Fiasco Tries to Make Iran-Contra a Teachable Moment
These are boom times for multitasking, boom times for alienation, and, thus, boom times for content. Audiences need entertainment (give me more to do with my phone!), and capital has made the safe bet:...
View ArticleAbolish the Iowa Caucus
Some things are worth preserving out of tradition. Every year, for example, my British mother makes a traditional Christmas pudding—a mélange of many different dried fruits and spices, treacle, and...
View ArticleThe Washington Post Has Gotten Off Easy for Too Long
For Jeff Bezos, ownership of The Washington Post has come with a number of unintended consequences. Since he purchased the paper in 2013, it has been dubbed the “Amazon Washington Post” by the...
View ArticleThe Iowa Caucus Was a Media Debacle, Too
On Monday night, not long after the Iowa Democratic Party announced it was conducting “quality control” on ballots from the Iowa caucus, cable news’s talking heads and Twitter’s energetic touts began...
View ArticleThe Iowa Caucuses Are Dead
Born in 1972, when anti-war crusader George McGovern put Iowa’s caucuses on the map by placing second and transforming himself into a major presidential contender. Died in 2020, when a technology...
View ArticleTrump Has Never Looked More Comfortable as a Demagogue
Roughly 24 hours ago, Democrats around the country were informed that the Iowa Democratic Party, after years of organization and effort from the Democratic candidates and their campaigns, would not be...
View ArticleThe Youth Climate Movement Comes to New Hampshire
On a January weekend in New Hampshire, one month away from the state’s presidential primary, it was 64 degrees and sunny. The average high for January is 34 degrees. Members of the New Hampshire Youth...
View ArticleThe Senate Has Convicted Itself
There was never much hope that Republican senators would vote in large enough numbers to remove President Donald Trump from office this week. So in his closing statement on Monday, California...
View ArticleAfter Iowa, All the Candidates Have Something to Prove
The day after Donald Trump’s election, Pete Buttigieg stopped by the Notre Dame campus to attend an impromptu gathering of about three-dozen distraught College Democrats who had all worked on losing...
View ArticleWhat the Spotify Acquisition of The Ringer Says About Online Media
On Wednesday, after weeks of flirtation, Spotify and The Ringer made it official: The Swedish audio giant is acquiring Bill Simmons’s sports and entertainment website for an unspecified sum, almost...
View ArticleFossil Fuels Aren’t Even a Very Good Investment
Jim Cramer is done with fossil fuel stocks. It’s not that the fundamentals are bad, the irascible investment guru and Mad Money host told CNBC anchor Becky Quick last week. The dividends are great. But...
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The Abuses of Objectivity
In January 2017, Kellyanne Conway, at that time President Trump’s press secretary, coined the term “alternative facts” on Meet the Press. The term was part of a broader move by President Trump and...
View ArticleThe Airport Workers Who Starved Themselves in the Super Bowl’s Shadow
This year’s Super Bowl LIV in Miami, Florida, was, by all accounts, a successful event. One team’s fans were filled with victorious joy, the other’s with the agony of defeat; the bombastic halftime...
View ArticleHow to Mess Up Black History Month
Book events rarely garner national media attention—or, for that matter, much attention at all. But on Wednesday, Barnes & Noble canceled the launch of “Diverse Editions,” a series of 12 new covers...
View ArticleDemocrats Embrace the Grift
The press accounts of the App That Failed during the Iowa caucuses this week were probably most Americans’ introduction to Acronym, the Democratic nonprofit responsible for developing the app, but...
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This Is How Bernie Wins
I managed to find one person in Coos County, New Hampshire, who would admit to voting for Bernie Sanders in the 2016 primary and Donald Trump in the general. Don Couture, 79, is a Berlin native who...
View ArticleHistory Will Remember Democrats’ Timidity, Too
For reasons well beyond the antics of Trump himself, this has already been one of the most frustrating weeks of the Trump era. In the headlines, the ongoing fracas in Iowa has managed to overtake not...
View ArticleThe Radical Possibilities of Not Paying Your Student Loans
I left college $25,000 in debt, a fact I’m reminded of every month when an email from Great Lakes Borrowers Services informs me that “Your Automatic Payment Will Be Made Soon.” But relative to most...
View ArticleThe Lodge Is a House of Horrors With Nothing Inside
Horror destabilizes, but it follows rules. It is illicit and thrilling but temporary: like taking drugs, only safe. So I tell myself, anyway, when I have to watch a horror movie. Just in case, I saw...
View ArticleThe Empire Strikes Back
One day after the Senate acquitted him in 1999, Bill Clinton spoke from the White House about the grueling impeachment battle. It had been a bitter ordeal. He had lied to the country and broken the...
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