By Eliza Newlin Carney
Writings that predict democracy’s demise are commonplace these days, from books like “How Democracies Die” and “Twilight of Democracy” to articles like policy expert Robert Kagan’s Washington Post essay warning of “mass violence” amid a “constitutional crisis.”
The apocalyptic tone of much democracy writing is unsurprising…
By Eliza Newlin Carney
The election is over but the voting wars continue, and a wave of new state laws to restrict access to the polls has stirred national controversy. …
By Eliza Newlin Carney
One of Donald Trump’s very last acts as president was to release a report by his “1776 Commission” that trumpeted “patriotic education,” defended the Founding Fathers’ ownership of slaves, likened progressives to Mussolini, and was roundly denounced by historians.
Four days later, one of President…
By Eliza Newlin Carney
The presidential election is over, despite ongoing efforts to rewrite history. President Donald Trump’s failure to subvert the will of the voters is thanks largely to a half-dozen guardrails that held fast against an extreme democracy stress test, as I wrote in The Fulcrum. …
By Eliza Newlin Carney
Election Day is here, and Americans are on edge. Storefronts and office buildings are boarded up in anticipation of street violence. Partisans on both sides are warning that the opposition will rig the outcome.
At this moment of national anxiety and even paranoia, it behooves us…
By Eliza Newlin Carney
On the surface, this election looks like a disaster waiting to happen. Congress approved only a small fraction ($400 million) of the estimated $4 billion that states needed to run the election amid a pandemic. Lawsuits, postal service delays, and fears about voter suppression or a…
By Eliza Newlin Carney
Joe Biden’s selection of Kamala Harris as his running mate cements 2020 as the year of the Black woman, particularly when it comes to campaign fundraising. Biden raised $48 million within 48 hours of tapping Harris, the senator from California, as his №2 on the Democratic…
By Eliza Newlin Carney
Americans may have to wait days for final election results this year, election experts warn, as the pandemic drives voters to absentee ballots. Since Republicans favor in-person voting while Democrats are more inclined to vote absentee, President Trump may perform better on Election Day than in…
By Eliza Newlin Carney
Is the nation falling apart, or coming together? Perhaps a bit of both, but the forces of unity are stronger than they might look on the surface.
By one measure, the number of Americans who describe the country as unified has jumped fourfold since 2018, as…
By Eliza Newlin Carney
One of the ironies of the Covid-19 pandemic is that local newspaper readership is surging at the same time that plunging ad revenues are forcing newsrooms cut their staffs to the bone.
In the short term, the news industry needs federal relief to avoid what…
