I submit the following mots justes: neo-Confederate. The neoconservatives of the Reagan-George W. Bush era may be estranged from today’s GOP (hello, Bill Kristol), but the semi-abbreviation “neocon” need not be discarded. Only henceforth, it means “neo-Confederate.” The fundamental ideology of today’s GOP is white racism, with all its historic trimmings. In one particular after […]
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Posted inTAP
More employers are considering hiring people with criminal records…
The New York Times recently reported that more and more employers are considering hiring people with criminal records, as unemployment falls and labor markets tighten. As Keynes and the Keynesians have long argued, all the compensatory programs in the world are no substitute for full employment. We can support “ban the box” and other efforts […]
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
Mick Mulvaney Leads the Race for Worst Cabinet Official
Mick Mulvaney has been busy—and for those who believe that the federal government can improve Americans’ lives, that’s not a good thing. Mulvaney, who is both President Trump’s Office of Management and Budget director and acting director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, introduces himself to others as a right-wing nutjob. And as a South […]
Posted inTAP
America’s Own Forgotten People
Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door! —Emma Lazarus, inscription on the base of the Statue of Liberty, 1903 Why do we want all these people from […]
Posted inTAP
When the president of the United States is guided solely by self-interest…
…politicians of all stripes will just have to figure out how to enhance his material gains. Is that so hard to figure out? Apparently, it is. Consider the bipartisan outrage we’re hearing from elected officials in coastal states over the decision of Donald Trump’s Interior Department to allow coastal drilling, quickly followed by an exemption […]
Posted inTAP
Robert Frost, Trump, and the Wall
As Robert Frost famously wrote, “Something there is that doesn’t love a wall.” Does Donald Trump agree? Is Trump really about to make a deal with Democrats to preserve the right of undocumented Dreamer adults who were brought to this country as children to remain here under DACA? It sure seemed so at Tuesday’s White […]
Posted inTAP
California’s Thin Red Line
California’s thin red line—so thin that in much of the state, it’s barely discernable—crumbled a little more yesterday with the announcement from Orange County Republican Representative Ed Royce that he wouldn’t seek re-election. Royce, who has served in Congress since 1992 without anyone really noticing, holds one of the four Orange County seats that Hillary […]
Posted inTAP
When the other memoirs come out—and they will—Michael Wolff’s book will feel tame
Just imagine how serious people around Donald Trump, like General H.R. McMaster, or General John Kelly, or former Goldman chief Gary Cohn, or even Jeff Sessions feel about the idiocy of Trump, and the stories they have to tell? The great disgrace of the Republican Party is to deny the appalling reality (or unreality) that […]
Posted inEconomic Policy
Republicans Suddenly Want to CHIP In
As time winds down for Congress to pass a short-term spending bill to avoid a government shutdown, Republicans have another plan in the works—not only to place the blame for a shutdown squarely on Democrats but to blame them for a failure to fund the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP). Early Friday morning, House Speaker […]
Posted inTAP
If a liberal strategist or screenwriter had scripted the Bannon-Trump crack-up…
… it would be hard to improve on events now unfolding. Michael Wolff’s book, Fire and Fury, is only a more detailed version of what the world knows all too well. Donald Trump is an undisciplined mess, unfit to govern. His cabinet knows all too well what a total idiot he is, and says so. […]
