By Glynn Wilson – FBI Director James Comey issued a statement Tuesday morning saying the agency will not recommend criminal charges against Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton for her use of a private email server when she was secretary of state. But he called Clinton and her staff “extremely careless†in handling sensitive information. “Although…
By Glynn Wilson – Scientists have confirmed that Juno, a craft the size of a football field launched to explore some key secrets of space, successfully entered the volatile atmosphere in an orbit around Jupiter Monday night about the time most Fourth of July fireworks shows in the United States were climaxing. After a five-year…
By Glynn Wilson – As Americans party by the water, gorge on barbecue and take in the fireworks shows on the Fourth of July 2016, space scientists from Florida to California will be consuming coffee and staring at computer screens waiting to see if the Juno probe will successfully enter the volotile atmosphere of Jupiter.…
By Robert Reich – We talk a lot about Patriotism, especially around July 4th, but we need also to take to heart its five basic principles. First: True patriotism isn’t simply about waving the American flag. And it’s not mostly about securing our borders, putting up walls and keeping others out. It’s about coming together…
By Glynn Wilson – By getting involved in the Democratic Party and joining the fight for the platform, Bernie Sanders supporters are having a profound influence on the party’s direction for the future at meetings this week in Orlando, Florida ahead of the party’s convention in Philadelphia next month, according to sources taking part in…
By Neal Gabler – Moyers & Company – When we talk about the media’s effect on our political discourse, usually we’re referring to the way politics are reported. There are, of course, lots of other ways in which media mediate the political process, from ads to organizing to community building to fundraising, all of which…
By Robert Reich – We hear a lot about patriotism, especially around the Fourth of July. But in 2016 we’re hearing about two very different types of patriotism. One is an inclusive patriotism that binds us together. The other is an exclusive patriotism that keeps others out. Through most of our history we’ve understood patriotism…
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Vice President Joe Biden and the U.S. Department of Commerce’s U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) have announced new actions aimed at advancing President Obama’s call for a “Cancer Moonshot†to make “America the country that cures cancer once and for all†at the White House Cancer Moonshot Summit, according to a…
By Lauren McCauley – While the outsized influence that Big Money is having on federal elections is well-documented, the local impact of the Supreme Court’s 2011 Citizens United vs. FEC ruling has not been fully realized — until now. The Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law on Sunday published a…
By Glynn Wilson – WASHINGTON, D.C. – The German automaker Volkswagen has admitted to cheating on emissions tests and agreed to pay more than $15.3 billion in a settlement with U.S. regulators for decieving customers and causing pollution from its diesel vehicles, according to a release just out from the Justice Department and the Environmental…
By Dick Polman – With apologies to the climactic song in “Les Miserables,” here are the self-destructive Brits who voted yesterday to exit the European Union. Cue the music! Do you hear the people sing Singing the song of angry men We will crash the British pound Against the dollar and the yen, When the…
My Supporters and I Want Real Change – By Bernie Sanders – As we head toward the Democratic National Convention, I often hear the question, “What does Bernie want?” Wrong question. The right question is what the 12 million Americans who voted for a political revolution want. And the answer is: They want real change…
By Todd Gitlin – To readers who follow taxes and finance — subjects often introduced with the adjective “arcane†— David Cay Johnston is one of America’s best-known reporters. Johnston has worked on the staffs of Reuters, the Los Angeles Times, The Philadelphia Inquirer and from 1995 to 2008, The New York Times, where his…
By David Underhill – The American South is conservative. This is repeated so often that it resembles church liturgy uttered without thought to display adherence to a creed. But it won’t bear examination. The civil rights movement sprang from the South and convulsed the whole country, which quivers still from the effects in this presidential…
President Barack Obama took a few days to go on a working vacation this week and, to help celebrate the 100th anniverrsary of the National Park Service, the first family visited Yosemite National Park, one of the nation’s most popular national parks. In a brief speech on Saturday at Sentinel Bridge with the 2,425 feet…
In a speech webcast Thursday night from Burlington, Vt., Sen. Bernie Sanders, who won more than 10 million votes in the 2016 Democratic primary, urged supporters to begin the work of organizing politically “at the local and state level in an unprecedented way.†“Election days come and go, but political and social revolutions that attempt…
The Big Picture – By Glynn Wilson – Did your momma ever get on to you for some mischief and say something like this? “Wipe that smile off your face … I’m going to wash your mouth out with soap.” Well, I’m sorry to play your momma today. But if you are a Democrat or…
Nuclear weapons, climate change, and the prospects for survival. – By Noam Chomsky – In January 2015, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists advanced its famous Doomsday Clock to three minutes before midnight, a threat level that had not been reached for 30 years. The Bulletin’s statement explaining this advance toward catastrophe invoked the two…
The Big Picture – By Glynn Wilson – I had to turn off NPR news again this morning. I can’t listen to the same old, same old pretense of two-sidedness that helped get us into this mess in the first place. I had to turn off the TV news on Sunday. Same thing. Less facts.…
By Robert Reich – When I was a boy and lost just about every sporting event I tried, my father told me, “What counts isn’t whether you win or lose but how you play the game.” Most parents told their kids this. It was part of the American creed. But I doubt Fred Trump passed…
