The United States insists it cannot afford housing, jobs, or care. Yet it can always afford cages. Immigration enforcement is not a response to crisis; it is a budgetary preference. Billions are reliably available to detain, transport, and deport people, even as Black communities are told to be patient, resilient, and fiscally realistic. Immigration and Customs Enforcement—ICE—embodies that choice. Its budget has ballooned over two decades, underwriting detention centers, sur

We are living in a time of deep and dangerous instability. Wars are threatened or underway, democratic norms are eroding, and economic inequality is no longer episodic—it is structural. Historian Margaret MacMillan calls moments like this ones of radical uncertainty: periods when old assumptions no longer hold, power is shifting, and leaders respond less with wisdom than with force. As we mark the birthday of Martin Luther King Jr., it is worth remembering that King did not a

The United States Postal Service is under attack again—and this time, the damage threatens both Black livelihoods and Black votes. The Postal Service is not just how we send letters. It is democratic infrastructure. It is also one of the largest employers of Black workers in the nation. Roughly 29 percent of postal workers are Black, more than double Black representation in the overall labor force. For generations shut out of private-sector opportunity, the post office offere

We are repeatedly told that inflation is down, the economy is improving, and that relief is on the way. By the numbers, that is partly true. Inflation has cooled from its recent peak. Wages have risen modestly. The unemployment rate remains historically low, though the Black unemployment rate is twice the white rate. The man who lives in the House that Enslaved People Built treated us to yet another rant about how great he is. But his hysterical televised rant on December 1

Congress is has headed home again, leaving behind a familiar mess. Health care costs are rising, insurance premiums are climbing, millions of people are struggling to stay covered—and lawmakers have once more failed to act. This is not a surprise. The Congressional coward love to run and hide, leaving, always, unfinished business, and their cowardice has consequences. Health care consumes roughly 17 to 18 percent of U.S. gross domestic product, far more than any other wealth

It has been a hard year. A loud year. A year marked by cruelty dressed up as policy and indifference framed as realism. Which is precisely why, this Christmas, I am urging something quiet, intentional, and sustaining: give a book. A book is not just a gift. It is an act of faith. It says to the recipient: I believe you can think. I believe you can sit with complexity. I believe your inner life matters. In a culture of scroll, speed, and disposability, a book resists the churn

Every December, we celebrate the story of a child born in a manger. We adorn nativity scenes with soft light and warm sentiment, but we rarely linger on the truth of the story: Jesus was born housing insecure. There was no room at the inn. His family was displaced, turned away, and forced to improvise shelter in the most vulnerable of circumstances. Two thousand years later, the story resonates more than we admit. Millions of Americans are, in their own way, “born in a manger

It’s the end of the year, which means you are being barraged by requests to give. Whether it is your alma mater, your church, a charity you gave to once upon a time, even a long, long time ago, you are getting repeated requests to give. Giving Tuesday, this December is December 2, and the encouragement to give is not a bad thing. The Giving Tuesday concept began in 2012, when the United Nations Foundation and New York’s 92nd Street Y, a Jewish cultural and community center

Every year, corporations expect us to line up, log on, and lose our minds for Black Friday. They expect us to stretch our budgets, drain our accounts, and pretend that “doorbuster deals” are some kind of patriotic ritual. But this year, a coalition led by Black Voters Matter, Indivisible, and Until Freedom is calling on us to do something radically simple—and profoundly powerful: A spending freeze from November 28 through December 1. No Black Friday splurges. No retail rush.

Now that Zohran Mamdani is the mayor-elect of New York City, expect the slings and arrows at him to intensify. He has been called everything but a child of God, and he gleefully claims himself as a democratic socialist, a Muslim, a progressive social justice advocate and a leader who recognizes the shoulders on which he stands, shouting out some of the workers responsible for his victory. He is not a communist, whatever that means in a contemporary context. But it serves ra

Dick Cheney, who died this week at age 83, was one of the most powerful and controversial figures in modern American politics. The former Vice President leaves behind a complicated legacy—marked by the Iraq War, expanded executive power, and decades of polarizing policy. Yet in his twilight years, Cheney performed an act of rare political courage: he stood against Donald Trump and, in a move that shocked Washington, endorsed Kamala Harris for president. That single act—rooted

For millions of Americans, the federal government isn’t an abstraction. It’s a paycheck, a housing voucher, a student loan payment, a disaster relief check. When the government shuts down, those lives shut down too. Yet here we are again — watching a small band of ideologues in Congress hold the nation hostage, threatening to turn off the lights on the very institution they’re sworn to serve. Government shutdowns have become almost routine — not the rare constitutional crisis

We don’t hate America. We built America. Brick by brick, cotton bale by cotton bale, invention by invention, we shaped this nation while it denied our humanity. Our ancestors sowed its fields, cleaned its houses, fought its wars, and fueled its economy. If we hated America, we would have left long ago—or let it collapse under the weight of its own hypocrisy. But love and hate are not opposites here. The opposite of hate is trust, and trust is something America has never truly

The federal government shut down on October 1, and the impasse between Congressional Democrats and Republicans suggest that this may be a...

The United States economy is cruising for a bruising. Inflation keeps ticking up thanks to, among other things, rising inflation. The...

When does a depiction of history turn into a “corrosive ideology”? When the current administration is working overtime to erase facts...

Activist and Code Pink (a pro-peace feminist organization) founder Medea Benjamin was simply walking the halls of Congress when she...

Members of Congress have slithered their way back to Washington, many Democrats continuing to silently cower in the face of injustice,...

The French philosopher Albert reportedly said, “Without work all life is rotten but when work is soulless, life stifles and dies. Now,...

The July 2025 unemployment report, released on August 1st, did not meet expectations. Instead of addressing the deficiencies by his own...