(Tomdispatch.com ) – We’re now living in an age of opacity, as Rudy Giuliani pointed out in a courtroom recently. Here was the exchange: “‘In the plaintiffs’ counties, they were denied the opportunity to have an unobstructed observation and ensure opacity,’ Giuliani said. ‘I’m not quite sure I know what opacity means. It probably means […]
State of Chaos: Can America Escape Trump’s Hellscape?
( Tomdispatch.com) – In 2016 as now, he was the candidate of chaos. Yes, he was a billionaire (or wanna-be billionaire or in-hock billionaire, not to mention a liar, a cheat, and a scoundrel), but from the beginning he appealed to the forces of order in America that were also, as it happened, the forces […]
Has American History Bent toward Racism and the Southern Strategy, from Nixon to Trump?
( Tomdispatch.com ) – It was summer almost half a century ago when I got into that Volkswagen van and began my trip across country with Peter, a photographer friend. I was officially doing so as a reporter for a small San Francisco news service, having been sent out to tap the mood of the […]
A Death on 5th Avenue: America’s Maestro of Mayhem
( Tomdispatch.com ) – Yes, when he was running for president, he did indeed say: “I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn’t lose any voters, OK? It’s, like, incredible.” Then he won — and this November 3rd (or thereafter), whether he wins or loses, we’re likely to […]
Climate Trumpnado in the West: Fire and Fury Like the World Has Never Seen
( Tomdispatch.com) – It was August 2017 and Donald Trump had not yet warmed up to Kim Jong-un, North Korea’s portly dictator. In fact, in typical Trumpian fashion, he was pissed at the Korean leader and, no less typically, he lashed out verbally, threatening that country with a literal hell on Earth. As he put […]
Fourth World: Or American Carnage from a Pandemic President
( Tomdispatch.com) – The year was 1991 and the United States was suddenly the globe’s lone superpower, its ultimate hyperpower, the last and greatest of its kind, the soon-to-be-indispensable nation. The only one left — alone, utterly alone and triumphant atop the world. Who could have asked for more? Or better? It had been a […]
OK, Boomers: Will the America we die in be unprecedentedly Hot, Racist, Unequal, Sickly and Authoritarian?
( Tomdispatch.com ) – Let me be blunt. This wasn’t the world I imagined for my denouement. Not faintly. Of course, I can’t claim I ever really imagined such a place. Who, in their youth, considers their death and the world that might accompany it, the one you might leave behind for younger generations? I’m […]
Did he Win? Osama Bin Laden wanted America Effed up with Loathing and Forever Wars
( Tomdispatch.com) – It’s July 2020 and I’m about to turn 76, which, as far as I’m concerned, officially makes me an old man. So put up with my aging, wandering brain here, since (I swear) I wasn’t going to start this piece with Donald J. Trump, no matter his latest wild claims or bizarre […]
The World isn’t Flat After All, But Trump’s America is. Very Flat.
(Tomdispatch.com) – Let me rant for a moment. I don’t do it often, maybe ever. I’m not Donald Trump. Though I’m only two years older than him, I don’t even know how to tweet and that tells you everything you really need to know about Tom Engelhardt in a world clearly passing me by. Still, […]
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