The Republic of T.

Here are some of the people writing about some of the stuff I wish I had time to write about, for January 27th through February 3rd:

• Watch MSNBC’s Melissa Harris-Perry Cover Transgender Issues The Way They Should Be – In a refreshing contrast to the problematic and often transphobic coverage provided by other media outlets, MSNBC host Melissa Harris-Perry used her eponymous show to allow a transgender woman to tell her own story in a segment that highlighted the importance of letting transgender people speak for themselves.
• The Tragedy of Philip Seymour Hoffman: How We Can Prevent Overdose Deaths – His death will be called a "teachable moment," but we need to ensure that what we're teaching includes basic drug user safety
• To Honor Hoffman, Focus on Prevention, not the Drug War – As devastating details about Philip Seymour Hoffman's apparent heroin overdose are beginning to emerge, we are already hearing speculation about police efforts to identify the drug source. If and when the suppliers are found, authorities will likely use the full extent of the law to prosecute them on drug, and even homicide charges. Instead, the focus should be on preventing others from following Hoffman's fate.
• Philip Seymour Hoffman and a double standard over drugs – We turn a blind eye to an unworkable law and assume it does not apply to people like us – then take draconian vengeance on others
• Jordan Davis case has echoes of George Zimmerman trial – A man with a gun. A black teen, shot dead.
• Left Grovels to Right, Achieves Nothing – The question is, though, why on earth would a Democratic president bother to grant an interview to an antagonistic conservative talk show host? The New York Times described the interview as "an unpleasant duty that was more or less unavoidable," but in truth it was nothing of the sort. A solo interview with the president is a relatively rare privilege given to only a few journalists. I don't remember George W. Bush inviting Keith Olbermann to interview him in the White House. So what gives?
• Taking Note: No Comment Necessary: Coca Cola’s Super Bowl Ad – Not everyone appreciated the multilingual version of “America the Beautiful.”
• For The Clowns Hating The Coke Ad With A Gay Family: Guess Who Wrote The Song? – Conservative news outlet Breitbart.com reported Sunday night that a Coca-Cola ad featuring the song “America the Beautiful” sparked “outrage from some viewers" because, among other perceived offenses, it "featured a gay family.” The writer of the song herself might be a bit confused by the outrage.
• Obama has a message: ‘Real men don’t hurt women’ – In this morning's weekly address, Obama discussed the formation of a task force to combat sexual assault at college, emphasizing how the issue is not just one concerning individuals, but our communities as a whole.
• Bill Maher: The Right-Wing’s Pathetic Fake “Manliness” – "It's not really masculinity conservatives love, anyway — it's bullying."

Here are some of the people writing about some of the stuff I wish I had time to write about, for January 21st through January 27th:

• Confessions of a Former Libertarian: My Personal, Psychological and Intellectual Epiphany – I was a Buddhist concerned with world suffering — and I could no longer reconcile my humanity with my ideology.
• Op-Ed Columnist: Paranoia of the Plutocrats – Extreme inequality, it turns out, creates a class of insecure but powerful people who are alarmingly detached from reality.
• Editorial: A Formula for Repelling Women Voters – The Republican obsession with undermining Roe V. Wade won’t build the party.
• Hypocrisy on Privacy and The Pill – Birth control and data mining used to be things they believed in, now both are Big Government plots to be stopped.
• Meet 330 Lawmakers Who Made 2013 “A Terrible Year for Women’s Health” – In all, lawmakers in 22 states enacted 70 new provisions that curbed reproductive rights—that's more new abortion restrictions than there were in any year but 2011. Earlier this month, the Guttmacher Institute, a think tank that supports abortion rights, reported that more new restrictions have passed in the last three years than in the entire previous decade.
• President Obama Does Many Things Well but Being a Socialist is Not One of Them – I get that the President has said stuff that rubbed some rich folks the wrong way, but as Paul says, he’s awfully mild relative to say, FDR. But in both economics and Buddhism, we’re taught to look at what actually happened. That should pretty quickly lead you to conclude that if Obama is a socialist, he’s the worst socialist ever.
• Red State vs. Blue State | Thom Hartmann – News & info from the #1 progressive radio show – In almost every category, Americans are better off living in a Blue state. Republicans love to say that lower taxes, less regulation, and pro-business policies benefit Americans, but this report proves that people are suffering in states that adopt those principles.
• How We Got Economic Inequality and Why the President Needs to Talk About It – On Tuesday night, President Barack Obama is going to give his fifth state of the union address. The president is likely to call for policies that will help working people, like an increase in the minimum wage and the extension of unemployment benefits to the long-term unemployed workers.

  But what will his larger message be?

• Justin Bieber benefits from double standard, while Richard Sherman is smeared as a ‘thug’ – Calling Justin Bieber a thug does not make the racial insults hurled at Richard Sherman any more palatable, so let’s stop with that half-hearted campaign.
• Op-Ed Columnist: The Undeserving Rich – Why you can’t lump the plutocrats in with the upper middle class.

Here are some of the people writing about some of the stuff I wish I had time to write about, for January 15th through January 21st:

• Editorial: Gay-Baiting Before the Olympics – President Vladimir Putin is using the Sochi Games to denigrate homosexuals.
• The Longer Chris Christie Stonewalls on Hobokengate, the Worse It Is For Him – There's something fishy going on here. If Christie wants to discredit this allegation, there are two simple things he can do.
• Study Refutes the Myth of the Absent Black Father – CDC research dispels prevailing assumptions about black fathers, they're more involved with their children's lives than previously thought.
• Dr. King and Full Employment…Again – Dr. King, toward the end of his life, clearly recognized the role that full employment played in providing economic opportunity for African-Americans. The Selma boycott in which he was instrumental tapped the economic clout of the black community. Yes, a large part of his life’s work was to convince racists of their spiritual corruption, but he was not about to wait for their enlightenment to make progress.
• The Teachings of Texas on Political Payback – Chris Christie would never make it as a pol in Texas. He leaves too many fingerprints. Victims are not supposed to know who stuck the knife in them. They are just supposed to be bleeding and then dead. This lesson has already been taught, governor.
• Has Martin Luther King’s “Dream” Been Realized? – The celebration of Martin Luther King, Jr. Day gives us an opportunity to consider: Has King‘s “Dream“ Been Realized?
• 11 Things Atheists Couldn’t Do Because They Didn’t Believe In God – Here are 11 things atheists couldn't — and in many cases still can't — do because they didn't believe in God.
• No, We’re Not All Social Darwinists. Empathy for the Poor Is Common – Matt Bruenig posted an interesting response to Barbara Ehrenreich's brilliant The Atlantic essay on what poverty is really like. In the essay she argues that there has been a palpable shift in how we as a society conceive of poverty. Where we once felt empathy, we now feel anger. Bruenig correctly points out that there has always been a moral stigma attached to poverty.
• For some idiots, there just aren’t enough guns on university campuses | Diane Roberts – Guns are a part of US culture. But as a professor, I see no reason they need to be on college campuses. It just invites disaster
• The Real Chris Christie Scandal – During last fall's New Jersey gubernatorial contest, which Gov. Chris Christie used as a rehearsal for a 2016 presidential bid, the media were so mesmerized by his outsize personality that they paid little attention to his track record as governor. Contrary to his carefully-crafted image, Christie has not been a can-do pragmatist but a hard-line conservative. When he plays the no-nonsense tough guy, it is usually aimed at the most vulnerable people in society. But he gets all warm and fuzzy when it comes to the rich and powerful.

Here are some of the people writing about some of the stuff I wish I had time to write about, for January 10th through January 14th:

• Why Republicans Protect the ‘Honor’ of Offensive Team Names – Conservatives have a convenient belief that when it comes to racism, it's all about intent.
• Christie: A Bully’s Bully – Oh, how we love those Republican “straight-shooters.”
• Cuban Students Arrive To Study In Miami College For First Time In 5 Decades – The Heritage Foundation is pushing a "bipartisan" bill that would require the federal government to respect state laws on gay marriage.
• Christie appeared with official tied to bridge scandal during traffic snarl – According to a Tuesday report from the Wall Street Journal, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie made a public appearance in early September with the Port Authority official who ordered the creation of a major traffic jam in Fort Lee.
• Ignore the Republicans: Obamacare Is Doing Fine – I've been writing a bit less lately about Obamacare, and there's a reason for that: It's a done deal. It's not going to be repealed; the website woes have mostly been fixed; and we're now at a point where we're simply not going to know how it works out until it's been up and running for a while. Obsessing over every interim report and every Republican screamfest doesn't make much sense. We just have to wait and see.
• How to Sue Over the Christie Bridge Scandal and Win – As New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie tries to recover from the fallout for his administration’s participation in the vindictive decision to close lanes and snarl traffic on the George Washington Bridge for five days, he will get no help from lawsuits brought by angry citizens stuck in the mess. The first suit has already dropped. These claims will surely breed others. They could keep the story alive for years. And they could even result, unusually, in personal liability for the officials involved, including, perhaps, the governor himself.
• Conservatives can sure dish it out … – I'm just putting this up here for posterity so I can easily find it the next time some right wing jackass gets his shorts in a wad about how the South gets no respect.
• Jailing of an Alabama blogger: It’s worse than we thought – On Monday I highlighted the case of Roger Shuler, an Alabama blogger currently being under indefinite detention in a state prison for contempt charges after refusing to remove items from his blog in adherence to an injunction ruling. His detention is a striking abrogation of First Amendment protections.
• Christie Says, “I Am Not a Bully.” Here Are 8 Videos of Him Yelling, Name-Calling, and Belittling People. – Here are 8 videos of Christie yelling, belittling people, and name-calling—and most of the clips are promoted by Christie himself on his popular YouTube page:

Here are some of the people writing about some of the stuff I wish I had time to write about, for January 10th from 16:31 to 16:43:

• Some in GOP like to see Christie knocked back – Gov. Chris Christie is facing his biggest political controversy and is under fire from the left. But there are plenty in his own party pleased to see the tough-talking Republican governor get a bit of a comeuppance.
• Strauss: Why teachers think Gov. Christie is a bully – New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie says he’s not a bully, but there are plenty of teachers in New Jersey who would disagree.
• How white, black and brown students learn the language of racist bullying – Children are bombarded with racist messages in the media and public debate. It's no wonder this has reached the playground
• New Yorker Rips Chris Christie In Latest Cover – Yeah, the governor probably won't love this image of him as a little boy blocking all that Jersey traffic.
• Feds recognize same-sex couples in Utah – The Obama administration extended federal recognition to the marriages of more than 1,000 same-sex couples in Utah that took place before the Supreme Court put those unions in the state on hold.

  The action will enable the government to extend eligibility for federal benefits to these couples. That means gay and lesbian couples can file federal taxes jointly, get Social Security benefits for spouses and request legal immigration status for partners.

• Why Conservatives’ Old Divide-and-Conquer Strategy — Setting Working Class Against the Poor — Is Backfiring – For almost forty years Republicans have pursued a divide-and-conquer strategy intended to convince working-class whites that the poor were their enemies.

  The big news is it’s starting to backfire.

• The Chris Christie scandal proves it: strong leaders are dangerous | Jonathan Freedland – The disgrace of New Jersey's Republican governor shows how political strength can fast become bullying – or worse
• “We Can Afford to Live Again” – 10 Americans Who Got Covered – The very best people to describe what having new health insurance means — what it feels like — isn't me or any White House policy staffer. It's not even the President.
• READ: New Chris Christie Bridge Scandal Documents Released – On Friday, the New Jersey legislature released hundreds of pages of documents relating to Republican New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie's George Washington Bridge scandal. The documents are divided into seven exhibits, A-G. Read them here (we will add exhibits as they become available; the state legislature's website is currently overloaded):
• Chris Christie’s Not In The Clear Yet. These Text Messages Show Why. –

Here are some of the people writing about some of the stuff I wish I had time to write about, for December 31st through January 2nd:

• Duck Dynasty’s Phil Robertson is everything that is wrong with conservatives | Ana Marie Cox – We already knew he was racist and homophobic. Now it emerges that he thinks girls should marry at 15 or 16
• Obamacare is up and running. But that’s not the end of the story. – It's going to take years to build up a real, universal system and much of that is going to come from work in the 50 states. It means we will be living with an unequal system for many years, but that's an old story in America, isn't it? Maybe the best we can hope for is that the speed of eventual universality is faster than it used to be.

