   at the same time  isn rsquo t the stein model more relevant than ever  when personality needs to be the publicity vanguard that creates acceptance for work that ever fewer people are willing to read     today  the way readers tend to know about gertrude stein is a mirror for the way they increasingly know literature  our knowledge of what exists increases  we go down wikipedia rabbit holes  save books in our wish lists  listen to podcasts about books we don rsquo t plan to read anytime soon  but encounters with literature at the point of contact can feel scarce  i have not heard anyone wonder about what a particular passage in a new book really means in quite some time  either we know already  or we quickly concede we rsquo ll never really know  and we try to appreciate it and turn the page  stein enlivens us to the mystery  that everything is strange and nothing is strange too  and that if we sit down and let the words overtake us  we might wonder for a long time<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/gertrude-stein-afterlife-wade-review/">The Enigma of Gertrude Stein</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Mon, 30 Mar 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/gertrude-stein-afterlife-wade-review/</guid>
  </item>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The Lower Ninth Ward in New Orleans Can’t Get a Break]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/lower-ninth-ward-new-orleans-development-industrial-projects-katrina-recovery/]]></link>
		<author>Roberta Brandes Gratz</author>
	<date>Mar 30, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The neighborhood is facing an onslaught of catastrophic projects that could be more damaging than Hurricane Katrina.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["The neighborhood is facing an onslaught of catastrophic projects that could be more damaging than hurricane katrina      the rebuilt industrial canal levee wall  l  in the lower ninth ward stands near restored homes in new orleans  louisiana  on august 6  2025  during hurricane katrina in august 2005  multiple levee breaches flooded the lower ninth ward  causing many deaths and destroying thousands of homes  many of which belonged to multigenerational families       new orleans  louisiana mdash the lower ninth ward in new orleans can rsquo t get a break  this mostly low income but heavily homeowning neighborhood filled with classic shotgun houses is where the levee breached 24 hours after hurricane katrina and engulfed the area in a toxic flood  the floodwaters reached above rooflines  leaving people stranded on rooftops or floating to safety in makeshift boats  now  after 20 years of a gradual but steady rebirth that politicians and experts didn rsquo t think possible  the predominantly black neighborhood is facing an onslaught of catastrophic projects that could be more permanently damaging than the hurricane       for a while after hurricane katrina  the lower 9 was front and center in the news  everything city and state officials did mdash or didn rsquo t do mdash reflected an unspoken desire to not see the area revived  even a golf course was whispered as a replacement  this was the last neighborhood where residents were allowed to return  four months after the floodwaters engulfed it and three months after the water had receded  damp and mold did more damage than the floodwaters     the lower 9 was not the poorest neighborhood in the city and actually boasted a home ownership rate higher than the rest of the city and probably more rooftop solar panels than elsewhere  it had its fair share of blight  abandoned properties  and drug dealing but it was by no means an impoverished wasteland  the community  filled with family networks  had a strength and deep roots that would be the envy of any place  the neighborhood was and remains a mixture of finely crafted shotgun houses and bungalows  mixed in with nondescript brick houses  the population is about 5 000 and was growing  but with the upcoming projects  nobody expects newcomers to keep coming       a 50 year old plan by the army corps of engineers to alter and widen the industrial canal paralleling the neighborhood moves ahead despite the obvious  ruinous impacts it will have during its projected 20 year duration  a drawbridge over the canal connects the neighborhood to the rest of the city  the project is designed to speed up commercial shipping between the inland waterway and the mississippi  but dates from the urban renewal days in the 1950s when plowing through black neighborhoods for highways and other projects was customary  here  65 families will have to be  ldquo temporarily rdquo  relocated mdash to where and to what is unknown mdash for an incalculable time  the project rsquo s time is estimated between 13 and 20 years but  based on the history of these overscaled projects  no one believes the numbers  it is difficult to define as  ldquo temporary relocation rdquo  when a project could go way beyond its estimated time  which projects usually do     the reported economic cost benefit ratio of the project has gone from an original 13 1 to 1 2 and is expected to diminish more with time  nor is there any projection of what shipping needs will be like 20 years from now     doron dusua  a 34 year old civil engineer  lives with his mother in a teal colored bungalow converted from a shotgun a block and a half from the canal  his father bought the house in 1996  dusua points out the sad irony of this story  a better site exists for this allegedly necessary shipping shortcut four miles down the road in violet  a thinly populated community in neighboring st  bernard parish  the problem is simply that the corps of engineers would have to start over not only with the paperwork but also with the politics and community engagement  all of which always takes years  but as dusua adds  even that is questionable on both a cost benefit analysis and added shipping advantage  assuming that the same size barges are in use 20 years or more from now  this alteration will allow two barges to pass through the lock at one time      ldquo the project would also bring the canal 12 blocks deeper into the city making the whole city more vulnerable to floods  rdquo  notes sandra stokes  chair of advocacy for louisiana landmarks society  stokes  on behalf of the society  has been the city rsquo s most aggressive voice on behalf of protecting individual and neighborhood landmarks and opposing ill considered development  in more than a dozen letters and e mails  stokes has worked with numerous local residents to challenge army corps assumptions and plans  so far  it has been to no avail  the economic and social impact is beyond measure       then  further downriver on the mississippi in holy cross  the lower ninth rsquo s designated historic district  another overwhelming industrial project is emerging  sunrise foods international has made a deal with the city rsquo s port to convert an unused historic brick wharf into a facility to unload and store grain brought from the ukraine  it will then be shipped on a rail line that runs through the historic neighborhood with horn blasts at 27 traffic intersections  attempts to revive a similar industrial rail line in new york city a few years ago were vociferously opposed and turned into a rail trail instead  but this one went through middle class neighborhoods     the carcinogen loaded  ldquo organic rdquo  grain gives off a fine dust expected to cover residences and businesses of the area  as well as jackson barracks  an historic louisiana national guard military installation established in 1834  now a command center for emergency operations  a second 100 000 square foot warehouse is planned for sunrise to store salad oil     eliot robinson lives with his wife and 3 year old daughter in a historic house on alabo street they bought in 2022 for  281 000   ldquo we moved here for the quiet quality of life and the glorious advantage of living one and a half blocks from the levee  it has a quiet rural feel  rdquo  the mississippi levee is the location of wharves  a whole crop of young families with kids have similarly moved to alabo street   ldquo we rsquo ve been blindsided by both the grain deal and the revival of the rail line  rdquo  he says   ldquo this is an aggressive escalation of industrial development in a peaceful residential neighborhood  rdquo  he says     this neighborhood  holy cross  is a designated historic district  it lies abreast the mississippi and is filled with creole cottages  shotguns and two stunning captain rsquo s houses replete with third story lookouts and elaborate exterior embellishments  this is the highest elevation area of the lower 9 because of its proximity to the river  it flooded the least of the whole lower ninth ward   ldquo they lean on the fact that the grain is organic but grain dust is grain dust  rdquo  eliot says        ldquo sunrise international had a deal to use the industrial site at avondale shipyard 20 miles upriver in st  bernard parish  rdquo  said sandra stokes  but switched to the alabo site  she and other opponents assume that the new orleans port gave sunrise a better deal  a 2023 letter of intent from sunrise to avondale obtained by opponents outlines in detail the plans they had with avondale       the lower nine is a community that was always undervalued by the larger city  it fought hard to come back after the federal levee failure and overwhelming flood that was katrina      ldquo overindustrialization is now coming at it from every direction  rdquo  says stokes   ldquo there rsquo s no value of the community and no respect for its resilience  rdquo  adds stokes<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/lower-ninth-ward-new-orleans-development-industrial-projects-katrina-recovery/">The Lower Ninth Ward in New Orleans Can’t Get a Break</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Mon, 30 Mar 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/lower-ninth-ward-new-orleans-development-industrial-projects-katrina-recovery/</guid>
