I have often lamented the solid support that so many right-wing Christians give to the Trump/MAGA government. Not only lamented, but I’ve also puzzled over how they reconcile their fervor for Trump with their professed belief in the teachings of Jesus. It doesn’t add up. It recently occurred to me that the stage was ...
My editor and old friend emailed me this morning about Trump’s latest outrages.You may have missed them given the dizzying pace of authoritarian bombast from the White House — executive orders, threats, insults, boasts, firings and lies — lobbed almost hourly. On Aug. 25 Trump signed an executive order to eliminate “cashless bail” in ...
Most of us who grew up in the mid-20th century are accustomed to talking about political issues as if they only amounted to differences on policy. Consider the issue of the minimum wage. Republicans and Libertarians would argue for a low or nonexistent minimum wage and refer to Adam Smith’s “invisible hand” metaphor to ...
It will take some time, perhaps years, until we know what role our government played in Israel’s decision to attack Iran on June 12. Did Israel simply give us a heads-up about its plans, then go ahead without our encouragement? Did we “green light” its operation in advance? Did we encourage Israel? Did ...
It just doesn’t stop. Day in, day out since the Mad Hatter-in-Chief reclaimed the White House, he’s buffeted our country with non-stop recklessness and cruelty. The despair I feel today, only one-tenth of the way into his second term, is as acute as my dread about what lies ahead. It’s a safe bet that ...
After Hamas’s horrific attack on Israeli civilians on Oct. 7, 2023, New York Times columnist Tom Friedman offered some prescient advice to Israel: Don’t make the same mistake the U.S. made after Al-Qaeda attacked us on 9/11. (See author’s note below) Instead, react in a measured, proportional way. Striking back at Hamas with overwhelming military ...
Amid the outpouring of emotion following the death of Pope Francis, it’s not surprising that another news story was almost overlooked: The meeting of JD Vance with the Pontiff on Easter. Their encounter tells us something we should already have known about Pope Francis and a good deal more about the vice president. We’re ...
Last November Americans elected a presidential candidate who promised mass deportations of undocumented immigrants. The candidate demonized certain kinds of immigrants and flagrantly lied about them to whip up his rabid base. He was careful, mind you, not to demonize immigrants from predominantly white European countries and a plurality of American voters flocked to the ...
Of all the disparaging adjectives one could pick to describe the Trump administration, the one most under-used is cruel. Neither the media nor our political leaders are calling out the spectacular cruelty of the Trump/Musk cabal forcefully enough or often enough. Yes, we hear about their unconstitutional actions, but the public is ...
Twenty-two years ago, allied armies led by the United States thundered into Iraq with “shock and awe,” aiming to depose Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein and take away weapons of mass destruction he supposedly possessed. We quickly learned he had no such weapons — our intelligence was bad — but we stayed on in ...
