Source: THE WASHINGTON POST

Founded in 1877, The Washington Post is a leading U.S. daily, with extensive coverage of national politics, including the historic series of stories following the Watergate break-in that led to the resignation of President Richard Nixon. After decades of ownership by the Graham family, the Post was purchased in 2013 by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos

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In The News

How Julian Assange And WikiLeaks Changed Journalism

WikiLeaks founder arrested by the Metropolitan Police on April 11
WikiLeaks founder arrested by the Metropolitan Police on April 11 Victoria Jones/PA Wire/ZUMA

-Analysis- For press-freedom advocates, Julian Assange has long been a polarizing figure. And his arrest Thursday in London once again ignited the seemingly endless debate: Is the WikiLeaks founder, who until Thursday had been holed up in the Ecuadoran Embassy in London for years, essentially a publisher — though a notably strange one — who believes in taking radical steps to expose government secrets, and who thus should be afforded the same First Amendment protections given to news organizations? Or is he a reckless traitor — and by no means a journalist — who deserves no such consideration and who […]

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Society

Encyclopedic Equality: The Fight To Eliminate Wikipedia’s Gender Bias

At a Wikipedia Art+Feminism edit-a-thon
At a Wikipedia Art+Feminism edit-a-thon Michael Mandiberg

As countless important women remain unrecognized in their fields, a collection of campaign groups are springing up to fight to fight that

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Eyes on the U.S. Trump And The World

After Mueller, What’s Next For Trump — And America?

Bidding Mueller adieu
Bidding Mueller adieu Lannis Waters/ZUMA

WASHINGTON — Next, more of the same, but with more entrenched division, a bitter crossfire of allegations and then, finally, a reckoning in the form of the 2020 presidential election. The long-awaited conclusion of special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election is likely to harden congressional Republicans’ wall of support for President Trump, strengthen Democratic demands to hold Trump to account — and result in little change in public opinion, according to historians and politicians who have studied past national scandals. Mueller’s conclusion — he found no evidence of collusion with Russia but […]

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In The News

New Zealand Terror: The Shared Power Of Online Hate

Locals pay respect near site of mosque attack in Christchurch, NZ
Locals pay respect near site of mosque attack in Christchurch, NZ P.J. Heller/ZUMA

How messages of hate and violence drive both radical Islamists and white supremacists.

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Geopolitics

No Free Lunch: What Trump Must Face On North Korean Nukes

Kim and Trump happy meal?
Kim and Trump happy meal? Shealah Craighead/The White House via ZUMA

The U.S. may need to accept that Pyongyang doesn’t give up its nuclear program.

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Eyes on the U.S. Ideas

Bernie’s Ready For Another Run — Are Democrats Ready For Him?

Still feeling the Bern?
Still feeling the Bern? Charlie Neuman/ZUMA

The straight-talking senator from Vermont energized the 2016 presidential race. But he faces a very different playing field this time around.

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Ideas

Drug Dealers’ Love For U.S. Postal Service At All-Time High

So many parcels to deal with
So many parcels to deal with U.S. Air Force

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Postal Service likes to boast that it is the nation’s most trusted government agency. It certainly has the trust of dope dealers. A report by the Postal Service Office of Inspector General demonstrates just how valuable the mail is as a marketing tool for drug pushers: “For example, a cocaine trafficker claimed to have used the Postal Service to successfully distribute nearly 4,000 shipments, stating that they had a 100% delivery success rate. In addition, of the 96 traffickers who indicated they used the Postal Service as their shipping provider, 43% (41) offered free, partial, or […]

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Ideas Trump And The World

Russia Is Exploiting American Racism

Protesters facing off in North Carolina
Protesters facing off in North Carolina Chuck Liddy/Raleigh News & Observer/ZUMA