  </item>
  <item>
	 <title><![CDATA[Joy, Healing, and the Resolve to Keep Fighting at No Kings in St. Paul]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/no-kings-st-paul-minnesota/]]></link>
		<author>Joan Walsh</author>
	<date>Mar 30, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Some 200,000 people crammed the grounds of the state capitol for a celebration of the area’s resilience and defiance of the Trump regime.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<description>
	<![CDATA["Some 200 000 people crammed the grounds of the state capitol for a celebration of the area rsquo s resilience and defiance of the trump regime      over 200 000 protesters gathered at the no kings rally in st  paul  minnesota  the flagship rally of the march 28 no kings protests       st  paul  minn  mdash minnesota rsquo s twin cities have been the site of grief and suffering for more than three months  since the ice siege began  but on saturday the streets were filled with joy  this was the official  ldquo flagship rdquo  of the global  ldquo no kings rdquo  protests  and some 200 000 people crammed the grounds of the state capitol for a celebration of the area rsquo s resilience  community  and defiance of the trump regime       yes  they showed up to hear bruce springsteen sing his hymn  ldquo streets of minneapolis  rdquo  to listen to indefatigable senator bernie sanders and local anti ice stalwarts governor tim walz  lt  governor peggy flanagan  and attorney general keith ellison  and to see the octogenarians joan baez and jane fonda  along with maggie rogers and tom morello  rock out and dance to the civil rights anthem  ldquo ain rsquo t gonna let nobody turn me around  rdquo  alongside the astonishing locals brass solidarity and singing resistance  but mostly they came to celebrate one another  and to heal     if you rsquo ve ever tried to figure out how the twin cities resisted kristi noem rsquo s department of homeland security so successfully  you heard some great stories  i want to focus on two  natalie ehret  the founder of haven watch  recalled how her pro immigrant work began when she and her two sons were delivering hand warmers to anti ice protesters at the whipple detention center  and her 21 year old son jack discovered that two young girls had been released from custody and were  ldquo wandering in the cold  freezing  rdquo  she told the crowd  he put them in the family car  gave them food and water  and lent them his phone so they could call relatives  haven watch started that day  recruiting volunteers to meet immigrants being released from whipple  without food  winter clothing  money  or their identification papers  that led to a more robust program to meet the ongoing needs of the detainees   ldquo it wasn rsquo t organized or well rehearsed  we didn rsquo t know what to do  we just acted  rdquo  ehret said   ldquo strangers paused their lives  they showed up to stand and watch at a gate hellip without regard for their own safety or comfort  or even their own lives  rdquo     it turns out jack had been diagnosed with brain cancer three years earlier mdash i had heard of haven watch  but i didn rsquo t know this part of the story   ldquo he has always been kind  but that experience changed him  he understands now what most of us don rsquo t  how short life can be and how important true human connection and kindness is  rdquo  ehret went on   ldquo don rsquo t walk past suffering  act  even when it rsquo s not easy  rdquo     flight spotter turned 50501 activist nick benton described to the crowd how he and a friend suddenly discovered ice shipping detainees out of the city  and began tracking the flights   ldquo we rsquo ve woken up full of rage after a nightmare  rdquo  said the self described  ldquo plaid clad working dad  rdquo  he denounced  ldquo silent businesses and cowardly politicians  rdquo  and continued   ldquo be the neighbor that mr  rogers knew you could be hellip   we keep us safe  no kings is a great start  but we also need to be done with cowards  rdquo  he then led the crowd in a call and response   ldquo when i say  lsquo no kings  rsquo  you say  lsquo no cowards  rsquo  rdquo  and he closed with  ldquo fuck ice  rdquo     the first half of the program  the most locally centered  was emceed by comedian and abortion access front cofounder lizz winstead  who also  full disclosure  happens to be one of my best friends   she made sure the day was about ordinary minnesotans who stood up for one another   ldquo you know how to show up and show out  rdquo  she said in her intro   ldquo please take a moment to be proud of yourselves  rdquo  i rsquo m not the only one who loved winstead rsquo s work  meidastouch posted my favorite joke   ldquo you chased out the fun sized fascist greg bovino  you chased out that evil kristi noem  she rsquo s so evil  i rsquo m starting to think her dog took his own life  rdquo  and it has hundreds of thousands of views on social media      https   twitter com acyn status 2037953211160752491       but winstead did more than make jokes  she asked the crowd to text  ldquo vote rdquo  to the minnesota election protection network  which trains election observers and monitors voter suppression reports  the group got 14 000 texts in the next hours  a strong retort to critics who question the value of these protests  which drew 8 million people on saturday  indivisible cofounders ezra levin and leah greenberg  who happened to celebrate their 11th wedding anniversary that day  announced a new minnesota inspired day of economic shutdown  on may 1  they  and everyone  emphasized the importance of getting mobilized for the november midterms  these were not people celebrating themselves in the  cold  spring sunshine   but if ever a people deserved to do that  it rsquo s minnesotans      i was moved by the strong current of native culture on the program  ojibwe healer and singer dorene day waubanewquay sang in her native tongue what she called  ldquo a healing song for all who have suffered in this time  rdquo  it had never before been sung to a non native audience  and it was haunting  i love bruce  but that song meant even more to me  minnesota poet laureate and ojibwe scholar heid erdrich read  ldquo a crowd sourced poem on justice  rdquo     lieutenant governor peggy flanagan turned to her ojibwe heritage  as a member of the wolf clan  to explain minnesota rsquo s resilience   ldquo the role of our clan is to insure that we leave no one behind  you have been showing what it means to leave no one behind  rdquo  flanagan mourned the two ice monitors murdered in january by customs and border patrol agents  renee nicole good and alex pretti  as did many others  including springsteen   ldquo they should be alive  rdquo  she said   ldquo we say their names  we honor their memories  and we turn our grief into action  rdquo     as the program was running late  flanagan teamed up on stage with her  ldquo brother  rdquo  keith ellison  to make room for more to speak  i found that gesture moving  three other national leaders deserve credit for comparable grace  afl cio president liz schuler  american federation of teachers leader randi weingarten  and seiu president april verett  they let others who had planes to catch speak first  and also made room for local leaders who were in danger of being cut from the program  thus they spoke last  to a mostly departing crowd  it was a gesture of solidarity that went beyond speech making  it wasn rsquo t lost on me that they happened to be three women  but all day we saw different types of leadership emerging  as far away from the misogynist cruelty of the trump regime as could be imagined  it should give all of us faith that we rsquo ll find our way out of this nightmare<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/no-kings-st-paul-minnesota/">Joy, Healing, and the Resolve to Keep Fighting at No Kings in St. Paul</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Mon, 30 Mar 2026 09:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/no-kings-st-paul-minnesota/</guid>
