Letters + Celebrities Speak

Life is better if you own a yacht.

“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.

Don’t Pretend Joe Biden Is Actually Moving Left

Joe Biden has named several progressives, including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Sara Nelson, to newly announced policy “task forces.” This beats him just sneering at leftists — but it’s no great progressive victory that a few good people are on a random list of names for toothless task forces.

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.

Why Does Nancy Pelosi Want to Subsidize a Brutal For-Profit Health Insurance Industry?

We desperately need a Medicare expansion to provide health care to millions. But instead, Nancy Pelosi’s office is backing a health policy reform that is actually more expensive and will cover less people — all to placate centrist Democrats and insurance executives.

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.

The “Good War” in Afghanistan Was Never Good

As the war in Afghanistan slowly grinds to an end, many in the foreign policy establishment want to tell you it was a “good war gone bad.” That’s false. The war in Afghanistan never should have been waged in the first place.

The New Thatcherites

The Rich and Poor Don’t All Suffer Under the Pandemic Equally

Versions of today’s global pandemic nightmare have been imagined by Hollywood since the 1990s. But films like Contagion and Outbreak have all overlooked the way a health crisis is unevenly distributed across classes, both in the United States and around the world.

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. 

Why Social Distancing “Doesn’t Apply” to Germany’s Migrant Farmworkers

The German state emphasizes the need for social distancing — except for the Romanian migrants working in its farms. The EU’s neoliberal order has deepened the continent’s labor market inequalities, making a mockery of the rhetoric of European solidarity.

Inside the Latest Plan to “Bankrupt” and Privatize Social Security

President Donald Trump’s motivation behind a payroll tax holiday is not to help families through this crisis, but to set the stage for devastating cuts to Medicare and Social Security. And Democrats might end up helping him.

The Day My Coworkers and I Chose Our Survival Over Our Supervisor

Like many during this pandemic, my coworkers and I were told on September 11, 2001, to possibly risk our lives by staying on the job. Instead, we walked out.

One Check Isn’t Enough. Congress Must Give Every American $2,000 a Month Now.

Amid spiraling unemployment and looming economic ruin, the federal government must give ordinary Americans the assistance they need, beginning with a monthly $2,000 check. Without such basic supports, we risk a dangerous groundswell of demands for the premature reopening of the economy.

States Are Copying and Pasting Immunity Laws for Nursing Home Executives

Lawmakers across the country are using identical legislative language to shield hospital and nursing home corporations from prosecution for COVID–19-related illness and deaths — after those companies pumped huge amounts of cash into state elections.

In America, the Rich Get Immunity. The Rest of Us Get “Law and Order”

America is a country that eagerly hands out get-out-of-jail-free cards to the rich and powerful, and rubber bullets, tear gas, and jail sentences to the rest. The protesters on the street this weekend were trying to change that.

Capitalism Was Always Like This

It’s fashionable to claim that the “rise of the robots” or the “disappearance of work” have changed everything about labor in the twenty-first century. But when it comes to extracting profit from workers, today’s era of ruthless capitalism is fundamentally the same as those of the past.

The New York “Progressive” Establishment Is Complicit in the NYPD’s Brutality

Mayor Bill de Blasio has been rightly criticized for letting the New York Police Department run wild with brutality in the recent racial justice protests. But he's not the only “progressive” in New York bowing to the boys in blue — the city council, supposedly to de Blasio’s left, has long been under the NYPD’s thumb, too.

Police Brutality Against Protesters Only Stoked the Anti–Police Brutality Movement

Credit for the unprecedented wave of mass protests should go to anti-police brutality activists, movement journalists, and politicized young people. But let’s not forget the boys in blue themselves: cops' vicious treatment of protesters proved to millions around the world that the protesters were right.

The Free Market Can’t Prevent Latin America’s Coming Food Crisis

Even before COVID-19 hit Latin America in earnest last month, one-third of the region’s population was facing food insecurity. Now, as the economy contracts under lockdown and supply chains falter, overhauling the continent’s market-driven food system is more necessary than ever.