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The PROGRESSIVE POPULIST,
the People's Voice in a Corporate World.

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Selections from the January 1-15, 2024 issue

COVER/Hal Crowther p. 1
How close were you? The lone gunman approaches

EDITORIAL p. 2
Trump the fascist Joker

JIM HIGHTOWER p. 3
Corporate giants say you don’t mind their price gouging. Do you?
Woody Guthrie’s anthem mocking right-wing republicanism.
Here’s a wild idea that’s taking root.
Voters reject the illiberal bigotry of Moms 4 Liberty.
Why ‘Supreme Court Ethics’ is an oxymoron.
When and where was the first Thanksgiving feast.

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR p. 4

DON ROLLINS p. 4
Prison for the holidays

RURAL ROUTES/Margot McMillen p. 5
Boomer pols: Be more like the Carters

DISPATCHES p. 5
More jobs drop unemployment rate further.
Study shows corporate profiteering ‘amplified’ global inflation.

It’s high time, as 6 Democratic governors urge DEA to reschedule marijuana by year-end.
Rural jobs grew in September, but still lag.
Senate Republicans hand Putin victory.
Chattanooga VW workers announce push to join UAW.


ART CULLEN p. 6
Woke made Sen. Ernst choke

ALAN GUEBERT p. 6
Soybeans’ big players looking to a bruising year ahead


SONALI KOLHATKAR p. 7
The high cost of low holiday prices

JOHN YOUNG p. 7
How extortion machine fueled the Big Lie

KAZMYN RAMOS p. 8
The importance of home

DICK POLMAN p. 9
Trump’s tenure “did not bestow on him the divine right of kings to evade the crimial accountability that governs his fellow citizens.”

JOE CONASON p. 9
What the numbers now tell about Biden’s economy

DAVID McCALL p. 10
Workers need a fighting chance

LES LEOPOLD p. 10
Wall Street or the working class: The Democrats must choose


ROBERT KUTTNER p. 11
Charlie Peters and the odyssey of neoliberalism

MARC G. RATCLIFF p. 11
The poignant path to despotism

THOM HARTMANN p. 12
If Democrats ran red states fewer people would die


SARAH ANDERSON p. 13
Scraping away the anti-worker, anti-racial equity vestiges of the Reagan era


JOSEPH B. ATKINS p. 14
Keeping the line to heaven


HEALTH CARE/Joan Retsinas p. 15
Dangerous ideas need stiffling

SAM URETSKY p. 15
Congress finally agrees on George Santos

FRANK LINGO p. 15
Climate conference offers little hope

WAYNE O’LEARY p. 16
Refugee roulette in Israel

JOEL D. JOSEPH p. 16
Henry Kissinger made the biggest mistakes in U.S. history

JAN SCHAKOWSKY p. 16
Hey House GOP, keep hands off Social Security and Medicare!

JUAN COLE p. 17
Palestinian-Israeli leader Mansour Abbas calls for nonviolent struggle; says Hamas’s Oct. 7 atrocity blasphemed against Islamic values

JASON SIBERT p. 17
Second Cold War will have no winners, except arms makers

JAMIE STIEHM p. 18
Haley best to vie vs. Trump — and Biden

BARRY FRIEDMAN p. 18
If Biden were Trump

LINDSAY KOSHGARIAN p. 18
The Pentagon just can’t pass an audit

RALPH NADER p. 19
Israeli government’s mass terrorism fortified by Biden and Congress

SAVANNAH ROSE p. 20
Outrage in Wyoming erupts over public land auction

ROB PATTERSON p. 20
Finally sold on reading Ebooks


MOVIE REVIEW/Ed Rampell p. 21
Polynesian happiness on the soccer field of dreams

AMY GOODMAN p. 22
Carbon colonialism, COP28 and the climate crisis


GENE NICHOL
The expanded NC Republican sedition caucus

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More on our features:

Featured in the Essays section are collections of articles and resources on Health Care, Social Security and Voting Security, among other topics. Also see our collection of resources on 9/11 and the aftermath of terror attacks on the United States.

We mainly cover current events, but in an effort to provide historic background, our Populist Reader offers texts such as the Preamble to the People's Party Platform, which formed the rhetorical underpinning for the Populist movement, the People's Party Platform of 1896, which represented the Populist demands at the peak of the agrarian/labor revolt, and more. And Mark Twain's "War Prayer," written in response to the Spanish-American War, is as relevant as ever.

Also featured in the Essays section is "Democratic Money: A Populist Perspective", with Lawrence Goodwyn, William Greider and Tom Schlesinger of the Southern Finance Project discussing the Populism of the 1890s and how those historical lessons relate to the prospects for financial reform today.

Also see reminiscences by two former Alabama journalists about the late George Wallace, the former Alabama governor who transformed American politics with his combination of racism and populism. Claude Duncan remembers the good George Wallace in "George Wallace Joins the Ghost Brigade", while Peggy Roberson reminds us of the bad George Wallace in "Remembering George Wallace"

We also offer Eugene J. McCarthy's remarks on his career in politics on the event of his 80th birthday, as well as his remembrances of Chicago as the Democrats returned to the scene of the crime in 1996 after 28 years. See James McCarty Yeager's remembrance of McCarthy, some notes on McCarthy by Sam Smith and a short film on McCarthy, "Sorry I was Right," at Free Speech TV. Also see a website devoted to McCarthy's legacy.

Another feature that we hope you will check out is Dan Yurman's Samizdat: Militia News from Idaho; Blood Oaths and Fish Stories Swim in Political Waters. This collects a series of dispatches, analysis and commentary by Yurman on militias, wise-use and white-supremacist movements in Idaho and the Rocky Mountain states. Please tell us what you think.

