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Remarkable wins for democracy

Ever since Brexiters and Donald Trump won in 2016, the world’s big-picture political story has been that democracy is under siege. This summer, Jair Bolsonaro’s victory in Brazil, Narenda Modi’s Kashmir crackdown and dramatic electoral gains for the anti-immigrant Alternative fur Deutschland in eastern Germany have only amplified widespread beliefs about the inexorable advance of the authoritarian right. This general story line is dangerously true, but an intriguing counter-narrative may be starting to appear: Small-D democrats are starting to play offense. Not that you would ...

My, how the times have seriously changed

You may, if you are old enough, recall a TV actor named Foster Brooks. He was a guest star on such classics of boomer kitsch as “The Monkees,” “The Munsters” and “The Mod Squad.” But if you do remember him, it’s likely for one thing only: his imitation of inebriation. Brooks made his slurring, stammering “funny drunk act” a TV staple, back when drunks were still considered, well … funny. To recall his career is to marvel at what a difference a generation or two makes. That era produced another TV trope that, in hindsight, seems equally bizarre: The funny sexual ...

Schiff’s riff on call true, but unwise

The ratcheting up of the House Democrats’ impeachment inquiry has pushed President Trump to new extremes of craziness. Consider the president’s deranged attack Monday morning on Rep. Adam B. Schiff, unaffectionately known to Trump as “Liddle’ Adam Schiff” or “Shifty” Shiff. On Twitter, Trump suggested Schiff might have committed treason by reading aloud a “FAKE & terrible statement” that, according to Trump, purported to quote from the White House account of the president’s July 25 telephone conversation with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy. The ...

No winning collegiate arms race

Erin M. Carr The Baltimore Sun Like many institutions we implicitly trust, our higher education system is assumed to be an engine of social good. Collectively, we get those squishy, feel-good reactions in reflecting upon such notable historical moments as the passage of the GI Bill (which conveniently omitted veterans of color) and the expansion of educational access (which was late coming and still excludes large numbers of talented students). Although the U.S. higher education system has never been a model of equity, making it such remains a worthy aspirational goal. But a ...

Old-school Democrats set to face primary challenges

PITTSBURGH Jerry Dickinson is the Democrats’ perfect House candidate — and not just on paper. Yes, he’s young, accomplished, academic and a charismatic liberal outsider who supports the ideals of the Green New Deal, the impeachment of the president and can self-raise an impressive amount of cash for his candidacy. He is all of those things and more. His only handicap is that he’s running against a Democratic incumbent. That, however, is far less of an obstacle in this new era, when incumbency may not hold the weight among Democratic primary voters that it used to. Once ...

Pelosi and the power of restraint on impeachment

For a long time, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi held a stop sign before vocal Democrats’ revving demands to get President Donald Trump’s impeachment on the road. Now her sign reads, “proceed with caution.” Pelosi knows what she’s doing. The speaker wouldn’t launch an impeachment inquiry back then because she knows that impeachments are fraught with risks. Polls show a public tired of Trump’s civic decrepitude but also weary of more political strife. Impeachment proceedings sometimes backfire on the party that launches them. And in any case, an election is planned for just ...