Michael Massing

Jews remain one of the most liberal groups in American society. And although concern about Israel’s security has pushed some of them to the right, the majority have supported the peace process, including the efforts of President Clinton late in his term to bring about an agreement with the Palestinians. During and since those years, […]

A quiet but profound revolution is taking place in suburban America, affecting the way people there think about government, taxes, property rights, the free market, and the idea of community itself, and it is being sparked by that most mundane of phenomena: the traffic jam. From New York, where 80,000 more cars a day enter […]

O n a warm Sunday in September, Michael Steinhardt, maverick hedge fund operator turned Jewish philanthropist, was showing a group of fellow donors around his private zoo. Located on his 51-acre estate in Mount Kisco, New York, an hour north of Manhattan, the zoo features free-range zebras, miniature horses, guinea fowl, wallabies, antelopes, blue-necked pheasants, […]

Last year, during a visit to Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, I got a firsthand look at the underside of globalization. Located across the Rio Grande from El Paso, Texas, Juárez is home to more than 400 plants known as maquiladoras. Here, workers assemble parts sent by foreign companies–mainly U.S.-based corporations–for subsequent export. Most of the plants […]

“This is a different kind of conflict,” said General Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, at a Pentagon briefing in October. He was speaking of the war on terrorism. “The closest analogy would be the drug war.” Since September 11, comparisons between the two wars have been rife: Both are said […]

O n the October 23, 2000, issue of TAP, Wendy Kaminer argued that political calls for regulating “toxic media”–like violent movies or profane rap albums–can lead to dangerous censorship and repression. But what if there’s a legitimate public interest in monitoring the cultural products kids consume? Michael Massing says that Kaminer’s argument is typical of […]

Last year, when the editor of another magazine asked me to write about the progress of welfare reform in America, I called around to see which state was leading the way. I ended up in Wisconsin. Under the direction of Republican Governor Tommy Thompson, Wisconsin had begun cutting its rolls earlier than most […]