What is it about the month of August that finds so many celebrities dying? Just this month we’ve seen the passing of Glen Campbell, Barbara Cook, Dick Gregory and Jerry Lewis. Thomas Meehan, who wrote the book for the musical “Annie,” died last week. Marilyn Monroe died in August 1962 (though she “lives” on in […]
Op-Eds
Posted inOp-Eds, sj-web
Hurricane Harvey brings Houston together
It seems like it always takes a disaster. Twenty-five years ago this month, that disaster was Andrew, a hurricane that devastated a large swath of South Florida, including the house in whose master bedroom closet I sheltered through the night with my wife and five kids. The storm took our roof and our possessions. It […]
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America needs higher taxes, not lower
WASHINGTON — Can we get real about “tax reform,” the Republican promise to enact deep tax cuts that will spur economic growth? Probably not, but let’s give it a try. For starters, we can stop calling it “reform.” That’s a charged word, implying that the new tax system will be superior to the old. We […]
Posted inOp-Eds, sj-web
Trump makes CNN his prime enemy
For many Republicans, what matters most about Donald Trump is that he’s demonstrated resolve against the enemy — not the Islamic State or the Taliban, but the media. The media has become for the right what the Soviet Union was during the Cold War — a common, unifying adversary of overwhelming importance. Before the fall […]
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Remember the deep roots of racism and violence
When Gov. Paul LePage and others call for preserving Confederate monuments so we don’t forget our nation’s history, they seem to engage in some of the very forgetting that is at the heart of racial injustice in this country. For starters, tearing down monuments to Robert E. Lee will not lead to tearing down monuments […]
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One big fizzle
By now it is clear that the so-called Free Speech Rally in Boston last weekend was a bust. No one was fooled by the alt-right using a cherished American freedom as a hook to rally its cuckoo cohorts. Still, no matter the context in which it arises, free speech is among our most cherished freedoms, […]
Posted inOp-Eds, sj-web
Trump signs on to the forever war in Afghanistan
NEW YORK — There is surely no greater sign of the bankruptcy of American foreign policy than its Afghanistan policy. After 15 years of war and the deployment of hundreds of thousands of troops, a new president entered the Oval Office poised to fundamentally change that policy. Within months he presented, with great fanfare, a […]
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The day Marcellus Williams didn’t die
Last week, on the day he was scheduled to die, Marcellus Williams didn’t. Just hours before he was to be strapped down and pumped full of poison, Williams, the convicted killer of Felicia “Lisha” Gayle, a former reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, received a reprieve. Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens stayed the execution and announced […]
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Can we win the war in Afghanistan?
President Trump is not the first U.S. leader to pivot when it comes to foreign policy. His speech Monday night before American military personnel at Fort Myer in Arlington, Virginia, was in stark contrast to his campaign pledge to put “America first” and his promise to avoid “foreign entanglements,” as George Washington put it in […]
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Concerns raised about electronic privacy
The following appeared in Friday’s Washington Post: The news sounded horrifying: Federal prosecutors last month demanded wide-ranging electronic records regarding anyone who visited disruptj20.org, a website devoted to protesting President Donald Trump’s Jan. 20 inauguration. An astonishing 1.3 million people could be exposed. The website’s host, a Los Angeles company called DreamHost, was fighting the […]