US politics

By Jasmin Zine, Wilfrid Laurier University | – (The Conversation) – In political communication, a big lie — what is known as the “illusory truth effect” — is when the constant repetition of misinformation makes people more likely to accept it as truth. Repetition is how lies gain traction. The more exposure to specific ideas […]

Anti-intellectualism

From Palestine to Slavery, Ron DeSantis’ Muzzling of Universities is dooming Florida Higher Education

Florida Phoenix

Diane Roberts ( Florida Phoenix ) – The American Association of University Professors recently conducted a survey of faculty in Florida, North Carolina, Georgia, and Texas, finding the state of higher education in the South is not strong — in fact, it’s in crisis. One-third of those surveyed say they’re looking for a job in […]

Authoritarianism

What a Second Trumpocracy would Mean: The Coming Crisis of 2025

Tomdispatch

By Clarence Lusane | – ( Tomdispatch.com) – If he becomes the official nominee of the Republican Party in next year’s presidential race, Donald Trump will receive tens of millions of votes in the general election. He may get less than the presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden. He may get more. Regardless, tens of millions […]

Donald Trump

Republican Contradictions: Are they Fascists or Nihilists — or Both?

Rebecca Gordon

( Tomdispatch.com ) – Sometimes the right wing in this country seems like a riddle wrapped in an enigma encased in a conundrum. Do they want to strengthen the government in line with the once-fringe doctrine of the “unitary executive,” concentrating most official power in the hands of a president who would then rule more […]

film

“Killers of the Flower Moon” puts Oklahoma’s Dark History of Native Osage Murders on Display

Florida Phoenix

By: Carmen Forman ( Florida Phoenix) – OKLAHOMA CITY — Although many Oklahomans were long ignorant about how white settlers systematically murdered members of the Osage Nation for their oil wealth in the 1920s, “Killers of the Flower Moon” will mark a milestone in how the state addresses its complex and painful history. The Friday […]

Afghanistan

A Reflexive Act of Military Revenge Burdened the US – and May do the Same for Israel

The Conversation

By Peter Mansoor, The Ohio State University | – In the wake of the shocking invasion of southern Israel by Hamas militants on Oct. 7, 2023, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to destroy Hamas. “We are fighting a cruel enemy, worse than ISIS,” Netanyahu proclaimed four days after the invasion, comparing Hamas with the […]

Featured

Biden’s Historically Illiterate and Hypocritical Speech on Ukraine and Gaza

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Biden administration’s foreign policy is a mess and lacks any real consistency. This messiness was on full display in the president’s brief address on Thursday evening, a plea for Congressional funding of both the US struggle to get Russia back out of Ukraine and of support for the extremist […]

Far Right

The Man Behind the Right’s Supreme Court Supermajority: How Leonard Leo built a machine that is Remaking the American legal system

ProPublica

By Andy Kroll, Andrea Bernstein and Ilya Marritz | – ( ProPublica ) – The party guests who arrived on the evening of June 23, 2022, at the Tudor-style mansion on the coast of Maine were a special group in a special place enjoying a special time. The attendees included some two dozen federal and […]

Central Intelligence Agency

The Real U.S. Intelligence Failure in Gaza: For years, U.S. officials have known that dire Conditions in Gaza could lead to violence

Foreign Policy in Focus

By Edward Hunt ( FPIF ) – As officials in Washington scramble to address the rapid outbreak of war in Israel and Palestine, they are sidestepping the fact that they believed that such a dramatic outburst of violence was likely. Since May 2021, when Hamas and Israel clashed in a brief war that left more […]