Start Making Sense

Michelle Obama declares in her new memoir, "I am not a political person, so I'm not going to attempt to offer an analysis" of Trump’s victory.  That’s her stance in the rest of the book as well.  It seems strange for the person the New York Times called "The most outspoken first lady in modern history."  What’s going on here?  Amy Wilentz comments. Plus: The Democrats won the midterms by the largest popular vote margin for either party in the history of midterm elections -- larger than the Watergate midterm after Nixon resigned in 1974, 44 years ago.  But there was a deeper and more significant victory hidden behind those numbers, Kai Wright argues: the political mobilization of millions of people of color in the South. Also: Last week the White House – that is, the Trump White House – released a major scientific report on climate change, with the darkest warnings to date about the consequences of rising temperatures for the United States.  Tom Athanasiou explains.Advertising Inquiries

Orange County, California, was the political starting point for Nixon, for the Barry Goldwater presidential campaign, and for Reagan—as Republican as any place in America. But starting in January, not a single Republican will represent Orange County in the House. It’s solid blue. Gustavo Arellano will explain how it happened – he’s a weekly columnist for the LA Times, and wrote the legendary column “Ask a Mexican.” Also: mass demonstrations in America, from the 1963 March on Washington to the 2017 Women’s March: what protests do when they work, and why: L.A. Kauffman explains. Her new book is "How to Read a Protest: The Art of Organizing and Resistance." Plus: cities providing sanctuary for people the federal government is trying to arrest and return to the oppression they had escaped-- today’s battles over Trump’s attacks on undocumented immigrants have some striking parallels with the battles over fugitive slaves in the decade before the Civil War. Andrew Delbanco comments--his new book is "

Frank Rich finds lessons for Democrats in the midterms: seeking “the political center,” as recommended by New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristoff, running on “clean-government themes and promises of incremental improvement to the health care system rather than transformational social change,” is “ridiculous.” Frank writes about politics for New York Magazine and is executive producer of VEEP on HBO. Also: Trump’s appointment of a new acting attorney general, Matt Whitaker: is it legal? He hasn’t been confirmed by the Senate – or even nominated. Erwin Chemerinsky comments—he’s dean of the law school at UC Berkeley, and his new book is “We the People: A Progressive Reading of the Constitution for the 21st Century.” Plus: a report on that caravan from Central America headed across Mexico toward Tijuana, from Laura Carlsen, who has has been with the caravan. Trump has stopped talking about it, now that the midterms are over and his fear-mongering failed to win key House seats.Advertising Inquiries: https:/

Tuesday night was a good night for progressive Democrats, John Nichols argues—and Democratic control of the House will bring an epic change to Washington politics—starting with a return to Constitutional principles and an insistence that the president is subject to the rule of law. Also: women won unprecedented victories in the midterms.  Joan Walsh analyzes the feminist insurgency that will bring almost a hundred women to the House of Representatives in January—including the first two Muslim women (Michigan’s Rashida Tlaib and Minnesota’s Ilhan Omar); the first Native American women (New Mexico’s Deb Haaland and Kansas’s Sharice Davids), Texas’s first two Latina congresswomen (Veronica Escobar and Sylvia Garcia); plus three young black women (Massachusetts’s Ayanna Pressley, Connecticut’s Jahana Hayes, and Illinois’s Lauren Underwood). Plus: Brazil last week elected Jair Bolsonaro.  Our man in Rio, Andy Robinson, says he is “worse than Donald Trump,” and “as close to fascism as you will get in the world

