Start Making Sense

By The Nation Magazine

Society & Culture

What's Start Making Sense about?

Progressive news without the boring parts—featuring the writers, activists and artists who shape the week in news. Hosted by Jon Wiener and presented by The Nation Magazine.

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Defund—and Disarm—the Polic...

07.01.2020

Defunding the police and re-imagining public safety—in Los Angeles—starts with the LAPD, but includes the sheriffs, the school police, and the UCLA police force. Kelly Lytle Hernandez comments—she’s a professor of history at UCLA, she wrote City of Inmates, a ...

Start Making Sense episodes:

07.01.2020 Defund—and Disarm—the Police: Kelly Lytle Hernandez, D.D. Guttenplan, and Zoë Carpenter Defunding the police and re-imagining public safety—in Los Angeles—starts with the LAPD, but includes the sheriffs, the school police, and the UCLA police force. Kelly Lytle Hernandez comments—she’s a professor of history at UCLA, she wrote City of Inmates, a ...
06.24.2020 How Racism Works in a Liberal Democratic City: Michele Goodwin, plus Mia Birdsong on abolishing the police Michele Goodwin talks about her experiences of racism in daily life in Minneapolis—before she became Chancellor’s Professor of Law at the University of California Irvine. Also: removing statues from the Capitol Building honoring traitors and defenders of slavery—there’s one that’s ...
06.17.2020 The Protests, the Police, and Juneteenth: Robin Kelley, plus Dahlia Lithwick on Trump Juneteenth, a day of celebration and reflection for African Americans, is particularly significant in this season of protest and demands for change by Black Lives Matter. Historian Robin Kelley comments. Also: The great thing about the protests of the past ...
06.10.2020 The Police vs. the People: Jody Armour, plus Amy Wilentz on Ivanka and that Bible Democrats in Congress have introduced legislation to reform police practices nationwide and hold bad cops responsible—while LA has spent decades trying to reform its police force. Jody Armour comments—he’s the Roy P. Crocker Professor of Law at the University of ...
06.03.2020 America in Revolt: Elie Mystal, plus John Nichols with Keith Ellison Across America, protests against police violence are met with more police violence. Elie Mystal talks about the failure of Democratic mayors in deep blue cities to stop their police forces from engaging in racist violence—especially Bill De Blasio in New ...
05.27.2020 Thinking Big about politics and the virus: Mike Davis, plus Christopher Shay on the crisis, and Amy Wilentz on Jared and Ivanka It’s time to think big about the coronavirus crisis and the 40 million workers who have lost their jobs—while the rest struggle to hold on to what they’ve got. Everything seems more fragile now, and the cruelty of the system ...
05.20.2020 Does the Evidence Support Joe Biden, or Tara Reade? Katha Pollitt; plus John Powers on TV during the pandemic Did Joe Biden sexually assault Tara Reade in 1993? Katha Pollitt examines the evidence—and concludes that it supports Biden’s denial. Especially significant: the PBS NewsHour interviews with 74 former Biden staffers, of whom 62 were women; none said they had ...
05.13.2020 The fight for universal vote-by-mail: David Cole, plus Katha Pollitt on right-wing women Universal vote-by-mail: it’s obviously necessary for our Nov. 3 election, but Trump, of course, is against it. He said that if we were to adopt voting by mail, “you’d never have another Republican elected in this country again.” David Cole ...
05.06.2020 Fighting for the Soul of the Democratic Party: John Nichols, plus Amy Wilentz on Jared and Ivanka Before Bernie and AOC, before Jesse Jackson and George McGovern, there was Henry Wallace, FDR’s vice president, who fought for the soul of the Democratic party in the 1940s. John Nichols tells that story, and links it to today’s battles ...
04.29.2020 Mike Davis: Back to Work in the Covid-19 Economy? Plus John Powers on Virus Time TV Minnesota’s back-to-work plan is a lot better than Georgia’s, Mike Davis says – it requires employers to provide PPE and bans face-to-face activity—i.e. the restaurants, shopping malls, and tattoo parlors that Georgia and South Carolina have opened. Mike’s book The ...
04.22.2020 Joseph Stiglitz: What Workers Need Right Now; plus Katrina Vanden Heuvel on Solidarity Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz says the US has “one of the poorest systems of unemployment insurance in the world”—and that our number one priority should be to keep workers connected to their jobs. His book People, Power and Profits: ...
04.15.2020 Mike Davis: Is Coronavirus Ushering in a New World Order? plus Barbara Ehrenreich on low-wage work Mike Davis talks about the fragmentation of Europe, the marginalization of the WHO, the danger to Africa, and whether China will emerge less powerful in the world economy because of the rise of economic nationalism. Mike wrote about the avian ...
