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Resettling Refugees is Harder than You Think – A Personal History

by Ron Steinman

Experience shows that resettling refugees isn't easy. But with respect for common humanity and dedication, it's possible. 

Were the 9/11 Attacks Preventable?

by J. Samuel Walker

It's impossible to know if more diligent preparation for potential Al Qaeda attacks could have prevented them, but the Bush administration's slowness to develop a national security strategy for terrorism will always haunt the nation and the world. 

Critical Theory Opposes the Right Wing's Cancel Politics

by Leah Allen and Pipa Marguerite

Before Critical Race Theory, the Frankfurt School of social criticism was a preferred target of the right. Ironically, it is the right that has been most agressively and systematically moving to "cancel" ideas it opposes, and the Frankfurt School that shows how to resist. 

Comparing Trump to Hitler is a Wrongheaded Distraction

by Claudia Koonz

The comparison indulges liberal distaste for Trump, but it obscures the degree to which, absent any coherent policy of national rebuilding, Trumpism is hitched even more closely to racial nationalism than Nazism was.

A Brief History of the "Isolationist" Strawman

by Brandan P. Buck

As the United States enters another round of agonizing soul searching after another lost war, Americans should learn the fraught political history of the "isolationist" label.

Words of Warning: Many Opposed the Afghanistan Invasion in 2001

by John Bodnar

"Today Americans worry over the humanitarian crisis at the Kabul airport.  But they mostly forget the one that transpired over a period of two decades and led to the death of some 150,000 Afghans in a war to eliminate evil from the world."

The View from the New York City Hiroshima Peace Vigil

by Michael McQuillan

The march featured the testimony of antinuclear activists and rekindled a demand for New York's city council to divest the city budget from contractors who make nuclear weapons, but too much of the public seems willing to ignore the nuclear threat.

In California Recall, a Tiny Minority of Voters Could Choose the Governor

by James Thornton Harris

The particularities of California's recall process create a dangerous situation where a minority of voters can choose the state's chief executive. 

Can the Nuclear Genie Be Put Back In the Bottle? Must It?

by David P. Barash and Ward Wilson

We won't eliminate nuclear weapons by expunging the science behind their creation but by comprehending their uselessness and letting them join the ranks of abandoned technologies.

Rule 50 and Racial Justice: The Long History of the IOC War on Athletes' Free Expression

by Debbie Sharnak and Yannick Kluch

"The recent rise of athlete activism brings the IOC’s claim that sports are a neutral space into direct conflict with athletes’ increasingly vocal demands for freedom of expression and the right to use their platform to advance human rights and social justice issues."

History Matters at the National Library of Medicine

by Jeffrey S. Reznick and Kenneth M. Koyle

Historians are a vital part of the National Library of Medicine's ongoing work, conducting research with historians of medicine, supporting social science and humanities research, acquiring and interpreting materials from the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, and supporting public health work. 

Children's Teeth, Collected Decades Ago, Can Show the Damage of Nuclear Testing

by Lawrence Wittner and Joseph Mangano

The Radiation and Public Health Project will use thousands of baby teeth collected for a discontinued 1960s study of radiation exposure to assess the health toll of nuclear testing. 

The Republicans Have Abandoned the Big Tent

by Donne Levy

The Republicans have decisively parted ways with their past "big tent" strategy of placating the right wing while appealing to moderates. Now, it seems the party will try to win as a smaller right-wing party, making vote suppression, gerrymandering and the Electoral College more important.

A Community of Necessity: The Quabbin Reservoir's History and the Future of "Managed Retreat"

by Elisabeth C. Rosenberg

In 1939 the dammed Swift River submerged four Massachusetts towns beneath the new Quabbin Reservoir. The story of the residents, politicians and engineers of the Swift Valley foreshadows the negotiations that will accompany a managed retreat from places jeopardized by climate change.

Historians Can't Leave the Teaching of History to Politicians

by Walter G. Moss

As a historian of Russia, the author finds today's political interference with history teaching "like Soviet authorities forbidding Soviet history teachers to mention Trotsky’s role in bringing the 1917 communist revolution about."

Ike Would Like the New Private Space Race

by Yanek Mieczkowski

Wary of government spending and the entanglement of public money with private contractors, Dwight Eisenhower would find much to like in today's billionaire space race. 

Charlottesville's Lee Statue Belongs in a Museum

by John Troast

"Charlottesville’s recently removed statue of Robert E. Lee is not a statue of a man, it is a statue of a myth," and the history of that dangerous myth needs to be preserved.

The Media's Failure on Agent Orange

by Ron Steinman

The media seldom covers the ongoing harm caused by Agent Orange because little of the story is "news." This is a failure of duty to inform the public about the callous use of the defoliant that may allow similar wartime ecological catastrophes in the future. 

The Legacies of Un-critical Race Theory at Berkeley

by Tony Platt

For most of its history, the University of California has been a bastion of un-critical race theory from Manifest Destiny to The Bell Curve. 

As Americans Hit the Road Again, It's Time to Revisit the Ideals of Liberty

by Heidi M. Ravven

Americans are contemplating travel as COVID gives way to greater freedom to move. There's no more apt place for a visit than the Statue of Liberty.