Women voters—and candidates—are mobilized as never before for next week’s midterms: Joan Walsh and Cecile Richards report from across the country at a Nation event introduced by publisher and editor Katrina vanden Heuvel.  Joan is the magazine’s National Affairs Correspondent and Cecile recently stepped down as head of Planned Parenthood after leading the organization since 2006\. Also: the Democrats are focusing now on voter mobilization and turnout, while the Republicans are at work on voter suppression.  How significant will the Republican effort be in this election--and where is it likely to have the biggest impact?  Ari Berman reports—he wrote about vote suppression for the New York Times opinion pages. Plus Gary Younge, The Nation columnist, talks about politics in the midwest, the heartland, the rust belt – he’s covering the midterms from Racine, Wisconsin, an old Democratic factory town on Lake Michigan.  After so many defeats in the state, Democrats there told him they “can’t afford the luxury

62 per cent of white men voted for Trump, 31 per cent for Clinton.  Kai Wright has our analysis--he’s host of WNYC’s podcast The United States of Anxiety, and he’s also a columnist for The Nation.  It’s easy to get confused by the crosscurrents of misogyny and racism and xenophobia, he argues; they are not  discrete issues, but rather “the interlocking tools of white men’s minority rule.” Also: Trump’s place in American history: Jill Lepore of the Harvard history department and the New Yorker talks about her new book These Truths which starts in 1492 with Christopher Columbus, and ends in 2016 with Donald Trump. And we’ll recall the 1968 presidential election, when Richard Nixon won, and many of our current problems began.  The man who almost defeated Nixon was Hubert Humphrey, the onetime Minnesota senator who had become LBJ’s vice president.  Anti-war activists hated Hubert Humphrey in 1968--Michael Kazin will explain.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redc

What lessons have the Democrats learned from the disaster of 2016? Jeff Cohen talks about the progressives’ fight to win the party away from dependence on corporate contributions—and instead to mobilize the grassroots. Jeff is one of the co-authors of “Democratic Autopsy—One Year Later” at TheNation.com. Also: Arizona is a red state, ground zero for Trump’s anti-immigrant politics, but it’s changing. Sasha Abramsky has returned from Tucson, with a report on how and why the Democrats seem likely to flip a key House seat there. Plus: A historic challenges to the Republicans is underway in Georgia, where Stacey Abrams is campaigning to become the state’s first black governor, and first female governor. The polls have her tied with her opponent, a far-right figure endorsed by Trump. Joan Walsh just got back from Georgia with a report.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Rebecca Traister sees in the Kavanaugh hearings a typical case where women’s anger was marginalized or made to sound hysterical or infantile or threatening—but men’s anger was taken to be valid and righteous. But that is changing, she argues: women’s anger increasingly is “in the beating heart of many political and social movements.” Her new book is Good and Mad: The Revolutionary Power of Women's Anger. Also: David Cay Johnston talks about the “Mountain of Tax Cheating” by Donald Trump, as exposed in the massive New York Times report on where Trump’s money came from, and the violations of tax laws in his past. David is a Pulitzer-prize winning reporter who has written for the New York Times and the L.A. Times and is now editor of DCReport.org. Plus: what the Democrats can do about newly-confirmed Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh when they win the House in November and take control of the Judiciary Committee in January: John Nichols talks about investigations that could lead to the filing of arti

Joan Walsh explains why we lack confidence in the re-opened FBI background check into Kavanaugh’s past, and talks about the activists who are fighting the nomination, and the senators who need to be told “do not vote for this man.” Plus: D.D. Guttenplan talks about some alternatives to those old white Republican men who shouted and pouted at the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing last week–his new book is “The Next Republic: the Rise of a New Radical Majority.” And while the eyes of the nation search for news on the FBI investigation of Brett Kavanaugh, the hard work of fighting for social change goes on--for example in St. Paul, where a campaign for a $15 minimum wage is being fought right now.  Michelle Chen reports.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