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  <item>
	 <title><![CDATA[The Nap Room Didn’t Love Me Back]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/society/the-nap-room-didnt-love-me-back/]]></link>
		<author>Elizabeth Burns Dyer</author>
	<date>Mar 28, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>I left academia for a tech job that offered me the promise of stability. What happens when corporate employers become our most reliable caregivers?</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["I left academia for a tech job that offered me the promise of stability  what happens when corporate employers become our most reliable caregivers        employees demostrate sleeping  ldquo pods rdquo  in a corporate office       the nap room already had a reputation by the time i arrived at the company  officially  it was meant for resetting  with a salt lamp in the corner  tissues on hand  a deep couch upholstered in a calming shade of greige  rumor had it that some of the software engineers used it for something else entirely  the warning came wrapped in half jokes and tight smiles  i wouldn rsquo t go in there  they told me     but bodily fluids no longer startled me  my clothes were already compromised by spit up  i had a baby at home  and my sleep came in fragments that never added up to real rest  so i brought my own pillowcase  i lay down in the nap room  and i slept     in the same month that i defended my dissertation  i also had a baby  academia  already precarious  suddenly revealed itself as geometrically impossible  the history lectureships on offer meant four courses a semester for adjunct pay that would not cover rent  let alone childcare  the humanities postdocs came without maternity leave in corners of the country where my partner could not find work  i kept trying to do the math mdash salary  hours  infant  body mdash but each time the equation failed  there was simply no space for a newborn and his mother in the narrow corridor stretching out before me  calling itself a career path     so i did what i rsquo d been trained never to do  i left academia for a job in the san francisco tech world  it was 2019  and tech rsquo s self image as a humane system builder was beginning to crack even as the venture capital still flowed  the office where i landed looked like a parody of corporate self care  catered lunches  ergonomically adjustable furniture  a wellness stipend  a lactation room  kombucha on tap  and then there was the nap room  where i blocked off  ldquo focus time rdquo  each afternoon and slept like the dead  the only disruption came on fridays  when the room was reserved for back massages and filled with incense and the low hum of a didgeridoo  i beat the engineers to the sign up sheet every time       coming from academia  what startled me was not the perks but the premise that a workplace could be organized around the assumption of human need  for the first time in my life  my job came with paid leave and the expectation that my body would sometimes need to stop  recover  and eventually age with provisions in place  human resources spoke to me not as someone who should feel lucky to be there but as an adult whose health mattered     what the nap room offered was a place where exhaustion could be acknowledged without explanation  because it had already been translated into the grammar of productivity  at the time  it felt like a safety net i couldn rsquo t find anywhere else  in truth  it was a soft landing available only to people with money and the right kind of job title       the structure steadied me  but the work itself felt unmoored  my job was writing  ldquo microcopy  rdquo  the tiny sentences that appear when you log in  click  ldquo submit  rdquo  enter a credit card number  or make an error on an e commerce website  i spent my days smoothing the path toward buying expensive products online  whether anyone needed these products was simply not part of the conversation  meaning was sidestepped in favor of professionalism and reduced to words like collaboration  simplicity  and trust  printed on walls and repeated in quarterly reviews  the question was not whether the work mattered but whether it moved without friction     in another season of life  this might have unsettled me more  but having just escaped a system that treated precarity as the cost of doing meaningful work  i no longer trusted purpose to compensate for instability  i needed enough space and structure for my body and mind to recover  the paycheck secured our rent and our childcare  but it was the nap room  the bagel fridays  the small visible gestures of corporate care that reached my nervous system and suggested that there was enough slack in the system that the exchange might actually hold     as i settled into that stability  a harder truth came into view  the care sustaining me flowed through an institution whose purpose i could not fully defend and whose commitment to keep me was never guaranteed     in other words  the nap room felt exceptional  but the fact that my stability ran through my employer was not  in the united states  care is not secured as a right of citizenship  health insurance and income continuity during illness or caregiving are largely routed through employment  in prosperous years  companies supplement the state with  ldquo progressive rdquo  offerings such as paid volunteer time  fertility benefits  or student loan reimbursement  in lean years  those perks disappear  what reads as generosity is a volatile welfare system tethered to quarterly earnings       in this system  losing an at will job can mean losing not just income but care already in motion  an ivf cycle halted midstream  a gender transition interrupted  a trusted specialist suddenly out of reach  support that arrives as a perk rather than a right does not circulate equally  it pools in salaried roles and thins out in contingent ones     those of us cushioned by catered meals  custom gifts  and stock options move through a world buffered by institutional abundance  under the same logo  contract and hourly workers clean offices or staff call centers with minimal leave and little protection  perks do not flatten hierarchy  they deepen it  comfort for some of us rests on a labor structure in which others remain cheaper  more contingent  and easier to replace     over time  i began to notice a force stronger than collegiality taking hold  corporate dependency deepening into attachment  we do not stop attaching when we grow up  under strain  we cling to what reliably steadies us  the nap room did not love me  but it absorbed my postpartum collapse without humiliation  my company became the place i turned to when i was depleted  the structure i trusted to steady me  for a time  it felt less like an employer than a site of refuge     in salaried white collar corporate roles  where healthcare and leave are bundled into employment  the workplace can begin to feel uncannily like a dependable attachment  it appears steady  responsive  visibly caring  and yet at will employment cannot offer real security  when basic security depends on remaining valuable to an employer  attachment shifts toward performance and vigilance becomes rational  the question is no longer only  ldquo am i valued  rdquo  but  ldquo am i still indispensable  rdquo     when that shift happens  the instability feels personal rather than structural  emerging research on adult attachment and work suggests something unsettling  in economically precarious contexts  employees with more avoidant attachment styles may report higher career satisfaction  sustained detachment  however  is difficult when care feels essential and personal     hr translated my needs into eligibility without resentment  the benefits arrived through an hr specialist i knew by name  she set up time with me  sent reminders  remembered due dates  and checked in before i had to ask  my maternity leave worked because she walked me through subsidized programs line by line  this form first  then this site  and i rsquo ll remind you to resubmit on this date  childcare assistance operated the same way  through a dependent care account that allowed pre tax dollars to be set aside  i relied on that guidance again and again     the system itself remained opaque  i could not have explained how the support was structured or why access to something so central to family survival was routed through certain employers  that obscurity mattered  because access depended on interpretation and timing  administration began to feel like recognition  gratitude crept in where clarity about rights might have