When I was a pre-teen, my favorite song was Dee Clark’s “Raindrops,” a sappy ballad of lost love sung straight to saccharine strings. The thunder sound effects in the background gave “Raindrops” just enough kitsch to make it a hit. But at the end of a very standard rendition in which he seems to be […]
Read More… from STORY OF AN OPPRESSED PEOPLE IN FOUR WORDS OF A SONG
I recently noticed that those stupid Facebook memes asking whether we really knew anyone who had contracted or died of Covid-19 have disappeared. Their slightly smarmy insinuation that the pandemic was a hoax has become completely untenable. More than 25 million cases, more than 400,000 deaths and counting. At this point, virtually everyone knows someone […]
The right-wing is happy to label initiatives to change the relationship between police and the communities that they protect as “disbanding” and “defunding” the police. As many are pointing out, those on the left who use these terms are playing into the hands of Trump and his merry band of fascists. Much better terms are […]
I have to admire the thousands of people protesting the awful death of George Floyd and the unredeemable racism in the criminal justice system that it represents. Even wearing masks, the protestors are risking their lives to show that they are both sick to their stomachs and exhausted by the centuries of racism that have […]
Read More… from Are the George Floyd riots the American Reichstag Fire?
OpEdge is turning over today’s column to my dear friend William Torphy, who has written a poignant article which explores how forty years of policies that favor the ultra-rich has weakened America and harmed its ability to fight the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic: Justice and Security for All/William Torphy Our society is like an […]
For the last week, I’ve been meaning to write an article begging Bernie Sanders to get out of the presidential race and support the putative Democratic nominee, Joe Biden. My thinking was that Sanders’ supporters need time to go through all the stages of grieving before they can deal with the reality of the 2020 […]
The “cull the herd” strategy for addressing the corona virus epidemic in the United States has emerged in public discourse this week, touted by Donald Trump, some minor politicians from southern states and a few Fox News pundits. Essentially the “cull the herd” strategy revitalizes the specious economic argument against environmental regulation—that doing something to […]
If we were judging only on their ideas and proposals, I would make a strong recommendation that every Democrat give their primary or caucus vote to Bernie Sanders. Biden, like Bill Clinton and Obama, is a conservative Democrat who has always been too quick to give away the store to Republicans, whereas for decades Sanders […]
Read More… from Bernie versus Biden. It’s not an easy choice, even for progressives
Centrist pundits are raising alarms about the possibility of Bernie Sanders getting the nomination, convinced that his so-called extreme policies will turn off centrist voters and conservatives who are disgusted with Trump’s hateful rhetoric. Supporters of Buttigieg, Biden, Klobuchar and Bloomberg are all saying that their candidate is the only one left who can defeat […]
Read More… from The Democratic Nominating Process is Much Ado about Very Little
Virtually everyone who has commented on the drone killing of Iranian Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani premises their remarks with the idea that Suleimani was, as one MSNBC talking head put it, “a bad dude.” Even the critics of Trump’s action feel forced to mention that Suleimani deserved what he got, no matter the nature of their […]