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democracy

  • SOURCE: Amicus with Dahlia Lithwick

    The American Contest: Featuring Heather Cox Richardson (Podcast)

    Regardless of the outcome of the election, the Supreme Court has already entered a new era. Dahlia Lithwick is joined by Heather Cox Richardson for a big-picture conversation about what that means: minority rule and the court’s role, past and present, in changing visions of democracy. 

  • SOURCE: New York Daily News
    10/12/2020

    Our Unrepresentative Republic

    by Mark Boonshoft

    We should understand that plans to add states or end the Electoral College are plans to restore actual representation. Their opponents are defending a system of virtual representation. You don’t have to be a party hack to see these similarities.

  • SOURCE: Bloomberg Opinion
    10/8/2020

    Yes, Mike Lee, America is a Democracy

    by Jonathan Bernstein

    Mike Lee's insistence that the US is "a republic" and not "a democracy" is a petty distinction that ignores the historically interchangeable usage of the terms in American politics in order to justify undemocratic rule by a minority party. 

  • SOURCE: New York Times
    10/6/2020

    America May Need International Intervention

    by Peter Beinart

    When other democracies have fallen into peril, they have sought help from the United Nations. The United States might consider it, writes Peter Beinart, since Black Americans have long had to appeal to the community of nations to intervene to secure their democratic rights. 

  • 9/27/2020

    Anti-racist Lens Distorts History on New Jersey “Freeholders”

    by Tony Fels

    Beginning in 2021, New Jersey county officials will no longer be known as "freeholders." Although the author concedes the term is archaic, and "county commissioner" is a more informative descriptor, the term "freeholder" is not a relic of past racism. 

  • SOURCE: Boston Review
    9/10/2020

    American Democracy Is in the Mail

    by Daniel Carpenter

    The Postal Service has been a circuit of information vital to democracy, a non-exclusionary employer, and a service connecting all communities in the nation. It's also been a tool of conquest and voracious capitalism. For good and ill, the history of the USPS is the history of America. 

  • 6/2/2020

    The Chinese Dream Imperiled

    by Andrew Meyer

    We are going to hear much in the near future about the dangers of Chinese ambition. World leaders would be well advised, however, to prepare for the dangers of internal Chinese instability.