Would the GOP Use Trump’s Covid Diagnosis to Start a War?
One of the funniest responses to the president’s announcement that he had tested positive for the coronavirus was assuredly not meant to be laughed at. Florida Senator Marco Rubio issued a stern...
View ArticleHow the EPA Is Screwing Oklahoma’s Tribes
Jim Inhofe might be best known as the dipshit who brought a snowball to the floor of Congress as “proof” that climate change is not real. But the Republican senator from Oklahoma is no fool.In 2005,...
View ArticleThe Paradox of the Burmese Python
Samantha Smith first encountered PYBI029 in January 2019 after a farmer traced her tracks in the ash of a recently burned agricultural field on the outskirts of Sakaerat Biosphere Reserve, in Thailand....
View ArticleThe Religious Hijacking of the Supreme Court Doesn’t Require Amy Barrett
Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett has already drawn a substantial amount of scrutiny for her conservative religious beliefs and her potential willingness to overturn Roe v. Wade. An originalist...
View ArticleClaudia Rankine Has a Few Questions
In her newest book, Claudia Rankine takes on the oldest question in politics: How ought we to live together? Just Us completes Rankine’s trilogy of works on race in the United States, following Don’t...
View ArticleThe Barrett Confirmation Hearings Don’t Have to Be a Waste of Time
The Senate Judiciary Committee will begin its confirmation hearings for Judge Amy Coney Barrett next week. I am not looking forward to them, and for reasons that have nothing to do with Barrett...
View ArticleWho Will Win the 2020 Nobel Prize in Literature?
Four years ago, I made the worst prediction of my professional life. No, not that Hillary Clinton would defeat Donald Trump—though I was pretty confident of that, too. Instead, I wrote that Bob Dylan...
View ArticleExxonMobil Should Not Exist
On Monday, Bloomberg reported that multinational oil company ExxonMobil has recently planned to increase its carbon dioxide emissions 17 percent by 2025 while doubling its earnings. According to...
View ArticleTrump’s Gilded Age Coronavirus Care Is a National Shame
The nation surely breathed a sigh of relief last night, just as the president inhaled some very normal, deep, refreshing breaths, on the balcony of the White House, in front of television cameras—just...
View ArticleMelania Trump’s Charmed Pandemic Life
Last week, Melania Trump managed to avert a potential P.R. disaster by contracting Covid-19. On Thursday, CNN released audio secretly recorded by Melania’s former friend and adviser Stephanie Wolkoff,...
View ArticleImagining the Post-Trump Internet
On Monday, Trump declared victory in his battle with the coronavirus. By Tuesday, he had moved on, fighting the invisible enemy he apparently blames for keeping his (false) Covid-19 tweets from the...
View ArticleIs California Doomed to Keep Burning?
What will it take to save California? Around the world, fire season is growing increasingly severe and increasingly lethal. This year, wildfires have destroyed more than five million acres in the...
View ArticleWhy Trump’s Experimental Covid-19 Treatment Could Be Bad News for Everyone Else
Soon after President Trump spiked a fever, shares of Regeneron, a pharmaceutical company he has previously invested in, also shot up—along with interest in the company’s experimental Covid-19...
View ArticleThe Final Message of a Dying Campaign
With a month to go before the November election, Donald Trump has returned to the Covid-19 message he, his administration, and his allies pushed in the early spring. “Don’t let it dominate you,” Trump...
View ArticleOur President Is Literally Toxic
In 1978, Susan Sontag published a famous essay titled “Illness as Metaphor,” which argued against perceiving illness metaphorically. “Illness is not a metaphor,” Sontag wrote. “The most truthful way of...
View ArticleChaos Engulfs White House as Trump Learns That the Coronavirus is Contagious
The White House Coronavirus Superspreader Week is now among the biggest governmental outbreaks in the world, with the president’s residence ranking as one of the worst hot spots in the city of...
View ArticleKamala Harris and Mike Pence Tried to Have a Normal Debate. It Didn’t Quite...
Believe it or not, while it seems like an eternity has passed since the first presidential debate, it was actually only eight days ago. After the lights went down on that frenetic affair—which was...
View ArticleMaybe Trump Just Doesn’t Want to Be President
On Tuesday, not long after he had concluded an astonishing performance of dexamethasone-fueled theatrics from Walter Reed Hospital, President Donald Trump announced he would be quashing further...
View ArticleDonald Trump Has Lost His Ability to Short-Circuit the News
Twelve days ago, The New York Times published a story based on documents that reporters had wanted to see for years: Donald Trump’s tax returns. The story revealed that the president was deeply in...
View ArticleThe White House Coronavirus Outbreak Won’t Stop the Barrett Confirmation
Two weeks ago, the White House held an event with more than 200 attendees where President Donald Trump formally announced his nomination of Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court. Since then, the...
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