David Sirota from Creators Syndicate

Fear, Loathing and the Crisis of Confidence for 12/21/2007

Fri, 21 Dec 2007 00:00:00 -0800

Just a few weeks ago, Scripps Howard News Service and Ohio University released a little-noticed study showing that one-third of Americans now "believe in a broad smorgasbord of conspiracy theories" revolving around government complicity in everything from the 9/11 attacks to the Kennedy assassination. The same survey last year found that "anger against the federal government is a ...

Updated: Fri Dec 21, 2007

The Path to a National Popular Vote for 12/28/2007

Fri, 28 Dec 2007 00:00:00 -0800

Right now, many are frustrated about Iowa and New Hampshire voters having such oversized influence in America's presidential elections. In a few months, as the general election campaign unfolds, we will be similarly frustrated about Ohio and Florida. Who arbitrarily gave this handful of states the disproportionate power to determine our national political path?

When it comes to the Iowa ...

Updated: Fri Dec 28, 2007

Stay Classy, Mike Huckabee for 01/11/2008

Fri, 11 Jan 2008 00:00:00 -0800

"The uncool subject is class," author Bell Hooks once wrote. "It's the subject that makes us all tense." What an understatement, considering the two leading "change" candidates in the latest presidential polls.

Barack Obama is contending for the Democratic nomination as a candidate who avoids focusing on economic class. He asks us to believe — nay, to ...

Updated: Fri Jan 11, 2008

Digging In the Right Place for 01/18/2008

Fri, 18 Jan 2008 00:00:00 -0800

There's a memorable moment in "Raiders of the Lost Ark" when Indiana Jones sees a rival's archaeological excavation and realizes the buried treasure is somewhere else. "They're digging in the wrong place!" he exclaims.

The line could explain why our national elections leave us feeling empty. By expecting so much so fast from Washington D.C., we are digging for "c ...

Updated: Fri Jan 18, 2008

The Stimulus Swindle for 01/25/2008

Fri, 25 Jan 2008 00:00:00 -0800

"Stimulus" — you've probably heard this nebulous, scientific-sounding word this week. Every politician suddenly wants economic "stimulus," and wants you to think this "stimulus" is unequivocally good.

But here's the question: Why are we talking about "stimulus" only now? After all, most people have been hurting for quite a while. Paychecks ha ...

Updated: Fri Jan 25, 2008

Rocky Mountain Realities for 02/01/2008

Fri, 01 Feb 2008 00:00:00 -0800

When I told my East Coast friends a few years ago that I was going to live in Montana, they were stunned. "Isn't that near Nebraska?" one wondered. ("Yes, relative to Washington, D.C.," I replied). Another New York friend recently sneered about my move last year to Colorado. "I'd never move to Denver," she said. "It's a B-list city."

Some friends, ...

Updated: Fri Feb 01, 2008

The Democrats' Class War for 02/08/2008

Fri, 08 Feb 2008 00:00:00 -0800

For all the hype about generational and gender wars in the 2008 Democratic presidential primary, we have a class war on our hands. And incredibly, corporate America's preferred candidate is winning the poorer "us" versus the wealthier "them" — a potentially decisive trend with the contest now moving to working-class bastions like Ohio and Pennsylvania.

In most s ...

Updated: Fri Feb 08, 2008

The Candidate of the Permanent Will for 02/15/2008

Fri, 15 Feb 2008 00:00:00 -0800

To the consternation of news bureaus, political consulting firms and has-been politicians, the Wall Street Journal's poll last month shows that America is hostile to an independent presidential candidacy by Michael Bloomberg. The New York mayor is viewed more unfavorably than favorably by voters. In head-to-head general election polls, he gets crushed everywhere, losing even the city he now gov ...

Updated: Fri Feb 15, 2008

A Trade Transformation for 02/22/2008

Fri, 22 Feb 2008 00:00:00 -0800

When it came to sex, Bill Clinton made us debate the definition of "is." Now, when it comes to economics, Hillary Clinton wants to debate the definition of "long," claiming this week in Ohio that "I've long been a critic of the shortcomings of NAFTA."

True, Clinton has recently criticized NAFTA — the 1993 trade policy whose lack of labor and environmen ...

Updated: Fri Feb 22, 2008

The New Permanent Campaign for 02/29/2008

Fri, 29 Feb 2008 00:00:00 -0800

In 1976, a young political consultant named Patrick Caddell sent a memo to Jimmy Carter telling the president-elect to wage "a continuing political campaign" that fuses public policy and political goals. This doctrine became known as the permanent campaign, and it is now changing from a White House tactic into a national grassroots organizing strategy.

Today's permanent campaig ...

Updated: Fri Feb 29, 2008

Hope In the Time of NAFTA for 03/07/2008

Fri, 07 Mar 2008 00:00:00 -0800

Reading articles about Hillary Clinton attacking NAFTA can lead you to believe The Onion has taken over America's news bureaus.

Clinton spent the last 10 years repeatedly praising the trade deal in speeches, most recently calling the job-killing accord "good for New York and America." Yet, journalists barely mention that record as they transcribe her assertions that, "I ha ...

Updated: Fri Mar 07, 2008

Remembering What Nixon Learned for 03/14/2008

Fri, 14 Mar 2008 00:00:00 -0700

A half century ago, Richard Nixon spearheaded his party's national congressional campaign in the face of a recession like we face today. Then Dwight Eisenhower's vice president, he decided the GOP would champion anti-worker laws pioneered in the segregationist south as a way to defeat Democrats. Specifically, he rolled out "right to work" ballot initiatives to weaken the labor movemen ...

Updated: Fri Mar 14, 2008

New Crisis, Old Isms for 03/21/2008

Fri, 21 Mar 2008 00:00:00 -0700

The Federal Reserve Bank's decision last week to address the housing crisis by extending $200 billion of taxpayer-financed credit to Wall Street banks was met with a stunned reaction typical of surprising events. But really, the move was the expression of longstanding isms that routinely package corruption as sound public policy.

Some background: During the housing boom, banks doled out ...

Updated: Fri Mar 21, 2008

Is Wright Right About Racism? for 03/28/2008

Fri, 28 Mar 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Since the 1960s, bigotry has undergone an aesthetic makeover. Today, the most pernicious racists do not wear pointy hoods, scream epithets and anonymously burn crosses from behind masks. They don starched suits, recite sententious bromides and stage political lynchings before television cameras. For proof, behold the mob stalking Barack Obama's former pastor, Jeremiah Wright.

Wright has ...

Updated: Fri Mar 28, 2008

Confessions of an Economic Hit Man for 04/04/2008

Fri, 04 Apr 2008 00:00:00 -0700

I'll admit it: I used to admire John McCain.

To paraphrase the UFO poster from "The X Files," I wanted to believe.

Specifically, I wanted to believe the guy talking tough about campaign finance reform was committed to getting money out of politics. This was the Arizona senator who in 2002 taped a radio ad praising his state's "clean elections" system. It provid ...

Updated: Fri Apr 04, 2008

The Ludlow Legacy, Part I: Colombia for 04/11/2008

Fri, 11 Apr 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Note to Editors: This is the first of two columns looking at the legacy of the Ludlow Massacre on its 94th anniversary.

Ninety-four years ago on April 20, America made international news when a government-sanctioned paramilitary unit murdered Colorado union organizers at a Rockefeller-owned coal mine. The Ludlow Massacre was "a story of horror unparalleled in the history of industri ...

Updated: Fri Apr 11, 2008

The Ludlow Legacy, Part II: Colorado for 04/18/2008

Fri, 18 Apr 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Note to Editors: This is the second of two columns looking at the legacy of the Ludlow Massacre on its 94th anniversary.

The Ludlow Massacre's tiny monument off I-25 in Southern Colorado is easily missed if you don't know where to find it. Though the nearby coal mine garnered international attention in 1914 after a government militia slaughtered union organizers there, the minimalism of ...

Updated: Fri Apr 18, 2008

Matthews vs. McNulty for 04/25/2008

Fri, 25 Apr 2008 00:00:00 -0700

If television is the nation's mirror, then no two TV characters reflect the intensifying "two Americas" gap better than Chris Matthews and Jimmy McNulty.

A recent New York Times profile of Matthews describes a name-dropping dilettante floating between television studios and cocktail parties. The article documents the MSNBC host's $5 million salary, three Mercedes and house in l ...

Updated: Fri Apr 25, 2008

The Plague of Potomac Fever for 05/02/2008

Fri, 02 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

If any publication was going to document the sickness known as Potomac Fever, it was going to be the Washington Post.

Last month, the newspaper penned a front-page dispatch headlined "Housing Accord Puts Builders First; Strapped Homeowners Offered Little Aid." It described congressional leaders agreeing to "provide billions of dollars in tax rebates to the slumping home-bu ...

Updated: Fri May 02, 2008

Acknowledging the Race Chasm for 05/09/2008

Fri, 09 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

When it comes to race, American politics is as polarized as a red and blue election map. On one side are those who try to distract from the issue; on the other side are those who work to sensationalize it. As this campaign season shows, what unifies both is bigotry.

Take the reaction to my recent In These Times magazine article about Barack Obama winning states with either very small or ...

Updated: Fri May 09, 2008