been  the person who guided me through it sat across from me  the public program did not  the leave and the childcare subsidies were partly underwritten by public policy  but they did not feel that way  the institution that delivered them absorbed the gratitude  reliance deepened into attachment mdash not just to the paycheck but also the institution that made publicly structured care feel like it belonged to me     but institutional attachment was only part of the story  the kindness exchanged between colleagues was real and meaningful  it did not come from the nap room or the hr portal  it came from people who were not drowning  because wages were solid and basic needs were buffered  most of us were not operating in survival mode  and that insulation made reciprocity possible  the workplace did not demand constant availability or cultivate cutthroat competition  and colleagues covered meetings when my mother had a medical emergency and sent meals when i gave birth again  those gestures mattered  they were part of what held me there  we recognized one another as adults making the same bargain  trading skill and time for stability  this was not the  ldquo do what you love rdquo  fantasy of an earlier millennial moment  it was a quieter pact sustained by mutual recognition     from the outside  white collar work is often described as morally empty  as in anthropologist david graeber rsquo s widely read essay turned book bullshit jobs  that may be true  but emptiness alone does not explain why people who could leave choose to stay  what binds them is not the task itself but the soft infrastructure wrapped around the paycheck  it is work visas and health insurance and paid leave  it is also the reassurance that someone will help you navigate the public and private maze     the texture of this arrangement is not moral injury so much as anxiety  attachment to something that cannot attach back produces vigilance  so much of adult stability is routed through a single employer that it begins to feel rational to invest fully there  the rituals  the recognition  the steady pay  the company merch  the visible surplus all encourage that investment  and yet everyone knows the agreement is contingent and layoffs are routine  reorganizations arrive without warning  and automation threatens to redraw the boundaries of who counts as indispensable  the comfort is real  but so is the knowledge that it can be withdrawn       idid not have language for this uneasiness until much later  but it announced itself anyway through a recurring dream  in it  i come to the office  my manager greets me warmly and gives me a task  write personalized letters to colleagues who are about to be laid off explaining what is happening in a way that feels humane     i sit down and write  only afterward does my manager mention  almost casually  that i was let go weeks earlier  during a reorganization announced somewhere in slack  i didn rsquo t know  shame moves through my body  i notice a mess on the floor and begin to clean it up  apologizing as i work  desperate not to be seen as difficult       the dream revealed how fully i had internalized the system that made people legible and manageable  when recognition disappeared  i did not experience it as structural  i experienced it as my fault  that is what structural insecurity feels like from the inside ndash not like politics  but like shame  then the world caught up with the dream  and what i had mistaken for personal vulnerability revealed itself as systemic design     i already had a newborn and a toddler home from preschool when my mother developed rapid onset dementia  the pandemic was raging and shelter in place had become the ruling logic  remote work was introduced as crisis management and only later recast as a benefit  even as other perks quietly disappeared  the shift was not designed around my needs  yet for a time it made my life barely workable     in practice  it meant an infant on the floor beside my laptop  a slack notification arriving while i was on hold with a neurologist  a meeting conducted from the same room where my mother was forgetting my name  the workday did not shrink  it settled onto the same body already carrying everything else  work from home relocated care once outsourced to schools  offices  and public space into homes and unpaid hours  layering it directly onto the formal workday     once my family rsquo s stability depended on my availability at home  returning to the old terms was no longer imaginable  when talk about returning to the office began  i recognized the pattern immediately  the role still existed  my qualifications had not changed  but the life the job required no longer fit the life i was living  and the mismatch was treated as my preference rather than a structural constraint  across industries  mothers are confronting the same collision  called back to offices and schedules that assume no competing claims between nine and five     when i finally quit  it was not in protest  it was triage  i did not leave because the work lost meaning  for me  it never had any  i left because the conditions that had once made the exchange possible no longer held     ifound myself asleep in the nap room during a brief window of corporate excess  after years inside institutions that treated scarcity as proof of seriousness  the safety net provided by my job felt like air  i do not regret the stability i found there  but the benefits were never mine to rely on  the nap room was not a public provision  our country does not guarantee paid parental leave  paid family or medical leave  universal childcare  or healthcare as a right  some states offer programs and some employers provide generous packages  but when care is parceled out state by state and job by job  security becomes something you earn through attachment to the right institution and risk losing the moment that attachment frays     that arrangement still structures my family rsquo s life  my partner still works in tech  his job provides our family rsquo s insurance  i may have left the building  but not the system     now the cycle has turned again  layoffs ripple through the tech industry  the era of visible surplus has thinned  the language of care remains  but its margins have narrowed  corporate care in america is not generosity  it is infrastructure by default  for many  it has become the primary way basic stability is accessed mdash not because corporations are suited to this role  but because the institutions that once carried it have been hollowed out  mourning a job in such a landscape is never only about work  it is about losing the doctor  the therapist  the daycare  and the fragile assurance that someone  somewhere  knows how the system works     the danger is not only that this care can disappear  it is that it begins to look like the only place to lie down<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/the-nap-room-didnt-love-me-back/">The Nap Room Didn’t Love Me Back</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Sat, 28 Mar 2026 09:30:00 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/society/the-nap-room-didnt-love-me-back/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[“I Refused to Let the Genocide Steal My Dreams”]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/world/al-shifa-graduation-gaza/]]></link>
		<author>Esraa Abo Qamar</author>
	<date>Mar 27, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>For these medical students in Gaza, completing their studies was an act of defiance.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
	<thumb_image>https://www.thenation.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/GettyImages-2253860488-275x173.jpg</thumb_image>
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	<description>
