Reading List

The most recent articles from a list of feeds I subscribe to.

This is what it takes to become Trump’s attorney general

It’s been a big week for the Trump Justice Department, beginning with the arraignment of an alleged would-be presidential assassin on Monday. Just one day after charges were brought against Cole Tomas Allen, who prosecutors say attempted to assassinate President Donald Trump at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, the DOJ pivoted to a new target: […]

The Voting Rights Act is all but dead. Prepare for maximum gerrymandering.

Get yourself a man who loves you as much as Justice Samuel Alito loves partisan gerrymandering. The Supreme Court’s decision in Louisiana v. Callais, which was handed down on Wednesday, was expected to deal a mortal blow to a longstanding federal rule that guarantees Black and Latino voters a minimum level of representation in some […]

The battle over rescuing 2,000 beagles from lab research is not over

It’s exceptionally rare that the tiny, perpetually marginal, and politically outmatched animal rights movement manages to capture national attention. A lack of attention is that movement’s core problem and central organizing question. How can it convince the public to make space in their minds for something they’d really, really prefer not to: the industrialized torture […]

The sad, ugly debate behind the new Michael Jackson biopic

The new biopic Michael, about the tortured King of Pop, had a record-breaking opening weekend — despite the fact that the film celebrates the musical legacy of Michael Jackson, a man credibly accused of sexually abusing multiple children.  After the success of the 2019 documentary Leaving Neverland, it was tempting to think that there was […]

We’re missing the economic fallout of the Iran war — just like we did with Covid

In the early weeks of the Covid pandemic, in those days when public spaces emptied and hospitals filled up, I used to see this magazine cover from 2017 being passed around social media. The story was a familiar one to me, because I was the one who had written it: The posts were all versions […]