04.08.2020 What the Pentagon Knew about the Coronavirus—in 2017: Ken Klippenstein, plus Amy Wilentz on Jared and Laila Lalami on “The Other Americans” The Military Knew Years Ago That a Coronavirus Was Coming. The Pentagon warned the White House about a shortage of ventilators, face masks, and hospital beds in 2017, according to a document obtained by Ken Klippenstein, The Nation’s Washington Correspondent ...
04.01.2020 Mike Davis: The Coronavirus--Politics vs. Science; plus Rebecca Solnit on Becoming a Feminist Mike Davis talks about who gets forgotten in a pandemic—and about the political, and economic, obstacles to making faster progress on effective anti-viral medication and a vaccine. Mike is the author of many books, including City of Quartz and The ...
03.25.2020 E.J. Dionne: The Coronavirus and the election; plus Melina Abdullah on Black Lives Matter and Katha Pollitt on "Contagion" What’s our strategy for beating Trump in November? Is the Coronavirus making that easier, or harder? E.J. Dionne analyzes the effect of the virus on politics – he’s a columnist for the Washington Post, and his new book is Code ...
03.18.2020 Paul Krugman: The Coronavirus and the Economic Crisis; plus John Nichols on elections and Amy Wilentz on the Kushners and the Coronavirus Paul Krugman, the New York Times columnist and Nobel Prize winning economist, says we don’t have an easy way of responding to the economic threats posed by the coronavirus, and Trump’s preoccupation with the stock market is a big mistake. ...
03.11.2020 Bernie's Next Steps: John Nichols; plus Steve Phillips on Big Data and Adam Hochschild on a Forgotten Radical Despite Bernie's big losses in Michigan and elsewhere on Tuesday, he's staying in the race to challenge Biden on the issues which Democratic voters support. John Nichols assesses the situation, and talks about what we need to do now about ...
03.04.2020 Super Tuesday: The Earthquake--John Nichols and Joan Walsh, plus D.D. Guttenplan with The Nation's Endorsement of Bernie Sanders John Nichols analyzes the bad night for Bernie--and the tasks that remain if Biden is going to be defeated in the primaries. Plus: Joan Walsh covered the South Carolina primary and saw first-hand the results of Jim Clyburn's endorsement of ...
02.26.2020 Nominating Bloomberg Would Destroy the Democratic Party: Jeet Heer on politics, plus Rick Perlstein on Bernie and Robert Edelman on Sports Bloomberg can’t win the primaries, but he might try to get the nomination if Bernie doesn’t go to the convention with a majority of delegates. Jeet Heer argues that nominating Bloomberg would destroy the Democratic Party and assure Trump’s reelection. ...
02.19.2020 Elizabeth Warren: Unity Candidate? Joan Walsh, plus Bob Borosage on Bernie and John Sayles on 'Yellow Earth' Pundits have declared that Elizabeth Warren is finished, but we’re not so sure. Joan Walsh points out (https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/elizabeth-warren-iowa-caucus/) that, while Warren came in third in Iowa and fourth in New Hampshire, only 64 delegates have been selected—there are more than ...
02.12.2020 After New Hampshire: John Nichols on politics, plus Jane Kleeb on rural America and Amy Wilentz on Don Jr. New Hampshire’s primary has reshaped the Democratic race: Progressives are coalescing around Bernie, and moderates are abandoning Biden in favor of Mayor Pete and Amy Klobuchar. John Nichols reports. Plus: How the Democrats can win in rural America: Jane Kleeb ...
02.04.2020 Meltdown in Iowa: Winners and Losers—John Nichols on Politics, Rick Hasen on Elections, plus John Powers on the Oscars The problem in reporting the results in Iowa isn’t just a delay; it’s a disaster—that’s what John Nichols says—for the Democrats, and especially for Bernie, who so far appears to have won at least the popular vote. And if Biden ...
01.29.2020 Defending Trump Now—and Losing the Senate in November: Joan Walsh on Impeachment Politics, plus Robert Lipsyte on the Superbowl and Morley Musick on the Border Patrol Republican Senators in swing states are falling in their approval ratings back home as the Senate impeachment trial unfolds. In Maine, Arizona, Colorado, and North Carolina, 63 percent of voters want the Senate to allow witnesses and subpoenas in the ...
01.22.2020 Impeachment Has Already Succeeded: John Nichols, plus Andrew Bacevich on the End of the Cold War and Michael Klare on Climate 51 per cent of Americans now think Trump should be removed from office, according to the new CNN poll (and 45 per cent think he shouldn’t). That, John Nichols argues. shows impeachment has succeeded—and if Republicans in the Senate block ...
01.15.2020 Hunger and Hope in Haiti: Amy Wilentz, plus Mia Birdsong on poverty and Kate Aronoff and Michael Kazin on socialism It’s been ten years since Haiti was devastated by the earthquake that killed more than a hundred thousand people. Amy Wilentz, who has been reporting on Haiti for three decades, returned to the island and found the country oddly calm, ...