	<![CDATA["For these medical students in gaza  completing their studies was an act of defiance      a graduation ceremony for 230 medical students at al shifa hospital  in gaza city  on january 3  2026       on january 3  230 medical students from gaza celebrated their graduation in the courtyard of the devastated al shifa hospital  which was once one of the largest hospitals in the gaza strip  the ceremony took place amid destroyed buildings and damaged infrastructure mdash a powerful symbol of the refusal of gaza rsquo s healthcare workers to surrender even as israel has tried to eliminate them       since the genocide began in october 2023  gaza rsquo s healthcare system has suffered unprecedented damage  according to the world health organization  hundreds of attacks have been carried out against health facilities  ambulances  and medical personnel  by early 2025  only about half of gaza rsquo s 36 hospitals were still even partially functioning  while the vast majority of medical facilities had been damaged or destroyed  hundreds of healthcare workers  including doctors  nurses  and paramedics  have been killed during the war     al shifa hospital itself has suffered endless wounds  gaza rsquo s ministry of health managed to rehabilitate parts of the hospital  but the scale of the destruction wrought by israeli bombs remains too vast for al shifa to return to normal operation     yet none of this prevented families  colleagues  and surviving hospital staff from gathering in al shifa rsquo s ruins to celebrate the graduation of a new generation of doctors     many of the graduates had continued their medical education despite losing family members  homes  or both  among them was dr  ezzedine lulu  who lost 20 members of his family  including his father  samir  and his brother  huthaifa  their bodies remain under the rubble  lulu received the devastating news of their deaths while he was besieged inside the emergency department at al shifa  where he was volunteering     instead of stopping  the loss pushed lulu to complete his studies  he later founded the samir foundation  named in memory of his father  to support medical students academically  financially  and psychologically  the graduation ceremony was held under the patronage of the samir foundation  led by dr  lulu  now a graduate himself       despite the destruction surrounding them  the graduates rsquo  excitement during the ceremony was palpable  after six years of hard work  exhaustion  and persistence  especially during the last two years of war  they were finally doctors  they sang together  danced to palestinian songs  and stood side by side to recite the hippocratic oath in one unified voice     but despite the celebration  pain was never far away  many graduates broke down in tears throughout the ceremony  families of students who were killed during the war attended  carrying framed photos of their sons and daughters mdash young doctors who never lived to witness their graduation  they sat quietly among the crowd  holding the images close     among the graduates was aseel nawas  23  her decision to study medicine began as a childhood dream      ldquo i always saw medicine as a noble and humane profession  rdquo  she said   ldquo with time  it became more than a career  it became a message and a way to make a real difference  especially in a community that needs this role so much  rdquo       the genocide deeply reshaped nawas rsquo s journey as a medical student  at its beginning  education stopped completely   ldquo there was a full disconnection from studying because of how intense everything was  rdquo  she explained   ldquo when we slowly returned  the connection was never the same  rdquo     aseel was in the second year of her clinical phase  when hospital based training makes up most of the curriculum  but hospitals had turned into shelters and emergency centers  overwhelmed with wounded patients      ldquo there was no real space for lectures or proper training  rdquo  she said   ldquo most of the time  we were only observing  yet we were expected to perform at the same level in completely abnormal conditions  rdquo     with the declining quality of education and training  nawas relied heavily on her own efforts to keep going   ldquo no one would give me an excuse if i fell behind  so i had to work harder on my own to make up for what was missing  rdquo  she trained at al aqsa and al awda hospitals  where the lack of resources shaped every detail of her experience   ldquo even deciding to go to the hospital required long thinking  how will i get there  how will i come back  rdquo  she said   ldquo during famine  my colleague and i once searched for something sweet just to get energy  and we found nothing  rdquo     her daily routine during the war depended on daylight and rare internet access  and was pervaded by constant fear      ldquo i studied during the day because there was no electricity  any moment with the internet was precious  at night  studying was almost impossible not just because of power cuts but because night was the most frightening time  the bombing intensified  and the planes flew very close to our home  rdquo     continuing her education under bombardment  displacement  and shortages was never easy  but it became a conscious decision   ldquo sometimes  just continuing felt like a form of resistance  i refused to let the genocide steal my dreams  rdquo  she said       nawas recalled moments when she genuinely feared for her life  during air strikes  while commuting  and even inside hospital surroundings  on one occasion  her shift at al aqsa hospital was canceled after an explosion there      ldquo during my surgery rotation in my final year  i received the news that a colleague from my class was killed  rdquo  she said   ldquo i started questioning whether going to the hospital was worth risking my life  rdquo     the shortage of medical equipment and medications severely limited practical learning   ldquo many times  we had to rely on alternatives or just observe instead of practicing  rdquo  she said       one of her unforgettable experiences with patients was in the internal medicine department   ldquo i saw young men in their early 20s diagnosed with serious illnesses  rdquo  she said   ldquo watching patients suffer in a place that cannot provide even basic treatment because of the siege felt like a slow death  rdquo     al shifa hospital holds deep personal meaning for nawas  it was where she had her first day of clinical training in her fourth year      ldquo i took a photo there and wrote   lsquo first day of clinical training  rsquo  it became our second home  we studied  laughed  learned  and spent most of our days there  rdquo  she said     graduating in its courtyard carried heavy symbolism      ldquo al shifa witnessed pain  resilience  and endless attempts to save lives  rdquo  she said   ldquo graduating there is not the end of the road  it is the beginning of responsibility  rdquo     for nawas  being a doctor in gaza today means far more than providing treatment   ldquo people need support and reassurance  rdquo  she said   ldquo to be a doctor here means to be a good human being  the genocide placed a much greater responsibility on us  not only medically but humanly as well  rdquo     in a place where hospitals have been repeatedly attacked and the healthcare system pushed to the brink  the graduation of new doctors is not just an academic milestone  it is proof that medical education and the commitment to healing continue in gaza  despite everything<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/world/al-shifa-graduation-gaza/">“I Refused to Let the Genocide Steal My Dreams”</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 27 Mar 2026 15:14:38 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/world/al-shifa-graduation-gaza/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Nothing Works in Trump’s America—Except Racism]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/newsletter-laguardia-tsa-baseball/]]></link>
		<author>Elie Mystal</author>
	<date>Mar 27, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>In this week’s <em>Elie v. U.S.</em>, our justice correspondent explores Trump’s stunning incompetence. Plus: Baseball is back—for now. </p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["In this week rsquo s elie v  u s   our justice correspondent explores trump rsquo s stunning incompetence  plus  baseball is back mdash for now         people wait in long security lines at laguardia airport on march 25  2026       laguardia stopped functioning this week  on sunday night  an air canada plane crashed into a fire truck  killing the two pilots and injuring more than 40 passengers  one runway was shut down for days  the mayhem exacerbated the hours long security lines that had been growing ever since the partial government shutdown axed tsa agents rsquo  pay  the trump administration responded by sending ice agents to the airport to hellip  stand around and do nothing  the result was even longer delays for passengers at one of the world rsquo s busiest airports  in the future  historians will look back at our system of air travel the way we look back at medical treatments from the middle ages   ldquo people stood in line for hours for this  what did they do if someone got sick mdash administer leeches  rdquo       it rsquo s kind of amazing that the planes could afford to fly at all  given the price of gas  consumers are facing high prices at the pump as trump rsquo s illegal war in iran rages on     in a normal country  the president would be held accountable for fixing the things he rsquo s broken  at least by the media  i try to avoid  ldquo imagine if barack obama did hellip  rdquo  comparisons but imagine if barack obama launched a war of choice that led to massive spikes in the price of oil while the airports ground to a halt because the tsa wasn rsquo t funded because he was trying to foist unconstitutional thugs on the country     of course  the reasons those comparisons are useless