Barons of the Valley
The tycoons of Big Tech are following in the footsteps of their Gilded Age predecessors, using a facade of social concern to cover over their depredations. We need to depose the new Robber Barons.
20422 Article(s) by: James Bloodworth
James Bloodworth is a writer and journalist from London.
America’s Cold War Crimes Abroad Are Still Shaping Our World
In the twentieth century, the United States engaged in brutal, even sadistic interventions all over the world, from Indonesia to Brazil, to stop the Left’s advance. We’re still living in those interventions’ shadow.
Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot Is Prioritizing a Coronavirus Recovery for the Wealthy, Not Average Chicagoans
Mayor Lori Lightfoot was elected last year as a progressive reformer who rejected politics as usual in Chicago. Yet her response to coronavirus in the city has prioritized the city’s corporate interests, not the vast majority of Chicagoans.
Expensive, Overcrowded Housing Is Deadly
Making cities more resilient against coronavirus pandemics will require taking on the landlords, real estate developers, and elected officials who prop them up. We need safe, affordable housing.
A New Study Shows That Holding Wisconsin’s April Election Made the COVID–19 Crisis Worse
The state of Wisconsin plowed ahead with an in-person election last month despite the many clear dangers. A new study suggests exactly what many feared: a direct link between voting in person and spreading COVID–19.
Anti-Communist Massacres Killed Indonesia’s Hopes for National Liberation and Socialism
The mass slaughter of leftists in Indonesia was more than just another Washington-backed atrocity. It was the prototype for smashing the hopes and dreams of the Left in the developing world — for good.
No Act of God
Hurricanes, pandemics, and droughts are acts of God. Private markets in housing, health care, and food — and the resulting deaths — are not.
Interpreter of Maladies
Here’s a guide to the words you should probably know, even if you don’t want to think about them.
Every Economic Question Is a Question of Power
The links between business, finance, and the state do not represent a perversion of liberal democracy — they are an unavoidable feature of capitalist political economy.
Viral Socialism Now!
Class struggle will shape how this crisis plays out, and the world that’s created in its wake.
The Black Death Helped Bring About the Modern World
The Black Death wiped out a third of Europe’s population in just a few years. But the peasants and laborers who survived wielded newfound power over their masters.
Millions Die, But They’re All Liberals
On the literary destruction of Los Angeles and the nervous breakdown of American exceptionalism.
Pretty Faces Who Care
Why we all hate celebrities right now.
It Came From Canada!
David Cronenberg’s first three films track the progress of epidemics “from the perspective of the disease.” What they reveal is a North American society already on the brink of disaster.
Beautifying the Apocalypse
In films like Annihilation and Ex Machina, director Alex Garland knows how to make the end of the world look majestic. But his new show, Devs, gives a grace and dignity to the apocalypse that you won’t find in our own world.
Letters + Celebrities Speak
Life is better if you own a yacht.
The Market Is Leaving Us Unprepared for a Pandemic
As we face down what the World Health Organization calls “a new normal” of high-impact epidemics, researchers and public health officials find themselves at war with for-profit pharmaceutical companies.
“We’re Not Heroes, We’re Health Workers”
While most politicians quarantine in safety, La France Insoumise’s Caroline Fiat is risking her life on the front lines as a health worker.
If Neoliberalism Were to End, How Would We Know?
What will decide the fate of neoliberalism today is not the extent of the economic damage the virus wreaks — it is the extent to which the virus transforms popular expectations.
Is This the End of Neoliberal Globalization?
The coronavirus has scattered the pieces on the geopolitical chessboard, revealing the fragility of just-in-time global production. Getting back to normal is the last thing we need.