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Vol. 10 No. 43March 1999
Features
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Devil in the Details
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Investor Illiteracy
The great bull market of the 1990s has generated euphoria in millions of inexperienced investors and laid the groundwork for privatization of Social Security. But extensive poll data suggest that investor expectations are grossly unrealistic. -
Green Herring
Is the Green Party the worst threat to progressive politics since Reagan or its best hope since the New Deal? -
Mississippi Waltz
While the House Republican leadership imploded after the 1998 elections, the Senate majority leader kept a low profile. Despite his reputation as a conservative ideologue, Trent Lott is a big-money pragmatist—some would say an opportunist. -
Care and Trembling
As provision of care for the sick and the elderly moves from the domestic sphere to the public realm and the market, caregivers often find themselves in the role of bedside bureaucrats. -
Is He a Soul Man?
As Democrats’ most loyal constituency, blacks have rallied around the President during his political crisis, even (some argue) going so far as to confer on him honorary black status. Maybe blacks are selling their political capital too cheaply. -
Lynne Cheney, Policy Assassin
Her role is simple but important: produce a steady supply of screeds for major media outlets claiming that our culture has been commandeered by the left. But there is often less to Lynne Cheney’s work than meets the eye. -
Rush from Judgment
We used to expect reporters and editors to place events in their proper context. Post-O.J., post-Diana, and soon (we hope) post-Monica, perhaps it’s time to ask: What happened to news judgment? -
Exhuming McCarthy
By encouraging Joe McCarthy and his red baiting tactics in the 1950s, conservatives embarrassed themselves. Emboldened by new evidence, they’re going to embarrass themselves again. -
Muddy Waters
New data show just how successful affirmative action programs have been at elite colleges and universities. Too bad those data might not have much relevance for the current debate over preferences in higher education. -
We Are All Third Wayers Now
The Third Way doesn’t have to be market conservatism in centrist clothing. -
Forty Acres and a Sheepskin
Redistributing income has always been difficult politics, but recent books propose a host of wealth-building ideas that may have some purchase even in today’s free market political environment. -
The Storm Amid the Calm
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Recasting the Stones
In our multicultural society, traditional monuments may no longer possess the unifying power they once did. Some projects by contemporary artists suggest a way around this conundrum.
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Vol. 10 No. 42January 1999
Features
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The Indelible Color Line: The Persistence of Housing Discrimination
Overt racism and active discrimination have decreased significantly over the last 30 years. So how come acute urban segregation persists? We need to look at our mortgage and insurance practices. -
Of Our Time: The Age of Trespass
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Choice Options
Conservatives ask, “Are you for or against school choice?” The question should be, “What kind of choice are you for?” Americans’ historical experience can help answer that question. -
Arresting Developments
In a variety of ways, police now serve private organizations, not just mixing missions but putting the coercive power of the state in unaccountable hands. -
One Pill Makes You Larger
The development of human growth hormone and antidepressants like Prozac has already begun to blur the line between “treating” an illness and “enhancing” an otherwise already healthy person, making it difficult for insurance companies to know how and what to pay for. -
The Prosecutorial State
Ken Starr is the least of it. -
Secrets and Lies
Critics from the right often condemned the old liberal foreign policy establishment for an excess of secrecy. Now the right has a new elitist establishment of its own. -
The Feminism Gap
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From Purity to Politics
Under repressive totalitarian regimes, the absolute moral rectitude of Eastern European intellectuals like Vaclav Havel and Adam Michnik was heroic. Ten years after the fall of the Wall, what happens when the reality of democratic politics calls for quotidian pragmatism and petty compromise? -
Global Warming and the Big Shill
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Clinton's Darkness At Noon
Bill Clinton has likened his Starr Chamber travails to those of Rubashov, the protagonist of Arthur Koestler’s Darkness at Noon. The comparison is more apt than he knows. -
Taking Liberties: The New Assault on Freedom
Freedom is falling out of fashion all across the political spectrum, and new moves by Congress and the courts threaten basic liberties. -
Bull Market Keynesianism
What if the reasonable growth, low unemployment, and low inflation of the last few years are in fact the vindication of Keynesian theory about consumption spending? And what if this spending has been driven not by government but by the stock market run-up? And what if the stock market collapses? -
Devil in the Details
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Power Play
The deregulation of the electric utility industry has been billed as a boon for consumers, because competition is supposed to lower prices. But utility companies are using the opportunity to pass the cost of abandoned nuclear reactors to customers. Big business may save, but consumers will pay more and the environment may suffer. -
Policing the Police
Where is the line between effective crime control and violation of civil liberties?
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Vol. 9 No. 41November 1998
Features
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The Successor Generation
If the profusion of legacy candidates this election season is any indication, having a political pedigree can do wonders for your electoral chances. As we hurtle toward the possibility of the first all second-generation presidential race, it's time to ask: Do dynastic advantages trample democratic fairness? -
Controversy: The Black-White Test Score Gap
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Elephantiasis
Republicans spent a generation bludgeoning Democrats with those dreaded "wedge issues." Maybe it's time to give the GOP some of its own medicine. -
Why Americans Go Broke
America's high bankruptcy rates suggest the recent economic boom is less than it appears. Changing bankruptcy law, which is what Republicans in Congress are threatening to do, won't help. -
State of the Debate: The Case Against "Civility"
Can't we all just get along? Not when "civility" is just a genteel way to mask the inevitable tensions and antagonisms of democratic society. -
Rape of the Appalachians
Strip mining is carving up broad swaths of West Virginia's hillsides and valleys. Are we willing to pay higher energy prices to stop it? -
State of the Debate: Defining Democracy Down
Must the Catholic Church admit women as priests? Must families with children or pets be allowed to live in every homeowners' association? These questions are even more complicated than they first appear. -
Sovereign Myopia
American values of internationalism, the rule of law, and human rights are finally being enshrined in a permanent world court. So why is the United States leading the charge against it? -
Essay: Look at Me! Leave Me Alone!
Which is stronger, the craving for publicity or the desire for privacy? The Truman Show demonstrates how tightly married these impulses are. -
Controversy: Charters and Choice
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Behind the Numbers: The Treadmill Economy
Even before the swooning of the Dow, the current economic expansion was less robust than it appeared. Is this a new economy? Or just people working harder to stay in place? -
Will Libraries Survive?
Rumors of the death of the brick-and-mortar library have been greatly exaggerated. Yes, the digital age has transformed the nature of data storage. But the public library will be a chief agent in providing access to digital information. -
Hearings Loss
It has been a long time since congressional hearings investigated real corporate and government abuses or serious social problems. But since 1994, the situation has gotten far worse: the oversight machinery is used for partisan purposes or simply left to rot. -
Of Our Time: The Bankers' Regime
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Vol. 9 No. 40September 1998
Features
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The Great Carjacking
Public outrage about auto insurance costs -- which almost derailed Christine Todd Whitman's re-election in New Jersey -- is symptomatic of a deeper problem that reforms typically fail to confront. -
The Myth of the Supermayor
A new breed of supermayor is supposed to be revitalizing the nation's cities. So let's visit the city and mayor often held up these days as a model for America. -
What Japan Teaches Us Now
Japan's economic crisis is a case study in the long-term costs of protecting inefficient industries. Yet it also shows how the pressures for protectionism become irresistible without a strong safety net and policies to aid displaced workers. -
Storylines: Tough Chat
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A Fast Track for Labor
Saying no to trade agreements won't stop trade. Labor's advocates need to support realistic proposals for modifying NAFTA and other pacts. -
Devil in the Details
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How Low Can You Go?
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America's Next Achievement Test
Despite significant improvement in recent decades, blacks still score consistently lower than whites on tests of academic performance. But recent studies show that the gap is not genetic in origin and suggest how it can be closed. -
Of Our Time: Constraining Capital, Liberating Politics
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State of the Debate: Lessons of Right-Wing Philanthropy
It is well known that the conservative movement has for years enjoyed a decided financial advantage on the battleground of ideas -- they have far more corporate and foundation support than liberals. But conservatives don't just have more money; they spend it better, too. -
Rooting the Home Team
All over America, owners are demanding extravagant subsidies and tax breaks for new stadiums. If communities want to keep their teams, there's often a cheaper solution than giving way to these demands. Follow the example of Green Bay. -
State of the Debate: The Rise and Fall of Racialized Liberalism
Liberalism took a fateful turn in the 1960s by redefining reform in racial terms. Two new books on urban politics sometimes overstate their case against recent liberal policies, but they help clarify what went wrong. -
The Still-Industrial City
In Chicago, like most other big cities in America, manufacturing was once the core of the urban economy -- until recent decades, when most of it moved out to suburban areas and beyond. But while much smaller today, manufacturing still makes a vital contribution that cities should work hard to maintain. -
Essay: Web of Paradox
The language of our emerging digital culture suggests adventure, daring, and unprecedented novelty, while we sit comfortably at our desks, alone, communing with our computer screens. Are we being taken in by our own metaphors? -
Controversy: The Rhetoric of "Corporate Welfare"
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No Dumping
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Below the Beltway: New Labor, New Democrats -- New Alliance?
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Vol. 9 No. 39July 1998
Features
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Essay: Age of Irony
Taking irony seriously may seem like missing the point. Today's ironic sensibility is never serious. But the old masters of irony had serious fun cutting through cant and pretension. -
The Clash of the Samuel Huntingtons
It's one of the fundamental dilemmas of foreign policy: Should American democracy be for export? Samuel P. Huntington makes a powerful case -- for both sides. -
Sacramento: Bowling Green Elementary
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How Low Can You Go? Viagravated Assault
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The Care Equation
Women used to do all the unpaid work of caring for the kids of aging parents. Although career barriers have fallen, women won't have real equal opportunity until America recognizes its crisis of caring. -
Le Sueur-Henderson: Minnesota New Country School
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Boston: Renaissance Charter School
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Devil in the Details
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Charter Conundrum
In exchange for autonomy from school districts, charter schools promise to achieve measurable progress in children's performance. But the movement is based on a dubious premise. -
State of the Debate: The Color of the Law
Race and crime commingle dangerously in the American psyche. Now that crime rates are declining, might color-blind justice finally be achievable? -
Screening Out Sex
When the Supreme Court overturned the Communications Decency Act, it was a triumph for civil liberties. Now new forms of censorship threaten to cut off young people's legitimate access to sexual information in cyberspace. -
The Turnout Imperative
Low voter participation favors conservatives. If liberals want to avoid a reprise of 1994 in 1998, they have to make turnout a top priority -- and fortunately some are already hard at work. -
Rampant Bull
Are liberals failing to rise in defense of their greatest legacy? As calls for privatizing Social Security grow louder, the time has come for a bold new defense of universal social insurance. -
Ballot Blocks
Poor people are typically democracy's missing persons. But the patterns of low-income voting show what really motivates the voters on election day. -
After Genocide
The fate of one town, Brcko, almost derailed the Dayton Accords. Now Brcko's reconstruction has become one of the most daunting ventures in peacekeeping ever attempted by the United States.
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