RKuttner

For several days, Democrats and Republicans alike have been puzzling over why President Trump would sell out America’s most loyal and key geostrategic allies in the Mideast, the Kurds. The current explanation is that Trump, after a phone call with Turkish President Erdogan, impulsively decided to consult no advisers, and withdrew the 5,000 U.S. troops who had been preventing Turkey and Syria from overrunning the Kurds. This move strengthens not only Syria and Turkey but also the influence of [...]

Far too often, the Democratic nominating process is a prolonged demolition derby, one that goes on far too long, leaving bad feelings, a divided party, and a wounded candidate. By some bizarre mix of random events and luck, this could be the year when the nominee is effectively known before the first primary. As readers of these posts will know, I have been a huge admirer of Elizabeth Warren since I first met her more than 15 years ago. [...]

Economic growth is clearly slowing. Manufacturing output is down, as are exports, thanks to Trump’s trade cold war with China. The government has run out of stimulus tricks. Even interest rates that are close to zero, plus an immense fiscal jolt in the form of a trillion-dollar deficit (courtesy of Trump’s tax cut for the rich) isn’t fixing what’s broken. Corporate America is sitting on trillions in profits that it can’t find ways to invest. Thus, stock buybacks. (This [...]

At some point, Republicans are going to have to admit that the king is mad. Trump’s latest gambit, his contention that House Intelligence Committee Chair Adam Schiff should be arrested for treason—for accurately summarizing the whistleblower complaint—shows just how unhinged Trump has become. Many commentators had argued that a formal impeachment investigation would be risky. Their argument was that impeachment would divert attention from pocketbook issues, the Democrats’ strong suit, on whose basis Democrats made big gains in the [...]

I take my hat off to The New York Times and The Washington Post for their superb investigative coverage of Trump’s self-immolation. However … There is another aspect of the Times that demonstrates just how out of touch the Paper of Record is with the way most people actually live—its fawning over elite consumption and food. The Times Food section yesterday included a three-page photo spread called “The World at Dinner.” In a stab at multiculturalism, the feature displayed happy families, with children and parents around dining room tables, [...]

The just-released transcript of Trump’s call with Ukraine’s president Zelensky is nothing short of staggering. Trump’s self-regard, swagger, and extreme narcissism are all on display. You get the sense that he is so eager to strut his stuff and have the public see it, that it overwhelms any sense on his part that this particular strut could be the stuff of impeachment. And of course, the transcript can’t be read in isolation. Just days before, as Trump now admits, he withheld [...]

Well, just when Democrats are in danger of giving in to faintheartedness, you can count on Trump to rescue them from their risk aversion. All the smoking-gun material laid out in the Mueller report was not quite enough to push the House Democratic leadership to support impeachment. The sins of the 2016 campaign increasingly felt like yesterday’s news. But then Trump tried one more time to enlist a foreign power to damage a political rival—not in 2016 but just two months [...]

Five years ago, a regional supermarket chain called Market Basket acted out a drama that was one part Shakespeare and one part Marx. The family-owned company, famed for low prices, well-compensated employees, and fiercely loyal customers, was consumed by a vicious split. The grandfather, an immigrant from Greece named Athanasios (Arthur) Demoulas, founded his first grocery in Lowell, Massachusetts, a century ago. The current chief executive, Arthur T. Demoulas, continued the model of benign paternalism. At Market Basket, a [...]

The Working Families Party has endorsed Elizabeth Warren for the Democratic nomination and for president. This is something of a stunner, since the WFP endorsed Bernie Sanders last time. The endorsement was made via a poll of the membership and leadership, in which Warren received 61 percent to Sanders’s 36 percent. It came several days after Warren astutely endorsed two high-priority candidates backed by the Working Families Party, one running for the Philadelphia City Council, the other being Stephen Smith, who [...]

I noticed a large American flag outside the home of a neighbor, marking this fateful anniversary. My first reaction, I am ashamed to admit, was to wonder if there might be a Trump voter in my nice liberal neighborhood. But then I thought, hey it's my flag, too. As we head into 2020, it's time for a serious game of capture the flag. Patriotism is too valuable to leave to Donald Trump and the far right. But let's define [...]