 

See previous postings in our weblog archives:

 


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The Progressive Populist is an independent newspaper that reports from the Heartland of America on issues of interest to workers, small business people and family farmers and ranchers.

We produce our newsprint edition and PDF versions twice monthly with updates and resources online.

We also produce a daily supplement, delivered by email, with additional columns by our writers, such as Joe Conason, Amy Goodman, Alan Guebert, Froma Harrop, Jim Hightower, Jesse Jackson, Robert Kuttner, Gene Lyons, Ralph Nader, Robert Reich, Mary Sanchez, Jamie Stiehm, John Young and others, as well as features such as OtherWords.com and other news and commentary. The daily service is available to regular subscribers who want more of their favorite writers.

We hope you enjoy our website, which includes the blog below as well as other resources, including samples of articles from our current newsprint issue, recent editorials, online essays and resources you might find useful and a summary of what we're all about.

We also hope you'll try a subscription to our twice-monthly tabloid newspaper or email version of the paper under our special discount introductory rate of $24 for six months (11 issues). That rate is good for addresses in the US as well as our email version. And if you're not satisfied with the first three issues we'll refund the entire $24.

 

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If you can't find the book you're looking for at your local independent bookstore, Powell's Books is an indy bookseller in Portland, Ore., with whom we have partnered. Get your book there and help support our website. See our book page for more suggested titles.

 

A Few Good Weblogs
to keep you from getting your work done:

The American Prospect
Center for American Progress
Juan Cole's Informed Comment on Middle East politics, history and religion.
Common Dreams
Crooks and Liars
Daily Kos (Democratic politics)
Democratic Strategist journal of public opinion and political strategy by William Galston, Stan Greenberg and Ruy Teixeira.
Digby's Hullabaloo.
Eschaton by Atrios (politics)
Media Matters for America
Mother Jones
Charles P. Pierce's Politics blog at Esquire.
Progressive Review Undernews
Political Wire by Taegon Goddard
Raw Story
Poynter Media News (journalism scuttlebutt)
Salon
Greg Sargent's Plum Line at WashingtonPost.com.
Talking Points Memo by Josh Marshall
Talk Left, the politics of crime.
This Modern World, by Tom Tomorrow
Campaign for America's Future, progressive insights
Washington Monthly Political Animal
Washington Spectator
Economic Policy at WashingtonPost.com.

For international news which the US media such as the Chicago Tredibune, the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times and the Washington Post might not see fit to print:

From Canada
Globe and Mail of Toronto, for Canadian news and perspectives on its southern neighbor.
Toronto Star, a liberal Canadian newspaper.

From Britain
The Guardian, a liberal newspaper in London (formerly the Manchester Guardian). See also its US-oriented website, Guardian America.
The Independent, a liberal newspaper in London
Daily Mirror, liberal tabloid in London.
New Statesman, British Socialist weekly.
• BBC World News

From Elsewhere:
Al Ahram, English-language weekly based in Cairo, for Arab perspective on Mid-East
Dawn, of Karachi, centrist English-language Pakistan daily.
The Frontier Post of Peshawar, Pakistan, for news from the front lines of the war on terrorism in Afghanistan.
Haaretz, Israeli liberal daily with English language edition
International Herald Tribune, Paris-based daily operated by the New York Times.
Le Monde Diplomatique, English language monthly digest of the French daily newspaper.
Mail and Guardian, daily web edition of South African liberal weekly.
Mexico City News, the English language daily in our neighbor to the south.
South China Morning Post, independent Hong Kong and Pacific news (registration required).
Spiegel, English version of
German newsweekly.
Sydney Morning Herald, for news from Down Under.
Watching America, links to articles in foreign press about the USA, with translations of articles originally written for foreigners about the US. Updated daily.
World Press Review, a monthly magazine with analyses and English translations of articles in the international press, as well as an excellent directory of publications by nation, with ideological leanings.

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They say a picture is worth a thousand words; well, here are some good cartoon sites:

Jules Feiffer

Jeff Danziger

Mark Fiore

Forever Dada, an animated political cartoon created by California artists Louis Dunn & Steve Campbell.

This Modern World, by Tom Tomorrow. (And he has a pretty good links page.)

Ted Rall, our cartoonist/columnist.

Tom the Dancing Bug, by Ruben Bolling

Matt Wuerker

Also see our Links to Independent Media

See links to health care reform

--------------------------------

See our recent editorials at The Progressive Populist Today blog, and older editorials at our editorial archives page. And like us on Facebook.

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This World Wide Web site not only features selections from the newsprint edition of the Progressive Populist, to which we hope you will subscribe. It also gives you another crack at selected articles from back issues as well as texts of populist speeches and essays on populism that we could not otherwise fit into our printed edition.
Watch our Global Trade site for information on the World Trade Organization, the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and citizen efforts to check the globalization of corporate power. And after you have bookmarked our site, go to the Links for pointers to other web sites that you might find of interest.


The Progressive Populist started in November 1995 as a monthly newspaper with editorial offices in Austin, Texas, and business and production offices in Storm Lake, Iowa. In October 1999, after four years, The Progressive Populist switched to twice-monthly publication. Our editorial offices moved to Manchaca, Texas, just south of Austin, in 2005.

We aim to make the Progressive Populist the antidote to the monopoly daily news, throw a lifeline to progressives who feel like they are stranded in a sea of conservatives, and maybe play a role in reviving political and economic debate. We hope this web site is useful to you.


If you would like to hear more about our project, or if you would like to comment on our web site or receive a sample copy of the Progressive Populist, drop me a line by email or regular post.

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-- Jim Cullen, Editor

E-mail populist@usa.net
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