01.08.2020 The Failure of Trump’s Iran Strike: Andrew Bacevich, plus Henry Louis Gates on American slavery and Jelani Cobb on Joe McCarthy Trump’s Iran strike continues a long, failed history of American actions based on the idea that the U.S. military can shape the mideast in accord with our wishes. That’s what Andrew Bacevich argues—his new book is The Age of Illusions: ...
12.31.2019 Trump Will Lose in 2020: Stan Greenberg, plus Naomi Klein on the Green New Deal and J. Hoberman on Reagan and the Movies The 2020 election will liberate us from Donald Trump and Republican hegemony. A sweeping Democratic victory will make it possible at last for us to address our most serious problems—because 2020 will bring the death of the Republican party as ...
12.24.2019 Socialism is on the Agenda for 2020: Katrina vanden Heuvel, plus Kathleen Belew on White Nationalism and Rick Perlstein on Impeachment Capitalism is broken – that's why socialism is on the agenda for 2020. Katrina vanden Heuvel explains - she's publisher and editorial director of The Nation. We also look back at some of the big events of 2019, and some ...
12.18.2019 Does Boris Johnson’s victory in the UK mean Trump will win in the US? D.D. Guttenplan, plus John Nichols with the Progressive Honor Roll and Arundati Roy on India The British Labour Party suffered a historic defeat last week—working class people who voted Labour their entire lives have now switched sides. Centrists in the Democratic Party say this means that the socialist program doesn’t work as an alternative to ...
12.11.2019 Progressives and White Working-Class Voters: Joshua Holland, plus Katha Pollitt on Fetal Personhood and Ruth Marcus on Brett Kavanaugh Some analysts criticize progressives who urge Democrats to focus on turning out their core base—people of color, unmarried women, and younger voters—they say it’s a big mistake to give up on working class whites. And many progressives reply that it ...
12.04.2019 How the Dems Can Win in 2020: Lessons of the Virginia Victories--Joan Walsh, plus Jeet Heer on Trump and War Crimes and Bryce Covert on Strikes Democrats need to learn the lessons of their historic victory last month, when Virginia became the first Southern state in the post–civil-rights-movement era to entirely flip back to Democratic control. Virgina Democrats now hold the governorship AND both houses of ...
11.27.2019 ‘It Can’t All Be Bernie’: The Candidate with John Nichols, plus Adam Hochschild on deportation and John Powers on “The Irishman” Bernie Sanders says it will take a movement to change America: “It can’t all be Bernie.” John Nichols comments on his interview with the candidate, who is now back in second place in the polls. And we play clips from ...
11.20.2019 Gail Collins: Ruth Bader Ginsberg and the Complicated Story of Women and Aging in America; plus Rick Perlstein on Impeachment and Eric Foner on The 1619 Project The adventures of older women in America: Ruth Bader Ginsburg for example is 86,and Nancy Pelosi just turned 80. But where are the prominent Republican women in politics today who are older? Gail Collins has been thinking about that; of ...
11.13.2019 Sherrod Brown: How to Beat Trump; plus D.D. Guttenplan on Joe Biden and Thom Hartmann on the Supreme Court Sherrod Brown, the senior senator from Ohio, was re-elected in 2018. He won by 7 points—in a state Hillary Clinton had lost—by 8 points—just 2 years earlier. What are the lessons for 2020? “You need to talk to workers,” he ...
11.06.2019 The Election, One Year Away: John Nichols on the Polls, plus Paul Adler on Socialism and John Powers on John Le Carré Where do we stand one year out from the election? The best polls this week show Trump losing the popular vote by around 15 points—but also show that he’s still “highly competitive” in the swing states Democrats must carry in ...
10.30.2019 Joe Biden’s Zombie Campaign: Jeet Heer on Moderate Dems, plus Elie Mystal on Senate Republicans and Amy Wilentz on Haiti Joe Biden may be the frontrunner, but he’s slipping, and it seems doubtful that he will get better at this. Big donors are pulling away from him. But do the “moderates” in the party–-the Wall Street Democrats--have a Plan B? ...
10.23.2019 How TV Made Trump: Tom Carson, plus David Perry on Ilhan Omar and Pico Iyer on Japan We all know Trump got famous on TV with The Apprentice – but how many of us ever watched The Apprentice? Reality TV was a key force in making Trump president. Tom Carson talks about “Audience of One” by James ...
10.16.2019 The Deepening Desperation of Donald Trump: Sasha Abramsky on the President, plus Corey Robin on Clarence Thomas and Katha Pollitt on Abortion Trump’s increasingly reckless efforts at intimidation reveal the increasingly desperate situation he has created for himself, where even Fox News has become an inconsistent and unreliable defender of his actions. Sasha Abramsky separates Trump’s efforts at distraction from the political ...
