By Andrea Mazzarino | – (Tomdispatch.com) – Recently, in this Black Lives Matter protest moment, my five-year-old son looked at me and asked, “Mommy, where did all the brown people go? Did the police here shoot them?” We’d just moved to the outskirts of a more affluent rural town from a city where my son […]
Organizing the Rich or the Poor? Which America Will Be Ours After the Pandemic?
By Liz Theoharis | – ( Tomdispatch.com ) – In the summer of 1995, when I was 18, I started visiting Tent City, a temporary encampment in an abandoned lot in northeast Philadelphia. About 40 families had taken up residence in tents, shacks, and other makeshift structures. Among them were people of various races, ages, […]
Who is “Essential” to our Covid-19 World? A Military Spouse’s Perspective on Fighting this Pandemic
By Andrea Mazzarino | – ( Tomdispatch.com ) – “When he first came home, it was tough.” So Aleha, the wife of an airman in Colorado, told me. She was describing her family’s life since her husband, who lives with chronic depression, completed a partial hospitalization program and, in March, along with other members of […]
Celebrated to Death: Memorial Day Is Killing Us, says an Afghanistan Vet
[Note for TomDispatch Readers: Here’s a way to support TomDispatch in tough times and end up with a good book while you’re stuck at home in this pandemic moment. For a donation of $100 ($125 if you live outside the U.S.), you can get a signed, personalized copy of Erik Edstrom’s striking new work, Un-American: […]
Neoliberalism starved our Classrooms of Resources for 50 Years, and then Covid-19 Budget Cuts Hit
By Belle Chesler | – ( Tomdispatch.com) – Do you hear that silence? That’s the absence of footsteps echoing through our nation’s public school hallways. It’s the silence of teaching in a virtual space populated with students on mute who lack a physical presence. It’s the crushing silence of those who are now missing, who […]
Other Countries get Testing, Contact Tracing and Open Economies: We get President Lysol and Malign Neglect
By Ann Jones | – ( Tomdispatch.com ) – Donald Trump is not a president. He can’t even play one on TV. He’s a corrupt and dangerous braggart with ill-concealed aspirations for a Crown and, with an election coming up, he’s been monopolizing prime time every day, spouting self-congratulation and misinformation. (No, don’t inject that […]
Beware the Pentagon’s Pandemic Profiteers: Hasn’t the Military-Industrial Complex Taken Enough of Our Money?
By Mandy Smithberger | – ( Tomdispatch.com ) – At this moment of unprecedented crisis, you might think that those not overcome by the economic and mortal consequences of the coronavirus would be asking, “What can we do to help?” A few companies have indeed pivoted to making masks and ventilators for an overwhelmed medical […]
Inequality and the Coronavirus: Or How to Destroy American Society From the Top Down
By Liz Theoharis | – ( Tomdispatch.com) – My mom contracted polio when she was 14. She survived and learned to walk again, but my life was deeply affected by that virus. Today, as our larger society attempts to self-distance and self-isolate, my family has texted about the polio quarantine my mom was put under: […]
When Renters and Homeowners and Small Businesses need a Bailout, the Fed gives it to Big Corporations
By Nomi Prins | – ( Tomdispatch.com ) – To say that these are unprecedented times would be the understatement of the century. Even as the United States became the latest target of Hurricane COVID-19, in “hot spots” around the globe a continuing frenzy of health concerns represented yet another drop down the economic rabbit […]