To Comfort The Afflicted
And Afflict The Comfortable
Government Protects The Little Guy
BY FROMA HARROP Over a century ago, William Jennings Bryan presided over mass rallies of mostly middle-class Americans angry about economic inequities. The Tea Party activists gathered in Washington last weekend for Glenn Beck’s event shared similar concerns. Both leaders framed their populist mission in Christian terms. But Bryan’s people knew the source of their […]
A Labor Day Commitment To The Common Good
BY JIM HIGHTOWER America’s corporate chieftains must love poor people, for they’re doing all they can to create millions more of them. They’re knocking down wages, offshoring everything from manufacturing jobs to high tech, reducing full-time work to part-time, downsizing our workplaces, busting unions, cutting health care coverage and canceling pensions – while also lobbying […]
Mad Men In A Saner Time
BY FROMA HARROP “Mad Men” just won its third Emmy for “outstanding drama.” If there were a gold statue for “best nostalgic portrayal,” the AMC series would have walked off with that one, too. The allure and success of “Mad Men” is its stylish evocation of a lost era that many older Americans miss and […]
Beck, Palin Commandeer MLK’s Dream
BY ALEXANDER COCKBURN This coming weekend brings us the Aug. 28 anniversary of the March on Washington back in 1963. It was when Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his famous “I have a dream” speech from the Lincoln Memorial. At least 250,000 people, 75-80% black, rallied in the Mall. Each year the anniversary rolls […]
The Billionaire Right-Winger
BY JOE CONASON Despite the kaleidoscopic proliferation of political media over the past decade, most of what Americans hear and read about the workings of our democracy can be politely termed superficial. Only very rarely does journalism fully penetrate the glittering illusions created by partisans on every side to reveal the grittier realities. When a […]