UPDATE: Though Chosun Media reported that Pompeo would gift an Elton John CD to Kim on the president’s behalf, Trump on Tuesday revealed that Pompeo was not carrying a signed disc containing “Rocket Man” on his trip to North Korea last week. “They didn’t give it. I have it for …
Read More »What to Know About the Foiled 4th of July Terrorist Attack
Fourth of July means big crowds in concentrated spaces, which unfortunately also means the conditions are ripe for a terrorist attack. This is allegedly what 48-year-old Ohio residentDemetrius N. Pitts was thinking before the FBI arrested him on Sunday for plotting to attack a holiday parade celebrating America’s independence in …
Read More »The Parkland Parents Are Not Backing Down
PARKLAND, FLORIDA – The parents and spouses arrive alone and in pairs. On a scorchingly hot morning in June, they park their cars outside the clubhouse in a pristine subdivision and make their way inside to the “Teen Room.” If any of them notice the grim relevance of this meeting …
Read More »This Is What a Pro-Trump Local News Monopoly Would Look Like
Fox News might be President Trump’s most prominent propaganda arm in the media, but a deal proposed by the Sinclair Broadcast Group could change that. The FCC is currently mulling a $3.9 billion merger of Sinclair and Tribune Media, a move that would give the former company over 200 local …
Read More »Cambridge Analytica's Psy-Ops Warriors
In the ongoing furor over the pilfered data on 50 million Americans taken from Facebook by Cambridge Analytica and weaponized during the 2016 election campaign on behalf of Donald Trump, attention has focused primarily on CA’s slick and fast-talking CEO, Alexander Nix, who’s been suspended from his job over the …
Read More »Jamil Smith: You Can't Kill Your Way to Freedom
Freedom and safety are both fragile, but it is curious to see how often they are treated as if one will break the other. The zero-sum goes like this: The more freedom we have, the more risk that we incur. To be safe, we have to curtail liberties. But what …
Read More »The Worst Government Possible, on Purpose
I worry less about Kim Jong-Un than I do Betsy DeVos. The North Korean dictator, for one, doesn’t have dominion over the educational futures of nearly 51 million elementary and secondary students and countless more in college. Barring a nuclear attack, of course, the wealthy charter-school champion is poised to …
Read More »Taibbi on Russiagate and the New Blacklist
Putin loves you; therefore, you love Putin. The enemy re-tweets you, therefore, you’re in league with the enemy. We’re at war with them, therefore we’re at war with you. One of the first rules of a shunning campaign is that it doesn’t have to make sense. It just has to …
Read More »A Year Inside the Black Lives Matter Movement
Months before the now infamous Unite the Right march this summer, the 10 or so members of the Charlottesville chapter of Black Lives Matter heard that the largest white-supremacist rally anyone had seen in years was coming to their town. They leapt into action. First, they pleaded with local leaders …
Read More »Al Franken Agrees to Ethics Investigation After Groping Accusation
Minnesota senator Al Franken said he would cooperate with an ethics investigation after radio/TV host Leeann Tweeden accused the then-comedian of “forcibly” kissing and groping her without her consent during a USO Tour in December 2006. In a statement, Franken apologized to Tweeden, the other USO performers and his constituents …
Read More »