is because obama was a black man and trump is a white supremacist  and being an open white supremacist apparently grants you a kind of pass for your drooling incompetence  indeed  the only thing trump can deliver on consistently is racism     amid all this failure  trump made the time this week to take another bigoted swipe at somali americans  he said   ldquo in minnesota  it s very somalia oriented  these people come from a crooked country  disgusting country  one of the worst countries in the world  they come to our country mdash low iqs mdash and they rob us blind  stupid people  and they rob us blind  rdquo     donald trump rsquo s disgusting racism is the cover for his gross incompetence  the racism is what he uses to convince his supporters to ignore his pathetic job performance       and it works  trump is objectively bad at running the government  but he rsquo s objectively good at running a klan rally  and his supporters value the latter so much that they forgive the former  that rsquo s why racism is the only thing that is actually still working in our country     the bad and the ugly     the trump administration is launching an investigation into the admissions practices of three top medical schools  stanford  ohio state  and uc san diego  if there is any place we need more affirmative action  it rsquo s in the medical profession  it is incredibly difficult to find a black doctor  and incredibly difficult for a black person to get quality care from a white doctor  i rsquo ve had precisely one white doctor in my entire life who made me feel like i was getting the same care as his white patients  anyway  like i said  racism is the only thing that is working in this country     the international olympic committee officially banned transgender athletes from competing in women rsquo s sports  the rule will take effect at the 2028 olympics  which are still slated to be held in los angeles  to recap  trans people in sports   bad  major sporting events in fascist countries that violate international law   ok     a coalition of 21 states have sued the trump administration over its new usda regulations  which could deny funding for snap  wic  school lunch  and other essential programs  the administration has threatened to punish states that promote  ldquo dei rdquo  and  ldquo gender ideology rdquo  or  ldquo provide incentives for illegal immigration  rdquo  aside from not really knowing what those terms mean in the context of snap benefits  i must also point out that not giving people food because you don rsquo t like a state that celebrates tolerance is just fucking evil  collectively punishing poor people because a state refuses to subject people to a genital exam before they use the bathroom is beyond wrong     new jersey passed a law banning ice agents from wearing masks  umm hellip  that rsquo s good  holy crap  something good happened this week     in a unanimous opinion  the supreme court ruled that internet service providers cannot be held liable for copyright infringement done by its users  the case  which involved music rights holders like sony suing isps  already feels obsolete  i rsquo m no longer worried about kids using napster to steal a couple of songs  i rsquo m worried about ai stealing every song and then spitting it back out in some kind of unholy cacophony of sound  and this ruling doesn rsquo t help us deal with that problem      inspired takes     i saw somewhere that tech bro marc andreesen proclaimed that he does  ldquo zero introspection  rdquo  and i thought   ldquo what an incredible thing to admit to the entire world that you are both an idiot and a sociopath  rdquo  i didn rsquo t think much beyond that until i read david futrelle rsquo s deep dive in the nation on the latest case of tech vulture nihilism     this investigation by oren ziv and ariel caine mdash published by the nation in partnership with  972 magazine and local call mdash connects the violent dots between a series of settler attacks on palestinian villages and a coordinated settler effort to push even deeper into the west bank and seize more palestinian land  all with army support     the trump administration rsquo s arguments in the birthright citizenship case mdash which will be heard by the supreme court next week mdash are based  in part  on the theories of the white supremacist who argued on behalf of the segregationists in plessy v  ferguson  ian millhiser explains      worst argument of the week        on monday  the supreme court issued a short ruling in a case about police brutality  predictably  the republican supermajority sided with the brutal police     the case  zorn v  linton  arose after a peaceful protest at the vermont statehouse in 2015  cops went to clear out the protesters  and shelia linton claims that  while most of the protesters were ushered out peacefully  she was put in a rear wristlock  a  ldquo pain compliance technique rdquo   by officer jacob zorn     this is where i point out that linton happens to be black  zorn allegedly told linton she should have  ldquo called her legislator rdquo  instead of showing up at the protest     as many know  police officers generally receive qualified immunity for actions taken while on the job  the protection means that cops can generally not be held liable when they violate the law  but there are some exceptions to qualified immunity  one exception is when police officers commit crimes  another exception is when officers knowingly violate citizens rsquo  constitutional rights     in this case  the second circuit court of appeals rejected zorn rsquo s qualified immunity claim  it said that zorn should have known that applying a pain compliance technique to a peaceful and nonviolent protester was a violation of linton rsquo s constitutional rights     the supreme court disagreed  in an unsigned opinion  the court rsquo s republicans said that officers have no reasonable way of knowing when inflicting pain is a violation of constitutional rights     justice sonia sotomayor dissented  she accused the roberts court of turning qualified immunity into an  ldquo absolute shield rdquo  for law enforcement     it doesn rsquo t have to be this way  qualified immunity is something made up by supreme court justices  there is no constitutional language granting law enforcement immunity from the constitution  states could remove qualified immunity from police officers tomorrow simply by passing legislation     police unions would complain  of course  the police have become accustomed to violating the law with impunity  that doesn rsquo t mean we should let them     what i wrote    the supreme court heard oral argument this week in the mail in ballots case mdash the one the republicans have been pushing to try to block mail in ballots received after election day from being counted  i explained what happened  including the fact that the republican rsquo s antidemocratic argument doesn rsquo t stop with ballots received after election day  taken to its logical conclusion  it can be used to attack early voting and ballots mailed in before election day  it rsquo s hellip  pretty much all bad  friends      in news unrelated to the current chaos    baseball is back  thursday was opening day  and our long winter is at an end  baseball is my favorite sport  i know that rsquo s weird  because i rsquo m black and am under the age of 95  but what can i say  i can watch a baseball game while reading a book  and if i happen to doze off  it rsquo s still ok  it rsquo s not a sport  it rsquo s a lifestyle     and this might be the last season i get it for a while  the lords of baseball mdash i e   the owners of the various teams mdash appear ready to blow up the sport to make themselves a little wealthier     baseball is the only major american team sport that operates without a salary cap  there are some  ldquo luxury tax rdquo  rules and other thresholds meant to punish teams that spend a lot of money  but  fundamentally  owners can spend as much cash on their baseball teams as they want     you rsquo d think that the kinds of smash and grab businessmen who are able to amass the kind of wealth necessary to own a baseball franchise would be fans of  you know  unfettered competition  but they rsquo re not  instead  most of the owners want a salary cap  and why wouldn rsquo t they  imposing a salary cap gives the owners fixed  and artificially depressed  labor costs  most capitalists are more than happy to abandon capitalism if market regulations help them reduce labor costs     the owners want a salary cap  and to get one  they rsquo re probably going to lock out the players next year mdash until the powerful baseball player rsquo s union agrees to give the owners a way to artificially depress the wages of baseball players     as matt kreisher explains in the nation  what rsquo s particularly infuriating about the owner rsquo s position is that many baseball fans will end up