Politics
American Democracy in Peril: Eight Challenges to America's Future
William Hudson's critical and provocative text urges readers not just to think about how American democracy functions, but also to examine why American democracy has become what it is today. Hudson identifies eight major challenges to the strength of the political system, directly laying out the ways in which these developments erode the very foundations of American democracy
How To Talk To A Climate Skeptic - Grist
No matter how many times they are bludgeoned with informed rebuttals, the same skeptical arguments about climate change keep lurching back to life like zombies. It can get tiresome searching for the same counterarguments over and over again. A new series on Gristmill aims to put all those counterarguments in one place, for easy access.
Our Hidden History - Reclaim Democracy
Our surprising history of citizens wielding authority over corporations holds many keys to progress.
The Disease of Permanent War - Chris Hedges
The embrace by any society of permanent war is a parasite that devours the heart and soul of a nation. Permanent war extinguishes liberal, democratic movements. It turns culture into nationalist cant. It degrades and corrupts education and the media, and wrecks the economy. The liberal, democratic forces, tasked with maintaining an open society, become impotent.
There's No Such Thing as a Free Market, Just a Matter of Who Pays for It - Alternet
We’re told that free markets are almost God-given things, that they fall from the sky, when, in fact, they are human made. Free markets very much depend on governments to pick them up when they fall. Ideologues for the free market, apologists if you like, are useful in pushing forward a free market doctrine that suits the very powerful.
Ten Reasons Why Capital Punishment is Flawed Public Policy - NCADP
There are many reasons the death penalty should be abolished. It is a complex issue and it is difficult to point to any single fact or argument as the most important. Here are ten reasons why states should stop the practice of capital punishment.
The Scourge of Militarism - Mother Jones
In the neoconservative world view, America was to be the new Rome. But the neo-cons learned the wrong lessons from Rome's imperial experience.
Culture
The Gospel of Consumption - Orion Magazine
Charles Kettering, director of General Motors Research, wrote a 1929 magazine article called “Keep the Consumer Dissatisfied.” He wasn’t suggesting that manufacturers produce shoddy products. Along with many of his corporate cohorts, he was defining a strategic shift for American industry—from fulfilling basic human needs to creating new ones.
Cultural Tectonic Plate Shift - Technomadic
As with tectonic plate shifts that lead to an earthquake, so it is with social tectonic shift. There is a continuous movement of social plates until social quakes create a new cultural landscape. Some of these quakes are obvious and felt by everyone (for example, September 11, 2001.) Most are much more subtle and felt only by the observing few. However, all social plate shifts catalyze after-shock ripples that reach deeply into the cultural plate, moving a society forever.
