Inequality

(By Juan Cole) Sen. Ted Cruz criticized Jeb Bush for appearing to downplay the rule of law in arguing that undocumented immigration to the US is a crime of passion, resorted to out of an abundance of love for families in straitened circumstances. Cruz said that such an argument injures the sovereignty of the US […]

Climate Change

World Bank Head: Climate Change and Growing Inequality threaten Global Upheaval

Juan Cole

(By Jon Queally) President of the World Bank, Jim Yong Kim, is warning that the combined crises of planetary climate change and rising global inequality in a highly interconnected world will lead to the rise of widespread upheaval as the world's poor rise up and clashes over access to clean water and affordable food result […]

Inequality

Can We Safeguard Our Democracy After Supreme Court Decision?

Juan Cole

The Supreme Court’s evisceration of our campaign finance rules is a powerful argument for the cleansing properties of sunlight. We should respond to McCutcheon by pushing for the full and timely disclosure of every penny donated to advance a political…

Barack Obama

Ted Cruz Pwned by own Facebook Poll on Obamacare (Young Turks)

Juan Cole

Cenk Uygur of The Young Turks: “Facebook Poll Hilariously Backfires On Senator” Crooks & Liars writes: Ted Cruz, Don’t Ask The Question If You Don’t Want To Know The Answer (via http://crooksandliars.com) Ted Cruz thought he could rile up his followers on Facebook by posting the following “straw poll”: Quick poll: Obamacare was signed into […]

Afghanistan

Ft. Hood & the True Cost of Iraq & Afghanistan Wars: Nearly 1 mn traumatized: PTSD by the Numbers

Juan Cole

(By Juan Cole) The Ft. Hood shooter who left 3 victims dead yesterday had been being assessed for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. He had served for 4 months at the tail end of the Iraq War in 2011 and suffered from anxiety and depression. A staggering 1 million veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars have […]

Economy

Obamacare Enrolls 7.1 Million: But Will the haters ever stop hating?

Juan Cole

LAST week, while watching videos on YouTube, I was repeatedly served with an advertisement in which a mournful woman informed me that unfortunately, Obamacare “just doesn’t work.” This left me bemused, since I live in a country where a variety of Obamacare…

Economy

Walmart Admits that its Business Model Requires Employees to Depend on Food Stamps

contributors

Critics cite irony of annual report filing: ‘This is a company that everywhere it goes it creates poverty’ (By Lauren McCauley) [ Walmart employees are known to be among biggest Medicaid and Food Stamp recipients in over half of the states. – JRIC] Although a notorious recipient of "corporate welfare," Walmart has now admitted that […]

Economy

We’re not Envious, we’re Disappointed: US Firms Stash $2 Trillion in Foreign Tax Havens, Costing us Billions

contributors

(By Michael Winship) Here on our whimsical island off the coast of the Eastern Seaboard, we have a company called Manhattan Mini Storage that is as famous for the semi-snarky wit of its billboards and subway posters as it is for the spaces it rents to we New Yorkers who live in apartments so small […]

Africa

A World built on Slavery

contributors

(By Greg Grandin) Many in the United States were outraged by the remarks of conservative evangelical preacher Pat Robertson, who blamed Haiti’s catastrophic 2010 earthquake on Haitians for selling their souls to Satan. Bodies were still being pulled from the rubble — as many as 300,000 died — when Robertson went on TV and gave […]