-OpEd- WASHINGTON — Two newly released reports from the Senate Intelligence Committee about Russian interference in the 2016 election have been nothing short of revelatory. Both studies — one produced by researchers at Oxford University, the other by the cybersecurity firm New Knowledge — describe in granular detail how the Russian government tried to sow discord and confusion among American voters. And both conclude that Russia’s campaign included a massive effort to deceive and co-opt African Americans. We now have unassailable confirmation that a foreign power sought to exploit racial tensions in the United States for its own gain. Ever […]

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Geopolitics Ideas

Why Evangelical Christians Keep Betting On Trump

Sec. of State Mike Pompeo reads a prayer at the White House
Sec. of State Mike Pompeo reads a prayer at the White House Oliver Contreras/CNP via ZUMA

And why he’ll never be the savior they’re looking for…

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Eyes on the U.S. Geopolitics Ideas Trump And The World

Trump Has Kept His Promise: Unprecedented Unpredictability

Mattis & Trump on Dec. 20
Mattis & Trump on Dec. 20 Ron Sachs/CNP/ZUMA

-Analysis- WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump pledged in his campaign that he would not be predictable. He’s more than lived up to that promise this week, and along the way, he has made a hash out of the way business is being done in Washington. Three times this week, Trump abruptly and unexpectedly changed course, lending credence to perceptions of a presidency in chaos. The biggest bombshell came Thursday afternoon, when Trump announced that Defense Secretary Jim Mattis would leave the administration at the end of February, and Mattis’s resignation letter explicitly stated that he and the president were not […]

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Future Society

Annals Of Technophobia: When Mark Twain Met The Typewriter

Twain was already world famous when he first saw a typewriter
Twain was already world famous when he first saw a typewriter U.S. Library of Congress

This is a story about love, hate and Mark Twain. The object of Twain’s desire (then resentment): the typewriter. Twain first laid eyes on a “newfangled typing machine,” as he called it, sometime in the early 1870s. He was, by then, on his way to becoming the world’s most famous writer and humorist. At the same time, the tools of writing were undergoing a profound transformation — from fountain pens, with their leaking and smudging ink, to the pleasant sound of tapping a key whose corresponding letter was magically stamped to paper. The new technology did not emerge with the […]

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Eyes on the U.S. Ideas Trump And The World

U.S. Midterms: A First Umbrella After The Trump Tsunami

Pools and polls
Pools and polls Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call/Newscom/ZUMA

America’s midterm elections saw Democrats recapture the House, but lose ground in the Senate. A nation as divided as ever, though with new checks on Trump.

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Geopolitics

Anti-Semitism In America: Rising Hate Speech Turns To Terror

A vigil Saturday night in Pittsburgh
A vigil Saturday night in Pittsburgh Greggetsreal/Instagram

This is what they had long been fearing. As the threats increased, as the online abuse grew increasingly vicious, as the defacing of synagogues and community centers with swastikas became more commonplace, the possibility of a violent attack loomed over America’s Jewish communities. On Saturday, the worst of those fears was made real as a gunman stormed a Pittsburgh synagogue, killing at least 11 of its members and injuring many more, reportedly shouting “All Jews must die” during his rampage. It is the worst single attack on American Jews in the history of the country. And it is one that […]

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In The News

The Trump Effect: Can We Blame Him For The Bombs?

Trump at a rally in Houston on Tuesday.
Trump at a rally in Houston on Tuesday. SongQiong/ZUMA

A series of bombing attempts have targeted prominent Democrats and other Trump critics. Is this the inevitable result of inflammatory presidential rhetoric.

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In The News

Kavanaugh And Supreme Court: No Way Out For U.S. Culture War?

Protesters before the Senate final confirmation vote.
Protesters before the Senate final confirmation vote. Lorie Shaull

WASHINGTON — When Christine Blasey Ford accused Judge Brett Kavanaugh of sexual assault last month, she did more than open herself up to unwanted scrutiny. She held up a mirror to a country in crisis, revealing its political players and embattled institutions not for what they claimed to be but for what they really are. The painful 20-day passion play that followed — staged in committee rooms, Senate floor debates, hallway protests and millions of private conversations — did little to alter the future makeup of the Supreme Court. Kavanaugh was narrowly confirmed Saturday by the Senate, 50-48, in a […]

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Eyes on the U.S. Geopolitics

Kavanaugh Confirmation: Washington Broken, Nation Divided

Judge Brett Kavanaugh testifying on Sept. 27, 2018
Judge Brett Kavanaugh testifying on Sept. 27, 2018 Tom Williams/DPA/ZUMA

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The subject was supposed to be the selection of a new justice on the Supreme Court. Instead Thursday’s showdown on Capitol Hill was a raw, scorched-earth confrontation across the nation’s most emotionally wrenching divides. This was men against women, right against left, a cascade of recriminations, explosions of anger, hours of tears and sobs. A hearing that was supposed to bring clarity instead erupted in thunderclaps from the nation’s built-up tensions over how the sexes are supposed to behave with each other. Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh and the woman who accused him of sexually assaulting her came […]

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In The News

Losing My Faith In The Catholic Church

Pope Francis at the Vatican on Aug. 22
Pope Francis at the Vatican on Aug. 22 Evandro Inetti/ZUMA

The major disgrace of America’s Catholic bishops was to foster a culture in which priests sexually assaulted children and were then sent on to new duties as their ungodly behavior was covered up. There is also a second failure. Thanks to the bishops, who are supposed to strengthen the faith, Catholics are now regularly asked: “How can you be a Catholic?” And, even more pointedly, “How can you stay?” This summer, these questions became much harder to answer. This is about the institution, not about whether to be a Christian. Christianity heroically preaches a devotion to the poor and the […]

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Ideas Trump And The World

Storm Looms For Trump After Courtroom Bombshells

Bidding Mueller adieu
Bidding Mueller adieu Lannis Waters/ZUMA

The President’s former lawyer pleads guilty on the same day his former campaign chairman is convicted of financial crimes. The hand of special counsel Robert S. Mueller is significantly strengthened. What happens now?

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In The News

The Battle For A Constitutional Right To Literacy

Students are fighting to make literacy a Constitutional Right
Students are fighting to make literacy a Constitutional Right Redd Angelo/Unsplash

Lawyers representing students in several U.S. states are making the case that the right to literacy is the bridge to so many other rights.

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In The News

How The Ivy League Creates Group-Think Inside Supreme Court

Supreme Court Nominee Kavanaugh and U.S Vice President Mike Pence at the Capitol Hill, Washington on July 10
Supreme Court Nominee Kavanaugh and U.S Vice President Mike Pence at the Capitol Hill, Washington on July 10 D. Myles Cullen/Planet Pix/ZUMA

WASHINGTON — It is not hard to see similarities between President Donald Trump“s last two Supreme Court nominees: They are both white male conservatives who attended Ivy League law schools, clerked for retiring Justice Anthony M. Kennedy and went to the same exclusive private prep school. The elite background does not end with them. If the Senate approves Trump’s nominee, Brett Kavanaugh, every justice sitting on the Supreme Court will have attended either Yale’s or Harvard’s law school. (Ruth Bader Ginsburg started at Harvard and transferred to another Ivy, Columbia.) The shared elite backgrounds of Supreme Court justices, some experts […]

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In The News

Future Defense, Europe Must Get Equipped For Post-U.S. Order

French defense forces at the NATO battalion battle group ceremony last year in Estonia
French defense forces at the NATO battalion battle group ceremony last year in Estonia Sergei Stepanof/Xinhua/ZUMA

-OpEd- WASHINGTON — After many weeks of claiming, dishonestly, that European allies “owe us a tremendous amount of money for many years back” — in fact, Europeans spend far more money on European defense than does the United States — and after referring to NATO members as “delinquent” and worse, President Donald Trump appears to have handed America’s European allies an ultimatum: Pay up, spend 2 percent of gross domestic product on the military, do it fast — or the United States will pull out. We can “go it alone,” he told them, by some accounts. During the news conference […]

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In The News

Power Couple: Trump And Kim Make History, But What’s Next?

U.S. President Donald J. Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un after their luncheon meeting in Singapore on June, 11
U.S. President Donald J. Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un after their luncheon meeting in Singapore on June, 11 Kevin Lim/The Straits Times/Wire/ZUMA

-Analysis- With smiles and handshakes and words of mutual warmth, President Trump and North Korea’s Kim Jong Un entered the history books in Singapore on Tuesday as the first sitting leaders of their countries ever to meet face to face. Whether their summit turns out to be a truly historic event depends much more on what comes next. The United States and the world community have tried before to rein in North Korea. Three recent presidents were parties to agreements in which North Korea pledged to halt its nuclear activity. In each case, the commitments crumbled, the promises proved meaningless, […]

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In The News

North Korean Defectors Watch Summit With Hope, Trepidation

Reopened communication channel between North and South Korea
Reopened communication channel between North and South Korea Ryu Seung Il/ZUMA

SEOUL – They are the simplest of dreams. To see familiar streets once more. Or walk along a river at the center of childhood memories. Or throw a big party with wine. These dreams belong to people who risked everything to flee North Korea and then, as some of the most high-profile defectors, spoke out about the rights abuses and repression of Kim Jong Un’s regime. But now, ahead of Tuesday’s summit between Kim and President Donald Trump in Singapore, the defectors are considering a question that until recently seemed foolish to ask: Could they one day return home? Such […]

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In The News

The Mercantilist: Why Trump Economics Are Stuck In 17th Century

Trump signs the new tariffs
Trump signs the new tariffs Michael Reynolds/CNP via ZUMA

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump often seems as though he’s stuck in the “80s. But maybe the better comparison is to the 1680s, not the Reagan era. Consider his announcement Thursday of new tariffs on steel and aluminum imported from the European Union, Canada and Mexico. These countries not only supply about half of our imports of these metals; they are also among our closest allies. Astonishingly, the White House claims that alienating these important military allies is necessary “to protect America’s national security.” These trade policies, and the supposed rationale behind them, bear an uncanny resemblance to classical mercantilism. […]

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In The News

Brunch: America’s Response To Sunday Mass

The horror. The horror.
The horror. The horror. daydreamer via Instagram

Why do Americans brunch so hard? ‘I don’t know,’ says one young woman from Baltimore. ‘I’m too drunk to think about it.’

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In The News

Iran To North Korea, Trump’s My-Way Foreign Policy

Trump speaks beside three American detainees after their arrival in the U.S. on Thursday,
Trump speaks beside three American detainees after their arrival in the U.S. on Thursday, Al Drago/CNP via ZUMA

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump yanked the United States out of the Iran nuclear deal this week and will reverse decades of policy in Israel next week, in each case acting on a campaign pledge and intuition that he argues has already proved more successful than traditional diplomacy. He is aggressively moving forward with his planned summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. This week Trump sent Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to visit the rogue nation for the second time to continue preparations and bring home three American prisoners released by the Kim regime in a sign of […]

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Economy Future

Facebook, A Black Market For Five-Star Amazon Reviews

SAN FRANCISCO — On Amazon, customer comments can help a product surge in popularity. The online retail giant says that more than 99 percent of its reviews are legitimate because they are written by real shoppers who aren’t paid for them. But a Washington Post examination found that for some popular product categories, such as Bluetooth headphones and speakers, the vast majority of reviews appear to violate Amazon’s prohibition on paid reviews. Such reviews have certain characteristics, such as repetitive wording that people probably cut and paste in. Many of these fraudulent reviews originate on Facebook, where sellers seek shoppers […]

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Eyes on the U.S. Society

Why Americans Still Haven’t Mastered The Work-Life Balance

Work is a cardinal American virtue.
Work is a cardinal American virtue. GMT 83

-Analysis- WASHINGTON — Americans love to contemplate – and legislatively promote, to whatever degree possible – the virtue of hard work. Here in the United States, we already work more hours per year than our English- speaking counterparts in Britain, Canada and Australia – not to mention those enviable denizens of European social democracies, who enjoy the kind of leisure time only our highest-paid workers can afford. So perhaps it’s not surprising that several new pro-work policy ideas are enjoying attention on the left and the right. On the right, work requirements for Medicaid, food stamps and housing assistance represent […]

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In The News

Not Just Starbucks, Why White America Calls The Cops On Black People

Black Lives Matter protests in Sacramento, California last month
Black Lives Matter protests in Sacramento, California last month Jose Luis Villegas/Sacramento Bee via ZUMA

-OpEd- WASHINGTON — It’s good that Starbucks, with its announcement this week that it will close thousands of stores for a day of “racial bias training” in May, is taking steps in the right direction after a video of two black men getting arrested in one of its coffee shops went viral. But white America’s habit of needlessly calling the police on black people is not just a Starbucks culture problem. It’s an American culture problem. The tragic examples are all over the Internet. In McKinney, Tex., in 2015, after a neighbor called police about a pool party, a responding […]

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Eyes on the U.S. Future

Live From The Blue Ridge Mountains, Where Facebook Stores Its Data

Data in bytes stored on tens of thousands of computer servers in Forest City.
Data in bytes stored on tens of thousands of computer servers in Forest City. Forest City Data Center Facebook Page

FOREST CITY — It was slow at the thrift shop, and manager Stephanie Henderson, 38, was looking at her laptop, trying to discover all that Facebook had collected on her: the posts, the memes, the photos, the messages to her family. She had been meaning to do this for weeks, ever since outrage over Facebook’s handling of user privacy first burst into her timeline. Now, she clicked a button. Her request for her Facebook data was sent. As she waited, Henderson tried to imagine what a decade’s worth of personal details might look like. “I’m afraid to see what Facebook […]

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Economy Eyes on the U.S. Future

Got AI? Connected Cows, Artificial Intelligence, Your Milk

Cows with their 'FitBits' that control Ida
Cows with their "FitBits" that control Ida Connecterra Facebook Page

‘Cow Fitbits’ and artificial intelligence are coming to the dairy farm, but some farmers aren’t impressed.

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In The News

The Back Story On Why Trump Approved Russian Spy Expulsion

Trump last year at CIA headquarters
Trump last year at CIA headquarters Olivier Douliery/CNP via ZUMA

The White House national security team presented Trump with three options, leading to an unprecedented purge of 60 Russian spies, which caught Moscow off-guard.

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Ideas Trump And The World

Donald Trump Could Usher In A Female Revolution In Congress

Arizona Representative Kyrsten Sinema
Arizona Representative Kyrsten Sinema Ron Sachs/ZUMA

WASHINGTON — How many times have we heard that this is the year of the woman? Let’s just say, several. Each decade for the past century or so seems to have presented a fresh feature to justify yet another proclamation of historic import. From suffrage (1920) to the pill (1960) and legalized abortion(1973) to Gloria Steinem and Ms magazine (1972) to “Reviving Ophelia” (1994) — fast-forwarding to the recent pink-capped Women’s March (2017) and the #MeToo movement (2017) — women have been pushing their way forward to reach parity with men. Many of the original goals have been reached. Women […]

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Ideas Trump And The World

North Korea: Hailing Trump’s Biggest Win So Far, With Caution

Thumbs up, for now?
Thumbs up, for now? Marc Nozell

WASHINGTON — For the moment, at least, it appears to be a clear-cut victory — the biggest foreign policy win of his young administration. President Donald Trump has brought his arch-nemesis, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, a.k.a. “Little Rocket Man,” to the table to negotiate away his nuclear arsenal. Optimists declared a major breakthrough. Even pessimists acknowledged that Trump’s hard line against Pyongyang, after decades of less forceful U.S. effort, played a significant role in moving one of the world’s most vexing and threatening problems in a potentially positive direction. But in the afterglow of the surprise announcement — […]

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In The News

Gun Lobby’s Strategy: Show No Compassion, Don’t Give An Inch

Gun shop in Kennesaw, GA
Gun shop in Kennesaw, GA Robin Rayne Nelson/ZUMA

WASHINGTON — You have perhaps heard the joke about the liberal who is so open-minded that he can’t even take his own side in an argument. What’s less funny is that on gun control, liberals (and their many allies who are moderate, conservative and non-ideological) have been told for years that if they do take their own side in the argument, they will only hurt their cause. Supporters of even modest restrictions on firearms are regularly instructed that their ardent advocacy turns off Americans in rural areas and small towns. Those in favor of reforming our firearms laws are scolded […]

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Eyes on the U.S. Geopolitics Ideas Trump And The World

After Florida School Massacre, Gauging Trump’s Empathy Deficit

Feb. 16 vigil for the victims of the Florida shooting
Feb. 16 vigil for the victims of the Florida shooting Liu Yang/Xinhua/ZUMA

WASHINGTON — As he heads to Florida this weekend, President Donald Trump is following in the footsteps of former President Barack Obama, a man he loathes and a leader whose time in office in many ways came to be defined by mass shootings. Obama bequeathed on his successor an almost ritualistic response to gun tragedies, beginning with the 2011 attack on then-Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Ariz., and ending with the 2016 Dallas attack that left five officers dead. There were 15 speeches from the White House, countless prayers for the fallen and more than a dozen visits to the crime scenes. […]

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In The News

Washington Nuclear Strategy, Russia Is Still The Real Threat

Putin in September watches military drills in Saint Petersburg
Putin in September watches military drills in Saint Petersburg Mikhail Klimentyev/Planet Pix via ZUMA

Nuclear policy in the age of Trump (and Kim) is a scary proposition. But deterrence should still be front and center in light of Moscow’s aggressive posture.

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In The News

Race On The Road, African Americans Relive Perils Of Travel

At a bus station in Durham, NC, in May 1940
At a bus station in Durham, NC, in May 1940 Jack Delano

ROCKVILLE — Her mom always smiled — except when the family made its annual summer drive to visit the grandparents in Magnolia, Arkansas. “The smiles were gone while we were traveling,” said Gloria Gardner, 77. It was the 1940s, and traveling to her parents’ hometown was not approached lightly after the family moved to Muskegon, Michigan, during the Great Migration. Stopping for food or bathroom breaks was mostly out of the question. For black families, preparing for a road trip required a well-tested battle plan in which nothing could be left to chance. There were meals to cook and pack […]

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Eyes on the U.S. Syria Crisis Trump And The World

Will Washington Finally Let The Middle East Fight Its Own Battles?

Calling it a day at the U.S. Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan
Calling it a day at the U.S. Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan DoD

FORT POLK — In training exercises in a mock Afghan village constructed here on a base amid swampland, the U.S. Army is applying the military lesson of the war against the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq: Help your partners beat the enemy, but don’t try to do the fighting yourself. Letting others fight the battle hasn’t been the American way in modern times, to our immense national frustration. The U.S. military became bogged down in Iraq and Afghanistan, much as it had a generation earlier in Vietnam, by trying to reshape societies with U.S. firepower. For the military, the […]

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Ideas Trump And The World

Trump’s Big Lie Is Now Clear To All, And It May Not Matter

Trump arriving at the White House on Jan. 7
Trump arriving at the White House on Jan. 7 Kevin Dietsch/CNP/ZUMA

His false promises to the working class are being exposed. But the paradox of a new expose book is that it may actually strengthen his alliance with traditional Republicans.

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