Start Making Sense Clips

Trump declared in his State of the Union speech “America will never become a socialist country.” Of course that only makes it seem like maybe it will.  Bernie Sanders gave an important speech on socialism last week, connecting it to the unfinished agenda of FDR's New Deal -- and our John Nichols spoke with him about it -- beforehand.   Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privac...

At a time when several states have passed draconian new abortion restrictions, you don’t have to be a woman to stand up for reproductive rights: Katha Pollitt talks about abortion and men.   Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Rashida Tlaib is one of the two the Muslim women elected to the House. John Nichols spoke with her for the “Next Left” podcast, our sister podcast at The Nation.  Tlaib, who represents Detroit, was born there; her parents are Palestinian immigrants, and she a long and deep engagement with progressive politics in that city.  In this segment John introduces clips from his interview. Advertising Inqu...

The British should extradite Julian Assange to Sweden for the investigation of rape charges against him, but neither the Swedes nor the Brits should extradite him to the US – because the new “espionage” charges against him are political, a threat to freedom of the press and to all journalists and publishers.  Bruce Shapiro explains; he's a longtime contributing editor at The Nation. Advertisin...

Every Democratic primary candidate with more than 1 per cent in the polls has signed the Indivisible Pledge to support the Democratic winner, with one exception: Joe Biden.  Why not?  Ezra Levin comments—he’s co-founder of Indivisible, the nationwide network of grassroots progressive groups. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Opponents of Medicare for All say it would be impossibly expensive.  Exactly how are we going to pay for it?  Robert Pollin of U Mass Amherst explains; he’s one of 219 economists who just signed an open letter to Congress urging passage of Medicare for All. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

We know the world is getting hotter and the storms are getting bigger and the seas are rising.  What we need to know now is not what climate change will do, but rather what we should do—because, for us, climate change is a political problem.  Alyssa Battistoni comments.  Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

There are 1,000 redactions in the 448 pages of the Mueller report, individual names and entire pages that we are not allowed to see.  They are part of a larger problem of government secrecy which started long before Trump and which is now threatening to cripple our democracy—Karen Greenberg explains. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/priva...

John Nichols talks about Justin Amash, the first Republican member of Congress to say that Trump has committed impeachable offenses—and also about The Nation’s new podcast, which he hosts – it’s called “Next Left,” and the premiere episode, out now, features Ilhan Omar. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

During the presidential campaign, Donald Trump often talked about an American soldier in Afghanistan who became the longest-held American POW since Vietnam.  Trump said he was “a dirty rotten traitor” who should be shot or thrown from a plane.  He was talking about Bowe Bergdahl.  Michael Ames explains how the Bergdahl story reveals a lot about why the Afghan war has been a disaster.  Ames is co-a...

Nation columnist Laila Lalami talks about her new novel, “The Other Americans,” about the suspicious death of a Moroccan immigrant in a small town in California.  It’s a family saga, a murder mystery, and a love story. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Climate change and living in the city, where the health effects of hyrdocarbon production and global trade are felt most intensely: Ben Ehrenreich reports on local organizing in the city of Commerce, California, a transit point for the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Paris isn’t the only place where a cathedral of Notre Dame is in ruins and awaiting rebuilding – there’s another Notre Dame in Haiti, destroyed in the earthquake of 2010.  Amy Wilentz has a modest proposal about a source for the money: reparations -- from France. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Should the House Democrats begin impeachment proceedings?  The politics may be debatable, but congress’s duty is clear.  Joshua Holland says impunity always breeds more lawlessness, and there’s plenty of evidence that Trump plans to continue to act without regard for the law. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

We take a trip back back to the darkest days in the Cold War, when muckraking journalists, independent Marxists, trade-union rebels, freedom riders, beatniks and peace protesters all found a home at America’s Oldest Weekly, The Nation magazine.  That was the work of a great editor—who was also a great historian-- Carey McWilliams.  Peter Richardson will explain—his new book is American Prophet: Th...

Eric Hobsbawm was everybody’s favorite Marxist historian.  His books, especially "The Age of Revolution," "The Age of Capital," "The Age of Empire," and “The Age of Extremes,” have been translated into 50 languages and sold millions of copies.  He was also a lifelong member of the British Communist Party, and his fight against Stalinist orthodoxy in the Party shaped his und...

In Trump’s latest blowup over immigration, Stephen Miller has played the central role — goading him to close the border, warning him of the dangers of looking weak, and encouraging his sudden purge of his homeland security team. But who is this Stephen Miller?  He grew up in liberal Santa Monica-- what happened?  What went wrong? Laurie Winer will report—she wrote about Stephen Miller for LA Magaz...

Plastics and pollution: the problem isn’t just all the plastic in the oceans; it’s the manufacturing of plastics, a toxic petro-chemical.  The Nation’s Zoe Carpenter reports from the Texas and Louisana gulf coasts on the current plastics boom, a byproduct of fracking. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

‘Reconstruction: America After The Civil War’—that’s the new show premiering on TV this week.  It’s a four-hour PBS documentary produced and hosted by Henry Louis Gates, Jr., exploring the years after the Civil War, when the defeated South faced revolutionary social change—the world’s first interracial democracy.  Eric Foner comments – he was chief historical advisor on the documentary. Advertisin...

We’re still waiting for the text of the report of the special counsel Robert Muller, but in the meantime we’ve been told he did not recommend bringing charges against Jared Kushner in connection with Russian interference in the 2016 election.  But that does not mean Jared is innocent of everything. Amy Wilentz explains. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https:/...

Beto O'Rourke has a huge following, but what exactly does he stand for?  And what does his narrow defeat in the Texas senate race last year tell us about what kind of campaign he would run if he won the Democratic nomination for president? Harold Meyerson comments—he’s executive editor of The American Prospect. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redc...

In the wake of the Barr letter, Trump is calling his opponents “treasonous.”  He’s vowing to pursue and punish those responsible for the Russia investigation.  What would it be like if he got his way, if there were no way to restrain him?  Historian Adam Hochschild says it would be like the three-year period of censorship, mass imprisonment, and deportations during World War I, under Woodrow Wilso...

Trump’s Wall has become a powerful symbol of a radically new idea about what America stands for—replacing the myth of the frontier as a place of possibility, rebirth, and freedom.  Historian Greg Grandin talks about the wall, the border, and the frontier--his new book is “The End of the Myth: From the Frontier to the Border Wall in the Mind of America.” Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com...

In 2017, the Trump administration announced that, for the first time in history, states could impose a work requirement on the low-income people who rely on Medicaid for health nsurance. Arkansas was the first state to implement one, staring last June.  A number of other states, including Arizona, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, New Hampshire, and Wisconsin, are chomping at the bit to follow suit. Br...

Plus: Mississippi has only one place you can get an abortion--it’s in Jackson,  and the state also has a wonderful organization based there called the Mississippi Reproductive Freedom Fund. Rebecca Grant reports on the remarkable woman who founded and leads that organization. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy