Roundup 
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3/24/2023
The Roundup Top Ten for March 24, 2023
The top opinion writing by historians and about history from around the web this week.
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SOURCE: Made By History at the Washington Post
3/20/2023
The Police Car is PR for Power without Accountability
by Jeffrey Lamson
As the central feature of police technology and the main way that departments present themselves to the public, police cars have long been key symbols in police efforts to claim greater legitimacy, resources and power.
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SOURCE: New York Times
3/17/2023
On Abortion, Corporate Chains Like Walgreens Fear the Republicans More than the "Woke"
by Mary Ziegler
Despite claims that "woke" corporations are pushing a left-wing agenda, Republican Attorneys General have successfully pressured Walgreens under threat of litigation to stop selling mifepristone in states where abortion remains legal.
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SOURCE: The New Yorker
3/18/2023
How Can Haiti Move Forward?
by Marlene L. Daut
Calls for international intervention in Haiti need to consider how the history of foreign interventions—which have been aimed at helping governments instead of people—has brought the nation to its current state of crisis.
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SOURCE: Jacobin
3/20/2023
Iraq Discredited Liberal Interventionists. Why are they Still in Charge?
by Daniel Bessner
"War for oil" explains only part of the push to invade Iraq in 2003; the ideological belief that American militarism serves a noble and righteous cause appealed to many liberals. That general belief has been frustratingly immune to 20 years of exposure of facts about the falsehoods that sold the war.
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SOURCE: Contingent
3/20/2023
A Known and Unknown War
by Michael Brenes
"Time and distance are essential to the historian’s craft. They help us pursue the false promise of objectivity. I should embrace them when thinking about the Iraq War, but I don’t."
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SOURCE: Made By History at the Washington Post
3/22/2023
Nikki Haley's Campaign May Capitalize on Gender Stereotypes, but at a Cost to Women
by Jacqueline Beatty
The former South Carolina governor and UN Ambassador is seeking to separate herself from other conservatives by leaning into certain gendered stereotypes; this reinforces the idea that women leaders are fundamentally different, which has historically kept women from equal political footing.
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SOURCE: Nursing Clio
3/22/2023
History of Reproductive Law Shows Women in Power aren't the Solution
by Lara Friedenfelds
The end of Roe v. Wade makes difficult pregnancies and miscarriages potentially legaly perilous for women. The history of how the law determines fault in a lost pregnancy shows that women are as capable as men of participating in a regime that punishes other women for the ends of their pregnancies.
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SOURCE: The Atlantic
3/23/2023
The Crisis of the Intellectuals
by Ibram X. Kendi
A dire health crisis forced the author to ask what his intellectual work was ultimately for. Intellectuals more broadly need a similar push from the dire state of democracy, and should be assured that when they face pushback about being "illiberal" or "presentist" or violating the traditions of their discipline, they're on the right track.
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SOURCE: Substack
3/19/2023
A Prominent Story about How "Diversity" Entered College Admissions is Wrong
by Charles Petersen
The plaintiffs in a case seeking to outlaw affirmative action in admission policies are relying on a false narrative that "diversity" entered Harvard's admissions criteria as a way to limit the number of Jews admitted. While the existence of Jewish quotas is documented, the two aren't connected.
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SOURCE: TomDispatch
3/19/2023
We Miss Dr. Strangelove now that We've Learned to Stop Worrying and Forget the Bomb
by Andrew Bacevich
Kubrick's classic film forced viewers to confront the possibility that the controls of the world's nuclear weapons were held by fools, fanatics, and outright lunatics. Today, it's too easy to ignore it altogether.
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SOURCE: Boston Review
3/15/2023
Iraq's Militarized Politics Keep the Country in Turmoil
by Simona Foltyn
Sectarian divisions and easy access to weapons have ensured that force remains a determinative factor in Iraqi politics.
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SOURCE: TomDispatch
3/16/2023
Don't Bother Looking for a Place to Rent in DC
by Rebecca Gordon
New congressman Maxwell Frost's struggles to find an apartment in the capital echoes the "Bourgeois Blues" Leadbelly sang in 1937. What does it say about democracy if representatives of the people can't live in Washington?
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SOURCE: The Guardian
3/17/2023
20 Years Later, a Massive Effort to Forget the Runup to Iraq Invasion
by Stephen Wertheim
The impulse for American leaders to forget about Iraq and move on reveals the pathologies of American primacy in world affairs.
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SOURCE: TomDispatch
3/21/2023
Despite Ike's Warning, We're Still Nailed to a Cross of Iron
by William Astore
At the start of his presidency, Eisenhower warned of the dangers and costs of escalating militarism. By the end of his term, he was convinced the Military-Industrial Complex had entrenched itself. It was only getting started.
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SOURCE: L.A. Progressive
3/19/2023
On Marx, The Critique of Capitalism, and our Environmental Crisis
by Walter G. Moss
From E.F. Schumacher to Bernie Sanders, there is much to learn from left-wing critics of the environmental destructiveness of capitalism; the critiques are also important for how the follow and depart from the ideas of Marx.
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3/17/2023
The Roundup Top Ten for March 17, 2023
The top opinion writing by historians and about history from around the web this week.
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SOURCE: Nursing Clio
3/15/2023
"If they were White and Insured, Would they have Died?"
by Udodiri R. Okwandu
Texas's new maternal mortality report shows that historical patterns of medical racism are continuing, and the state plans to do little but blame Black women for the inadequate care they receive.
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SOURCE: NextCity
3/10/2023
Houston's Highway History Teaches Planners What Not to Do
by Kyle Shelton
Transportation planners have begun to collect the opinions of community residents affected by proposed highway projects, but they have yet to begin to meaningfully incorporate those concerns into planning. Doing so could prevent repeating the blighting effects of urban transporation projects.
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SOURCE: New York Times
3/10/2023
What Anna May Wong's History Tells us About Oscar's Asian and Asian American Moment
by Katie Gee Salisbury
The first Asian-American film star got her break when a film company cast ethnic actors in a 1922 film made to test out the new Technicolor technology. But Hollywood's racial politics and commercial imperatives kept other Asian actors from stardom.
News
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- When Right Wingers Struggle with Defining "Woke" it Shows they Oppose Pursuing Equality
- Strangelove on the Square: Secret USAF Films Showed Airmen What to Expect if Nuclear War Broke Out
- The Women of the Montgomery Bus Boycott
- New Books Force Consideration of Reconstruction's End from Black Perspective
- Excerpt: How Apartheid South Africa Tried to Create a Libertarian Utopia
- Historian's Book on 1970s NBA Shows Racial Politics around Basketball Have Always Been Ugly
- Kendi: "Anti-woke" Part of Backlash Against Antiracist Protest Movements
- Monica Muñoz Martinez Honored for Truth-Telling in Texas History