From the Left

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Politics

The Blame Game

From the Left / Susan Estrich /

And now it begins. America has elected a very flawed candidate. An aging, raging bully. Not the first choice of many Republican leaders. Not an acceptable alternative. Not a moderate by any standard. Not presidential by any definition.

So, who's to blame? I was on Black radio last night, and Tavis Smiley asked me if it was white women who ...Read more

What Do You Hear?

From the Left / Susan Estrich /

Will angry young men who are attracted by Donald Trump's sexist machismo and utter lack of a filter actually turn out to vote? Will latent sexism rear its ugly head, as it did in 2016, leading Trump to perform better than his poll numbers predict?

Will young women, who have every reason to be angry about losing their rights, and every reason ...Read more

The Bully and the Billionaire

From the Left / Susan Estrich /

It was a front-page story in The Washington Post back in October 2019. Amazon was in line to receive a $10 billion contract from the Department of Defense for cloud computing (the Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure, or JEDI, contract) when, at the last minute, the contract was awarded to Microsoft. Then-President Donald Trump has been ...Read more

The Week That Was

From the Left / Susan Estrich /

It was a week that would doom most candidates for high office. It began with Donald Trump going on a riff about Arnold Palmer's penis size, that the late golfer's daughter understandably found offensive. Did his supporters? Apparently not.

It got worse from there. If you don't mind a president who is focused on penis size, what about one who ...Read more

Trump Justice

From the Left / Susan Estrich /

An ABC story, which should have gotten more attention than it did, reports that a proposed appointment roster entitled "Transition Planning: Legal Principals" lists Judge Aileen Cannon, the federal district judge who threw out the classified documents case against Donald Trump, as a candidate for attorney general if Trump gets elected. Cannon,...Read more

The Endless Campaign

From the Left / Susan Estrich /

"Cat Eats Fox" was Matt Drudge's headline after Kamala Harris' much touted "interview" with Fox News anchor Bret Baier. It wasn't really an interview. He whined about her coming in 15 minutes late for a pretaped interview and then barely let her answer a question before interrupting her, talking over her and generally just playing to his Fox ...Read more

Beyond Weird

From the Left / Susan Estrich /

It started as a joyful campaign. When President Joe Biden dropped out, Kamala Harris, the president's pick and soon after the pick of every prominent Democrat, quickly secured the nomination. No one put themselves up against her. It was a relief and a joyful coronation. Her vice presidential nominee was the salt of the earth. Coach Tim. The ...Read more

'The Message' and The Interview

From the Left / Susan Estrich /

On Sept. 30, bestselling author Ta-Nehisi Coates appeared on the "CBS Mornings" show to promote his book "The Message," which is a one-sided critique of Israel as an apartheid state. The book compares Israel to the "Jim Crow South" and calls it out as the "one place on the planet -- under American patronage -- that resembled the world that my ...Read more

What Matters

From the Left / Susan Estrich /

Bob Woodward's new book, "War," has what we have come to expect as the usual number of blockbuster revelations, proving once again his skill at loosening the lips of those close to power. My favorite is the story that in the midst of drastic shortages at home and abroad, Donald Trump was sending Covid tests off to his authoritarian buddy in ...Read more

Contempt for Democracy

From the Left / Susan Estrich /

The latest filing by Special Counsel Jack Smith makes clear that Donald Trump and his aides had nothing but contempt for democracy in his efforts in 2020 to subvert the results of a democratic election.

Three days before the election, Person 1, someone who completely matches the biography of Steve Bannon, said that Trump would declare victory...Read more

A Good Enough Debate

From the Left / Susan Estrich /

J.D. Vance is a smooth talker and a far more disciplined debater than the man he is running with. He knows how to evade answering a question, how to sound more reasonable than he really is, and how to stick to a plan and stay on-script. He made the case that Donald Trump literally forgot all about, notwithstanding his aides having previewed it...Read more

Trump's Antisemitism

From the Left / Susan Estrich /

At a donor event last week with Miriam Adelson, the widow of Las Vegas casino billionaire Sheldon Adelson, Donald Trump promised to be the best friend Jews have ever had in the White House. The event was entitled "Fighting Antisemitism in America." This is what Trump said:

"My promise to Jewish Americans is this: With your vote, I will be ...Read more

Demeaning Women

From the Left / Susan Estrich /

"I am your protector. I want to be your protector ... you will no longer be abandoned, lonely or scared. You will no longer be in danger. You're not going to be in danger any longer."

That's Donald Trump talking, the man who was found liable for sexual assault by a jury of his peers and ordered to pay millions of dollars in damages -- now ...Read more

The Mixed and Muddled Results of Banning Affirmative Action

From the Left / Susan Estrich /

In the arguments before the Supreme Court on affirmative action in college admissions, proponents of affirmative action claimed that the number of Blacks admitted to selective colleges and universities would plummet absent affirmative action. And opponents of affirmative action claimed that the number of Asian Americans would increase ...Read more

The Blame Game

From the Left / Susan Estrich /

The blame game is in full swing, and Donald Trump and his running mate, J.D. Vance, are the ones using inflammatory rhetoric to fan the flames. "He believed the rhetoric of Biden and Harris, and he acted on it," Trump said of the gunman hiding on his golf course. "Their rhetoric is causing me to be shot at, when I am the one who is going to ...Read more

Does Donald Trump Really Believe He Won the Debate?

From the Left / Susan Estrich /

Ever since he walked into the "spin room" at the conclusion of Tuesday night's debate, Donald Trump has been claiming that he won the debate. Does he really believe that? Are his advisers so cowed, or delusional themselves, that they are feeding his own delusions? And what does that say about them -- and him?

The overnight polls -- the ...Read more

Where Is America?

From the Left / Susan Estrich /

Is America so angry that they will vote for an undisciplined liar who vows to turn back the clock?

Or is the country ready to turn the clock on negativity and polarization and take a chance on a new leader promising to bring about change for the middle class?

Right now, the answer is that America is divided.

We know exactly who Donald Trump...Read more

How Kamala Can Win the Debate

From the Left / Susan Estrich /

The stakes could not be higher. Tens of millions of people will be watching, hopefully including those who (like me with baseball) tune in just in time for the World Series. Kamala Harris has to do two things: fill in the blanks in her own platform; and let Trump be Trump.

It's hard not to like what you see with Kamala Harris. Since she ...Read more

Back to School

From the Left / Susan Estrich /

"Welcome to MIT!" the flyers being handed out to incoming students announce, next to a drawing of Tim the Beaver, MIT's mascot. The flyers go on to comment on the conflict in the Middle East and the State of Israel in particular, and they list more than 20 additional resources.

One of the "resources" they list is the Mapping Project, a ...Read more

The Definition of Kamala Harris

From the Left / Susan Estrich /

What Kamala Harris has managed to do in a month is totally redefine herself in the eyes of American voters. She went from being a mostly disapproved of vice president to being a positively viewed candidate in the space of four weeks. What it proves is what I've suspected all along: that the disapproval of her was not deeply rooted. It was ...Read more

 

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