Blogs
10 Ways to Solve the Jobs Problem
As the midterm political season heats up, one word on every politician's lips is "jobs." And for good reason. People are hurting-they can't pay their mortgages, send their kids to college, pay their dental bills. Young people are wondering if they have a place in the work world.
Toxic Beaches Remain in Shadow of Latest Rig Explosion
As I was writing an article in Venice, Louisiana about my last two days in the Louisiana Gulf area doing research on the effects of the BP oil gusher, the news broke of another oil rig-production platform exploding in the gulf 80 miles south of Vermillion Bay. At this time, Coast Guard helicopters and ships are heading for the burning oil rig where 13 crewmen on the rig have abandoned the rig. Apparently no oil drilling was occurring when the explosion occurred.
More Stimulus Badly Needed to Create Jobs
This is the worst Labor Day for American labor in decades, maybe since the Great Depression. Unemployment is at 9.5 percent (as of July), and if we add in the people involuntarily working part time or who have given up looking for work, we get 16.5 percent of the labor force. This means that unemployment plus underemployment has risen by about 14.6 million people since the recession began.
The Skewed Middle East Peace Talks
Israelis and Palestinians who have started peace negotiations in Washington are separated by much more than the gulf between their substantive positions. Staggering asymmetries between the two sides could seriously imperil the talks.
Skeptics Could Doom Mideast Peace Talks to Fail
It's easy to be skeptical about the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks that have just begun. It might even be just a little bit fun. Skepticism puts you in with the in crowd - the swelling chorus of progressive pundits who predict that the talks are bound to fail, because Israel wants them to fail. Predicting failure gives you a chance to recount all the Israeli policies that block the path to peace: expanding settlements, maintaining military occupation in the West Bank, economically strangling Gaza, stirring up the fuel that keeps Fatah and Hamas split, and on and on.
FDR’s Labor Day Plea Resonates Today
On the eve of Labor Day in 1936, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt warned in his “Fireside Chat” of a potentially dangerous surge in class divisions if more was not done to support ordinary workers.
For FDR, providing the opportunity to labor for a “decent and constantly rising standard of living” was fundamental to a healthy democracy.
Moral Leadership and the Myth of 'Centrist' Thinking
If you have not read Drew Westen's outstanding piece, "What Created the Populist Explosion and How Democrats Can Avoid the Shrapnel in November", on the Huffington Post, Alternet, and other venues, read it immediately. Westen states as eloquently and forcefully as anyone what he, I, and other progressives have been saying from the beginning of the Obama administration. I agree fully with everything he says. But ...
Unseizing Gaza
In an interview with National Public Radio aired on August 30, 2010, Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon said that the three-year blockade on most foodstuffs and other materials was "a mistake" and that "denying different items or products into Gaza was not effective."
Flying the Flag, Faking the News
Edward Bernays, the American nephew of Sigmund Freud, is said to have invented modern propaganda. During the First World War, he was one of a group of influential liberals who mounted a secret government campaign to persuade reluctant Americans to send an army to the bloodbath in Europe.
Top 10 Reasons for Higher Taxes on the Top 1%
Funding for our country's children is being cut, but we
allow a hedge fund manager to make enough money to pay the salaries of
every public school teacher in New York City. Most of his earnings are
taxed at a rate less than that of his secretary.
We haven't been able to do anything about it because the cry of
'socialism' from the top generates fear in the minds of average
Americans. It's a meaningless cry. Here are ten reasons why the
wealthiest 10% of us, and especially the richest 1%, should be paying
higher taxes.
Buddhism, Peace, and Ecology
There is something extraordinarily child-like about the 84-year-old Zen Buddhist master Thich Nhat Hanh.
Can You Say, Fascism? The Political Consequences of Stagnation
My apologies to T. S. Eliot, but September, not April, is the cruelest month. Before 9/11/2001, there was 9/11/1973, when Gen. Pinochet toppled the Allende government in Chile and ushered in a 17-year reign of terror. More recently, on 9/15/2008, Lehman Brothers went bust and torpedoed the global economy, turning what had been a Wall Street crisis into a near-death experience for the global financial system.
Five Ways You Can Help Pakistan (and the Rest of Us)
As the world comes to terms with the mind-boggling scale of the tragedy in Pakistan, many Americans are asking what we can do to aid the flood victims.
Eve Ensler: Bald, Brave and Beautiful
Bald, brave and beautiful: Those words can't begin to capture the remarkable Eve Ensler. She sat down with me last week, in the midst of her battle with uterine cancer, to talk about New Orleans and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Eve, the author of the hit play "The Vagina Monologues" and the creator of V-Day, a global activist movement to stop violence against women and girls, told me how "cancer has been a huge gift."
Hurricane Earl... and Floating Nuclear Power Plants
It was supposed to happen off the U.S. East Coast and was scuttled because of skyrocketing costs, public opposition and a lack of need. But the concept of floating nuclear power plants is back. Russia, copying the U.S. plan, recently launched the first of what it says will be many floating nuclear plants that it will moor off its coastline and sell to nations around the world.
Fight Tea Partiers with Fresh Voters
Candidates have been in their districts, making nice to likely mid-term voters. They're more scarce than general election voters, and typically a more polarized bunch. What if there were more of them and more low-income people, particularly women, were in the mix?
The (Anti-War) Surge Did Work
Just Don't Do It: NIKE Digs Coal, Disrespects Coal Miners
"If we are to remain leaders in the green economy, then we have to be relentless in our pursuit of clean energy. We have to constantly evaluate all aspects of our energy footprint. Find opportunities to collaborate and partner with other companies and organizations.
Weaning the World Off Oil
Ten days ago I received a letter from Cairn Energy, the British company at the centre of Greenpeace's current direct action in the Arctic.
Iraq/Afghanistan: A Promise Kept, A Promise Deferred
President Obama wants credit for keeping his promise to end the war in Iraq. Some credit is due: the President reaffirmed his commitment to withdraw all U.S. troops from Iraq by the end of 2011, as required by the agreement between the U.S. and Iraq. But only partial credit is due, because the war-ending task is very far from complete.