taking the side of the greedy owners  for most people  the athletes getting paid multiple millions of dollars to play a game mdash a child rsquo s game that involves hitting a ball or throwing one mdash already seem grossly overcompensated  baseball players make vastly more than teachers or scientists or any number of people whose contributions are more critical to the functioning of society     but athletes are labor  and what the owners want is to artificially cap the cost of labor  even though baseball owners already enjoy a literal monopoly mdash aided by a straight up antitrust exemption mdash for the sport  moreover  baseball players must accrue six full years of major league service time before they rsquo re even allowed to become free agents with the power to sign with the team that offers them the most money  owners have a monopoly on the sport  a monopoly on the early careers of all its players  and when the players are finally able to participate in what counts as the free market for their labor  the owners want to introduce another artificial ceiling on how much they can make     yet fans of teams  especially fans in  ldquo small market rdquo  cities  support this ownership control and greed  they feel like their teams can rsquo t compete with the big spenders in new york and  especially  los angeles without a salary cap     it rsquo s a terrible argument  the owners in milwaukee or cleveland or pittsburg are not poor  they rsquo re not even broke  they have money to spend on players and compete with the los angeles dodgers or new york yankees  and if they don rsquo t have the liquid cash available  they can always sell their teams for billions of dollars to somebody who does have enough cash to buy a right fielder     the problem is that owners of some of the baseball teams don rsquo t want to spend money  they want to use their baseball teams as prestige toys  instead of putting the most competitive team they can on the field to try to win the world series  the owners want socialism for themselves but rapacious capitalism for everybody else     they seem to be willing to sacrifice the 2027 season to get it  players are already being told to save money in preparation for a long lockout     baseball fans are fond of saying  ldquo maybe next year  rdquo  but this year  next year might never come            if you enjoyed this installment of elie v  u s   click here to receive the newsletter in your inbox each friday<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/newsletter-laguardia-tsa-baseball/">Nothing Works in Trump’s America—Except Racism</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 27 Mar 2026 14:57:51 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/newsletter-laguardia-tsa-baseball/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[Pain Beach]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/pain-beach/]]></link>
		<author>Steve Brodner</author>
	<date>Mar 27, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>Naked gibbon.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["Naked gibbon<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/pain-beach/">Pain Beach</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 27 Mar 2026 14:54:48 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/pain-beach/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[The Politicians Won’t Stop This War. Only the People Can.]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/no-kings-anti-war-movement-iran/]]></link>
		<author>Jeet Heer</author>
	<date>Mar 27, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The No Kings movement needs to become a mass anti-war movement.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
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	<![CDATA["The no kings movement needs to become a mass anti war movement            this saturday  millions of americans and people all over the world will gather under the slogan  ldquo no kings  rdquo  the previous two no kings rallies  held last june and october  were the largest single day protests in us history  drawing between 4 and 6 million people to the streets     the sheer size of the protests has been heartening and has invigorated the ongoing and often successful resistance to trump rsquo s policy  still  i rsquo ll confess i rsquo ve always been of two minds about  ldquo no kings rdquo  as a slogan  meant to evoke the american legacy of resistance to tyranny dating back to the revolution  no kings has  at best  felt like a blank slate slogan that could be filled in with specific objections to trump rsquo s lawlessness  the brutality of the anti immigrant crackdown  or the sheer corruption of the white house rsquo s relationship with plutocrats such as elon musk  but it has risked being a bit too vague and evasive about the situation the world is currently facing  for one  donald trump is not a monarch  he is an aspiring autocrat who holds an elected office  and  like many forms of liberal anti trump politics  no kings has seemed excessively focused on trump rsquo s personality rather than his policies  with no clear effort to mobilize for an alternative political vision       this weekend rsquo s no kings rallies will take place under the shadow of trump rsquo s most dangerous political adventure  the war against iran that the us and israel launched at the end of last month  at least one prominent protester  bruce springsteen  who will be performing in st  paul  minnesota  realizes that no kings now has to mean no war  in a video announcing upcoming concerts that will take up the anti trump message  springsteen evoked the 1970 anti militarist anthem  ldquo war  rdquo     no message is more urgent right now than opposition to the iran war     while trump has created many disasters  none is likely to be as far reaching and globally devastating as the current conflict  which has already turned into a regional war  in addition to costing hundreds of lives  the iran debacle has disrupted the global economy  raising the price not just of oil but of other essential goods such as fertilizer  so far  the most severe effects of the war are being felt in the middle east and asia  but there rsquo s every reason to think that the combination of higher inflation  rising interest rates  rising yields on us high yield bonds  and sagging stock markets could presage a global recession  if not a full economic meltdown     the iran war was launched with no clear objectives   trump and his top officials have made a string of conflicting claims about the reasons for the conflict  from regime change to leverage in negotiations to support for israel to weakening iran rsquo s military   nor is there any clear exit strategy  as ilan goldenberg observed in foreign affairs  trump has gotten himself into a mess for which there is no good or easy exit  iran  having been burned twice now in us negotiations that turned to attacks  is clearly eager to inflict punishment and also win diplomatic concessions that ensure a lasting detente  it rsquo s unclear whether trump has either the desire to make such concessions  in fact us war aims remain maximalist   further  major us allies in the war  mdash not just israel but also the united arab emirates and saudi arabia mdash are in no mood for peace and want to continue pummelling iran       given this impasse  the danger is that the us will continue escalating  leading to a ground invasion  on thursday  cnn reported      while the military campaign has heavily focused on bombing the country so far  pentagon officials preparing for a next phase of war have drawn up scenarios for deploying troops to seize various targets within iran  according to more than half a dozen people familiar with the discussions     yet not only would those scenarios risk heavy casualties  there rsquo s also little guarantee they would successfully end the conflict      also on thursday  the wall street journal reported that  ldquo the pentagon is looking at sending up to 10 000 additional ground troops to the middle east to give president trump more military options even as he weighs peace talks with tehran  rdquo  there is reason to regard these reports with a little skepticism  the actual movement of troops into the region has been slow  trump could simply be trying to scare the iranians into negotiations  but this sort of shadow boxing is itself dangerous since it encourages escalation      bad as it is  the war could spiral even more out of control  further  although the war is intensely unpopular with most americans  there is as yet little political pushback to trump rsquo s dangerous belligerence  congressional democrats  under the leadership of representative hakeem jeffries and senator chuck schumer  have been slow walking opposition  the next vote on the war won rsquo t be held till at least mid april     one republican senator  speaking anonymously  told semafor that the war was a  ldquo fucking clusterfuck  rdquo  the senator added   ldquo there was a lot of superficial thinking that went into this operation  it rsquo s like so much that happens right now  a very risk seeking executive decides to make some risky moves that could turn out well  rdquo       this is a damning indictment  but even more damning of the entire political system is the fact that the senator spoke off the record  opposition to trump rsquo s clusterfuck is all too muted in washington  it rsquo s likely that most elected officials know trump has opened up the gates of hell  but they are still afraid to speak up     the only answer to this political failure is mass mobilization  no kings proves that millions are ready to march against trump  the task now is to convince them to march not just against the king but the king rsquo s mad war<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/no-kings-anti-war-movement-iran/">The Politicians Won’t Stop This War. Only the People Can.</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 27 Mar 2026 14:21:22 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/no-kings-anti-war-movement-iran/</guid>
