In the aftermath of World War II, the victorious Allies faced a daunting task. Not only had the war had a devastating impact on Germany’s industrial and economic might – since mangling the German industrial machine was essential to defeating its military – but the Allies were faced with a territory that had undergone years of intense propagandizing. Stationed for many years in Berlin, CBS … Continue reading Deqification
If you were to make a list of the accomplishments of the Trump administration, although it might not be long, it would include many of the things that Donald Trump set out to do when he ran in 2016. The United States pulled back from the global political community to become more isolationist, it revoked a number of the environmental and social policies of the … Continue reading Nearly every Trump accomplishment collapsed in the first day of the Biden administration
The internet got a little jolt of joy when the news broke late Friday that the National Rifle Association is filing for bankruptcy. Liberals celebrated what appeared to be the downfall of a major political opponent. After all, the NRA has long dumped money into lawmakers’ arms in exchange for lax gun control and a restriction that keeps the government from even investigating whether gun … Continue reading The NRA isn’t out of money, it’s using bankruptcy to escape accountability
Congressional Republicans are trying to stop the body from certifying Joe Biden as the winner of the presidential election. Congress makes this certification on January 6 and by all accounts is expected to do so but with a bit of a delay while Republicans make their case that something about the November 2020 presidential election was suspect. A group of Republican senators is trying to … Continue reading Here are all the times previously that Congress has gotten involved in a presidential election
President Trump signed, late Sunday, an omnibus appropriations bill in which he did not get a single thing he wanted. He demanded changes to the bill – upping stimulus payments from $600 to $2,000 and scrapping a ton of foreign aid chief among them – but caved after just a few days. That he caved was no big surprise. Trump’s demands were political poison. Republicans … Continue reading The World’s Greatest Negotiator has obtained nothing
Congress has this fondness for consolidated bills. If Senator Armsmoney (R-US) going to vote for some Democratic priority like expanding school lunches, it’s a lot easier to stomach that vote if the bill also includes funding for the creation of a new FBI Minority Crimes Unit. This is the sausage getting made, the room where it happens, etc. – the deals that are required to … Continue reading No, that’s not in the COVID bill
After months of kicking the ball aimlessly around the field, Congress finally scored a goal late Sunday when it reached a compromise $900 billion COVID-19 relief deal. That same day, around 1,500 people died from COVID-19, so this couldn’t have come at a better time unless that better time was literally any point in the past six months, Congress. Still, here we are. So what’s … Continue reading The end-of-the-year COVID relief bill, explained
On Patreon, we ask supporters to occasionally toss questions over to us that they want answered that are a little bit harder to get an answer to than something you might ask on Quora. For this, the third piece in our new series You Asked, we’re tackling the long and confusing history of political party colors. Whenever I talk to my European friends, they’re always confused … Continue reading You Asked: Why are red states red and blue states blue?
Back on Thursday – if you can remember back that far – Time magazine named Joe Biden and Kamala Harris as its “Person of the Year.” This surprised no one, since the POTY has been the winner of the presidential election since 2000: Bush, Obama, and Trump all got the accolade in their election and (for Bush and Obama) re-election years. That’s as far back … Continue reading Joe Biden isn’t the person of the year – but ‘Time’ is trapped in a loop
On Friday, the Supreme Court soundly rejected an attempt by the State of Texas to challenge the election results in four states. The whole thing was blatantly unconstitutional, as the U.S. Constitution lets the states run their own elections, and also hypocritical, since Texas’ position was that it has a vested interest in how other states run their elections despite the fact that the state … Continue reading Surprise: Trump supporters are threatening acts of terrorism to overthrow American democracy, who saw that coming?
