Archive
Russian Influence? Nyet!
The Year of ‘Post-Truth’
"Post-Truth." The Oxford English Dictionary named this its word of the year for 2016. This was a year when campaign lies — most, though not all, coming out of the Donald's mouth — were so numerous that fact checking became nearly impossible. Yes, each individual...
In OtherWords: December 14, 2016
America's post-election hangover took a major turn for the dramatic this past week, when sources told the Washington Post that the CIA believes Russia intervened in the vote to help Donald Trump. The jury's still out on the truth of the matter, but this week in...
Foreign Meddling in Our Vote? Remember How This Feels.
Even in an election year as shot through with conspiracy theories as this one, it would have been hard to imagine a bigger bombshell than Russia intervening to help Donald Trump. But that’s exactly what the CIA believes happened, or so unnamed “officials brief on the...
The Pentagon’s $125 Billion Cover-up
Let’s say you ask somebody a question. They give you an answer you don’t like, so you pretend you didn’t hear it. Probably all of us would cop to something like this at some time in our imperfect pasts. For most of us though, that pretending hasn't included trying to...
This Man May Be Trump’s Most Dangerous Cabinet Pick
President-elect Donald Trump recently picked Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions as his nominee for U.S. attorney general, a position that leads the Department of Justice and serves as the top law enforcement officer for the country. But even a cursory look at Sessions’...
Draining the Swamp: A How-To Guide
When President-elect Donald Trump talked about "draining the swamp," it evoked the way Bernie Sanders talks about how the system is rigged. Many Americans believe — with good reason — that powerful corporate lobbyists, elites, and other moneyed interests control the...
Trump Is Taking on Wall Street, Literally
Actor Jack Nicholson says he finally understood the meaning of the word irony when his mother called him an SOB. So let us consider Donald Trump, who campaigned as the populist champion of the working-class, promising that — by golly — he was going to take on Wall...
Conflict of Interest? Of Course Not.
In OtherWords: December 7, 2016
Dear _____, Another week, another round of headlines from Trump's transition picks. This week in OtherWords, my colleague Josh Hoxie examines some of the next administration's key economic advisers and finds something startling: They're exactly the kind of Wall Street...