10.09.2019 The new Supreme Court term will be worse than the last one—a lot worse: Elie Mystal, plus Amy Wilentz on Ivanka and Jeet Heer on impeachment The Supreme Court term began its fall term this week--and even though Brett Kavanaugh was confirmed at the start of last year’s court term, this year the Supremes’ decisions will be worse – a lot worse. Elie Mystal explains why—he’s ...
10.02.2019 Republicans and Impeachment: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly--Joan Walsh, plus Andrew Bacevich on Afghanistan and Azadeh Moaveni on ISIS Women The big question about impeachment is not the House -- there now seem to be enough votes there to pass at least one article of impeachment--the big question is about the Senate and whether some Republicans will abandon Trump. Former ...
09.25.2019 Impeachment at Last: Jeet Heer on Trump, plus Eric Foner on voting rights and Jane McElevey on the UAW strike Trump finally went too far, even for Nancy Pelosi: he used money appropriated by Congress for foreign aid to pressure the president of Ukraine to come up with dirt on Joe Biden—dirt that Trump could use in the upcoming election. ...
09.18.2019 2020 will Bring a Historic Defeat for the Republicans: Stan Greenberg on the Election, plus D.D. Guttenplan on Edward Snowden and Sasha Abramsky on Trump The 2020 election will liberate us from Donald Trump and Republican hegemony. A sweeping Democratic victory will make it possible at last for us to address our most serious problems. That’s what Stan Greenberg says – he’s a longtime pollster ...
09.11.2019 Why Doesn’t the GOP Resist Trump the Way Tories Resist Boris Johnson? D.D. Guttenplan on Britian and America, plus Katha Pollitt on Trump and John Nichols on Republican Resignations Last week Tory rebels in parliament staged a dramatic insurrection against their own Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, blocking his plans for a “no-deal Brexit.” But virtually no Republicans in Congress have resisted Trump. Why is that? D.D. Guttenplan compares and ...
09.04.2019 Why the Koch Brothers Don’t Support Trump: Christopher Leonard on “Kochland,” plus Joan Walsh on Indivisible How the Koch brothers transformed an obscure oil company based in Wichita into a $110 billion colossus, and reshaped the Republican Party—but failed to prevent Trump from becoming president: Christopher Leonard on Kochland: The Secret History of Koch Industries and ...
08.28.2019 The White Power Movement after El Paso: Kathleen Belew on domestic terrorism, plus Davis Maraniss on HUAC We’re still thinking about the terrorist attack in El Paso, where 22 people were killed at a Walmart and two dozen more were injured. Like almost all of these attacks, the El Paso killings have been treated as an isolated ...
08.21.2019 Trump’s Terrible Poll Numbers: Jeet Heer on the campaign, plus J. Hoberman on Reagan and the movies The latest polls—including the highly respected Fox poll—show Trump in terrible shape at this point: Among registered voters he trails Biden 50-38, Bernie 48-39, Elizabeth Warren 46-39, and even Kamala Harris 45-39. He’s losing crucial segments of his 2016 base. ...
08.14.2019 Bernie or Bust? Harold Meyerson on DSA, plus Katha Pollitt on Jeffrey Epstein and John Nichols on White Nationalism If Bernie does NOT get the nomination, the Democratic Socialists of America will not endorse the Democrat who does. “Bernie or Bust” was what they decided at their recent convention – but is that a good idea? Harold Meyerson comments--he’s ...
08.07.2019 America After El Paso: Joan Walsh on Trump, plus Katha Pollitt on Protest and D.D. Guttenplan on the Green New Deal After Trump’s tweets about the El Paso killings, Beto’s response was the one of the best: “He’s not tolerating violence, he’s inciting racism and violence in this country.” Joan Walsh, National Affairs Correspondent for The Nation, examines the mainstream media’s ...
07.31.2019 Trump’s Escalating Racism: A Sign of Political Desperation? Harold Meyerson, plus Jeet Heer on Al Franken and Paul Krassner remembered Are Trump’s recent racist tweets part of a political strategy, or an uncontrollable personal impulse? Harold Meyerson comments – and also proposes ways to end the potentially devastating divide among Democrats over a Green New Deal. Harold is editor-at-large of ...
07.24.2019 Is Trump Crazy? Would Pence be Worse? Amy Wilentz & Jane Mayer, plus EJ Dionne: America After Trump Amy Wilentz comments on the mental and emotional status of the president, as analyzed by 27 psychiatrists in ‘The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump,’ a book edited by Bandy X. Lee. The book was number four on the New York ...

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