AOC Knows Exactly What the Problem Is With Billionaires Like Jeff Bezos
Jeff Bezos is donating billions of dollars through his new foundation. But as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez argues, we need to redistribute his power, not just his wealth.
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Black Voters Know Better Than the Pundits
The Root’s laughable rankings of the Democratic candidates on their approach to black issues — assembled by an anonymous panel of experts — show just how out of touch many pundits are with the actually existing black electorate.
Why New Atheism Failed
The New Atheists had reactionary politics and a distorted view of science, but they owe their demise to a more fundamental flaw in their ideology: religion can’t explain all the world’s problems.
Defining Bernie’s Democratic Socialism
Bernie Sanders’s democratic socialism has always centered on improving the lives of working-class people and exposing how exploitation by the rich robs them of the opportunity to live dignified lives. Corporate Democrats who continue to ignore or undermine this agenda are putting themselves, the country, and the world in great peril.
Everything You Know About Mass Incarceration Is Wrong
The US carceral state is a monstrosity with few parallels in history — destroying untold millions of lives and families in just a few decades. But most accounts fail to understand how it was created in the first place, and how we can finally dismantle it.
From Acquiescence to Rebellion
People tend not to rebel against their oppressors, because the cost is simply too high. But sometimes they do, overcoming extraordinary odds — and understanding how and why rebellions like the Civil Rights Movement happen is crucial for socialists today.
Bernie Sanders: “We Have Won the Ideological Battle”
In a speech announcing the end of his candidacy, Bernie Sanders was defiant, saying that “together, we have transformed American consciousness as to what kind of country we can become.” We reprint the address here in full.
Thank You, Bernie Sanders
Bernie Sanders took socialism out of the margins and into the American mainstream for the first time in generations. His contributions to the struggle for a better world cannot be overstated.
North Carolina Nurses’ Union Victory Is One for the History Books
Earlier this month, nurses at Mission Hospital in Asheville, North Carolina voted to unionize. Taking place in one of the most anti-union states in the country, and challenging a bitterly anti-labor employer, the campaign is a monumental victory for labor.
The Majority of Americans Aren’t Scared Off by Policies Like Medicare for All
Liberal pundits argue that Bernie Sanders's policies were too radical for “ordinary Americans.” But primary voters are much richer than the average voter in the general. Among working-class Americans, ideas like Medicare for All are becoming common sense.
How McCarthyism and the Red Scare Hurt the Black Freedom Struggle
In the years immediately following World War II, the movement for black equality, rooted in the militancy of black workers, was making massive strides. The McCarthyist anticommunist campaign of the late 1940s dealt a hammer blow to that project, attacking its unions and scattering its activists, ultimately narrowing the ambitions of the black freedom movement.
Capitalism Is Not the Solution to Urban America’s Problems — Capitalism Itself Is the Problem
The COVID-19 crisis has triggered a fresh round of soul-searching in establishment media outlets about the problems of urban America. Unless we address the root cause of those problems in the structure of our economic system, we’ll never be able to solve them.
Sister Corita’s Immaculate Art
In the 1960s, a nun in California decided to make contemporary art — and managed to serve both the Vatican and the anti–Vietnam War movement in the process.
Polls Showed Many Americans Opposed to Civil Rights Protests in the 1960s. But That Changed.
Don't let opponents of the current racial justice protests fool you by citing public opinion polls — such polls often showed the majority of American opposed to the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s. Public opinion is not immovable through protest.
The Freedom Rides Made the Most of a Multiracial Activist Base
Today’s protests for racial justice are strikingly multiracial. Civil rights organizers have historically considered this an asset and often used it creatively and strategically to their advantage, as they did during the Freedom Rides through the American South in 1961.
The CIA Is Still Spying on American Citizens and Lying About It
The CIA has operated above the law and resisted accountability throughout the century, and now we find out it’s been operating an illegal domestic spying program for years.
Manning Marable Was a Pioneering Black Marxist. His Work Speaks Directly to Our Moment
Manning Marable was a leading radical thinker whose brilliant writings showed how the struggle for black liberation is bound up with the struggle against capitalism. Though he didn’t live to see the rise of Black Lives Matter, his work has a tremendous amount to offer the movement today.
Labor’s Great Awakening Continues
After a year of huge strikes and rising militancy, workers look to carry the momentum forward into 2024.
To Fight Racial Inequality, We Have to Attack the Power of Corporations
Corporations are a central driver of racial inequality in American society. But it’s not because they haven’t thought enough about racial injustice — it’s because their basic goal is to maximize profits, even when it decimates the lives of black people.
When Socialists Gain Power in States Like New York, Expect Bogus “Antisemitism” Charges to Follow
New York Democrats: stop trying to make “socialists are antisemitic” happen. It’s not going to happen.