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books

How Ronald Reagan Triumphed

Evan Thomas New York Times
The fourth volume in historian Rick Perlstein’s critical series on the rise of the modern GOP’s far right shows Reagan as key in uniting a rank coalition that still epitomizes and explains much of the Republican Party’s sway.

books

Convergence On the Right

Cathy Nugent Workers' Liberty
As the far right grows world-wide through the confluence of traditional conservatives, authoritarian elements, white nationalists and previously marginal fascists, its sway makes struggles against capital problematic. A new book charts alternatives.

books

White Power: At Home and Abroad

Thomas Meany London Review of Books
Two differently themed books complement each other; one on the rise of white power at home and the other on anti-communist adventures abroad show the domestic scourge nurtured by foreign experiences even as the global Right employed its services.

Media Bits and Bytes - December 11, 2018

Portside
Why CNN Fired Hill; Tech To Labor's Rescue; The Need For a Black Press; Regulating AI; News or Nonstop Lies?; Pretzels and Politics; NPR's Restless Temps

It Can Happen Here

David M. Kotz Dollars & Sense
The rise of a right-wing nationalist regime in the United States is now a realistic possibility.

What Trumpism Means for Democracy

Andrew J. Bacevich TomDispatch
American democracy has been failing for decades, so a disturbing number of us are turning to authoritarianism. Is Trump our Juan Perón? Trump's Atlantic City empire has crumbled. But Trump himself has somehow emerged stronger than ever. The man who sought to lure all aspiring monarchs to A.C. ('welcome to a kingdom where everybody's treated like a king') has whipped up a heady mix of xenophobia, political bromides, and so-light-it-floats policy proposals into a movement

Anti-gay KY Clerk's Case a New Twist on 'Right to Work'

Kathy Wilkes Portside
There's a difference between 'right-to-work', which limits agreements between workers' unions and employers, and First Amendment restrictions on government in matters of religion, speech, expression, association and so on. For conservatives, though, rights are rolled up into one, giant "freedom" ball aimed at imposing individual beliefs at the expense of democracy right down to the duties of a job. Who then are the prisoners of conscience?

Authoritarianism, Class Warfare and the Advance of Neoliberal Austerity Policies

Henry A. Giroux Truthout
Both neoliberal-driven governments and authoritarian societies share one important factor: They care more about consolidating power in the hands of the political, corporate and financial elite than they do about investing in the future of young people and expanding the benefits of the social contract and common good.

Tidbits - June 19, 2014

Portside
Reader Comments - Iraq; Ruby Dee; Cecily McMillan and Wall Street; Ukraine; Detroit Shuts Off Water to Thousands; Working Families Party; Civil Rights Movement; Children's Literature and Diversity; Common Core; Testing; Support Philly Jewish school teachers; Gabriel Kolko; Hatriot Politics and Las Vegas Killers; Argentina and US Banks; The Presbyterian Church and Divestment; Net Neutrality; Historic Slave Cemetery Bulldozed In Houston; Freedom Summer 2014

Stoking Fire: A Global Look at the Right's Anti-Gay Rhetoric

Eleanor J. Bader RH Reality Check
Globalizing Homophobia reminds us that a tangled web of right-wing organizations are working hard to reverse LGBTQ civil rights at home and curtail gay activism abroad. These groups are well-funded and well-connected, and while same-sex marriage is the hook they use to ensnare followers, their actual agenda is far more insidious. The goal? To shove queer communities back into the closets of denial and self-hate.
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