  It's better than it was, but it needs to be better than it is. Hopefully it will be excellent for everyone very soon.

• The 25 Best Progressive Victories of 2013 – Progressives are rarely satisfied. It is part of our political DNA. There's so much injustice in the world, it's sometimes hard to feel that we're making progress. But as Chinese philosopher Laozi reminded us, a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.
• The Resurgent Progressives – The re-emergence of a Democratic left will be one of the major stories of 2014.
• Congress to the Unemployed: Eat Confetti – Is this really how we want to start the new year, by denying unemployment benefits to more than a million Americans who have lost their jobs?
• Where Is Obama Hiding the Death Panels? – We sometimes forget that the popularity of the Affordable Care Act has been affected not just by the sort of breathless minute-by-minute assessment of the law's implementation we've been treated to since October, and the complaints of this or that interest group focused on the injustices allegedly meted out to this or that sub-population, but also by stuff just made up out of thin air by demagogues.
• We should be optimistic about the Affordable Care Act – When it comes to the Affordable Care Act, negativity is out in full force. But as history has taught us, there are plenty of reasons to be optimistic about the Affordable Care Act.
• Here’s How Obamacare Makes Americans More Free – Few values matter more to Americans than freedom. And now, as key provisions of the Affordable Care Act take effect, America is becoming a freer country. That's certainly how Katie R. Norvell sees it. The New York Times quotes this 33-year-old music therapist, who has been uninsured for three and a half years due to a pre-existing condition, as saying: "I feel a huge sense of relief. With coverage.
• Dog Whistle Politics: How Coded Racial Appeals Have Reinvented Racism and Wrecked the Middle Class – Campaigning for president in 1980, Ronald Reagan told stories of Cadillac-driving "welfare queens" and "strapping young bucks" buying T-bone steaks with food stamps. In trumpeting these tales of welfare run amok, Reagan never needed to mention race, because he was blowing a dog whistle: sending a message about racial minorities inaudible on one level, but clearly heard on another. In doing so, he tapped into a long political tradition that started with George Wallace and Richard Nixon, and is more relevant than ever in the age of the Tea Party and the first black president.
• 2013: The year in whiteness – Maybe it was the very fact of enjoying a wonderful Christmas with my family and friends, against the manufactured backlash to a nonexistent “War on Christmas,” that let me appreciate the perilous mental state of a small but noisy and paranoid swath of white America. Somehow over the holiday it became clear: 2013 was the year white grievance mongering became an uglier and even more lucrative racket.

Here are some of the people writing about some of the stuff I wish I had time to write about, for December 31st from 12:51 to 12:58:

• Myanmar declares ‘no more political prisoners’ after amnesty – To 1.3 million jobless Americans: The Republican Party wishes you a Very Unhappy New Year!
• Cutting jobless aid will be costly – If some of your neighbors don't seem too happy about the new year, it could be because Congress decided to go home and party without extending unemployment benefits.

  After patting itself on the back for barely passing a budget deal, Congress left 1.3 million long-term-unemployed Americans without any obvious means of support. Lawmakers didn't include an extension of unemployment benefits in the budget deal, so the program expired on Saturday.

• The TV Club, 2013 – Despite anger toward these supposedly anti-democratic decisions, judicial rulings have a necessary role to play in the advancement of civil rights, even when public and legislative opinion isn't on the same side. Especially when it isn't.
• The Pope’s Criticism Of Capitalism Has One Wealthy Donor Very Upset – Pope Francis' critical comments about the wealthy and capitalism have at least one wealthy capitalist benefactor hesitant about giving financial support to one of the church's major fundraising projects.
• Banner year for LGBT rights – Richard Socarides, former president of Equality Matters, shares his thoughts on 2013’s top stories related to LGBT rights.