A recent dip into conservative drive-time talk radio raised Michael Shermer's question: Why do smart people believe weird things?

It’s not as if the conservative talk audience is all Mensa members. (Sean Hannity, at least, need not apply.) And it’s not as if the left doesn’t believe its share of nonsense. more »

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After a recent talk about the struggle for social justice and the threats to the ecosystem, a student lingered, waiting to talk to me alone, as if he had something to confess.

“I feel so overwhelmed,” he finally said, wondering aloud if political organizing could really make a difference. more »

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Last week President Obama used a strategy that should become an important part of his leadership going forward. On February 18, he issued an executive order creating a bipartisan commission on addressing the budget deficit, after the Senate failed to enact legislation that would have done so. more »

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Market Failure and FOP’s

There are facts that have gone unstated in recent, often heated or wild debates regarding both financial and health care reform. The first is that market failure is a concept enshrined even in the most conservative economics textbooks. more »

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CNN’s star anchor Anderson Cooper narrates a chaotic street scene in Port-au-Prince. A boy is struck in the head by a rock thrown by a looter from a roof. Cooper helps him to the side of the road, and then realizes the boy is disoriented and unable to get away. more »

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In his triumphant speech on election night, the next senator from Massachusetts should have thanked top Democrats in Washington for all they did to make his victory possible.

For a year now, leading Democrats have steadily embraced more corporate formulas for “healthcare reform.” In the name of political realism, they have demobilized and demoralized the Democratic base. more »

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So who even uses the word “Negro” anymore, much less the phrase “Negro dialect”? Apparently Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, in a conversation with reporters before Barack Obama became president. more »

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Politically, this new year ends in just ten months on November 2, Election Day. Conventional wisdom tells us that the off-year election will end badly for progressives. But the circumstances are unique. 2010 could instead permanently discredit the current brand of conservatism and usher in a genuine progressive era.

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The winter solstice of 2009 arrived as a grim metaphor for the current politics of healthcare, war and a lot more. more »

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If there is anyone out there who still wonders why the problems this country faces have become all but insolvable, read the latest goings on in the Senate's debate over health care reform legislation.

Republicans as ever remain the consumate, staunch obstructionists, utilizing every tactic imaginable to delay any Democrat sponsored measure from being voted upon by the full Senate, in this insta more »

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