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	 <title><![CDATA[No Kings! No Wars!]]></title>
	 <link><![CDATA[https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/no-kings-protest-iran/]]></link>
		<author>John Nichols</author>
	<date>Mar 27, 2026</date> 
	<teaser><![CDATA[
<div class="wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek"><p>The founders of the United States feared monarchically inclined presidents who could wage wars of whim.</p></div>
]]></teaser> 
	<thumb_image>https://www.thenation.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/GettyImages-2256226098-275x173.jpg</thumb_image>
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	<![CDATA["The founders of the united states feared monarchically inclined presidents who could wage wars of whim      a mass protest outside an ice processing facility in broadview  illinois  on january 17  2026       the abuses of donald trump rsquo s second term inspired the rise of the no kings movement  which this saturday will return to the streets of these united states  from key west at the end of the florida keys to kotzebue sound above the arctic circle in alaska  in more than 3 000 cities  villages  and towns  millions of people will be protesting a president who organizers decry for  ldquo sending masked agents into our streets  terrorizing our communities rdquo  and  ldquo spending billions of our tax dollars on missile strikes abroad all while driving up the cost of living and handing out massive giveaways to billionaire allies  rdquo       the no kings movement has  from its beginnings  recognized the ways in which trump rsquo s authoritarian overreach mirrors what the authors of the declaration of independence identified as king george iii rsquo s  ldquo long train of abuses and usurpations  pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism  rdquo     but after trump launched a regionally destabilizing war in the middle east  with neither the approval of congress nor the support of the american people  those echoes grew louder  they grew louder still after the administration asked for another  200 billion to fund it       us representative mark pocan  the wisconsin democrat who cofounded the house rsquo s defense spending reduction caucus  has correctly identified trump rsquo s attack on iran as a  ldquo war of choice rdquo  rather than necessity  and no kings organizers are reminding americans that  in addition to their objections to the domestic chaos unleashed by this administration  they are now called to protest against an  ldquo illegal  catastrophic war putting us in danger and driving up our costs  rdquo     this is precisely the circumstance the founders of the american experiment feared  based on their bitter experience with king george iii and the british empire     in 1776  as the king rsquo s more rebellious subjects were pursuing independence from the united kingdom a delegate from virginia to the second continental congress  thomas jefferson  led a committee charged with detailing grievances against the king and his imperial enterprise  the committee mdash which also included john adams of massachusetts  benjamin franklin of pennsylvania  robert r  livingston of new york  and roger sherman from connecticut mdash produced a document that began to shape a new nation      ldquo the history of the present king of great britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations  all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states  to prove this  let facts be submitted to a candid world  rdquo  read the document  which was approved by the congress  dated july 4  1776  and titled the declaration of independence       among its 27 grievances  the declaration complained that the king and his cabal were  ldquo taking away our charters  abolishing our most valuable laws  and altering fundamentally the forms of our governments rdquo  and  ldquo suspending our own legislatures  and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever  rdquo     the signers of the declaration said the king was literally  ldquo waging war against us  he has plundered our seas  ravaged our coasts  burnt our towns  and destroyed the lives of our people  rdquo     the most profound grievance  however  had to do with the reality that  ldquo he has affected to render the military independent of and superior to the civil power  rdquo     the authors of the declaration  and of the us constitution  were not merely concerned about the war that king george iii and the united kingdom were waging against the americans  they were  more broadly  concerned about the prospect that an imperial president could lead the country they were creating into wars of whim     the founders recognized that any system that concentrated power in a king  or an executive with monarchical instincts  could leave ordinary citizens at the mercy of a megalomaniac whose choices might casually launch wars that threatened lives  property  and freedom  it was thomas paine who wrote in common sense  the seminal call for american independence from england   ldquo thirty kings and two minors have reigned in that distracted kingdom since the conquest  in which time there has been  including the revolution  no less than eight civil wars and nineteen rebellions  wherefore instead of making for peace  it makes against it  and destroys the very foundation it seems to stand upon  rdquo     paine warned that  ldquo so uncertain is the fate of war and the temper of a nation  when nothing but personal matters are the ground of a quarrel rdquo  and observed   ldquo in short  monarchy and succession have laid  not this or that kingdom only  but the world in blood and ashes  rdquo       when america finally broke the bonds of colonial oppression  a constitution was written with the express goal of chaining the dogs of war  to that end  the power to wage war was lodged not with one man mdash be he identified as a king or a president mdash but with the people  through their elected congressional representatives        ldquo in no part of the constitution is more wisdom to be found than in the clause which confides the question of war or peace to the legislature  and not to the executive department  beside the objection to such a mixture of heterogeneous powers  the trust and the temptation would be too great for any one man  rdquo  explained james madison  who oversaw the drafting of the document  madison observed      war is in fact the true nurse of executive aggrandizement  in war  a physical force is to be created  and it is the executive will  which is to direct it  in war  the public treasures are to be unlocked  and it is the executive hand which is to dispense them  in war  the honours and emoluments of office are to be multiplied  and it is the executive patronage under which they are to be enjoyed  it is in war  finally  that laurels are to be gathered  and it is the executive brow they are to encircle  the strongest passions  and most dangerous weaknesses of the human breast  ambition  avarice  vanity  the honorable or venial love of fame  are all in conspiracy against the desire and duty of peace      now  when domestic programs have been attacked and starved  and when the executive proposes to unlock the public treasures to further fund military adventures and a career of empire  it is no wonder that the patriots of our time cry out   ldquo no kings  rdquo<br/><br/>Keep on reading: <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/no-kings-protest-iran/">No Kings! No Wars!</a>]]>	</description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 27 Mar 2026 13:09:05 +0000</pubDate>
    <guid>https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/no-kings-protest-iran/</guid>
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