This article is an online-only supplement to the Prospect‘s recent profile of the Rev. Al Sharpton. You can read the profile here. Sharpton, the latest entrant in the Democratic presidential field, generates press by generating controversy. Whatever you may think of the man himself, one thing is clear: He will talk circles around the rest […]
Garance Franke-Ruta
Garance Franke-Ruta is a former senior editor at the Prospect. Her work has also appeared in The Washington Post, The Washington Monthly, The New Republic, and The Wall Street Journal, among other publications. She was a 2006 recipient of a fellowship at the Joan Shorenstein Center on Press, Politics, and Public Policy at Harvard University.
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Let’s Get Ready to Rumble!
The House of Justice on Madison Avenue between 124th and 125th streets in New York City may not look like the epicenter of a movement that could wreak havoc within the Democratic Party. The unremarkable, somewhat dilapidated edifice sits on a block bookended by a restaurant and the A & M Deli, where you can […]
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States of Decline
“Eight years ago, Connecticut’s economy was in decline,” the campaign ad flashed across television screens last spring. “Thousands of jobs lost. Taxes going up. Education failing. Governor John Rowland set out to change all that and today the positive results are everywhere. … Now some Democrats want to reverse our progress and raise the income […]
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Al in the Family
Does Al Gore know what he’s doing? Close readers of his two new books, The Spirit of Family and Joined at the Heart: The Transformation of the American Family, cannot help but wonder. Certainly no other serious politician in America has written so honestly, so refreshingly and so, well, earthily, about the contemporary American family. […]
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Moore’s the Pity
If you want about as clear a demonstration as you’re likely to find of the difference between truth and politics, go see Eminem’s 8 Mile, filmed on location in Detroit, and then go see Michael Moore’s Bowling for Columbine, which, despite the title, is set largely in Flint, Mich., and the white American and Canadian […]
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The Nader Guilt Factor
When it comes to predicting elections, journalists tend to get it wrong. Who could have predicted that the 2000 presidential election would have ended with Vice President Al Gore winning the popular vote and Texas Gov. George W. Bush winning the electoral-vote count upon the intervention of the Supreme Court? Sure, everyone knew it would […]
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Emily’s List Hissed
In early August, a months-long whispering campaign against Emily’s List hit the pages of Roll Call. In an article headlined “Making Enemies,” four anonymous Democratic consultants and operatives took turns criticizing the 17-year-old political action committee (PAC) — the largest source of Democratic hard money around — for wasting Democrats’ time, money and effort by […]
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Creating a Lie
To judge by the public reception of Sylvia Ann Hewlett’s much-hyped Creating a Life: Professional Women and the Quest for Children, you might think it was the first time American women had been admonished not to pursue high-powered careers when they could be having babies. Hewlett argues that the more women achieve in the workplace, […]
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“Missing” Sensitivity:
Most New Yorkers who encountered “Missing” posters after the attack on the World Trade Center simply stopped to view the poignant, desperate signs and then melded back into the bustle of the city. Some left candles at the impromptu shrines beneath them or took pictures, but few disturbed the chilling posters, which remain on display […]
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Farmer in a Cell?
Among the oddest side shows in the current Middle East impasse was the short-lived appearance of French farmer and trade unionist Jose Bove in the Ramallah compound of besieged Palestinian Authority President Yasir Arafat. Arrested outside the compound by the Israeli Defense Force on April 2, Bove — who gained international attention after destroying a […]