The Year Twitter Tried to Dictate an Election
If you want to see the future, imagine a finger clicking “mute” on anything criticizing an establishment presidential candidate, forever.
791 Article(s) by: Branko Marcetic
Branko Marcetic is a Jacobin staff writer and the author of Yesterday’s Man: The Case Against Joe Biden.
If You’re Worried About Misinformation, Focus on For-Profit TV News
Believe it or not, the data all point to television, not social media, as the most powerful reality-warping medium for most Americans. Unsurprisingly, that is not the impression you’d get from listening to the cable news–driven discourse on the subject.
To See the Danger of a Domestic “War on Terror,” Look No Further Than This Florida Case
Convinced his state capitol was set to be attacked by violent, far-right extremists, a Florida man called for armed resistance on social media and was promptly jailed. The episode is a case study of how easily a domestic "war on terror" will be turned on the Left.
The Response to the GameStop Fiasco Shows It’s Still Wall Street’s Economy
Now that hedge funds are losing billions to Redditors buying stocks like GameStop, Wall Street wants heavy-handed intervention into the market, and brokerages have clamped down on the upstarts. It’s a reminder that there’s no such thing as “people’s capitalism” or “shareholder democracy” — the capitalist economy is structured to do what’s best for the business elite.
Joe Biden Is Refusing the Alternatives to Mass Deaths Across America
Not long after his inauguration, where he assured Americans that they "can overcome this deadly virus," Joe Biden announced that as many as hundreds of thousands of coronavirus deaths are unavoidable in the coming months. But there’s only one reason for that — Biden preemptively ruled out pursuing a national stay-at-home order two months ago.
Donald Trump Was a Warning Shot
In the end, Donald Trump didn't destroy the American political system. He showed the world how corrupt, undemocratic, and reactionary it already was.
Here Are 4 Better Responses to the Capitol Riot Than Expanding “Domestic Terror” Crackdowns
A massive law enforcement failure led to last week's disastrous Capitol riot. Now, many, including liberals, are pushing to give those agencies even more power as part of a "domestic terrorism" crackdown. This is the wrong way to combat the threat of far-right violence — we should start instead with an investigation of white supremacist infiltration of local police forces.
We Don’t Need New Terror Laws to Defeat the Far Right
Last week's riot was an attempt to undermine the nation’s democratic procedures. The response from some political elites is unwittingly trying to do the same through calls for unnecessary new terror laws.
In America, Leftist Protesters Get Violently Beaten and Arrested. Right-Wing Protesters Get to Take the Capitol.
The kid-glove treatment of yesterday’s far-right protesters was a shocking departure from the wanton police brutality that is the norm for leftist protesters of any kind. When racial justice or antiwar protesters take to the streets, police repression is fierce and unrelenting. When right-wingers protest, they’re given free rein.
The Left Won the Argument in Georgia, If Not Much Else
Though Tuesday’s gratifying Democratic victories in Georgia are unlikely to move the needle of politics very far, they came as a satisfying vindication of arguments the Left has been making for years.
Don’t Let Trump Claim Credit for the $2,000 Direct Payments
Donald Trump didn’t get the figure of $2,000 from nowhere. Since the start of the pandemic, monthly direct payments worth that amount have been a core demand of democratic-socialist politicians like Bernie Sanders, Rashida Tlaib, and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
Joe Biden Wants to Bring the Dems Responsible for the 1994 Crime Bill Back to the White House
Documents from the Bill Clinton Library tell the story of the disastrous 1994 crime bill. They reveal the cynicism and callousness of Clinton administration officials — including Rahm Emanuel and Ron Klain, who Biden is considering for his own administration — who shepherded the bill through Congress for naked political gain.
“Fighting the Pandemic” vs. “Saving the Economy” Is a False Choice
US leaders are split between a hard right that would happily sacrifice millions of lives to let businesses keep operating and a liberal center that seems unable to merge the goals of stemming the pandemic and meeting the economic needs of Americans whose livelihoods have been disrupted by it. The truth is, fixing one means fixing the other.
Joe Biden Said He’d “Follow the Science” on the Pandemic. He Isn’t.
After winning the election on a “listen to the scientists” message, Joe Biden is actually rejecting the global scientific consensus on how to handle the pandemic.
It’s Joe Biden’s Swamp Now
So far, Joe Biden’s transition has hired liberally from Wall Street and corporate America, chosen appointees who have made multiple trips through the revolving door, and recruited fans of fossil fuels in the middle of a climate crisis. It’s little different than what we saw under Donald Trump.
The CIA’s Secret Global War Against the Left
Forty-five years ago, under a cloak of secrecy, Operation Condor was officially launched: a global campaign of violent repression against the Latin American left by the region’s quasi-fascist military dictatorships. The US government not only knew about the program — it helped to engineer it.
Stories for the End of the World
From the mutant animals of Chernobyl and Marie Antoinette’s perverted orgies, to QAnon and Russiagate, conspiracy theories flourish in times of crisis and collapse of political legitimacy.
Biden’s Immigration Moves Are Making a Mockery of His Vow to “Heal the Nation’s Soul”
Joe Biden’s most consistent pledge since launching his campaign in 2019 has been to “heal the soul of the nation” after four years of Donald Trump. Yet on immigration, he’s already signaling alarming continuity with the most outwardly racist part of Trump’s agenda.
No, Medicare for All Didn’t Sink Democrats in 2020
Medicare for All backers won in safe Democratic districts and Trump country alike this year, while its opponents lost in both. Yet centrists are now leading a campaign to blame M4A for the party’s devastating down-ballot losses this year. They’re wrong.
The Good, Bad, and Extremely Ugly of the 2020 Election
Looking beyond Joe Biden’s unexpectedly modest victory, the 2020 election was a historic failure for the Democratic Party. On the other hand, despite some painful hitches coming out of this campaign season, the Left has reason to be hopeful.