From the Left
/Politics
The Supreme Court, Justice Breyer and Abortion
It might just be a coincidence that former Justice Stephen Breyer's new book had its official publication date on the same day the court heard argument on the biggest abortion case since Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, which overruled Roe v. Wade. In his important new book, "Reading the Constitution: Why I Chose Pragmatism, Not ...Read more
Chuck Schumer and the Democratic Left
Who was Sen. Chuck Schumer speaking to when he denounced Benjamin Netanyahu and urged Israel to hold new elections to replace him? And who was he speaking for?
Don't get me wrong. I'm no fan of Netanyahu's. Not one bit. When the history of Oct. 7 is finally written, Hamas will rightly be blamed for unspeakable evil. It was their doing and ...Read more
'Bloodbath'
"Now, if I don't get elected," Donald Trump said at a rally last weekend in Ohio, "it's going to be a bloodbath for the whole -- that's going to be the least of it. It's going to be a bloodbath for the country."
Who talks like that?
The once and possibly future president of the United States. Warning of a bloodbath for the country.
His ...Read more
On 'From the Edges of a Broken World'
The essay was published by Guernica, which until this week I would have described as a highly regarded literary journal. (It can be found here: https://web.archive.org/web/20240305095742/https:/www.guernicamag.com/from-the-edges-of-a-broken-world/.) This week, they retracted the essay, saying they regretted publishing it. Why? Because it ...Read more
In His Own Words
The man can't control himself.
In a nearly two-hour speech at a rally in Georgia this weekend, he told the audience: "I just posted a $91 million bond -- $91 million on a fake story, totally made-up story. Ninety-one million based on false accusations made about me by a woman that I knew nothing about, didn't know, never heard of. I know ...Read more
The State of the Union
The Republicans should be mortified. In fact, by all accounts, they are. Rolling Stone featured an entire article quoting their reactions to Alabama Sen. Katie Britt's embarrassing response to the president's State of the Union speech. Describing the speech as "feeling more like a rejected audition tape for a supporting role on 'Grey's Anatomy...Read more
When Is Rape Not Real Rape?
It's a question I've been writing about for more than 40 years, since I found myself in the back of a police car explaining what happened to me when a Black man held an ice pick to my throat and threatened to kill me. I was, I learned that night, a lucky victim, lucky to be alive and lucky that racism meant that mine was considered a "real ...Read more
Trump Scores with the Supreme Court
The Supreme Court did not have to take up Trump's immunity case. When Jack Smith went to the court and asked them to fast-track the case -- avoiding the delay that an appeal to the D.C. Circuit would entail -- the court said no. The result was that the appeal, which took months to decide, put the trial on hold. If the court thought the case ...Read more
Good for Gavin
Asked last Sunday if he was ruling out a run for the presidency in 2024, California Gov. Gavin Newsom shot down the idea -- again.
"You gotta be kidding," he told Kristen Welker on Sunday's "Meet the Press." "I am here celebrating the extraordinary accomplishments of the Biden-Harris administration, making the case that we need to make to ...Read more
Embryos Are Not Children
The decision of the Alabama Supreme Court that frozen embryos are protected as children is being viewed as a major victory for the anti-abortion movement, which is ironic, to say the least, since its most immediate impact is to make the hellish trip to having children through in vitro fertilization even more difficult. So much for pro-life. So...Read more
Trump Is No Navalny, and Biden Is No Putin
Donald Trump has been outrageously silent about the brutal murder of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny. No, correct that. Silence would have been outrageous. Comparing himself to the slain hero is beyond outrageous. Trump, and his supporters, have had the audacity to compare Trump's indictment by four grand juries to the imprisonment ...Read more
The Culture of Gun Violence
"Turn on the TV," my friend Annie said. No hello -- it has to be something bad. "The Super Bowl." At first I thought Las Vegas. But no, this must be Kansas City. A shooting. One woman dead. Twenty-two people shot. Eleven children. Here we go again. What could be more American? The schools were closed. A million people gathered to celebrate. ...Read more
A Supreme Compromise
If there was one lesson to be learned from Bush v. Gore, and its impact on the Supreme Court's credibility, it is that the court should not decide presidential elections. That job belongs to the people: in the case of Donald Trump, to voters and juries. What that means in practice is that the court needs to find a way to decide the two cases ...Read more
A False and Unfair Confusion
One of them confused Nikki Haley with Nancy Pelosi -- both are, after all, women, whose first initial begins with an "N." One of them confused the president of Mexico with the president of Egypt, while the other confused the leaders of Hungary and Turkey. What does it prove? Basically, nothing. Certainly nothing about who should be the next ...Read more
Citizen Trump
On Tuesday, as expected, a three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit rejected in the strongest possible terms former President Donald Trump's claim that he is absolutely immune for crimes allegedly committed while he was in office. "For the purpose of this criminal case, former President Trump has become ...Read more
The Power of Women
The gender gap is growing.
According to the latest Quinnipiac University poll, President Joe Biden has opened a six-point lead over Donald Trump -- powered by the votes of women.
In a press statement, the university's polling analyst Tim Malloy said, "The gender demographic tells a story to keep an eye on. Propelled by female voters in just ...Read more
The UN and Hamas
What were United Nations employees doing on Oct. 7?
According to reports assembled by Israeli intelligence and shared with Western media this week, at least a dozen employees of the U.N. Relief and Works Agency, or UNRWA, actually participated in the terror attacks that murdered more than 1,200 Israelis, most of them civilians, and took ...Read more
Loose Lips
Donald Trump is on a roll. No, I'm not talking about his victories in Iowa and New Hampshire, although of course he won them both. I say "of course" because he's a president running for his second term, and if you judge him like you would an incumbent -- who you would expect to do better than 80% or more -- the fact is that he underperformed, ...Read more
No Labels, No Trump
The Dursts are right. The chairman and president of the wealthy New York real estate company brought suit this week in New York State Supreme Court against the group that is threatening to run a third-party candidate for president. It is not a bipartisan, pro-good government effort, which is what the Dursts contributed to when No Labels was ...Read more
How Not to Fix the Immigration Crisis
No one -- or almost no one -- can deny that there is an immigration crisis in America. New legislation is needed, including more funding for a fair and effective system for controlling the border and handling the asylum process. In the Senate, key Republicans and Democrats are at least talking together about how to deal with the problem.
Not ...Read more