Health Care

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The French press is reporting that the European Union is opening its borders on July 1, but will keep them closed to countries that seem incompetent in dealing with the coronavirus. The worst offenders in this regard are the United States and Brazil, the citizens of both of which will […]

Epidemics

Saudi Arabia ends Lockdown as Infections Surge: Is it on a Trumpian path to Disaster?

Brian Whitaker

(Al-Bab.com) – Saudi Arabia ended its coronavirus lockdown this morning despite record numbers of new infections during the past week. Lifting the lockdown brings an end to the night curfews first imposed in March. It also means mosques can reopen and all economic activity can resume, subject to precautions. This includes domestic tourism, though international […]

Donald Trump

Trump dumped the World Health Organization in the midst of a Global Pandemic. Why?

ProPublica

By Sebastian Rotella, James Bandler and Patricia Callahan | – ( ProPublica ) – Right before President Donald Trump unveiled punitive measures against China on May 29, he inserted a surprise into his prepared text. “We will be today terminating our relationship with the World Health Organization,” he announced during a press conference in the […]

Donald Trump

Trump at Tulsa as 21st Century Typhoid Mary, as Fauci Warns on Rally, Science-Bashing

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Scientists know the story of Typhoid Mary, an immigrant from Ireland to the US in the late 19th century. She had typhoid, but refused to admit it, and was hired as a maid, and by 1907 some 3,000 New Yorkers had typhoid, and she was the super-spreader. Typhoid Mary rejected […]

Donald Trump

The Ostrich Policy: Trump ready to Kill Hundreds of Thousands to avoid bad Coronavirus Optics for Election

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Trump and Pence on Monday were busy trying to spread the Big Lie that the only reason the US coronavirus numbers are spiking is increased testing. Trump is embarrassed because our situation is so dire, and it is in some large part his fault. More and more of it will […]

Democratic Socialism

What Corporations Fear: Best Recovery from Covid-19 Depression is Universal Income and Federal School Funding

John Buell

Southwest Harbor, Maine (Special to Informed Comment) – I am betting that before November 2020 Congress will pass and the President will sign another major relief package. More interesting will be the debate on the measure. That debate already says a lot about the underlying anxieties that grip both parties and their aspirations for the […]

Constitution

Could America’s Covid and Race Crises Weaken the Union the way Chernobyl Broke up the USSR?

Matthew Lenoe

Rochester, NY (Special to Informed Comment) – An unforeseen health disaster with rapidly propagating domestic and international consequences strikes a superpower already wallowing in heavy seas. Overwhelmed by the surge, the ship of state floods, and begins to break up. The nuclear meltdown at Chernobyl in April 1986, and the subsequent disintegration of the USSR […]

Donald Trump

OK, Boomer: The Trump Administration’s Generational Lies Deepen America’s Fissures

Rebecca Gordon

( Tomdispatch.com ) – These days, teaching graduating college seniors has me, as the Brits would say in the London Underground, “minding the gap.” In my case, however, it’s not the gap between the platform and the train I’m thinking of, but a couple of others: those between U.S. citizens and our government, as well […]