BLOG

This morning I drove up to what I expected to be a small protest on a rainy Saturday at the state capitol. Nearing Salem on Interstate 5 I began seeing vehicles adorned with various patriotic symbols, and stickers on cars from across the Cascade mountains with stickers that read “Re-open Central Oregon.” When I got

Hi Readers, I’ve extended some of the themes in the blog in this new piece for The New Republic: https://newrepublic.com/article/157505/morbid-ideology-behind-drive-reopen-america?utm_source=social&utm_medium=facebook&utm_campaign=sharebtn&fbclid=IwAR2SXXy2HN3h0X-3vzcKiny34MrSaTtpiLFDgH1aXMWA9YIjrGhFreeP12I

Opposition to lockdowns has finally turned into something resembling a movement in the last few days, with protests at state capitols in Michigan, Ohio, Kentucky, Idaho, and other states demanding a re-opening of the economy. Like a zombie return of the Tea Party movement, these protests revivify activists from across the right-wing spectrum. Ammon Bundy’s

In capitalist society, the market is an inevitable force to which everything else must be reconciled, no matter how brutal the cost. Yesterday US Trade Secretary Peter Navarro complained to the New York Times that medical experts warning about the effects of ending suppression orders too soon “appear tone deaf to the very significant losses

With jobless claims now past an astonishing 16 million with no end in sight, the COVID 19 pandemic is likely to push the US into another Great Depression. If that is the case, the countless indices of human misery will put enormous pressure on political institutions that are ill-equipped to respond adequately, opening the way

The purported effectiveness of hydroxychloroquine as a treatment for Covid-19 has by now become a regular pitch in Trump’s daily press briefings on the pandemic. The Chief Executive has focused precious energy on the antimalarial drug despite no real research to support its use and plenty of evidence of its potential harm. It has even

As the pandemic enters its most deadly phase in the United States, responses on the right have for the most part also shifted to accommodate what can no longer be denied about its catastrophic effects. Two weeks ago, New York Times columnist Bret Stephens warned that “overreaction” to the virus through suppression measures might itself

Jared Kushner’s insistence that a federal stockpile of medical supplies is not meant for use by states reflects the odd nationalism of the Trump administration. Facing outward it treats other nations as hostile rivals. Facing inward – like an inverted Jacksonianism – it sees subnational states and localities that make up the nation as greedy

It seems inevitable that as the US and global economic picture continues to worsen (confirmed dramatically by every conceivable indicator) there will be intensifying demands for the state to intervene and create a temporary welfare state. That kind of thinking destroys the longstanding neoliberal consensus in both parties. And Republicans in the Senate quite clearly