From the Left
/Politics
A Kakistocracy Takes Over Immigration Policy
Social media has been lighting up like fireworks, with myriad Trump voters exclaiming, "I didn't know he meant me!" For example, many MAGA cheerleaders are now shocked to learn that his rallying cry to eliminate "Obamacare" means killing the popular Affordable Care Act that provides their health coverage!
Perhaps the most stunned, though, are...Read more
Trump's Plan to Feed the Greed of Corporate Elites
Howard Lutnick wants to have his cake and eat it, too. Then, he intends to eat your cake. Lutnick is another billionaire corporate huckster who was a campaign bagman for Trump, and now he's to become the commerce secretary. But first, he's been tasked with picking hordes of corporate loyalists to be placed in Trump's government as ...Read more
How Trump's Made-in-America Scam Still Means Made-in-China
Wow! Who says election promises don't produce real change?
Candidate Donald Trump had loudly proclaimed that he'd force U.S. corporations to move their Chinese manufacturing jobs back to America. How? By imposing a whopping new tariff on all the made-in-China products they sell to us.
Even he must have been surprised, though, when one major ...Read more
Look to Maine for Some Good News!
Even in a barrelful of rotten apples, you might think there'd still be a few good ones.
But don't get your hopes up looking into barrels labeled "private equity investors." These esoteric, multibillion-dollar Wall Street schemes rig the marketplace so "high-net-worth individuals" can grab fat profits and special tax breaks to buy up doctors' ...Read more
Can Our Elections Be Made Even More Vapid? Some Are Banking On It
Many people feel that America's political campaigns have become vapid PR hustles with little connection to the real-life concerns of workaday people. Luckily, Adam Swart says he has the fix for such voter malaise: Just add a more professional level of vapidity to the process, he says, and you can reduce the need for having actual voters ...Read more
The Shame of TD Bank's Jolly Bankers
Woody Guthrie satirized Depression-era bankers who routinely gouged farmers and poor people. "I'm a jolly banker, jolly banker am I," Woody sang about the joyful lenders who profiteered on people's misery.
Woody's song could be sung today by Bharat Masrani, CEO of the TD Bank empire. Investigative digger Judd Legum reports that Masrani has ...Read more
Lilly Ledbetter Fought the Bastards -- And Won for All of Us
Forget the cartoonish "Great Man" version of American history. Nearly all social progress in our country has been spurred by unheralded "nobodies" who felt a sting of injustice and resolved to right the wrong.
Lilly Ledbetter, who recently died at 86, was one such trailblazing rebel. It's worth remembering her gutsy stand for "paycheck ...Read more
Sordid Story: Corporate Executives Get Self-Gratification From M&As
Sadism and masochism (abbreviated as S&M) are generally frowned on in polite society as perverse acts of sexual gratification. But what should we make of M&As?
This is Wall Street's abbreviation of mergers and acquisitions, which are acts of self-gratification practiced by top corporate executives. Such financial couplings can also be judged ...Read more
To Fight Right-Wing Book Bans, Read Banned Books!
In high school, my friend Charlie and I once poked into an abandoned Victorian house in our hometown. Up in the attic, we found a secret door to a space containing several boxes of books.
One held 50 copies of "The Age of Reason," Thomas Paine's treatise ridiculing the myths of Christian theology and the Bible. Hot, forbidden stuff! In Paine'...Read more
To Get Good Local News, Try Do-It-Yourself Journalism
Perhaps you've noticed from the shrinkage (or total elimination) of your local newspaper that this source of hometown journalism has become monopolized, nationalized and trivialized by conglomerate owners.
How uplifting, then, to see a national consortium of saviors rallying to reestablish a "thriving news media" for our democracy. How? Well,...Read more
School Lunch, Christian Nationalism and Jesus
An iconic Texas band, the Austin Lounge Lizards, has a song that nails the absurd self-righteousness of Christian supremacists: "Jesus Loves Me (But He Can't Stand You)."
I think of this refrain when I behold today's right-wing proselytizers wailing that the blessed rich should not be taxed to assure that everyone has the most basic human ...Read more
The Battle of Baraboo -- Privatizer Greed v. Seniors' Health Care
Baraboo, Wisconsin, is known as the former home of the Ringling Bros. Circus' headquarters. But even that extravaganza of acrobats and clowns could not surpass the dazzling tent show playing out in Baraboo this month, starring the Sauk County Board of Supervisors. Only ... you couldn't have seen it, because the tent was zipped tight to keep ...Read more
Why Are We Letting Corporate Profiteers Write America's Farm and Food Policy?
A farmer was asked what he'd do if he won a million-dollar lottery. "Well," he said, "I guess I'd just keep farming 'til the money runs out."
Trying to make a living as a farmer is not for the fainthearted. You have to take out high-interest loans from cold-eyed bankers to put in a crop and buy supplies. Then you're also at the mercy of ...Read more