Here is another excerpt from my on essay on Thomas Piketty’s Capitalism in the 21st Century. You can read the full article in the latest issue of Jewish Currents:  A few years back, when government debt trumped all other macroeconomic…

Those few (and perhaps imaginary) souls who have been wondering why OpEdge has been relatively quiet about Thomas Piketty’s Capitalism in the 21st Century can fret no more. I’ve been holding fire waiting for the publication of my extensive essay…

It’s fun to see the differences between the mainstream media’s coverage of Eric Holder’s resignation as U.S. Attorney General and that of the right-wing media. The mainstream is praising Holder, in particular for his department’s actions to protect voting rights,…

Like many of my friends, I’m excited about marching in the People’s Climate Change March this Sunday in New York City. Organizers are hoping it will be the largest demonstration in history in support of solutions to climate change. The…

The 16th century Venetian painter Paolo Veronese might have painted a photograph in the New York Times, so rich it is in symbolic content. Veronese crowded his paintings with myths, symbolic objects, references to literature and visual connections to contemporary…

President Obama has decided that there is only one way to respond to ISIS, a pan-Islamic military organization that now controls parts of Iraq and Syria, and that’s the way the United States usually responds to foreign events that displease…

Eduardo Porter of the New York Times is the latest journalist to advocate that the way to narrow the gap between what the wealthiest and everyone else earns is through education.  It’s an absurdly ridiculous argument that depends on us…

Two years ago I noted that it was September 28 when the first Christmas catalog arrived in my mail box. This year the first catalog showed its pages on September 4, stretching the holiday shopping season to one third of…

When I analyzed the long-shot possibilities of progressive Zephyr Teachout winning the Democratic primary for New York governor a few days back, I made a huge analytical mistake.  I forgot that the Working Families Party has already nominated Andrew Cuomo…

The front page of today’s New York Times tells the sad story of Los Angeles’ crumbling infrastructure.  Roadways, sidewalks and water pipes are in a state of decay thanks to several decades of tight municipal budgets. Close to 40% of…