The Judiciary Committee confirmation hearings for Brett Kavanaugh have been an outrage, even before the recent “allegations of sexual misconduct.” John Nichols comments. Also: Florida will vote in November on restoring voting rights for felons, and polls show the measure is likely to pass. Sasha Abramsky reports on the campaign and its significance. Plus: universal basic income—government payments to help keep people out of poverty: is that a better idea than a government job guarantee? Bryce Covert explains the current debate on the left. Support for this week’s episode of Start Making Sense is provided by Audible, visit [audible.com/sense](audible.com/sense) to get your first audiobook free.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Michael Moore talks about his new documentary, "Fahrenheit 11/9," opens Friday May 21 across America--It's a passionate argument about how the Democrats helped pave the way to Trump's election, and a call to arms to change our politics and vote on Nov. 9.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Katha Pollitt considers the arguments made by Brett Kavanaugh’s defenders in response to the charges that he sexually assaulted a 15-year-old when he was 17, and the evidence supporting Christine Blasey Ford, his accuser. Also: On the 10th anniversary of the financial crisis, Harold Meyerson argues that the recovery was a disaster all over again—and that we are still suffering from its political consequences.  Harold is Executive Editor of The American Prospect. Plus: 25 years ago, President Bill Clinton presided over a handshake on the White House grounds between PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, agreeing to the Oslo Accords, which, we were told, laid the foundation for peace between Israel and a Palestinian state. Mouin Rabbani comments—he’s a fellow at the Institute for Palestine Studies and a contributor to the London Review of Books and The Nation.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

As world leaders (except for Trump) gather in San Francisco this week for the Global Climate Action Summit, Bill McKibben comments on California’s new law mandating 100 per cent clean electricity by 2045—and on the next task: keep oil and gas in the ground. Also: Should Democratic strategy focus on winning the votes of moderate Republicans? Steve Phillips points to one key factor: there aren’t that many of them.  Steve is the author of the New York Times best seller, 'Brown Is the New White: How a Demographic Revolution Has Created a New American Majority.' Plus: the inequality industry: Atossa Abrahamian examines the new focus on inequality at the IMF, the Ford Foundation, and other elite institutions, and argues that there’s a big political difference between seeking to reduce inequality, and fighting for a world of equality.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

In Oklahoma and West Virgina and Missouri, teachers have led amazingly successful battles against Republican budget-cutting and tax breaks for the wealthy. Although the Supreme Court’s Janus decision sought to cripple the ability of public sector unions to engage in politics, recent polls show that unions are more popular than ever. Randi Weingarten comments on the big picture of unions and politics – she’s president of the American Federation of Teachers, with 1.7 million members in more than 3,000 local affiliates nationwide. Also, At the California Global Climate Action Summit, in San Francisco next week, all the world’s major nations will be represented--except for our own government. Mark Hertsgaard reports on how California, under Governor Jerry Brown, has taken the lead in fighting climate change -- and how climate activists have organized at the upcoming summit to demand that the governor end new oil and gas drilling. Mark wrote the cover story for The Nation’s special issue on climate politics. P

Amy Wilentz takes up the vital question, is Melania Trump a hero of the resistance—or an accomplice of evil?  Is she edging “ever closer to open contempt for him,” as New York Times columnist Frank Bruni argues, and finding “increasingly clever ways to show it”?  Or is she sticking with her role as wife to a racist tyrant with a clear history of infidelity, and lots of cash? Also: how mothers and pregnant women are discriminated against and punished – here at home, and around the world.  Katha Pollitt talks about how that has happened—and why. And as Labor Day approaches, we talk labor unions and politics with Lee Saunders, president of AFSCME.  His union was the target of that decision by the Supreme Court in June, when it ruled, 5-4, that government workers who choose NOT to join unions may NOT be required to help pay for collective bargaining.  Saunders explains what unions are doing to fight back – in the November election, and in the long run.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy

Centrism lost for the Democrats in 2016, and it will lose again in 2018, Gary Younge argues: the party needs not just to oppose Trump, but also to put forward an alternative vision that can earn the support of working-class Americans. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has shown how to do it, running on a program of tuition-free higher education, Medicare for all, and a federal jobs guarantee. Plus: Trump’s 1968 – and ours. In August 1968, 50 years ago this week, young antiwar demonstrators fought the police outside the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, while the whole world was watching. It was the culmination of an overwhelming year for the anti-war movement. But where was young Donald Trump? Todd Gitlin explains–he’s an activist, a sociologist, and author of "The Sixties: Years of Hope, Days of Rage." Also: Aretha Franklin, who died last week, was a musical genius who seems unique; but she came out of a specific place and time: Detroit in the 1950s and 1960s. Farah Griffin, Professor of Professo

One of the defining features of Trump’s politics has been the way he’s appealed to hatred and fear of refugees and immigrants. Viet Thanh Nguyen talks about refugee lives, and refugee writers. He’s the author of the novel The Sympathizer—it won the Pulitzer prize—and editor of the new book The Displaced: Refugee Writers on Refugee Lives.  He’s also the recipient of a MacArthur Foundation “genius” grant—and he’s a refugee himself, arriving from Vietnam with his family in 1975, when he was 4 years old. Also: Anna Deavere Smith talks about the the school-to-prison pipeline—that’s the subject of her one-woman show, called ‘Notes from the Field,’ which dramatizes the real-life accounts of students, parents, & teachers caught in a system where young people of color who live in poverty get pushed out of the classroom and into the criminal justice system.  It’s streaming online now, at HBO.com and HBO GO. Plus: There are 219,000 women in prison in the United States—Rachel Kushner’s new novel, The Mars Room, i

The Age of Trump, despite the opportunities it brings to investigative journalism, is hardly a “golden age”, John Nichols argues: cutbacks and layoffs have crippled the nation’s news media—not just in covering the White House, but state and local government as well.  The New York Daily News provides a vivid example of the crisis. Also: The Democrats need to retake control of the Senate if they are to have a chance of preventing Trump from transforming the Supreme Court into a right-wing bulwark.  Harold Meyerson of The American Prospect analyzes the political battles in key states—and the factors that may weaken Brett Kavanaugh in his confirmation hearings. Plus: Trump has done something genuinely new as president: he specializes in creating uncertainty.  Nomi Prins will talk about the economic consequences for us, and for our future.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Katha Pollitt is not happy with leftists calling Trump a “fascist” – maybe there’s a better term for his attacks on democracy, which have a lot in common with authoritarian leaders in Russia, Turkey, Egypt, Hungary, Poland, and other places.  The foundation for all of them: austerity, pushed by the big banks and right-wing parties, which creates the economic anxiety that fuels racism and anti-immigrant sentiment. Plus: left politics can win all over the country, not just in New York City and Chicago and LA – that’s what Mike Lux says , he’s a longtime strategist for the progressive movement and Democratic candidates. Also: Jonathan Gold, who died on July 21, was the first food writer to win the Pulitzer Prize for criticism.  He wrote, not about high-end restaurants, but about mom-and-pop places in immigrant neighborhoods of Los Angeles.  Harold Meyerson of The American Prospect talks about the significance of Gold’s writing about immigrants and their food in the Age of Trump.Advertising Inquiries: https:/

A week ago Trump returned from his disastrous press conference with Putin in Helsinki to face a firestorm of criticism.  Joan Walsh reviews the political landscape this week, when a significant minority of Republicans disagree with Trump on Putin – but nevertheless “approve” of his presidency.   On the Democratic side, he tumultuous week has further energized candidates and voters for the fall elections.  Also: Some questions for Brett Kavanaugh, Trump’s Supreme Court nominee: David Cole, legal director of the ACLU and legal affairs correspondent for The Nation, says there are questions that Kavanaugh should be required to answer. Plus: Jimmy Carter is widely regarded as a failed president, despite the fact that he promoted human rights around the world, granted amnesty to Vietnam era draft resisters, and was a dedicated opponent of racism who enforced the Voting Rights Act.  Historian Michael Kazin analyzes what went wrong with Carter’s presidency.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivac