Brandon Johnson Defeated Paul Vallas’s Austerity Agenda Last Night
In Chicago’s mayoral runoff last night, Paul Vallas’s vision of budget cuts and law and order lost to Brandon Johnson’s promises to tax the rich and invest in social services.
19146 Articles by: Abigail Torre
Abigail Torre grew up in Chile and now lives in Berkeley, California where she is cochair of the East Bay chapter of Democratic Socialists of America.
Donald Trump’s Legal Troubles Are Just Getting Started
When he faced prosecutors in New York yesterday, Donald Trump appeared worried about pending cases against him in Washington, DC, and Georgia. Those charges are far more serious than the New York case, indicating that his problems have only just begun.
Kathy Hochul Is Making Her Fossil Fuel Donors Happy
Governor Kathy Hochul is pushing to gut New York’s signature climate law to effectively allow more methane emissions. She is doing so after receiving nearly half a million dollars in donations from energy corporations and lobbyists advocating for the move.
Why Do We Even Need Private Banks?
Since Silicon Valley Bank’s collapse, some commentators have been waking up to the need for a socialization of deposit-taking banking. They’re right — but the same logic leads to a more radical conclusion: a fully socialized capital market, with no private banks.
Ernest Mandel and the Economics of Late Capitalism
Belgian Marxist Ernest Mandel popularized the term “late capitalism” to describe the way the system had changed in the postwar decades. Mandel’s work was a landmark in the study of capitalism, and we can still learn a lot from his analysis today.
The Solution to AI-Driven Job Displacement Is a Robust Welfare State
The idea that AI will wipe out all our jobs is generating lots of apocalyptic headlines these days. It’s no surprise why: in a society without an egalitarian welfare state and pro-worker policies, labor reallocation can be a disaster.
Ernest Mandel Was One of the 20th Century’s Greatest Marxist Thinkers
Born on this day a century ago, Ernest Mandel was one of the major political thinkers of his age. From his teenage activism in the anti-Nazi resistance to his final days, Mandel was an uncompromising defender of socialist ideals and working-class interests.
The Authoritarian Behind Peru’s Massacring of Protesters
Over 60 Peruvians have now been killed at protests following the impeachment of Pedro Castillo. President Dina Boluarte and PM Alberto “the Butcher” Otárola must be brought to justice.
Hysteria About Chinese Political Interference Has Arrived in Canada
Canadian news media is in a panic about alleged Chinese influence in Canadian politics. Their coverage is promoting anti-Chinese sentiment and creating farcical levels of paranoia about foreign interference.
Big Business and the Far Right May Soon Rule Finland
The far right won big in Finland’s parliamentary elections over the weekend. They’re now likely to join a ruling coalition led by the country’s main party of big business.
The No Labels Party Can’t Give Up on the Conservative Dream of Post-Partisanship
Joe Lieberman wants a “commonsense, moderate, independent” politics in America, to be advanced by his group No Labels. It’s a bankrupt “post-partisan” vision that has no solutions to any of the multiple dire threats facing Americans.
55 Years After MLK’s Death, His Radical Vision Should Galvanize Our Struggles Today
Martin Luther King Jr was assassinated 55 years ago today while in Memphis standing in solidarity with striking sanitation workers. His life and radical words stand as a beacon of hope, urging us to keep fighting for economic and racial justice.
MLK Was an Exemplar of a Black Socialist Tradition
Martin Luther King Jr had a rich relationship with socialist politics: he sympathized with but ultimately rejected Marxism, and he settled on a Christian socialism that viewed the struggle against racism and class oppression as fundamentally intertwined.
Italy’s Longest-Ever Factory Occupation Shows How Workers Can Transform Production
For two years, the GKN auto parts plant in Florence, Italy, has been occupied by laid-off workers. It’s the longest factory occupation in Italian history — and its retooling for green production shows how workers can reorganize the economy while saving jobs.
New Deal–Era Leftists Tried to Win Beautiful Social Housing for the Masses
The US housing system is organized around subsidized private homeownership and underfunded public housing. But during the New Deal, leftists had a different vision: beautiful social housing for all but the rich.
California Governor Gavin Newsom Is Giving the Crypto Industry Free Rein
Last September, California governor Gavin Newsom vetoed a bill that would have imposed rules and transparency on the state’s largely unregulated cryptocurrency industry. The move came after the crypto industry spent more than $400,000 on lobbying Newsom.
Key Inflation Measures Are Falling at Their Fastest Pace in 40 Years
After stripping out mismeasured housing prices, core inflation had its biggest 12-month drop since the massive disinflation of the early 1980s. Larry Summers continues to be wrong about inflation.
Joe Biden Is Shrinking the Welfare State
Because the Biden administration refuses to make a public case for keeping alive the pandemic emergency declaration that led to a huge expansion of desperately needed programs like Medicaid, millions are about to lose their health insurance.
A Thousand Flowers for Ryuichi Sakamoto
After a spell in a Marxist youth movement, Ryuichi Sakamoto’s constantly inventive music came to soundtrack the consumerist mania of the 1980s Japanese boom. But in his most recent work, the late composer turned back to experimentation and activism.
Silicon Valley Bank’s History of Recklessness Went Back Decades
Run-ins with regulators, financial troubles, and a highly publicized penchant for dangerous risk was what Silicon Valley Bank was best known for in the decades before its collapse this year. So why was it allowed to grow so big, and so unregulated?