Recently Published

An America for Brisenia Flores

by Kathleen Belew

In the aftermath of the Tucson shootings, many have focused on the death of nine-year-old Christina-Taylor Green.  Born on 9/11 and killed by the random violence of a madman, Green has become a martyr for optimistic bipartisanship.  “I want us to live up to her expectations,” President Barack Obama told the mourners in Tucson.  “I want our democracy to be as good as she imagined it.”Obama cautioned us against blaming the shootings on political invective.  We cannot, he said, conn

Philosophy as Dynamite: A Response to Warren Hynson on Nietzsche

by Kevin Kennedy

You should love peace as a means to new wars. And a short peace more than a long one. Friedrich Nietzsche"Of Wars and Warriors”Thus Spoke ZarathustraAmidst the media hype following the tragic shooting in Tucson, Arizona, many journalists, bloggers, and self-styled experts pointed to the literature found on the accused shooter Jarod Loughner’s bookshelves as possible sources of inspiration for this horrific deed. One of the writers quickly accus

History Left Behind in Education

by Ronald W. Evans

History in the nation’s schools is in trouble, plagued by a business-driven reform emphasizing coverage and test scores over quality, depth, and meaning.  What has resulted in many classrooms might best be de

America's History of Crazy Political Assassins Didn't Begin with Loughner

by James W. Clarke

Over a long academic career, I have researched and written about twenty-one American assassins, would-be assassins, and domestic terrorists.  It is pure nonsense to suggest, as some have, that the politica

Why Military Spending Remains Untouchable

by Andrew Bacevich

In defense circles, “cutting” the Pentagon budget has once again become a topic of conversation.  Americans should not confuse that

Property Tax Discrimination and the Question of Fair Taxation

by Andrew W. Kahrl

In a recent interview with the conservative commentator George Will, the new chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, Dave Camp (R-MI), offered a revealing glimpse into the underlying assumptions on the problem of taxation our new Republican majority brings with it to Washington.  The problem, says Camp, lies not in the massive slashing of tax rates on the highest income earners from the Reagan administration to the present, but rather from the continued undertaxation of the nat

Why Are We Still in Afghanistan?

by Ira Chernus

When I try to figure out why we are still in Afghanistan, though every ounce of logic says we ought to get out, an unexpected conversation I had last year haunts me. Doing neighborhood political canvassing, I knocked on the door of a cheerful man who was just about to tune in to his favorite radio show: Rush Limbaugh.  He was kind enough to let me stay and we talked.Conservatives are often the nicest people -- that’s what I told him -- the ones you’d like to have as neighbors. T

What Will Civil Dialog Look Like?

by Geraldo Cadava

After all of last week's calls for civility, we should wonder how they will translate into action, particularly in Arizona.  We were moved by President Obama’s words, and inspired by his vision, but we cannot expect his speech alone to sweep away the challenges we face.  He gestured towards a healing process, but what comes next will be up to us.Over the past year, we’ve measured the heat of national politics by focusing on developments in Arizona.  During the next several months

The Pentagon and the King Legacy

by William Loren Katz

This January 13 the Pentagon commemorated the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. with an address by Jeh C. Johnson, the Defense Department’s general counsel.In the final year of his life, King became an outspoken opponent of the Vietnam War, Johnson told a packed auditorium.  However, he added, today’s wars are not out of line with the iconic Nobel Peace Prize winner’s teachings.  “I believe tha

Remembering the Courage of Martin Luther King, Jr.

by Michael K. Honey

At this time of year we remember King’s positive messages of hope:  the best thing to make of an enemy is a friend; love is at the center of the universe; follow the nonviolence of Jesus and Gandhi.  The current moment also

The Firebombing of Tokyo and Its Legacy

by Bret Fisk and Cary Karacas

More than sixty-five years after the Great Tokyo Air Raid of March 10, 1945, and the subsequent firebombing and destruction of Japan’s cities by the United States Army Air Forces in World War II, a cursory examination of the relevant English-language literature, both popular and academic, reveals a striking lacuna.  Researchers have covered substantial ground in analyzing various historical aspects of the U.S. bombing campaign against Japan.  Specifically, much has been done to situate

Author and Oncologist Dr. Siddhartha Mukherjee on the History of Cancer

by Robin Lindley

“Medicine is storytelling,” writes acclaimed cancer specialist and now bestselling medical historian Dr. Siddhartha Mukherjee, author of The Emperor of

Teaching Huckleberry Finn in Historical Context

by Ron Briley

On January 16, 2011, author Lorrie Moore published an opinion piece in the New York Times suggesting that Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn be excluded from the high school curriculum as adolescents lack the knowledge and experience to place this controversial text within proper context.  Moore’ piece, along with the decision of NewSouth Books to publish an edition of the Twain classic with slave replacing the word “nigger” in the text (leading to a qui

Puncturing Betty Friedan, but Not the Mystique: An Interview with Stephanie Coontz

In your introduction, you wrote that the book still draws visceral reactions fifty years after its publication. Why? The book was such a giant bestseller in its day, and the t

Mass Consumption Isn't Just All-American—The Nazis Had It, Too

by S. Jonathan Wiesen

Today, no one can deny the importance of consumption to the American economy.  By some counts, consumer spending constitutes over seventy perc

The Mafia and Me: Reflections on Being Italian

by Michael Parenti

Like many others of  Italian-American heritage, I experienced some discomfort when in 1951 Senator Estes Kefauver, a Democrat from Tennessee, launched his highly publicized investigation into the organized rackets, uncovering scores of thugs with Italian surnames.  Subsequent decades produced an endless parade of such rogues whose mugs were repeatedly splashed across the print and broadcast media. I must admit that when it came to names, the mafia operatives really had them:  

Turmoil in Tunisia

by Daniel Pipes

The sudden and as-yet-unexplained exit of Tunisia's strongman, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, 74, after 23 years in power has potential implications for the Middle East and for Muslims worldwide. As an Egyptian commentator noted,"Every Arab leader is watching Tunisia in fear. Every Arab citizen is watching Tunisia in hope and solidarity." I watch with both sets of emotions.

Loughner’s Terrible Violence and His Misunderstanding of Nietzsche

by Warren Hynson

“God is dead.  God remains dead.  And we are the ones who killed him.”The name Friedrich Nietzsche, the author of this oft-quoted (and oft-misunderstood) assertion, has recently continued to surface in major currents of American media, particularly in the coverage of recent acts of abominable violence and the nihilistic philosophical underpinnings that their perpetrators were supposed to have personally invoked to justify them.Most recently, the New York Times fe

Remembrance of General Education Past

by Sheldon M. Stern

Normally, I don’t pay much attention to the new year.  Rather, I often chuckle when recalling Jackie Gleason wishing his viewers “a happy changing of the calendar.”  However this year is different:  2011 marks the fiftieth anniversary of my graduation from college.  In and of itself that fact may not seem so extraordinary, but for me it has a very special resonance.I grew up in tough, working-class district of Brooklyn. My father did piecework in a factory that made men’s caps.  M

Beware the Military-Industrial Complex

by David Greenberg

Fifty years ago, Dwight Eisenhower delivered what has become, with the possible exception of George Washington's departing speech, the best-known presidential farewell address in U.S. history. In his valedictory, Ike famously warned against"unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex."