Cynthia Nixon for Governor

KATHA POLLITT ON LOVE AND ABORTION

CYNTHIA IS SHE READY NIXON FOR FOR THE GOVERNOR SPOTLIGHT? THE EDITORS JOAN WALSH

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SENIOR AND MILITARY DISCOUNTS Ye s Perfect Choice HD Ultra is not a hearing aid. If you believe you need a hearing aid, please consult a physician. 81213 UPFRONT The Nation. 3 Cynthia Nixon for Governor since 1865 4 Cake-Case Concerns Sarah Posner 5 Asking for a Friend Liza Featherstone COLUMNS 6 Subject to Debate Abortion and Love Cynthia Nixon for Governor Katha Pollitt 10 Beneath the Radar One Big, Unhappy Family ver since Cynthia Nixon announced her long-shot cam- Gary Younge 11 Deadline Poet paign to become New York’s next governor, the current Political Horticulture incumbent has been a changed man. Not only has An- Calvin Trillin E Features drew Cuomo publicly reconsidered his longtime opposition to legalizing marijuana and issued an executive order restoring voting 12 Is Cynthia Nixon Ready for the Spotlight? rights to felons who have been released on parole, he Joan Walsh also spoke out against the wave of federal immigra- She doesn’t have a record of government service, Some New Yorkers tion raids across the state. After first refusing to en- and there’s no question that her celebrity is central want more in the way dorse a $19 billion plan to overhaul New York City’s to her ability to challenge Cuomo. But we live in a of policy detail from the crumbling subways, the governor now supports it. world where money talks, and Cuomo’s $30 million gubernatorial challenger. Somewhere under a sofa in Albany, he also found war chest—hardly any of it from small donors—has 18 Firestarter: Making a spare $250 million to begin to address New York frightened off most challengers. The celebrity that Impeachment a City’s ongoing public-housing emergency. Thanks Nixon earned from her career as an actor is the capital Voting Issue Mark Hertsgaard to the “Cynthia effect,” Cuomo has even managed that makes her run not only possible, but viable. That Billionaire Tom Steyer to find the political muscle to broker an end to the she has long chosen to use her fame to lift up the wants to make removing Independent Democratic Conference, a movements for public education, LGBTQ Trump a hot topic this November. breakaway faction of state senators who EDITORIAL rights, renewable energy, and housing jus- caucused with the Republicans, stymieing tice speaks to her character. She may not 22 Democrats Need to progressive legislation. have as much executive experience as her Say a Farewell to Arms Just as he did in response to Zephyr opponent, but as someone who grew up Joe Cirincione and Teachout’s challenge four years ago, when in a one-bedroom, five-story walk-up as Guy T. Saperstein The party shouldn’t be he changed his mind on fracking and the daughter of a single mother, was edu- afraid of opposing excessive enacted a $15 state minimum wage, New cated in New York City’s public schools, defense spending. York’s mercurial governor is once again has worked continuously since the age 24 Second and Third running to his left. Cynthia Nixon de- of 12, and has paid dues to four different Thoughts on Tom Wolfe serves credit for that, and for finally mak- unions, Nixon has the life experience to be Jamie Bernstein ing the shame of New York’s public schools—and a governor of and for the people. If elected, she won’t How the pioneering the scandalous failure to address the savage inequal- be beholden to the entrenched interests and political journalist’s acid prose ity in resources between some of the most lavishly machines that dominate state government. We can burned a prominent family. funded districts in the country and many of the most surely count on her to shake up business as usual. Books & deprived—into an urgent issue. She deserves credit By contrast, Andrew Cuomo has consistently dis- the Arts for putting forward bold, progressive, commonsense appointed, often standing in the way of vital reforms. 27 Artificial Persons positions on universal health care, public housing, He’s been a cheerleader for charter schools, a foe of David Cole education, renewable energy, rent protection, and campaign-finance reform, and the author of a series of mass transportation—not just in New York City but austerity measures that balanced the state’s budget on 31 Equipment for Living Rebecca Tuhus-Dubrow across the state, from Buffalo to Long Island. She the backs of public servants and the poor rather than also deserves credit for her courage in taking on raising taxes on New York’s burgeoning millionaire 35 Separate and Unequal Robert Greene one of the most powerful men in the country and a class. Far from confronting the culture of corruption notorious holder of grudges. that has long infected Albany, Cuomo has embraced But if you’re a voter in New York State, does she it, most notably by deciding to abolish the Moreland VOLUME 306, NUMBER 19, deserve your support? The rap on Nixon, spread in Commission before it could finish its investigation. July 2/9, 2018 part by the governor’s sound machine, is that she’s an He let Republicans in the State Senate draw their own The digital version of this issue is available to all subscribers June 7 unqualified lightweight, a politically correct, liberal district lines and readily accepted contributions from at TheNation.com. TV star gaining attention simply because of her ce- the Koch brothers and other GOP mega-donors. Cover photo of Cynthia Nixon lebrity. It’s true that Nixon is not a career politician. At the same time, Cuomo has waged war not by AUGUST / Ryan Pfluger. 4 The Nation. July 2/9, 2018

BY THE only on New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, but also on case, were evidence of government “hostility” to Phillips’s NUMBERS many progressive movements in the state, most recently religion. Without those particular facts, a different case in his efforts to defund and destroy the Working Families could lead to a different result. Party. Sadly, his threats against unions, many of which But while the decision isn’t a sweeping exemption from have endorsed him, have been more effective. But while antidiscrimination laws, it’s hardly a harmless bump on the we can understand why New York’s labor leaders might road to equality. Less noticed, but no less crucial to Phillips feel the need to bend before the governor’s power, we and his allies, was how assiduously Justice Kennedy labored hope rank-and-file members recognize that a politician to find a government “hostility” to religion. who deprives them of security and slashes corporate In the six years it took to wind its way through the 17 taxes while leaving their children’s schools begging for legal system, Masterpiece has become the cornerstone Estimated num- resources is not on their side. of a Christian-right public-relations campaign to paint ber of workers Over a long career as an activist and advocate, Cynthia LGBTQ rights as antithetical to religious liberty. In 2012, killed during the Nixon has proved that she’s on the side of workers and citi- David Mullins and Charlie Craig had visited Phillips’s shop construction of zens. She was arrested protesting inadequate school fund- to inquire about a wedding cake; the baker refused to make World Cup sta- ing back in 2002, during the peak of her fame on Sex and one for them, claiming it violated his sincerely held reli- diums in Russia the City. She’s a proven fighter not just for education, but gious convictions against same-sex marriage. Mullins and for marriage equality and women’s rights. Right now, some Craig sued under the state’s public-accommodations law, -13ºF of her proposals may lack the granular details that could which prohibits discrimination on the basis of sexual ori- Temperature at help to persuade skeptical voters, but there is no doubting entation. The Colorado Civil Rights Commission found in which the labor- her tenacity, her good faith, and her probing intelligence. their favor, as did the State Court of Appeals. Phillips and ers were still required to work at “It’s not a pipe dream,” Nixon insisted when she his attorneys at the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), World Cup sites spoke with The Nation’s editors, pointing out a Christian-right legal organization, litigated how much “a real progressive governor, a real the case to the Supreme Court, which found Democratic governor” could accomplish. “If Nixon has that the commission had violated Phillips’s 110 we’re going to enact single-payer health care, proved that constitutional rights. Minimum num- let’s do it in New York,” she added. Three years ago, Kennedy inflamed ber of North she’s on Korean slaves With Donald Trump in the White House Christian-right activists with his major- forced to help and Republicans in control of Congress, the the side of ity opinion in Obergefell v. Hodges, which build Krestovsky states must be the laboratories of progressive workers. made marriage equality the law of the land. Stadium in St. reforms that can put the economy back to But with Masterpiece, Kennedy may have re- Petersburg, according to a work for the 99 percent. Previous generations deemed himself in their eyes, by breathing Norwegian soc- of New Yorkers led the way on public health, public hous- new life into their claims that laws barring discrimination cer magazine ing, old-age pensions, and worker protections—and with based on sexual orientation are at odds with religious Cynthia Nixon at the helm, the state can do it again. liberty. His decision demonstrates that this Court has 42% In the end, this election—like all elections—is a ref- absorbed such arguments, as well as embraced a wide- erendum on the future. Do we want four more years of ranging definition of government “hostility” to religion. Percentage of the 12 World pay-to-play, where developers and political insiders call If the Court can accept the tepid evidence of such on Cup stadiums the shots? Or do we want a state government devoted to offer in Masterpiece, it will embolden others to refuse to that have seen improving the lives of working people, with mass-transit serve LGBTQ customers—and to hope for a “slip-up” by worker protests systems that function, fully funded schools, criminal- public officials seeking to enforce the law. over unpaid wages since 2016 justice reform, and health care and decent housing for all? In his opinion, Kennedy focused on one statement by Because if we do, there is only one candidate on the ballot a single member of the civil-rights commission, who had in September who will even try to deliver those things. observed simply that religion has, throughout history, $11B Her name is Cynthia Nixon, and she deserves your vote. been used as an excuse “to hurt others.” He also fixed on a Estimated decision by the commission in which it found no violation amount that of the nondiscrimination law in the case of a man named Russia has spent so far William Jack. Three separate bakers had refused Jack’s on World Cup Cake-Case Concerns requests for cakes with biblical images and homophobic infrastructure The Supreme Court’s narrow ruling is still alarming. messages on the grounds that they found those messages derogatory. Jack claimed he was refused service because 0 n June’s Supreme Court decision in Masterpiece of his religious beliefs. Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, baker “The treatment of the conscience-based objections at Number of workers interviewed Jack Phillips won absolution from legal liability issue in these three cases contrasts with the Commission’s by Human Rights for refusing to sell a wedding cake to a gay couple. treatment of Phillips’ objection,” Kennedy wrote, con- Watch who had I On the surface, the 7-2 ruling, written by Justice cluding that “the Commission’s consideration of Phillips’ seen any labor Anthony Kennedy, appears not to be the disaster that many religious objection did not accord with its treatment of inspections or monitoring LGBTQ advocates feared. The decision is limited to the these other objections.” In other words, Kennedy rea- —Andrew specific facts of this case, in which the majority found that soned, the secular bakers were given more leeway to act Tan–Delli Cichi the statements of some of Colorado’s civil-rights commis- according to their conscience than Phillips was —proof in sioners, along with the commission’s treatment of discrimi- his eyes of religious animus. nation claims brought by another person in an unrelated That difference in treatment, though, is based on how (continued on page 8) July 2/9, 2018 The Nation. 5 Asking for a Friend

L e i z n a t o Friend or Faux? F e a t h e r s

Dear Liza, ContraPoints,” by the transfemme YouTube star Natalie Wynn, who I fell into an instant and deep connection with does a fabulous job of acknowledging the value of Peterson’s self-help a man while on a work trip. I’m happily married, advice—you wouldn’t be reading this if no one needed advice!—while so there’s no chance of a romantic future, but the exposing his far-right political agenda. friendship has been, and is, enlivening. We share What’s more important than refuting Peterson empirically, says Har- many interests, but mostly we have an easy under- rison Fluss, a political theorist who has studied the alt-right extensively, standing—something slow and patient and unusual is understanding that he’s an “ideologue” and that you should therefore in this world. We occasionally talk on the phone engage in “philosophical battle.” Peterson, Fluss tells me, has a “disdain about life, and we’re looking forward to having lunch for mass society, which he thinks is making us weak, effeminate.” Faced when our paths cross again next month. with the growing popularity of socialist and social-democratic ideas, However, in the gaps between conversations, Peterson constantly raises the specter of the gulag. Stalinist dictatorship, I’ve come to realize that he might be a fan of Jor- to him, is always just around the corner. “It’s a really dan Peterson. He hasn’t mentioned his name, but scary dog whistle,” Fluss says. In that context, if you there have been significant clues. More alarmingly, want to convince your friend not to be a Peterson fan, it’s Questions? he has betrayed a thin-skinnedness around sensi- probably more important to persuade him of the merits Ask Liza at tive topics like #MeToo and transgender issues. of your own progressive ideology than of the specific TheNation wrongness of Peterson’s many claims. .com/article/ He’s said nothing that’s outright offensive—maybe asking-for-a- because I’ve made my politics clear. But if I ask di- If your friend is indeed a Peterson admirer, I also friend. rectly, and he responds affirmatively that he is a fan wonder if he might be depressed and lonely. Even more of Peterson, what should I do? than rage, transphobia, or misogyny, the affect most —Not a Fan of Social Darwinism palpable in Peterson’s public appearances is melancholy. He cries a lot, and the anger he expresses is of a brittle, depressive sort. I wonder to Dear Not a Fan, what extent his appeal lies in giving expression to (as well as providing oth of you are lucky. Not enough people make narratives to explain) male sorrow. He also offers sad men empathy, a Btime for real conversation and friendship in warm respite from the cold shoulder everyone gets from neoliberalism adulthood. As well, too many people isolate (and many men imagine they are getting from women and feminism). themselves from anyone whose values or politics are at So you may, outside the context of a political discussion, want to suggest odds with their own, and when we do that, we get in- (continued on page 8) tellectually soft. Worse, we lose the empathy with our opponents that can be so crucial to persuasion. That said, Not a Fan, I’m delighted you plan to keep your clothes on, not only because you’re happily married, but also because it would be advice-columnist malpractice to condone sex with a Jordan Peterson fan. For those readers who have been dwelling in happy ignorance, Jordan Peterson is a Canadian psychologist, best-selling author, and wildly popular YouTube star promulgating backward and deeply unoriginal biological determinism with certainty, zeal, and a lot of Jungian mumbo jumbo. Confronting Peterson’s repellent ideas, if you can do so without getting defensive or insulting, might actually help your friend think through some of these issues. There are a few things you can recommend that he check out, if you want to gently counter the propaganda. One is any book by Cordelia Fine, a psychologist who has been ruthlessly dissecting the banal discourse over “essential” differences between the sexes for years. Another is a wonderful video called “Jordan Peterson:

ILLUSTRATED BY JOANNA NEBORSKY 6 The Nation. July 2/9, 2018 Katha Pollitt Abortion and Love The repeal campaign in Ireland has shown a different way to frame the issue.

here must be a way to make abortion rights be Viewed through the lens of rights, abortion doesn’t appear a about love,” the journalist Anthea McTeirnan promising candidate for a love makeover. It’s more like freedom said to me when we met in Dublin in 2015, just of speech, a bedrock individual right that says to the government: before Ireland’s referendum on marriage equal- You can’t tell me what to do—my reasons are my reasons, and T Roe “ ity. Same-sex marriage was going to win big, that’s enough. That understanding is why connects abortion she believed, because the campaign was all about love and com- to the right to privacy, even though, as abortion opponents often passion and inclusion, not just abstract legal rights. People could remark, no such right is explicitly enumerated in the Constitution. see that their friends and neighbors and relatives simply wanted We just feel, maybe more so in the United States than in some to express their commitment to their partners the way straight other places, that society can only push us around so much. The people do. The campaign reflected that spirit, full of joy and legalization of abortion marks a major extension of this privilege humor; its guiding spirit was the sweet and popular drag queen to women, and 45 years after Roe, it’s obvious that many people and bar owner Panti Bliss. And, as it turned out, McTeirnan was think that was a huge mistake. right: That May, the referendum won by 62 to 38 percent, making The legal right to abortion may be grounded in individual- Ireland the first country in the world to legalize same-sex marriage ism—and unless you think the state should be able to conscript through a popular vote. women’s bodies for its population policies, as in China or Nicolae Can abortion rights be framed as a story about love? Ceausescu’s Romania, that’s a good thing. But is the I’ve been thinking about McTeirnan’s words in the decision to have an abortion itself such a solitary one? wake of the May 25 referendum on repealing the Irish In Ireland, as in the United States, most women seek- Constitution’s Eighth Amendment, which equated the ing abortions are not isolated individuals. Most are life of a pregnant woman with that of “the unborn” either married or in relationships; around 60 percent and banned abortion under almost every circumstance. are already mothers. (This fact always blows people Everyone I spoke with thought that the results of the away, so deeply ingrained is the stereotype of women referendum would be close. Thus, the magnitude of who choose abortion as either promiscuous teens or support for repealing the Eighth Amendment—66 to child-hating “career women.”) The decision to end 34 percent—came as a huge surprise. It was almost an a pregnancy involves thinking about what’s best for exact reversal of the results in the 1983 referendum that a range of people other than oneself: What will the passed the Eighth Amendment in the first place. effect of a new baby be on the kids you already have, on your It’s easy to talk about marriage equality in terms of love; abor- partner, on your own parents? It means thinking about what it tion and love is a harder connection to make. The right to end a means to be a good mother: Is it fair to pregnancy is about many things: saving women’s lives and health bring a child into a chaotic household, and even their fertility, for example. US Supreme Court Justice a loveless relationship, to give it a bad “Women in crisis Harry Blackmun’s decision in Roe v. Wade was very concerned father or no father, to have a child with the rights of doctors to care for their patients and the ways when you’re stretched to the limit by pregnancy have that the United States’ strict abortion laws put sick women at risk. the children you already have? been told: take Most people—including seven elderly Supreme Court justices, For pro-choicers, abortion can thus the plane or take five of them nominated by Republican presidents—could see that. be about love in the sense that we re- But, at bottom, abortion is about a woman’s individual free- spect women and trust them to know the boat. Today dom, her (cold word) autonomy—her right, you might say, to themselves, their lives, their relation- we tell them: take love herself. Autonomy may be the prime quality we value and ships, and their communities. If you reward in men—our archetypal heroes, whether cowboys or love someone, you acknowledge their our hand.” entrepreneurs, don’t let anyone get in their way—but in women, freedom, even if you think they are it looks to many people like selfishness. Women are supposed to making a mistake. For abortion oppo- sacrifice for others, especially for children, even children who do nents, by contrast, women are not trustworthy or wise. No mat- not, properly speaking, exist. Putting others first is what we tell ter the circumstances, there’s only one right answer: If a woman women love is. What, you had an abortion so that you could go to wants to end a pregnancy, she’s either “confused” or murderous. school on a scholarship, accept a promotion, move away from your In Ireland, those on the No side of the referendum adopted the hometown, leave your boyfriend, wait until you “felt ready”? You slogan “Love Both”—but it’s hard to see the love in their picture had an abortion because you just don’t want children? Monster. of women. What they call love is a tactic, like the baby clothes and Next you’ll be saying you had an abortion so that you could go on strollers on offer at crisis-pregnancy centers, intended to get them

a fancy trip to Europe or fit into your prom dress. to produce that baby. ANDY FRIEDMAN ILLUSTRATION: July 2/9, 2018 The Nation. 7

¼ ¼ Another way of connecting abortion with love all, it was commonplace to portray traveling as a ¼ is through solidarity with the pregnant woman. sensible “Irish solution.” No one says that now. ¼ Over and over, campaigners on both sides of the What changed? Hearts changed. The spark ¼ referendum told me that the Irish are a caring that lit the call for repeal was the agonizing death ¼ and compassionate people. Yet here they were, of Savita Halappanavar in 2012, after doctors at ¼ virtually disowning their own pregnant women, University Hospital Galway refused to complete ¼ offloading them onto the British, their former her ongoing miscarriage as long as the unvi- ¼

colonizers, so that they could preserve a false able, doomed 17-week-old fetus had a heartbeat. ¼ ¼ ¼ image of their own country as abortion-free. Abortion opponents claimed that Savita died

¼ ¼ Many women I met who had “travelled”—that from a hospital snafu, but clearly this tragedy was TRUMP’S LACKEYS is, gone to the United Kingdom to get an abor- the inevitable result of the Eighth Amendment’s tion—spoke not just of the stress of having to equation of pregnant mother and fetus. Dur- Mutiny at come up with the money and make the arrange- ing the referendum campaign, posters of Savita, ments, but also of the loneliness, fear, and pain healthy and beautiful and smiling in a brightly the EPA they felt because their country had rejected them colored sari, were everywhere. The message was n a stinging rebuke to when they most needed its support. The Yes obvious to all but the most deluded: If not for the Environmental Protec- campaign asked: Could the Irish not take care of Eighth, she would be alive today. I tion Agency head Scott their own at home? “Women in crisis pregnancy Savita’s death did something else: Women Pruitt, the EPA’s official Sci- ence Advisory Board voted have been told: take the plane or take the boat,” began talking and writing about their abortions almost unanimously on May said Health Minister Simon Harris, a strong Yes as never before. After all, since the passage of the 31 to review several of Pruitt’s supporter. “Today we tell them: take our hand.” Eighth Amendment, some 170,000 women had most consequential actions to How is this relevant to the traveled to the UK for an dismantle US climate policy. United States? Today, several abortion. In recent years, The group’s meeting was the states have only a single abor- despite the risk of a 14-year first since Pruitt instituted a rule tion clinic, and those provid- prison sentence, thousands last year barring scientists who ers are often hedged about have taken abortion pills receive EPA funding from serving by restrictions: long waiting ordered over the Internet. on the board. Pruitt subsequently periods requiring repeated But until a few years ago, appointed 18 new members, sev- visits, government-mandated no one talked about it. eral of whom came from industry scripts intended to frighten Now, women began tell- groups or had long histories of women with falsehoods that ing their stories—to their opposing EPA regulations. To the surprise of many envi- doctors must read to patients. friends and families, and in ronmental advocates (and likely States are competing to pass public too. Amy Walsh and Pruitt himself), over a third of flagrantly unconstitutional Amy Callahan described those who requested the review laws decreasing the time win- having to end their desired were Pruitt’s own appointees. The dow for a legal termination, pregnancies in the UK Solidarity with Savita: Voters Science Advisory Board—which in some cases to as little as were moved by her tragic death. after a fatal fetal-anomaly includes public-health academics, 15 weeks. A judge just stayed diagnosis. Journalist Róisín environmental specialists, and a Iowa’s new ban on abortion after a fetal heartbeat Ingle wrote about her abortion in The Irish Times. fossil-fuel executive—said it had can be detected (about six weeks). Meanwhile, The brilliant comic Tara Flynn did a one-woman received insufficient information Arkansas has banned abortion by pill, although it’s show called Not a Funny Word that began with her regarding the science behind not only safe but has been used, legally and ille- describing the most awkward date ever, moved six key regulatory rollbacks over gally, by millions of women in the US and around through the weirdness of abortion travel, and the past year and a half. These the world. In most states, including New York, ended with her waving an Irish flag while singing include Pruitt’s own so-called women who need a post-24-week termination for a raunchy song in praise of sex. “secret science” proposal, which would prevent any research that nonfatal medical conditions have to make their The effect of this personal storytelling was to uses nonpublic data from being way to a handful of distant clinics. humanize and complicate the image of women considered in federal rulemaking. In effect, many states abandon pregnant who had abortions and to make it clear that abor- Pruitt is not obligated to ac- women just as Ireland did under the Eighth tion (like sex) was already part of Irish life; only cept or implement the board’s Amendment. For women in the Rio Grande women’s silence had made it possible for abortion recommendations, but any ac- Valley or the Upper Midwest or the Mountain opponents to make it seem rare and deviant. Sto- tion he does or does not take States, getting to the nearest clinic may be a rytelling is also a big part of pro-choice activism in would go on the record and longer, harder, more expensive journey than the the United States, but there’s a difference, says law could strengthen legal challenges flight from Dublin to Liverpool. Can Mississip- professor Joanna Erdman: “American women tend against his agency. Additionally, pians and Texans and Arkansans be persuaded to to say, ‘It’s my choice and none of your business,’ Pruitt himself already faces at see providing straightforward, honest abortion and tell their stories in a context of self-expression least 12 investigations regarding care in their states as a form of compassion? Right and freedom. Irish women tell their stories explic- eight different types of official now, I have to admit, it doesn’t seem too likely— itly to ask for compassion and understanding.” misconduct. —Emmalina Glinskis baby-killers ought to suffer, seems to be the A third way that abortion is about love is thinking. But 10 years ago, one might have said through the provision of abortion itself. I remem-

TOP: REUTERS / CLODAGH KILCOYNE; the same about Ireland. Not so long ago, after (continued on page 8) 8 The Nation. July 2/9, 2018

(continued from page 7) (continued from page 4) liefs.” But in Masterpiece, there ber when, some years ago, pro-choicers started using the term nondiscrimination laws work. was no evidence that Colorado “abortion care,” a small way of reminding the world that abor- As Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg passed its civil-rights law with tion is health care and that it is also about caring in the sense of pointed out in her dissent, Jack’s any hostility toward religion; concern: both “I take care of you” and “I care about you.” Because claim “scarcely resembles Phil- instead, Kennedy is arguing we have chosen to stigmatize abortion and everything connected lips’ refusal to serve Craig and that the commissioners’ con- with it, we don’t look closely at how anti-abortion laws affect the Mullins: Phillips would not sell duct in enforcing the law can experience of being a provider or a patient. What happens when to Craig and Mullins, for no be examined for evidence of waiting periods push procedures from one week to the next? What reason other than their sexual such hostility. is it like to deal with patients who are stressed and exhausted from orientation, a cake of the kind What will the evidence be driving all day and sleeping in their car? Ironically, while pointless he regularly sold to others.” of such supposed animus in the regulations have forced many clinics to become less comfortable In contrast, the secular bakers next case: a question from a and pleasant—no plush chairs to recuperate in, only the hard plas- would have refused to bake the judge at oral arguments? Depo- tic kind—some crisis-pregnancy centers, flush with government homophobic cakes for any cus- sition questions by government funding, are looking more and more like cozy old-time women’s tomer. Jack, Ginsburg wrote, attorneys? This is the crucial centers. What is the effect on patients and staff when protesters “suffered no service refusal on question left open by the Court’s accost women on their way into the clinic, when they scream and the basis of his religion or any decision: not whether the next shout through bullhorns so that the people inside can’t help but other protected characteristic. case will be more winnable for a hear them? In Dublin, the anti-repeal No campaigners held up He was treated as any other cus- gay couple without Masterpiece’s enormous posters of bloody fetuses in front of maternity hospitals tomer would have been treated.” specific facts, but how hard op- and schools. Radqueers for Yes blocked the sight with even big- Kennedy cited Church of ponents of LGBTQ rights will ger rainbow banners, and Angels for Yes—a group dressed, yes, the Lukumi Babalu Aye, Inc. v. have to work to convince the as angels, complete with magnificent feathered wings—arrayed City of Hialeah, a 1993 case in courts that similar specific facts themselves in front. One side sought to frighten and shame, the which the Court found a free- exist in that case, too. While other to protect. Which showed love? exercise violation when a city the Court did not foreclose With the Eighth Amendment out of the way, the Irish govern- council passed a resolution that LGBTQ people from suing ment is proposing to make abortion legal on request throughout appeared to be aimed at barring under antidiscrimination laws, the first 12 weeks of pregnancy. There is talk of covering it under the animal-sacrifice ceremonies it did open the door for ADF to the national health-care system as well. That not only places of a minority religious sect, and continue to chip away at those Ireland well within the normal range of European abortion laws; wrote that the Colorado Civil protections. There is no telling it puts the country well ahead of many American states, to say Rights Commission was there- how that will turn out. nothing of federal policies like the Hyde Amendment, which bans fore “obliged under the Free SARAH POSNER funding for women on Medicaid. Exercise Clause to proceed in a Yes campaigners have a name for the new draft legislation: manner neutral toward and tol- Sarah Posner is a reporting fellow at Savita’s Law. Q erant of Phillips’ religious be- the Investigative Fund.

(continued from page 5) for an hour of my time, which I could spend interracial or gay couples, or women in that your friend seek treatment for depres- on massages for my tired activist shoulders nontraditional jobs, have helped our culture sion, or at least spend less time on YouTube, or taking a bunch of starving lefties to din- evolve. Ads that depict older people look- which can be a cesspool of self-reinforcing ner. But they should really go fuck them- ing glamorous and beautiful—or, better yet, masculine ailments and symptoms. selves, right? — Sellout? doing things that young people don’t expect them to do, like making scientific discoveries, Dear Liza, Dear Sellout? scaling rock faces, or taking lovers—could I’m gaining visibility as an activist ’m not convinced that they should have help our society progress in similar ways. against ageism, and I’m also starting to get Ito go fuck themselves—they’re going to Beyond positive imagery, corporations regular requests from marketing and ad- sell shit no matter what, so why shouldn’t can benefit the public by, as you suggest, vertising companies that seek my expertise. you make a little money out of this? I also creating workplaces more responsive to real The latest is from a global advertising com- wouldn’t assume that they’re necessarily up people’s aging and life patterns. Your ex- pany conducting “an exploratory research to no good. There are some societal prob- pertise could help them do that. Of course, project to understand modern retirement.” lems that marketing and advertising can help Sellout, you should avoid contributing your Clearly capitalism and ageism are deeply to address—though, of course, there are also insight to something that actually hurts your intertwined, and clearly they just want to some that these industries either can’t ad- cause: Don’t help pharmaceutical companies sell things to baby boomers, which is why dress or will inevitably make worse. I think that lobby against Medicare expansion or I’ve said no in the past. I do, however, have the key here is to ask yourself: Are they in a cosmetic companies that shame women into some smart stuff to say about “aging in position to make a positive difference? If so, buying dumb anti-aging creams. Another place,” workplace discrimination, mindless go ahead and help them out. consideration is whether the product they’re techno-optimism, and the like. Might they Advertising, even though it exists for the marketing is actually bad for society. You actually benefit from hearing what I have purpose of selling us stuff, does sometimes probably shouldn’t help sell fossil fuels, ciga- to say, or would I just be helping them sell make the world a better place, because im- rettes, or SUVs, no matter how enlightened shit? They’re also offering a lot of money ages matter. For instance, ads that show the marketing team might seem. Q Vietnam: Renaissance and Reconciliation | NOVEMBER 2–14, 2018

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FREE SPEECH Cardinal Sins Gary Younge n May 31, The Stanford ODaily published e-mails revealing that Niall Fer- guson, the prominent historian and a senior fellow at the Hoover One Big, Unhappy Family Institution, had encouraged a Britain isn’t the only “problem child” in the European Union. group of Republican students to conduct “opposition research” on a progressive classmate. In his ack in January, German Chancellor gary, Poland, and the Czech Republic over their typical pompous fashion, Fergu- Angela Merkel entertained the press refusal to accept their quota of refugees; it has also son proclaimed that “The price corps with tales of a bizarre non- threatened to withdraw EU voting rights from Po- of liberty is eternal vigilance” and negotiation she’d conducted with land for proposing reforms that would undermine urged his young acolytes to unite against social-justice warriors. British Prime Minister Theresa May. the independence of its own judiciary. B“Make me an offer,” May kept telling Merkel. Rarer is that the two Italian parties support Ferguson has since resigned his position with Stanford’s To which Merkel would reply: “But you’re leav- abandoning the euro. Neither campaigned to ac- “Cardinal Conversations” se- ing—we don’t have to make you an offer. Come tually do that. But when they came together to ries and acknowledged that he on, what do you want?” To which May would form a government and appointed Paolo Savona as needs to “grow up.” But to write retort: “Make me an offer.” finance minister, things started to kick off. Savona this off as a matter of one im- Five months later, Britain’s negotiating posi- has branded the euro a “German cage” and argued mature 54-year-old would be to tion has, if anything, become weaker. As though that “we need to prepare a plan B to get out of the understate the degree to which chiding a toddler (Merkel is said to have referred euro if necessary…the other alternative is to end the conservative movement has to the UK as the European Union’s up like Greece.” In an unusual move, embedded itself at Stanford. “problem child”), an EU official re- the Italian president vetoed Savona’s According to one campus pub- cently complained, “The precondi- appointment, leaving the country still lication, the university recently tion for fruitful discussions has to be without a government. What some cleared students to open a branch that the UK accepts the consequences have described as a constitutional crisis of Turning Point USA, which attempts to sway student elections of its own choices.” should, at this point, be less dramati- and maintains a “professor watch- The British government’s buffoon- cally termed an impasse. That Italy is list” targeting liberal academics. ish approach to Brexit has left two heading into its fourth month without Earlier this year, Stanford also overarching impressions. The first is a government is not unheard of (Bel- failed to respond to an article in that Britain’s Euroskepticism emerges gium went without one for more than The Stanford Review that falsely from an isolated and ultimately self- 18 months a few years back). accused a professor of being an defeating political culture that has no rationale In terms of the euro, Italy is an outlier: Among antifa ringleader and therefore a beyond nationalist idiocy. The second is that the the eurozone countries, only Greece, in the midst of member of a terrorist group. The EU is a secure and popular multinational organiza- its crisis, openly ques- error-filled op-ed prompted death tion that will resume its progress toward integration tioned keeping the cur- threats against the instructor. once this problem child is gone. rency. But that doesn’t Above all, it remains baffling Recent events across the continent have illus- mean the question still There is an why the Hoover Institution, the trated why neither of those assumptions is true. isn’t out there. Polls on-campus conservative think arrogance among Both nationalism and Euroskepticism are wide- show that most citizens tank, can, as historian Patrick Iber the EU’s true put it, “trade off its name while its spread in Europe, though they are not synonymous, in the EU want to stay fellows attack enrolled students.” even if there is considerable overlap between the in the union, even as believers that Stanford should clarify how it two. Partly as a result of that overlap, the EU is in they remain wary of goes all the way supports Hoover and why. In a cli- a far more fragile situation than it at first appears, its institutions. A 2014 mate where researchers go after and remains in a struggle to maintain its legitimacy. poll shows that just a to the top and students, it’s the least the univer- The most recent example of how those two third of Europeans that could be its sity could do. —Madeleine Han trends come together followed the March elections have a favorable view of in Italy, in which the two biggest parties to emerge the European Central undoing. were the xenophobic Northern League and the Bank, the European maverick Five Star Movement. After some horse- Parliament, and the European Commission, and trading, the two parties are now trying to form a barely half like the EU as a whole. There is little far-right, Euroskeptic populist government. support for leaving the EU—and, looking at the In this, Italy is not so much bucking a trend as hash Britain has made of it, that’s unlikely to change cementing one. Its pledge to deport asylum seek- soon—but the desire in many countries (includ- ers, raise pensions, and slash taxes is, sadly, part of ing Spain, France, and Italy) for a referendum on the all-too-familiar bigoted economic illiteracy of membership suggests that many would like to have the moment. Hungary and Slovenia have since had a debate about the current form of the union. elections that delivered significant gains to the hard And while Britons are alone in wanting to leave,

right. The EU has announced that it will sue Hun- they are by no means alone in feeling alienated. / PICTURE-ALLIANCE JAN HAAS AP IMAGES / DPA LEFT: July 2/9, 2018 The Nation. 11

A month before the Brexit referendum, majorities in 18 in response to the situation in Italy. Jean-Claude Juncker, EU countries felt that “their voice didn’t count in the the European Commission president, sniffed that the “Ital- EU.” In 11 countries, people felt more alienated than the ians have to take care of the poor regions of Italy. That British did. means more work; less corruption; seriousness.” European To EU fundamentalists, this is little more than false Budget Commissioner Günther Oettinger suggested the EU officials can consciousness. They accuse those who take issue with the markets would correct the Italians’ embrace of populism: afford to be this EU’s lack of transparency, convoluted sense of account- “My concern and expectation is that the [impact to] the condescending to ability, and gaping democratic deficits of being heretics. markets, government bonds, and the economy of Italy will They imagine that the source of discontent is ignorance— be so far-reaching that this will be a possible signal to vot- Britain, because people just don’t understand how the EU works—when ers not to vote for populists on the right or left.” it is already the reality is that, for some, it’s precisely because they do Unelected EU officials can afford to be this conde- leaving and its understand that they’re unhappy with the union. scending to Britain, because it is already leaving and its own conduct has There is an arrogance among the EU’s true believers own conduct has proved unworthy of respect. But such proved unworthy that goes all the way to the top and that could be its un- disdain toward the democratically elected government of of respect. doing. It is an institution tolerated for what it can deliver a member state—however odious its politics—is of a dif- rather than embraced with a sense of ownership. ferent order. Britain is not the only “problem child” in the That sense of preening self-regard has been on display EU. This is a dysfunctional family. Q

POLITICAL HORTICULTURE SNAPSHOT / YIBO WANG Since one of his administration’s features Calvin Trillin Is quite a large supply of swamp-like creatures, Bicycle Fields Perhaps he thinks he’ll make this swamp a garden An aerial view shows tens of thousands of rental Deadline Poet By offering each miscreant a pardon. bikes sitting unused in an area near Shanghai. Last year, bike-share companies flooded Chinese cities Though costumed as some roses or some thyme, with millions of bikes; weak regulation failed to put These swampy folks would still be dripping slime. the brakes on their growth. SHUTTERSTOCK Is Cynthia Nixon Ready for the Spotlight? The Nation.

The actor and activist is running to win—not just to push Andrew Cuomo to the left. But can she convince voters she’s ready to govern?

by JOAN WALSH

he symbolism could not have been more stark: on the opening morning of the new york State Democratic Party Convention at Hofstra University in May, the progressive caucus had been relegated to a curtained-off area that fit fewer than half the folks who showed up. There were no microphones, and speakers had to yell to be heard. Nearby, hired acts practiced their routines; for a while, a gospel choir soared. Across the way, the party’s powerful executive committee began its T meeting in a much roomier space. They had multiple microphones, and their voices boomed over those addressing the progressive faithful. Against this backdrop, upstart gubernatorial candidate Cynthia Nixon strained to make the case that she deserved to have her name put on the primary ballot to challenge two- term incumbent Andrew Cuomo. The governor, she said, has “slashed taxes on the rich, slashed services for everything else, and has run the New York subway into the ground.” Nixon promised to fight for single-payer health care and “real paid family leave. But his brash contempt for democratic criminal-justice reform,” end the school-to-prison pipeline, norms, alongside a notable failure to lead on a range of legalize marijuana, and “make sure we are enacting all pos- progressive issues, from cleaning up Albany corruption to sible protections [for] immigrants.” education funding and tax equity, has left him vulnerable to She finished to polite but less than rousing applause. challenges from the left—first by law professor and activist Quickly, a delegate pressed her. “I never hear details behind Zephyr Teachout in 2014, and now by Nixon. “I don’t think the wish list,” he complained. Talking a bit louder, Nixon people are excited about voting for Andrew Cuomo. I just repeated some of what she’d said, adding a few more issues don’t,” Nixon tells me later in the bright, homey kitchen of like fully funding New York’s public schools and strength- her Noho apartment. “We want to get people excited again ening tenant protections. “We have the wealth, if we would about the Democratic Party.” only use it,” she argued. But her answers lacked the policy Teachout, who is supporting Nixon while running her details that this insider crowd craved. At any rate, own campaign for state attorney general against her inquisitor appeared unimpressed. the Cuomo-backed candidate, New York City Later that day, Nixon would win less than “I don’t Public Advocate Letitia James, shocked the 5 percent of the delegate vote, far below the 25 think people party by getting almost 34 percent of the vote. percent threshold needed to get on the ballot. are excited She thinks Nixon can surpass that—and even But the popular actor counted her visit to “the win. “She’s doing better than I was at this point lion’s den” of the party establishment as a success about voting in 2014… I wasn’t even running yet,” Teachout nonetheless, telling reporters the next day that she for Andrew reminds me. She was attending the state conven- always expected she’d have to collect the 15,000 Cuomo. I tion as a delegate from Dutchess County, where signatures necessary to put her name on the bal- she ran and lost a race in 2016 for an open seat in lot. She’ll far exceed that, promises Joe Dinkin, just don’t.” Congress. Teachout has urged the party to bring communications director of the Working Fami- — Cynthia Nixon in the energy of anti-Trump resistance groups like lies Party, which has endorsed Nixon: “There’s no Indivisible and to stop excluding insurgent candi- doubt she has the volunteer energy, because people know dates. “It’s very brave of Cynthia to be here, even just to talk her as a bold and fearless activist, not an actress. She’s been to individual delegates,” she says. (Later that day, Teachout in the trenches [on education, labor, LGBTQ, and civil- herself would get only 5 percent of the convention vote.) rights issues] for decades.” For her part, Nixon dismissed the lopsided tally against In 2002, another upstart Democratic gubernatorial her as the harrumph of party insiders loyal to Cuomo. “I’m candidate likewise used a petition to get on the ballot. looking forward to September 13, when the great majority The young Andrew Cuomo eventually dropped his cam- of New Yorkers will vote, not just the establishment,” she paign against State Comptroller Carl McCall days before said the next day. “Everybody loves an underdog.” the primary, blaming his low standing in the polls on Nixon is indeed an underdog—the latest poll has Cuomo race. “The negative here,” he explained to The New York leading 50 to 28 percent—but she comes with powerful name Times’ Bob Herbert, “is that I was running against the first recognition from her 40-plus years of acting, most famously African-American. It was his turn…. How could I go as the pragmatic lawyer Miranda Hobbes in HBO’s iconic against Carl McCall? How could you do that? Don’t you Sex and the City, but also as the Tony Award–winning star of like black people?” The Little Foxes and Rabbit Hole. Nixon’s acting career goes Ah, there’s that trademark Cuomo charm! While the back to her days at New York City’s Hunter College High governor is widely feared by Democratic insiders, he is School—and, in a way, so does her activism. Drawing from warmly backed by few. He has undoubtedly notched some her experience as a public-school student and as a parent, she

AUGUST / RYAN PFLUGER AUGUST / RYAN progressive accomplishments, from marriage equality to has long been a powerful voice for equity in public-education 14 The Nation. July 2/9, 2018 funding. Her campaign so far has highlighted that record, while also using it as a to growing up in modest circumstances with her single springboard to talk about other progressive issues, such as housing, transit, mass mother, Anne—also an actor and activist—in a five-story incarceration, and health care. walk-up in 1970s Yorkville while attending the local pub- That’s got a lot of appeal. Nixon has already won the support of the Work- lic school. “The city was broke back then… a lot of crime ing Families Party, the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, Our Rev- and muggings,” she recalls. “The subway was a disaster, olution, Daily Kos, and Democracy for America, plus upstart New York Dem- loud and filled with graffiti—and so many empty trains! ocratic clubs like the Village Independent Democrats. But many New Yorkers But there was a sense of community here that I felt grow- are like the delegate looking for “details behind the wish list,” and some say ing up. Everybody I knew went to public school.” that Nixon has been slow to flesh out her inspiring but somewhat bare policy Nixon got into the prestigious Hunter High, but platform. “For the broader primary electorate, she still has time if she really she’d already started an acting career as a way to pay for bones up on the issues,” says Pablo Zevallos, a Columbia Law student and ac- college. “My mother was very clear with me from about tivist with the progressive Community Free Democrats club on Manhattan’s the age of 10: ‘I can’t pay for your college, so you’re going Upper West Side. But so far, Zevallos hasn’t been convinced by what he’s seen. to have to go to public college—or pay yourself.’… But With three months to go before the primary, Nixon will have to persuade a the mantra in our house was: ‘Child actors don’t become lot more voters to take a chance on a first-time celebrity candidate who wants adult actors. This is to save money for college, and when to start public service at the top. And then, of course, there are the inevitable you go to college, you will find something to do once comparisons to another television star from New York who decided to run for you age out of this profession.’ It was very good advice, high office with no political experience. Donald Trump powers the progressive because very few of us do make it.” political resistance that helps make Nixon’s run plausible. But he also powers a Nixon, of course, did make it, starting out in movies resistance to putting celebrities with no governing experience in big, important like Little Darlings and The Manhattan Project, while also offices. It’s not clear which resistance will prevail in this race. landing coveted Broadway roles in Angels in America, In- discretions, and other plays. Her life-changing turn in Sex hy didn’t you tell me miranda and the City began in 1998, and by the time her young “ was on this train?” one female Long daughter (with her then-partner, Danny Mozes) was Island Rail Road conductor asks ready for school in the early 2000s, Nixon would have W another as Nixon, trailed by staff- been easily able to afford to send her to a private school. ers and journalists, disembarks in Instead, she committed her family to public education. Hempstead, New York, for the short ride to Hofstra. “I found her “One of the profoundly confusing things for me when I Wearing a jaunty, double-breasted blue-and-white tweedy started to have children was that all of these nice families suit with white patent-leather loafers—cheeky machine- education that I became friends with were not sending their kids to pol costuming, if you ask me—a smiling Nixon embraces work really public schools. They were not even going to look at the the pair for a selfie. Soon enough, a half-dozen twenty- impressive. public schools, because it just seemed like not an option!” something African-American passengers, mainly women, Nixon toured several public schools in 2001 and en- crowd the candidate for photos. Nixon’s celebrity clearly She rolled her daughter Sam in what seemed like a good one. remains a draw, and not merely for Sex and the City fans, obviously “But when she started that September, it looked really dif- the mostly white women, now in their mid-30s to 50s, who ferent, because they’d had massive budget cuts over the thrilled to the show every Sunday and debated whether didn’t have summer,” Nixon recalls. “They fired two-thirds of the they were a Carrie, Samantha, Charlotte, or Miranda. to do it.” paraprofessionals: the art teacher, the music teacher, the Black millennial women, like those on the LIRR train, — Wanda Salaman, assistant principal.” And so a fierce education activist was represent the constituency that Nixon hopes to make the Mothers on the Move born. Nixon soon joined the Alliance for Quality Educa- backbone of her campaign. She’s an evangelist for an ap- tion, a grassroots organization founded in 2000 to advocate proach to politics that centers black women as the Demo- for quality public schools for all. Former ACORN head cratic Party’s most reliable and important base, noting that Bertha Lewis recalls first meeting Nixon at an AQE pro- 94 percent of them gave their support to Hillary Clinton, test. “We were all chained together with this white woman; whose candidacy Nixon also strongly supported. (Clin- she didn’t say, like, ‘I’m a celebrity’ or anything,” Lewis ton, however, recently endorsed Cuomo, while the Ber- told New York magazine. “She said, ‘My name is Cynthia nie Sanders–backed Our Revolution has endorsed Nixon.) Nixon; I am a public-school parent.’ Then we got hauled “Black women are going to stop showing up for the Demo- off to the precinct.” cratic Party unless the Democratic Party starts showing up Wanda Salaman, head of Mothers on the Move, a long- for them—all year long, not merely at election time,” she time engine of community change in education, housing, tells me. (Nixon has already used this line with New York and environmental justice in the Bronx, met Nixon when magazine, which is a sign either of practice or conviction.) they were both fighting for “education justice in state “We have to talk about mass incarceration,” she con- funding.” Salaman, who had earlier worked with Nixon’s tinues. “We have to talk about the school-to-prison pipe- now-wife, Christine Marinoni, on education issues in the line. This is something parents and students keep saying 1990s, tells me, “I found [Nixon’s] education work really to me in a graphic way. We’re criminalizing the behavior impressive. She obviously didn’t have to do it.” of children of color at a very early age, as we’re ushering I remind Nixon of this in our interview, that she could white children into college! The level of suspensions is have afforded to send her children to top private schools. through the roof for children of color.” “No! I got a terrific education—why would I pay for Nixon’s political calling card is her long history of something I don’t need to pay for?” she answers, sound- passionate advocacy for public education. She traces it ing very much like her frugal mother’s daughter. CYNTHIA FOR NEW YORK A fingernails,” Fields retorts. Nixon then launches into her fingernails,” Fields retorts.Nixonthenlaunches intoher ciative laughter, “You shouldrunforoffice!” actual plan?”Onthespot,Nixon shootsback,toappre- to school,”Fieldssays.“Iwant toknow:Whatisyour are dyingjusttogivebirth;our kidsaredyingastheygo high ratesofmaternalmortality andgunviolence.“We ingly abouttheneighborhood’s tragedies,includingits mental cleanup,andcommunityhealth,talksspellbind- ProjeK, whichworksonissuesoffoodjustice,environ- specifics. BronxdynamoTanya Fields, headoftheBLK developers wouldlikeachancetoprivatizepublichousing. NYCHA, givingvoicetocommunityfearsthatNewYork trying tobreakitsotheycanreplaceit,”Nixonsaysof mildew, 35-year-long waitsforanewboiler. “They’re with noheat,leaksthatleadtothescourgeofmoldand York CityHousingAuthority—rat-infested apartments terly againsttheconditionsatbuildingsrunbyNew of Democraticleaders,notjustCuomo.Mostinveighbit- speaks passionatelyaboutbrokenpromisesbygenerations the GOPandhavebeensupportedbyCuomo. breakaway groupofstatesenatorswhooftenvotewith joined bytheIndependentDemocraticConference,a Republicans intheStateSenate,Nixonnotes,whowere year. Itneverhappened.” “brought ustoAlbanypromiseitwouldbedonethis cess andtrial.HeremindstheaudiencethatCuomoonce bail andtoestablishtherightaspeedydiscoverypro- group. Browderhasbeenpushingtoendthepolicyofcash later killedhimselfafterhisrelease,isspeakingtothe nearly halfoftheminsolitaryconfinement—andwho was heldatRikersIslandwithouttrialforthreeyears— Browder, thebrotherof KaliefBrowder, ateenagerwho complain abouthowCuomohasneglectedthem.Akeem “No, I got too many nudie pics, and I like my long “No, Igottoo many nudiepics,andIlikemy long But atthismeeting,too,Nixonischallengedfor This roomfulofactivists,mostlywomencolor, the nation’s poorestcongressionaldistrict vened bySalaman,listeningtoresidentsof less roomintheBronxatameetingcon- Party convention,Nixonsitsinawindow- democratic the to visit her day after The reformswereblockedby plan?” plan?” your actual What is to know: I want to school. as theygo are dying our kids give birth; dying justto “We are rally inManhattan. marijuana-legalization Nixon speaksata Sensi andtheCity: — Tanya Fields, Fields, — Tanya BLK ProjeK B mitments bythe legislatorsthemselves. ises before,but this dealcamewithatleastnominal com- IDC membersback intothefold.He’s made suchprom- A fewweekslater, Cuomoannouncedaplantobring ing togoaftertheIndependent DemocraticConference. the situationwithmarijuanahas “changeddramatically.” Nixon madeitaleadingissue, he’s pivoted tosayingthat He usedtocallmarijuana“agateway drug”;now, after eliminate plasticbags,he’s nowcallingforabanonthem. tion. ThoughCuomoblockedNewYork City’s effortto came outstronglyagainstitandcriticizedCuomo’s inac- a controversialFingerLakesincinerator, after Nixon all Democratshere,butwewantreallydifferentthings.” Cuomo. “Thisisnotherturf,”Salamansays.“We are Party islegendarilystrong—andstronglyunitedbehind a toughsell,Salamanconcedes.TheBronxDemocratic Bronx, amongblackandbrownwomen,Nixonmayhave and getinformationshecantakeback.”Yet eveninthe wasn’t convenedforhertotalk;itwaslisten happy withNixon’s answers,shetoldmelater. “Butthis as sheadjournsthemeeting.Thepoliticalveteranwas according to“aroadmapwe’vedevelopedtogether.” amplify yourvoices”andpromises,ifshewins,togovern community.” Shetellsthegroupthatshe’s running“to working-class jobs—plusweneedthoseservicesinour jobs thatstatebudgetcutshaveeliminated:“Thoseare people out.”Shetalksaboutthe57,000human-service closing the“loopholesthatincentivizelandlordstopush regulated apartmentsoncetheprevioustenantleaves;and bonuses” thatcansharplyincreasetherentevenonrent- justice”: expandingrentstabilization;endingthe“vacancy “rent agent ofgentrification.Shealsooutlineshervision plans tofightcharterschools,whichsheidentifiesasan Most notably, Nixonannouncedhercandidacypledg- “We justneedtogetherelected,”Salamandeclares which Cuomo has moved. He now opposes which Cuomohasmoved.Henowopposes convention, shetickedoffseveralissueson left. Inherpressconferencebeforethe has alreadywonbypushingCuomotothe nixon say you might measures, y some 16 The Nation. July 2/9, 2018

Indeed, Cuomo is running as an anti-Trump progressive this year. At the system, Nixon quickly announced that she supported a tax convention, he told reporters that he had “the greatest record of accomplish- on millionaires and a controversial plan for congestion ment of progressive values in the country.” Teachout, however, mocked Cuo- pricing—imposing fees on cars coming into and leaving mo’s aspirations, calling his New York “a rolling scandal” and insisting that “if the city—but she didn’t flesh out which vehicles would be New York is going to take on Trump, we’ve got to clean up.” included and at what price. When I asked her about it, and In 2014, Teachout made an issue of Cuomo’s shutting down the Moreland about how she would push the policy from Albany, where Commission, which he had appointed to investigate government corruption many legislators are hostile to it, Nixon punted: “Well, in the state. When Preet Bharara, then US Attorney for the Southern District that’s the business of governing, making it a number-one of New York, suggested that he might investigate the governor’s interference, priority and seeing what you trade for it.” After the Bronx Cuomo sounded more than a little bit like Trump: “It’s my commission,” he forum, she promised that her subway plan would be com- asserted. “My subpoena power, my Moreland Commission. I can appoint it, I ing soon, but with June approaching and the questions can disband it.… So, interference? It’s my commission. I can’t ‘interfere’ with from reporters and voters accelerating, it seemed that it it, because it is mine. It is controlled by me.” couldn’t come soon enough. Four years later, allegations of corruption continue to dog Cuomo—and Then, on May 31, Nixon finally announced a fairly de- to boost Nixon’s candidacy. When she pledged to reappoint the Moreland tailed plan, to be paid for not just by a millionaires’ tax and Commission, Bharara tweeted his support. “The rare se- a tax on polluters, but also by imposing a steep $5.76 fee quel guaranteed to be better than the original,” he said. on cars entering and leaving the most congested parts of “The first Moreland Commission never should have been Manhattan (though these are not identified in the plan). disbanded and every New Yorker should support a strong To counter claims that the fee will hurt poor and outer- anti-corruption measure like this.” “I don’t think borough commuters, Nixon pointed to a Community Ser- Nixon talks regularly about Joe Percoco, the former vice Society survey that found that only 2 percent of the top Cuomo aide—the governor once described him we need to city’s working poor would be hit with the fee, and that only as “a brother”—who was convicted this year of taking give ground 4 percent of outer-borough residents drive to jobs in Man- $300,000 from businesses seeking state contracts. Mean- to anybody hattan anyway. To make the plan more equitable, Nixon while, the US Attorney’s office in Manhattan is reportedly would use some of the funds to lower road tolls in regions probing Crystal Run Healthcare, a fast-growing Hudson who’s weak not served by the subway. She also endorsed the subway- Valley firm that has received more than $25 million in at raising the improvement plan announced by NYC Transit Authority contracts from the state health department after employ- president Andy Byford, though she said she would change ees and their spouses contributed more than $400,000 to progressive how the improvements would be prioritized. Cuomo’s campaign. banner— Before Nixon released her plan, the Working Families Still, even some supporters say Nixon needs to build out and Cuomo Party’s Joe Dinkin made a virtue of her cautious approach. her progressive platform beyond its rough scaffolding. She “She has proven herself more than capable of rolling out is undeniably brilliant on education equity and funding is- is weak.” detailed proposals, as she’s done on education,” he said. sues. Beyond that, many of her proposals are aspirational, — L. Joy Williams, Nixon will also benefit from the surge of progressive not quite ready for Albany—or even the Upper West Side. Brooklyn NAACP activism among women—as organizers, volunteers, do- At a candidates’ forum there in May, Nixon left some pro- nors, and candidates. Rebecca Katz, the campaign’s senior gressives cold with the sketchy state of her answers, espe- strategist, calls it the “Year of the Fired-Up Mom.” One cially on subway reform, one of her signature issues. of Nixon’s top aides, Brooklyn NAACP president L. Joy “When someone really knows what they’re talking Williams, joined her at the state Democratic convention about, they mention agency names. They talk about key straight from the airport, flying in from the victory party players. They talk processes,” says Zevallos of Commu- of another progressive female candidate, Georgia Demo- nity Free Democrats. Nixon “gave us a lot of generalities Yes she can? cratic gubernatorial nominee Stacey Abrams. Nixon at a campaign and vagueness, not step-by-step processes.” In the end, stop in March, after Yet thinking about Abrams, and all the other women the progressive club endorsed Cuomo. she announced her who are fighting to turn their districts, cities, and states To pay for much-needed fixes to the New York subway candidacy. from red to blue, made me wonder: Does Nixon ever have second thoughts—for example, that perhaps she’s drain- ing resources from more urgent campaigns, like Abrams’s, when we have a Democratic governor in New York who mostly does the right thing, even if reluctantly? “I never have second thoughts,” Nixon replies, “because I don’t think he mostly does the right thing. I think he does the right thing every now and again. I think he does the right thing as little as he can get away with for a thin sheen of progressivism.” Despite her loyalty to Abrams, Williams doesn’t feel conflict in the slightest, she says. “First of all, I don’t think we need to give ground to anybody who’s weak at raising the progressive banner, and [Cuomo] is weak. Plus, I’m not willing to accept that there’s not money for both [Nixon and Abrams]. I’ve learned that when progressive white

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No hedging: Tom Steyer, seen here at a People’s State of the Union event in January, has denounced President Trump as “reckless, dangerous, and lawless.”

CAN ONE MAN AND by MARK HERTSGAARD MILLIONS OF DOLLARS MAKE IMPEACHMENT A VOTING ISSUE?

Billionaire Tom Steyer wants to make removing President Trump a hot topic this November. REUTERS / DARREN ORNITZ July 2/9, 2018 The Nation. 19

hen tom steyer was making millions of dollars a not being discussed much by the news media or advocated year running his hedge fund, Farallon Capital Management, by the opposition party. Scholars of public opinion have the secret to success was simple: “You try to figure out documented that citizens’ views are powerfully influenced what’s going to happen and how to be on the right side of by such “elite cues,” with support for a given idea (such it,” he explains. But “figuring out what’s going to happen” as climate change) rising when the news media and politi- can amount to predicting the future, and that’s much easier cians are talking about it, and declining when they’re not. said than done. That some 45 percent of Americans favored Trump’s im- W Steyer was about as good as it gets at mastering that trick. peachment in the absence of such elite cues suggests that Long before he became the biggest spender in American many more people might agree if the media and politicians electoral politics, a climate-change crusader, and the most prominent voice urg- talked about impeachment more. ing the impeachment of President Trump, Steyer spent 26 years at the highest And this 45-plus percent support was measured months levels of big-money investing. His personal fortune—$1.61 billion as of 2018— ago, before the revelations about Trump’s reimbursement is one measure of his success. So is the win/loss record behind that fortune: Until of his personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, for paying hush the 2008 financial collapse, Farallon averaged annual returns of almost 15 per- money to the porn actress Stormy Daniels; before Trump’s cent, according to Bloomberg Businessweek. Which means that Steyer was right own order that the Justice Department investigate the in- about “what’s going to happen” a hell of a lot more often than he was wrong. vestigation into his dealings with Russia; and before what- Failing to properly anticipate the future is what many on the left are get- ever fresh violation of laws or norms might occur before ting wrong about impeachment, Steyer believes, especially the overcautious this article is published. Nor can this support be attributed Democrats in Washington. It’s not simply that Trump should be impeached for solely to animus from the political left; the left simply isn’t his unlawful, corrupt, and dangerous behavior; it’s that, that big in the United States. Only 76 percent of Demo- over time, more and more ordinary citizens will come to crats (compared with 7 percent of Republicans) supported believe that he needs to be impeached. Steyer, who found- impeachment in the Quinnipiac poll, so a sizable portion ed the Need to Impeach campaign last October, doesn’t of that 45 percent total must be political independents. come right out and say that Democrats like Nancy Pelosi That’s bad news for Trump and the GOP as they approach and Charles Schumer—the House and Senate minority the November congressional elections, which will deter- leaders, respectively—are missing the point. But when It’s not mine whether Republicans retain control of the House and pressed a second time, he doesn’t deny it. simply thus the ability to block formal impeachment proceedings. “Our thesis has been that the president’s behavior in The goal of Steyer’s Need to Impeach campaign is to office would continue to be reckless, dangerous, and law- that Trump kindle these sparks of pro-impeachment sentiment into a less, and that is what has happened,” Steyer argues. Wear- should be bonfire of public outrage. The more that impeachment ing a gray hoodie and running shoes in the San Francisco is viewed as a responsible, constitutional response to office of his nonprofit advocacy group, NextGen America, impeached; Trump, Steyer believes, the more people will support the Steyer adds, “We anticipated that things would get worse, it’s that idea and press their elected representatives to act accord- and that that would make more people agree this presi- over time ingly. Toward that end, Steyer has pledged $40 million dent must be impeached.” for Need to Impeach and an additional $30 million for Steyer is certainly the loudest of the people calling more people NextGen America’s youth voting program. His strategy for Trump’s impeachment, but he was not the first. Free will come prioritizes younger people, especially millennials, but Speech for People, a good-government group based in to believe also the high-school students who have spearheaded a re- Austin, Texas, has been pushing for impeachment since markable surge of activism against gun violence after the the day Trump took the oath of office. Trump “created that he mass shooting in Parkland, Florida, in February. a constitutional crisis at that moment [by] refusing to needs to be “The $30 million is for the NextGen Rising program, divest fully from his business interests and treating the impeached. which is organizing people under age 35 to register, en- Oval Office as a profit-making enterprise at the pub- gage, and participate in the political process,” Steyer ex- lic expense,” John Bonifaz, the group’s co-founder and plains. “In response to Parkland, we said that we’d spend president, asserted on Democracy Now! “We now see the an additional million dollars, which will be added to by list of impeachable offenses growing by the day.… [T]his [former congresswoman] Gabby Giffords’s group and president acts like he is above the law.” Everytown for Gun Safety, to register high-school stu- Impressive numbers back up the pro-impeachment dents. Let’s make sure those young people have the abil- argument. In January, 45 percent of US registered voters ity to participate in the polls in November.” supported initiating impeachment proceedings against Need to Impeach’s online petition—which reads, in Trump, should Democrats regain control of the House its entirety, “Donald Trump has brought us to the brink in 2018, according to a Quinnipiac University poll. In Mark Hertsgaard, of nuclear war, obstructed justice, and taken money from The Nation’s late March, a survey by Public Policy Polling found 46 environment cor- foreign governments. We need to impeach this danger- percent of voters supporting impeachment. respondent and ous president,” followed only by a call for signatures—had These are extraordinary data points, for a number of investigative edi- been signed by almost 5.4 million people as of the end of reasons. For nearly half the country’s population to want tor, is the author May, according to the campaign. Free Speech for People, the president impeached is an unprecedented expression of seven books, whose petition in coordination with RootsAction calls on of no confidence, a much more widespread repudiation including HOT: Congress “to investigate whether sufficient grounds exist than preceded the moves to impeach Presidents Richard Living Through for…impeachment,” claims 1.39 million signatures. Yet Nixon and Bill Clinton. Equally striking is that so many the Next Fifty how many of these people can actually be mobilized to Americans held this view even though impeachment was Years on Earth. take further action remains to be seen. 20 The Nation. July 2/9, 2018

lifelong athlete who calls himself “an incredibly competitive tics—and he doesn’t bristle or lose his cool. Neither does person,” Steyer, 60, clearly relishes the thrust and parry of political he retreat. Steyer was born to great privilege—his father combat. Nor does he mind spending time in the limelight. Many of was a partner at Sullivan and Cromwell, the New York A the 5.4 million signatures that Need to Impeach has collected thus law firm that represented many of the largest US cor- far came from ads that the campaign has run on TV stations across porations of the 20th century (Ford, US Steel, General the country—ads in which Steyer, casually dressed and speaking straight to Electric) and enjoyed cozy relations with the CIA—and camera, makes an earnest and, he believes, nonpartisan case for impeachment. he excelled at elite schools (Phillips Exeter Academy, He even bought time on Fox News, where Trump apparently saw the ad in Yale, Stanford) before running one of the most successful October. (Not long after the president tweeted his displeasure, Fox pulled investment companies of his era, all of which imparts a the ad.) Steyer has also been barnstorming across the country on a 30-city self-confidence that is not easily shaken. tour, holding town-hall meetings, attracting volunteers, and generating local “I don’t think it’s billionaire’s disease,” Steyer replies; and national news coverage that further amplifies his “Need to Impeach” “I think it’s entrepreneur’s disease. I’m someone who message. Since December, articles on Steyer have appeared in many opinion- started my own business, and who was told by everybody leader outlets, including The Washington Post, The New York Times, Politico, that what I was doing was insane and would blow up. It’s Time, The New Yorker, and Bloomberg Businessweek. not unusual for people who start their own businesses to Echoing the critique of Democratic power brokers, there has been a scold- look at a system that they see is failing and to think, ‘Wow, ing, condescending tone to much of this coverage— there’s a way to do this better.’ I don’t think this has any- although, as with some of the politicians, this critique is thing to do with money; I think this has to do with a start- tempered by respect for Steyer’s wealth and influence. up mentality, where you believe that if there’s something (He spent more on the 2014 and 2016 campaigns— wrong, you can change it and make it better, and you have $75 million and $91 million, respectively—than any the confidence to try.” other individual donor, including right-wing kingmakers “This has Then, channeling the take-no-prisoners attitude that Charles and David Koch.) Steyer’s impeachment push has to do with he inflicted on underperforming CEOs during his hedge- been variously portrayed as naive, impractical, premature, a start-up fund years, Steyer picks apart his critics’ points one by and dangerous to Democrats’ chances in November. one. He can’t resist starting with the fact that none of What’s the point of pursuing impeachment, critics mentality, them bother to dispute impeachment is the right and pa- ask, when Republicans control Congress and have made where you triotic course to pursue. For the David Axelrods of the it abundantly clear that they won’t hold Trump account- world, impeachment is all about political positioning and able? Although this objection has carried less weight as the believe that electoral advantage; for Steyer, it’s a matter of principle. odds have increased that Republicans will lose the House if there’s “I think the most important truth in American politics— and perhaps even the Senate, it has been supplanted by something maybe world politics—is that we have a president who is two related complaints: first, that pushing impeachment dangerous, lawless, and unfit,” he says. “And everyone is actually plays into Trump’s and the GOP’s hands, ener- wrong, you standing on their heads to not say that, because they don’t gizing their right-wing base to get out and vote so that can change think it’s politically smart to say it. This is not about parti- Democrats can’t remove their hero from the Oval Office. it and make sanship: If Trump is impeached, Mike Pence will become And second, that proceeding with impeachment without president. I disagree with Mike Pence about almost every- Republican support—and before special counsel Robert it better.” thing. But that doesn’t change the fact that Donald Trump Mueller concludes his investigation—will make Demo- — Tom Steyer is a very dangerous person to have in the Oval Office, and crats look recklessly partisan, further inflaming the ideo- the founders gave us impeachment as a remedy for such logical divide across the land and leading independents to a situation. This is a question about leadership: Are you punish Democrats at the polls in November. willing to tell the truth about the most important fact in The prospect of impeachment may excite die-hard lib- our political life and then figure out what to do about it? If erals, these critics assert, but it leaves most of the country not, then what are you doing in political office?” cold. They point out that most Democrats on Capitol Hill From this philosophical plane, Steyer segues to the don’t support it; in separate votes in December and Janu- next stage of his counterattack: that disavowing impeach- ary, only 58 and 66 of the House’s 193 Democrats voted ment is not only morally vacant but politically foolish. to impeach Trump. The Washington Post’s piece on Steyer Articulating a critique of the Democratic Party that re- smirked at the small crowd at one of the town halls the sembles Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders’s during the reporter happened to attend. A breathless headline writer 2016 campaign, Steyer argues that Democrats make a at The New Yorker fretted that impeachment fervor could huge mistake when they don’t speak plain truths and rally “Start a Democratic Civil War” and yield “disaster in the their base. Impeachment isn’t the only example. Citing midterms.” Snarkier commentators attacked Steyer as a The next generation: the financial collapse of 2008, Steyer blasts the Demo- wealthy dilettante whose impeachment bid is really in- Steyer has been crats’ timidity: “Millions of people lose their homes [and] tended to gain name recognition for his own presumed motivated by young there is double-digit unemployment because of a finan- presidential run in 2020. “Steyer impeachment ads seem activists like Emma cial flimflam—and no one went to jail! They [the Obama González, a survivor to me more of a vanity project,” tweeted David Axelrod, of the school shooting administration] didn’t even try.” the former senior adviser to President Barack Obama. in Parkland, Florida. Ducking big issues and offering mealymouthed plati- Ask Steyer if he might be vulnerable to “billionaire’s tudes for fear of alienating swing voters causes Democrats disease”—the assumption that being fabulously success- to fatally depress the turnout of their most likely sup- ful at making money means that you will be fabulously porters: the rising electorate of single women, youth, and

successful at a completely different activity, such as poli- people of color. “Look at voter turnout in 2016, 2014, ERNST REUTERS / JONATHAN July 2/9, 2018 The Nation. 21 and 2010,” Steyer says. “Ev- not only within mainstream ery year for the last decade Democratic circles, but also when someone named Barack among some further to the Obama wasn’t at the head of left. Why hasn’t he joined the ticket, turnout was terri- forces with other organiza- ble.... The 2014 midterms had tions pressing for impeach- the worst turnout since 1942,” ment, such as Free Speech when millions of servicemen for People? Is Steyer re- were overseas and didn’t vote. ally using impeachment as a “So does the policy of not stalking horse, boosting his talking about the most impor- visibility and local and state tant issues really work? contacts in anticipation of a “The largest group in 2020 run? If he’s truly seri- American politics is the group ous about saving democ- who don’t vote at all,” Steyer racy, why isn’t he doing the continues. “We believe that long-term local organizing telling the truth is the way to that actually builds political build trust. How are you going to deal with people unless Raising a ruckus: power, instead of the rinse-and-repeat of voter regis- you say up front, ‘These are the things we believe and Steyer has spent tration for one-off electoral bids? millions on ads are going to fight for’? Playing Republican-lite doesn’t calling for Trump’s Steyer refused to be drawn into discussing a future run work—if people want Republican-lite, that will be on impeachment, like for president in 2020. As for big-footing other impeach- the ballot.” this billboard in New ment groups, Steyer actually was a featured speaker at a Why, then, has Bernie Sanders conspicuously failed to York’s Times Square. press conference that Free Speech for People sponsored endorse the Need to Impeach campaign? in December at the National Press Club in Washington, “I have no idea,” Steyer responds. “You’d have to DC. And he lashes back at the suggestion that Need to Im- ask him. I could hypothesize one thing: As a senator, if peach and NextGen America have been parachuting into Trump gets impeached, [Sanders would be] on the jury. local communities for short-term advantage. He points to It’s possible he doesn’t want to say it for that reason.” what his organization accomplished in California in the Sure enough, when The Nation asked Sanders why he months preceding Election Day 2016. “We spent a ton of hadn’t endorsed the efforts of Steyer and others to im- time putting together a registration drive that registered peach Trump, the senator’s office offered his recent re- 807,000 people across the state,” he says. “It’s a truism mark on Meet the Press: “You can’t jump the gun and de- “The that if you show up two weeks before Election Day and termine that somebody should be impeached when you’re founders say, ‘I’m here to help, we need your vote,’ no one believes going to be voting on the impeachment issue. So I think you. The whole point about grassroots organizing is how you allow the Mueller investigation to do its course. You gave us a long you’re there: How much a part of the community are fight against anybody who wants to impede that investiga- process you? How trusted are you? One of the great things about tion. But I think it is too early to talk about impeachment.” for this, grassroots organizing is that you not only get results in a What about the argument that Democrats will get given year, but you’re building your capacity to get results more votes by talking about jobs, wages, health care, and but elected after that year, too.” other such bread-and-butter issues than by raising a ruck- officials Steyer’s staff files into the conference room, signal- us about impeaching Trump? won’t do it ing his next meeting, but Steyer—always a high-energy “I think Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi did come kind of guy—is amped to reemphasize his overarching out with something called ‘A Better Deal,’” Steyer says. unless the point. “There’s something hugely important here: We “Well, how’s that working for you? I’ve asked about people push have a dangerous, corrupt, unfit president. The founders ‘A Better Deal’ at the town halls we’ve held across the gave us a process for this, but the American people alone country. Nobody has heard of it. I’m all in favor of talk- them.” can do it —their elected officials won’t do it unless the ing about economics—I’ve been begging Democrats to — Tom Steyer people push them.” Flipping the House in November do that for years. But I also think it’s insulting to the is important, he acknowledges, but “spending too much American people to say they can’t think and chew gum time on the tactics [of impeachment] is a mistake…. The at the same time.” real question is: Do the American people come to the Oddly, Steyer doesn’t mention the most obvious and conclusion that this guy has to go? And if they do, Re- piercing retort to the mainstream Democrats’ fear that publicans will throw him out in no time flat.” pushing impeachment will enable the GOP to rally its But Americans have come to the conclusions that own base in November. As John Nichols pointed out climate change is real and gun control is necessary, and on TheNation.com: “only a fool would imagine that, if Republicans still haven’t moved. Conceding the point, Democrats do not mention the ‘i’ word, then Trump will Steyer responds by sharpening his own. “It’s a question refrain from doing so. No matter what Democrats say, of whether we can make [impeachment] a voting issue,” Trump and his ruthless political strategists will mount a he insists, “because that is exactly what elected officials fall campaign that claims a Democratic takeover of the do respond to.” He and the other advocates of impeach- House will initiate an impeachment inquiry.” ment have between now and Election Day, November 6, Even so, Steyer’s crusade has prompted suspicions to make that happen. Q DEMOCRATS22 The Nation. NEED TO SAY July 2/9, 2018

ith its billions of dollars lavished on hundreds of n february, we commissioned a national survey weapon systems, the US defense budget has itself become a by Public Policy Polling to find out if positions based weapon of mass destruction, decimating our social programs on progressive values were more popular with voters and infrastructure. Republicans have no problem with this I than the “red meat,” tough-on-terrorism positions of arrangement. Democrats, however, are afraid to challenge conservatives. We took a representative sample of 41 these military expenditures for fear of being labeled “soft.” percent Clinton voters and 39 percent Trump voters (20 W They need not worry. Our latest research shows that not only percent either didn’t vote or voted for another candidate). can Democrats oppose excessive defense spending without fear, The poll surveyed 587 registered voters nationwide, with but they will benefit politically by doing so. The progressive position on America’s a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percent. wars, military spending, and nuclear weapons outpolls the conservative position The results surprised us: We found that by margins of by as much as three to one. We, not the conservatives, have the winning message. two to one, three to one, and even four to one, progres- Right now, the United States spends an estimated $1.2 trillion per year on sives could reframe the debate and prevail with voters. defense. This includes the Pentagon budget, supplemental appropriations for We gave voters a choice of the best summaries we hot wars, 17 intelligence agencies, the Department of Veterans Affairs, home- could find for both positions. We tried not to tilt the land security, the nuclear weapons buried in the Energy Department’s budget, scales in any way. For example, we asked voters which and interest on the debt created by our modern habit of financing wars on credit. statement they agreed with: Even if we just count direct US military spending, § Statement A: “Some people say we have to hunt and the figures are enormous. At $610 billion in 2017, US kill terrorists over there before they get to the United military spending accounted for more than a third of the States and strike our homeland.” world’s total. This dwarfs the $294 billion spent by our What if § Statement B: “Others say that America should stop potential adversaries: Russia spent $66 billion; China, voters know trying to police the world and invest, instead, in rebuild- $228 billion. In addition, US allies spent an estimated the War ing America, including its crumbling infrastructure and $600 billion last year on their militaries. So America social services.” and its allies outspent our possible opponents by more on Terror By an astounding 44 to 14 percent, voters agreed with than four to one. Yet the House of Representatives just has been Statement B, the new progressive frame. About 38 percent authorized raising the Pentagon budget to $716 billion. ineffective responded “Some of both,” but even that works in our Pentagon spending now consumes nearly 70 percent of favor, since progressives are rarely as absolutist in their the discretionary federal budget. and want to arguments as conservatives. We found that many Trump The results? We can’t pay for college education for our restore or voters agreed with Statement B: 26 percent, versus 26 per- young people; we don’t have money to rebuild declining even expand cent for the red-meat conservative frame of Statement A. schools; we say we can’t afford health care for everyone; Then we tried asking the question a different way: we can hardly conceive of spending to house the homeless. America’s § Statement A: “Some say that America should hunt And now conservatives are preparing a major assault on social and kill terrorists wherever we find them. If others won’t our social programs to—wait for it—balance the budget. deal with terrorists in their own countries, we should po- This would be bad enough even if these expenditures systems lice the world to keep America safe.” were effective—but they’re not. Endless wars in the Middle instead? § Statement B: “Others say that more than 16 years of East have only given birth to more virulent and dangerous the War on Terror have been a near-complete failure. In- forms of terrorism. A 2008 Rand Corporation study con- stead of trying to bomb our way to peace, we should work cluded that terrorism is rarely ended by military means: to address the root causes of terrorism and limit the civil- “Military force was effective in only 7 percent of the cases ian deaths that have fueled anti-American sentiment in the examined; in most instances, military force is too blunt an Joe Cirincione Middle East and increased terrorism.” instrument to be successful against terrorist groups.” is the president By a margin of more than two to one, voters agreed Despite this fact, many Democrats in Congress con- of Ploughshares with Statement B (43 percent) versus Statement A (19 tinue to agree with Republicans in squandering trillions Fund, a global- percent). We also asked voters directly whether they of dollars on unnecessary and often counterproductive security founda- thought the War on Terror had been successful: 40 per- spending just to seem “tough” on defense. Washington tion. Guy T. cent said no, while only 10 percent said yes. Even among think tanks routinely hold conferences with breathless ti- Saperstein is the Trump voters, only 17 percent thought the War on Ter- former president tles like “Strategic Competition: Maintaining the Edge,” of the Sierra Club ror had been a success, compared with 29 percent who as if we are on the verge of losing our military dominance. Foundation and thought it hadn’t. But what if the terms of this debate are wrong? What the founder of the The Trump administration has recently announced if voters know the War on Terror has been ineffective New Ideas Fund, plans to dramatically expand its arms sales abroad. We and, instead, want to restore or even expand America’s a national-security asked voters if they agreed that the United States should social systems and infrastructure? think tank. (continued on page 25) 23

Voters support cuts in defense spending—progressives should, too. by JOE CIRINCIONE AND GUY T. SAPERSTEIN Chic? No, anti-racist: Felicia and Leonard Bernstein with Donald July 2/9, 2018 L. Cox of the Black Panthers, 1970. Black Panthers, who scared white folks silly with their militant ways and infuriated many Jews with their anti-Zionist stance. In January of 1970, 15 Panthers were languishing in jail due to unfairly inflated bail amounts, awaiting trial on what turned out to be trumped-up charges involving absurd bomb plots around New York City. (When the trial finally did come around, the judge threw the whole case out for being unsubstantiated and patently ridiculous.) The host of the fund-raising event was my mother, Felicia Montealegre Bernstein, who was married to the famed conductor and composer Leonard Bernstein. My father’s multifaceted career and Park Avenue penthouse made him a ready target for Wolfe’s social satire—even though the Maestro wasn’t involved in the event beyond showing up midway through, after his rehearsal across town at Lincoln Center. Wolfe had not been invited to the fund-raiser; he’d sneaked in, as had Charlotte Curtis, a society reporter for The New York Times. We all know about Wolfe’s article for New York magazine, later republished in book form as part of a collection called Radical Chic & Mau-Mauing the Flak Catch- ers. But what is less well remembered is that, after Curtis’s sneering description of the proceedings on the society page, the Times felt moved to write an editorial—an editorial!—excoriating my parents for hosting a “soirée” on behalf of a group SECOND AND THIRD THOUGHTS ON that it claimed was “an affront to the majority of black Americans.” What I find perhaps even more galling than the sheer fact of Wolfe’s snide article is that the Tom Wolfe author himself spent the rest of his life basking in the attention it generated and never once, it seemed, stopped to think about what effect his He was blithely unaware of how his journalistic careless social skewering might have had on cutting edge sliced one family into ribbons—mine. those he skewered. My parents suffered public shame and harsh criticism from friends. (Two remarkable excep- by JAMIE BERNSTEIN tions were Jacqueline Onassis, who wrote to them, “I think it is wonderful what you did for uch an outpouring of encomiums for tom civil liberty”; and Gloria Steinem, who wrote, “Please, Wolfe upon his death—the long obits, the lav- please don’t be too upset by the idiocy of that Times edi- ish photos of his sartorial snappiness… it has torial…getting the Panthers out of jail is all that matters S all made me a little queasy. here.”) My father could escape into his work, much of it I confess that I’ve enjoyed much of Wolfe’s in Europe at the time—but my mother bore the brunt writing over the years. I loved The Right Stuff and thought of the scorn, stuck as she was in New York raising our The Bonfire of the Vanities was a major achievement. But family. She was plunged into a severe depression, became once again, as has happened so often over the past year ill, and died a few years later, at the age of 56. Of course, when pondering gifted malefactors, I found myself strug- not all of this was Tom Wolfe’s fault. But he truly did gling to square Wolfe’s journalistic and literary achieve- Wolfe helped not help. ments with his own brand of bad behavior—in this case, set blacks Yet there is another, more consequential way in which his blithe heedlessness about how his journalistic cutting against Jews, Wolfe’s article was an act of heedless aggression. In to- edge once sliced a family into ribbons. That family hap- thereby day’s climate, when those of us who despair over our cur- pened to be mine. rent administration are rooting for the FBI to get to the Wolfe decided to satirize my parents over their well- disempower- bottom of the corruption and deceit, it’s easy to forget meaning efforts to raise money and provide support for ing both how dastardly J. Edgar Hoover’s FBI was. As a result the families of a group that was receiving unfair—if not groups. of the Times articles, and above all Tom Wolfe’s piece, downright racist—judicial treatment. That group was the my father (who did not host the event) received reams TOP: STEPHEN SALMIERI; BOTTOM: AP PHOTO July 2/9, 2018 The Nation. 25 of hate mail, while members of the Jewish extent to which his breezy neo-journalism Times’ May 15 online obituary of Wolfe Defense League—an organization that was rendered him a veritable stooge for the featured this priceless erratum: “The itself highly inflammatory—picketed our FBI. By creating a rift between mainstream earlier version also misstated the title of building’s entrance, giving voice to their Jews and left-wing Jewish New York liber- a novel he published in 2004. It is ‘I Am outrage that a fellow Jew would advocate als, while simultaneously deriding the black Charlotte Simmons,’ not ‘I Am Charlotte for an anti-Zionist group. In 1980, through activist movement, Wolfe was performing Curtis.’” Charlotte Curtis, of course, was the Freedom of Information Act, my father one of the bureau’s favorite tricks: setting the abovementioned Times society reporter was able to review part of his own volumi- blacks against Jews, thereby disempowering who sneaked into my mother’s fund-raiser. nous FBI file. In it, he discovered evidence both groups in a single deft stroke. Wheth- Wolfe himself would likely have savored that hate mail was generated by the FBI— er consciously or not, Wolfe was complicit this felicitous blooper. Q which, because of its informants, knew all in a deep and ongoing process of damaging about the JDL’s plans to picket. the nation’s social fabric. Jamie Bernstein is a writer and concert narrator. I will give Tom Wolfe the benefit of Still, we get our smiles where we can. Her book Famous Father Girl: A Memoir of the doubt; perhaps he did not realize the In a too-good-to-be-true footnote, the Growing Up Bernstein was published in June.

(continued from page 22) strictions on Trump’s ability to start a war without continue to sell arms to the world. Again, by more than the consent of Congress. Among Clinton voters, 78 two to one, voters said no. percent wanted their candidates to restrain Trump. We also probed voters’ beliefs about nuclear weapons, Interestingly, we also found that there wasn’t on which the US government plans to spend some $1.7 much of a gender difference: Men and women trillion over the next few decades. By more than a two- largely agreed, with just a couple of exceptions. to-one margin, 47 to 23 percent, voters supported having Those politicians who vote whichever way the fewer nuclear weapons. Even 32 percent of Trump voters wind blows should know that the wind is with us. wanted to reduce the amount of nuclear arms. Unfortunately, Congress has already mortgaged We then gave voters a specific choice on the nuclear- our future with the massive $160 billion defense in- arms budget, arguing the best case we could for both sides: crease for the next two years in the omnibus spending bill § Statement A: “Some people say we have to spend $610B passed this March. But there will still be votes on autho- whatever it takes to make sure that the US nuclear arsenal rization bills for the coming fiscal year where members Estimated US is the best in the world. Nuclear weapons only take up a military spend- can oppose particularly wasteful and dangerous weapons small percentage of the Pentagon budget. They are af- ing in 2017 programs. Senators Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) and Ed fordable and necessary.” Markey (D-MA), for example, are trying to kill a new § Statement B: “Others say that spending on nuclear “low-yield” nuclear weapon that President Trump wants weapons takes money away from the conventional mili- $294B to put on submarines, making it easier to use in a conflict. tary programs that we actually use, like ships, planes, Estimated mili- Our polling indicates that voters are likely to support tary spending of tanks, and troops. Current plans call for us to spend Russia and China such efforts. They are also likely to oppose the new autho- $1.7 trillion over the next 30 years on new nuclear weap- combined in 2017 rizations for the use of military force that some lawmak- ons. We can’t afford this. We should scale back and buy ers are shopping around. Senators Tim Kaine (D-VA) and only the weapons we truly need.” 33% Bob Corker (R-TN) have a bill that would retroactively Again, voters agreed with Statement B by more than authorize all of the US military deployments now under Approximate two to one. percentage of way across the globe. The Friends Committee on Nation- The margin of approval for the progressive position global military al Legislation calls it “a new blank check for war.” If our increased when we came to the fundamental issues of war spending ac- poll is any indication, the public would strongly oppose and peace. Americans, it appears, are sick of war and want counted for by this dangerous expansion of the president’s war powers. Congress to take a much more active role in such deci- the United States We visited with over a dozen progressive senators and sions. We asked whether Congress should vote to autho- representatives last month, and found that all of them are rize any new wars, as required by the US Constitution. 70% looking for a new “transformative” message, as one lead- By 61 to 17 percent, voters said yes. Percentage of er put it. They had great suggestions for how we could We concluded with questions about President Trump, the discretionary improve our questions, probe deeper into voter attitudes, his national-security policies, and the role of Congress. As federal budget and expand the polling. We have posted the polls on the allocated to it turns out, Americans are afraid of what Trump might the Pentagon Ploughshares Fund website (ploughshares.org), along do. A strong majority of voters—53 percent—“fear that, with pie charts of the key questions. without control by Congress, President Trump could start Our bottom line: Progressives shouldn’t fear a de- a nuclear war in some place like North Korea or Iran.” 75% bate on national security or move to Trump’s right to Only 36 percent disagreed. Among Clinton voters, the Approximate prove their virility. It is possible for Democrats to frame fear was palpable, with 81 percent—the highest results for percentage their positions as core American values. Bipartisanship of voters who any question—saying they believed Trump might start a believe that the does not have to mean agreeing to right-wing positions nuclear war. Even 17 percent of Trump voters felt that way. United States or budgets. Democrats can stand up for tough, realistic So you will not be surprised that in our final ques- should stop try- national-security policies that protect the United States tion, voters said by two to one that they would be more ing to police while cutting excessive spending and excessive weapons. the world likely to support a candidate who promised to place re- Doing so will win them votes. Q 26 The Nation. July 2/9, 2018

VIOLATED AT THE BORDER THE PERSISTENCE OF PALESTINE RASHID KHALIDI The Nation. TEXAS SHOWDOWN EDITOR & PUBLISHER: Katrina vanden Heuvel

D.D. GUTTENPLAN EXECUTIVE EDITOR: Richard Kim; PRESIDENT: Erin O’Mara

Insurgent MANAGING EDITOR: Roane Carey populists are facing off against establishment picks LITERARY EDITOR: David Marcus in May’s high-stakes runoff. SENIOR EDITORS: Emily Douglas (on leave), Gregg Levine (acting), Lizzy Ratner, Christopher Shay CREATIVE DIRECTOR: Robert Best COPY DIRECTOR: Rick Szykowny Mangled Meaning progressive) candidate can at- DEPUTY MANAGING EDITOR: Rose D’Amora COPY EDITOR: tract big donors and help flip 24 Mike Laws Both D.D. Guttenplan [“Texas MULTIMEDIA EDITOR: Francis Reynolds seats, they should get the sup- Showdown,” June 4/11] and ENGAGEMENT EDITOR: Annie Shields port of even those Democrats ASSISTANT LITERARY EDITOR: Robert L. Borosage [“Why Matthew McKnight who don’t love everything about ASSISTANT COPY EDITORS: Lisa Vandepaer, Haesun Kim Primary Fights Are Good their politics. The sad reality is WEB COPY EDITOR/ PRODUCER: Sandy McCroskey for the Democratic Party,” ASSISTANT TO THE EDITOR: that, in House races, challengers Ricky D’Ambrose May 11, The Nation.com] INTERNS: Safiya Charles, Emmalina Glinskis, Madeleine Han, Joseph Hogan, Sophie must be financially competi- mischaracterize my April 23 Kasakove, Andrew Tan–Delli Cicchi, Sabine Formanek (Design) tive to beat incumbents. This article in The Daily Beast urg- WASHINGTON EDITOR: George Zornick; ASSOCIATE EDITOR: Zoë Carpenter year, when the Koch brothers’ ing Democrats to avoid ripping NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENTS: William Greider, John Nichols, Joan Walsh network is pouring $400 mil- each other apart or wasting INVESTIGATIVE EDITOR AT LARGE: Mark Hertsgaard lion into state and local races, money on distractions (e.g., EDITORS AT LARGE: D.D. Guttenplan, Chris Hayes, John Palattella that requires large amounts of Cynthia Nixon’s gubernatorial COLUMNISTS: Eric Alterman, Laila Lalami, Katha Pollitt, Patricia J. Williams, Kai Wright, Democratic money. campaign) when protecting Gary Younge “Money isn’t everything,” I DEPARTMENTS: Michael Sorkin; , Barry Schwabsky; , Rev. Dr. democracy demands a laser- Architecture, Art Civil Rights wrote. Democrats need a strong William J. Barber II, Defense, Michael T. Klare; Environment, Mark Hertsgaard; Films, like focus on winning back progressive economic agenda Stuart Klawans; Legal Affairs, David Cole; Music, David Hajdu, Bijan Stephen; Poetry, the House. to win. But this year, they don’t Steph Burt, Carmen Giménez Smith; Sex, JoAnn Wypijewski; Sports, Dave Zirin; Contrary to Guttenplan’s United Nations, Barbara Crossette; Deadline Poet, Calvin Trillin have the luxury of imposing critique, I never supported CONTRIBUTING EDITORS: Robert L. Borosage, Stephen F. Cohen, Marc Cooper, Mike litmus tests on their candidates. nominating “Rahm clones,” Davis, Slavenka Drakulic, Bob Dreyfuss, Susan Faludi, Thomas Ferguson, Melissa The stakes are too high. and I didn’t mention, much less Harris-Perry, Doug Henwood, Max Holland, Naomi Klein, Sarah Leonard, Richard Jonathan Alter Lingeman, Michael Moore, Christian Parenti, Eyal Press, Joel Rogers, Karen back, the Democratic Congres- montclair, n.j. Rothmyer, Robert Scheer, Herman Schwartz, Bruce Shapiro, Edward Sorel, Jessica sional Campaign Committee’s Valenti, Jon Wiener, Amy Wilentz, Art Winslow ham-handed (and unsuccessful) Border Cruelty CONTRIBUTING WRITERS: James Carden, Michelle Chen, Bryce Covert, Liza Featherstone, effort to drive Laura Moser I just recently noticed your Laura Flanders, Julianne Hing, Joshua Holland, Richard Kreitner, Dani McClain, from a House race in Texas. I Collier Meyerson, Scott Sherman, Mychal Denzel Smith magazine in my local library LONDON BUREAU: Maria Margaronis did write about a potentially and borrowed three issues. serious problem in certain Cali- EDITORIAL BOARD: Deepak Bhargava, Kai Bird, Norman Birnbaum, Barbara Ehrenreich, One story in particular haunts Richard Falk, Frances FitzGerald, Eric Foner, Greg Grandin, Philip Green, Lani fornia congressional districts, me: “For Trump, Cruelty Is Guinier, Tony Kushner, Elinor Langer, Malia Lazu, Deborah W. Meier, Toni Morrison, where too many Democratic the Point,” by Julianne Hing Walter Mosley, Khalil Gibran Muhammad, Victor Navasky, Pedro Antonio Noguera, primary candidates might split [April 9]. I am ashamed that Richard Parker, Michael Pertschuk, Elizabeth Pochoda, Andrea Batista Schlesinger, Rinku the vote and allow Republicans my country’s leaders would Sen, Dorian T. Warren, David Weir ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER, SPECIAL PROJECTS: Peter Rothberg to finish first and second in conceive of such a cruel idea: the state’s “top two” primary, VICE PRESIDENT, COMMUNICATIONS: Caitlin Graf separating migrant children DIGITAL COMMUNICATIONS MANAGER: Sarah Arnold squandering a chance to pick up from their parents at the ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER, CONSUMER MARKETING: Katelyn Belyus seats there. Efforts to convince border. I cannot imagine the CIRCULATION FULFILLMENT COORDINATOR: Vivian Gómez long-shot Democrats to drop trauma these parents and kids ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER, DEVELOPMENT: Sarah Burke out instead of being spoilers endured at separation, and will DEVELOPMENT ASSISTANT: Yubei Tang should be applauded. continue to endure for as long ADVERTISING ASSISTANTS: Vanessa Dunstan, Kit Gross Borosage writes that “energy as they remain separated. DIGITAL PRODUCTS MANAGER: Joshua Leeman TECHNOLOGY MANAGER: Chris Harford and money in politics are a func- We must continue to speak tion of excitement and interest.” IT/PRODUCTION MANAGER: John Myers out and fight against this PRODUCTION COORDINATOR: Mel Gray That’s true of energy—a critical shameful policy until it is re- DIRECTOR OF FINANCE: Denise Heller ingredient in driving turnout versed! I ask you and your staff ASSISTANT MANAGER, ACCOUNTING: Alexandra Climciuc and winning elections—but not to commit to covering this story HUMAN RESOURCES ADMINISTRATOR: Lana Gilbert necessarily of money. If progres- for as long as it takes. We can- BUSINESS ADVISER: Teresa Stack sive candidates can raise lots of not let this immigration policy PUBLISHER EMERITUS: Victor Navasky small-donor money—as Beto go unchallenged. We have to LETTERS TO THE EDITOR: E-mail to [email protected] (300-word limit). Letters are subject to O’Rourke is doing in Texas— editing for reasons of space and clarity. commit to resistance. SUBMISSIONS: Go to TheNation.com/submission-guidelines for the query form. that’s fantastic. But if they can’t, Nancy Thorsen Each issue is also made available at TheNation.com. and a more moderate (but still fairfield township, ohio Books & the Arts.

ARTIFICIAL PERSONS The long road to Citizens United by DAVID COLE

ew decisions in the Supreme Court’s cans think the case was wrongly decided. We the Corporations history have been more unpopu- Nineteen states have passed resolutions How American Businesses Won Their Civil lar than its 2010 ruling in Citizens calling for a constitutional amendment Rights United v. Federal Election Commis- to overturn the Court’s decision, which By Adam Winkler F sion, which declared unconstitu- is routinely blamed for the influx of vast Liveright. 496 pp. $28.95 tional any restrictions imposed on how amounts of money into political cam- much corporations can spend on speech paigns, although the lion’s share still adopted in 2011 by the New York Gen- related to elections. One poll found that comes from individuals, not corporations. eral Assembly of Occupy Wall Street, 85 percent of Democrats, 81 percent of But what precisely did the Court get for example, called for a constitutional independents, and 76 percent of Republi- wrong in Citizens United? The two most amendment “to firmly establish that common criticisms are that the decision money is not speech, that human be- David Cole, legal-affairs correspondent for erroneously extended constitutional ings, not corporations, are persons en- The Nation, is the national legal director of rights to corporations, and that it im- titled to constitutional rights, and that the ACLU. The views expressed here are his properly treated a restriction on money the rights of human beings will never own, not those of the ACLU. as a restraint on speech. A resolution again be granted to fictitious entities or ILLUSTRATION BY CURT MERLO 28 The Nation. July 2/9, 2018 property.” These criticisms are so often re- restriction on speech. A law that limited under the literal terms of the Constitution, peated that they have become virtual gospel how much a person could spend each year that right applied only to “citizens.” to many on the left. on political magazines, newspapers, or The result in Deveaux made sense be- Yet neither of these familiar critiques books, for example, would plainly restrict cause, as Winkler explains, “the very reason holds up. Citizens United was hardly the speech rights, even though in form it the corporation was invented was to enable first Supreme Court decision to recog- regulated only money. Campaign-finance the establishment of a durable, legal en- nize a corporation’s constitutional rights; laws raise First Amendment concerns be- tity that could exercise at least some legal corporations have received constitutional cause they single out spending on speech rights.” Similarly, concerns about out-of- protection almost since America’s founding. of a particular kind—namely, concerning state litigants getting a fair shake when Indeed, from 1868 to 1912, the Supreme political campaigns. Indeed, given the in- suing an in-state defendant apply equally to Court heard more than 10 times as herent advantages of incumbency out-of-state individuals and corporations. many 14th Amendment cases in electoral contests, there is Corporations are evidently not “citizens”; involving corporations as it nearly always a danger that they cannot vote or serve on juries, for did cases concerning Afri- restrictions on campaign example. But since corporations are made can Americans. Nor did spending will serve legis- up of citizens, the Court reasoned, they the decision break new lators’ self-interest. should have the same right to sue as their ground in treating restric- This doesn’t mean members. tions on the amount of that Citizens United was That reasoning would prove to be a money that can be spent correctly decided. But it predicate for many of the rights subse- on political campaigns as does mean that in order quently afforded corporations. In 1819, the limits on speech itself, and to persuasively critique the Court recognized that Dartmouth College, therefore subject to searching Court’s reasoning, one must a charitable corporation, had rights under scrutiny. The Supreme Court had move beyond the most common the Constitution’s contract clause that pre- established that principle more than sound bites. We the Corporations: How cluded New Hampshire from unilaterally three decades earlier, in Buckley v. Valeo American Businesses Won Their Civil Rights, rewriting its charter in what amounted to a (1976), which struck down limits on how an engaging and accessible new historical hostile takeover. As in Deveaux, the Court much individuals could spend on their own account by Adam Winkler of the very long reasoned that a corporation was an associa- independent speech concerning electoral road to Citizens United, should help inform tion of citizens and should have roughly the campaigns, while upholding the limits on the debate. Just as he did for the Second same rights, as a collective, as its members how much they could contribute directly Amendment in his previous book, Gunfight: did as individuals. to candidates. The Battle Over the Right to Bear Arms in Later, in a 1906 decision that arose from Corporations have long been granted America, Winkler offers a balanced guide an investigation into price-fixing by tobacco constitutional rights, including the rights to a controversial constitutional issue, and companies, the Court recognized that cor- of property and contract, the right to sue in succeeds in showing that the issue is far porations have Fourth Amendment rights federal court, protection against unreason- more nuanced than advocates on either side against unreasonable searches and seizures; able searches and seizures, the right to equal care to admit. but it also held that the privilege against protection and due process of law, the rights self-incrimination, which seeks to protect of association and speech, and virtually all of here is little evidence that, when the individual conscience, does not extend to the rights exercised by criminal defendants framers sat down to write the Consti- corporations. In 1936, the Court extend- (with the exception of the privilege against tution, they considered whether cor- ed free-press protections to the American self-incrimination). Moreover, there are porations should be protected by the Press Company, a corporation subjected to sound reasons for extending these rights T Bill of Rights. This is likely because discriminatory state taxes in Louisiana by to corporations. Individuals often create there were so few corporations around at the Governor Huey Long because its papers corporations to own and sell property or to time. In all of the United States, there were criticized Long. So while the Court has engage in contractual relations, so to deny two incorporated banks, two insurance com- not unthinkingly equated corporations and these entities property and contract protec- panies, six canal companies, two bridge-toll persons, it has often found that many of tions would defeat their central purpose. companies, and a handful of nonprofit cor- the rights of the collective are linked to Likewise, if corporations can be criminally porations, including Yale and Harvard. This those rights held by the individuals who prosecuted—and they can—shouldn’t they changed at the turn of the 19th century: With compose it. have the same protections we generally ac- industrialization, corporations began to pro- Winkler is critical of the proposition cord to all criminal defendants? And should liferate and quickly found themselves in legal that corporations should receive constitu- courts deny the right of association, speech, disputes and asserting constitutional protec- tional protections because they are asso- or a free press to the NAACP, the ACLU, tions. The Supreme Court first granted a ciations of individuals who enjoy the same. or The New York Times because these insti- constitutional right to corporations in 1809. In his view, if a corporation is a distinct tutions are incorporated? It’s simply not That case, Bank of the United States v. De- legal entity—one separate from its owners evident on its face why the corporate form veaux, involved the technical but important for purposes of limited liability—then the or the profit motive should be disqualifying question of whether the Bank of the United courts should not extend to it rights based with respect to many constitutional rights. States, a federally chartered corporation, on the rights its members have, but rather Nor is it wrong to treat a restriction could sue in federal court to challenge a tax should consider whether the entity itself on how much money can be spent on that the state of Georgia had imposed on it. deserves rights. He is less clear, however, on political-campaign speech as akin to a The Court ruled that it could, even though, what basis he thinks the courts should de-

30 The Nation. July 2/9, 2018

cide the latter question. The courts, howev- Perhaps the most important lesson of er, have generally granted associations the Winkler’s book is that we should have seen collective rights of their members, and it is Citizens United coming. It did not spring, not evident why associations that assume a fully formed, from the head of Justice corporate form should forfeit these rights. Anthony Kennedy, much less Zeus; it has Thus, the Court was right to rule, in its deep roots in our nation’s constitutional 1958 decision in NAACP v. Alabama ex rel. and economic history. And its premises Patterson, that the state of Alabama could are not self-evidently wrong—unless you not demand that the NAACP disclose the think the NAACP and The New York Times identity of its members despite its corpo- should not be entitled to First Amendment rate form. Allowing Alabama to impose protection, or that restrictions on how this obligation would violate the right of much money people can spend on political association of the NAACP’s members—and books and newspapers do not affect their of the NAACP itself. speech rights. “Families with no wage increases for The real problem with Citizens United over a decade, young people working at low paying jobs and living at home, inkler is fond of anomalies and lies not in the Court’s recognition that millions of men no longer in the labor contradictions, and these certainly limiting corporate spending on political force – these are the symptoms of a abound in the history of corporate speech raises First Amendment concerns, chronic economic crisis.” constitutional law. For example, but rather in its overly narrow conception of two of the Supreme Court’s fore- the permissible justifications for such limits. The stunning defeat of Hillary Clinton by a W most proponents for limits on corporate To say that speech is protected does not man whose character flaws would disqualify rights were Roger Taney, author of the Dred mean that it can’t be regulated, but only that him from serving as a city councilor brings into sharp focus the political weaknesses of the Scott decision, and the notorious conserva- the government must have very important Democratic Party. How did it happen? Unlike tive William Rehnquist. Another example: reasons for doing so. In 1990, the Supreme explanations that focus on personality flaws, The use of political-action committees, or Court upheld the same law that it would this book explains the economic trends and PACs, to engage in campaign spending was eventually strike down in Citizens United. social changes that led to the defeats of 2016. first developed by labor unions, but it soon That decision, Austin v. Michigan Chamber ISBN: 9781545618134 $15.95 became a tool of corporations—by 2002, of Commerce, recognized that a restriction on there were over 1,670 corporate PACs and campaign spending raised First Amendment Available on amazon.com only about 325 union PACs. concerns, but held that the restriction was Sometimes, however, Winkler strains justified by the state’s interest in combating too hard to find a contradiction. For ex- the distorting effects of corporate wealth on ample, he traces the notion that speech the electoral process. In Citizens United, the he Bethune should be protected because of its value to Court rejected this justification, overruled Murals listeners, irrespective of the identity of the Austin, and held that the only acceptable A Novel speaker—an argument used to protect cor- rationale for limiting campaign spending by Tony Holtzman porate speech—to Ralph Nader’s consumer- is to counter bribery and its appearance. $17.95 paper advocacy group Public Citizen. In 1975, And because the Court had long held that $3.95 e-book Public Citizen successfully advanced that ar- “independent expenditures”—money spent gument to extend constitutional protection to advocate a candidate’s election, but not to price advertising about pharmaceutical in coordination with the candidate—were drugs. Winkler notes that, three years later, unlikely to lead to bribes, it struck down the the same argument was used to support the limits on such expenditures by corporations. extension of speech rights to corporations To understand more precisely what is Tony Holtzman’s The Bethune in a campaign-spending case when the Su- wrong with Citizens United is critical to any Murals vividly captures the ways preme Court ruled, in First National Bank of effort to reverse or modify the decision. in which cold war anti-communism, Boston v. Bellotti, that the public’s interest in Reflexive opposition to all constitutional interacting with corporate greed, hearing what a corporation had to say regard- protections for corporations fails to grapple environmental degradation and ing a ballot referendum justified extending with the many settings in which these rights much else, infected the culture, First Amendment protection to that speech, are warranted. And government restric- not to mention the lives of its without regard to whether the corporation tions on how much one can spend on po- victims; and along the way offers itself had a right to speak. But, in fact, this litical speech do, in fact, limit one’s speech. an unforgettable history lesson in argument had already been accepted a little The problem with Citizens United is more the moral, political and aesthetic over a decade earlier, in Lamont v. Postmaster nuanced: Its failure is not in its protection General, when the Court struck down a limit of corporate rights or its view of money as issues raised. —victor s. navasky, former editor and on the receipt within the United States of speech, but in its inability to recognize a publisher of the communist literature mailed from abroad. broader set of justifications for limiting the nation and author The argument used in Bellotti, therefore, was distorting effects of concentrated wealth. of naming names available long before Public Citizen’s efforts Winkler’s careful history will help us do Available on amazon.com to protect consumer access to drug-pricing a better job of getting it right about what information. Citizens United got wrong. Q July 2/9, 2018 The Nation. 31

EQUIPMENT FOR LIVING Losing and recovering oneself in drugs and sobriety by REBECCA TUHUS-DUBROW

n December of 1934, an unemployed its summit where a great wind blew…. The Recovering stockbroker named Bill Wilson checked Then came the blazing thought, ‘you are Intoxication and Its Aftermath himself into Towns Hospital in Manhat- a free man.’” By Leslie Jamison tan. He had a habit of consuming more Bill Wilson never drank again. He went Little, Brown & Company. 544 pp. $30 I than two quarts of whiskey per day, and on to found Alcoholics Anonymous, the his wife had implored him to get help. The grassroots organization that has helped How to Change Your Mind doctor gave Wilson an extract of bella- millions of people achieve and sustain What the New Science of Psychedelics Teaches donna, a plant with hallucinogenic proper- sobriety. The story of Wilson’s spiritual Us About Consciousness, Dying, Addiction, ties, which at the time was an experimental awakening figures prominently in AA my- Depression, and Transcendence treatment for alcoholism. That afternoon, thology. The part about the preceding drug By Michael Pollan the “room blazed with an indescribably dose does not. Penguin Press. 480 pp. $28 white light,” Wilson later wrote. A vision Wilson’s dabbling in psychedelics— of a mountain came to him. “I stood upon including later experiments with LSD— tural criticism, and Michael Pollan’s How comes up in two new books: Leslie Jamison’s to Change Your Mind, an exploration of the Rebecca Tuhus-Dubrow is the author of Personal The Recovering, a memoir of drinking and awesome powers of psychedelics to enrich Stereo, a cultural history of the Walkman. quitting intertwined with literary and cul- human consciousness. Many other authors ILLUSTRATION BY TIM ROBINSON 32 The Nation. July 2/9, 2018 have covered similar ground, but Pollan Exams. We hear again about Jamison’s abor- was, she suggests, a matter of sovereignty and Jamison bring to bear singular gifts. tion, her heart surgery, the time she was over herself. “My shame about drinking They are, in some ways, very different writ- punched in the face by a guy on the street wasn’t mainly about embarrassment at what ers: Pollan is at heart a journalist oriented in Nicaragua. We’re back on the couch I did when I was drunk,” she writes; “it was toward the world; Jamison, trained as a with the consummate analysand. (“I wanted about how much I wanted to get drunk in fiction writer, is drawn to her own psyche to be loved because I deserved it. Except the first place.” She drank because she need- for material. But both deftly synthesize re- I was scared to be loved like this, because ed to drink; she quit for the same reason. search and their own experiences into finely what if I stopped deserving it? Unconditional Into the story of her addiction and crafted narratives that give new life to these love was insulting, but conditional love was recovery, Jamison weaves those of others, familiar themes. terrifying.”) Yet this time, the vignettes especially writers like Charles Jackson, These authors approach mind-altering and self-scrutiny are presented in a more John Berryman, Denis Johnson, and Jean substances from apparently opposite per- straightforward memoir, fleshed out with Rhys. She also pays attention to nonceleb- spectives. Jamison shows how they can context and with the narrative propulsion rities: women convicted on drug charges destroy lives and how to escape their thrall; that chronology bestows. Her prose, mean- in Arizona and forced to work on a chain Pollan focuses on their potential to trans- while, has become looser, freer, and funnier. gang in the extreme heat; alcoholics who form lives for the better. As the story of The humor often comes at her own spent time in a ragtag recovery center Bill Wilson suggests, however, unexpected expense. While working a post-college called Seneca House. The idea, she connections arise between the two books. job at a bed-and-breakfast, she explains, is that all of these Taking drugs and recovering are not always sneaks wine intended for the stories will collectively bear as incompatible as they seem. guests. “I never thought of some resemblance to an this as drinking on the job, AA meeting. eslie Jamison came to widespread at- although strictly speak- Through these sto- tention in 2014 with the publication ing—or really any way ries, Jamison explores of her essay collection The Empathy of speaking—it was,” how addiction gets Exams. The essays mined episodes she writes. Elsewhere, refracted through L from Jamison’s life—her abortion, her she recounts anticipat- race and gender. heart surgery, the time she was punched in ing reactions the first White male alcohol- the nose by a guy on the street in Nicara- time she told her story at ic writers have often gua—for insights into suffering and what it an AA meeting. “People been lauded as tortured means to try to feel the pain of others. The would compliment my story geniuses. White women collection also included journalistic pieces; or the way I’d told it, and I’d are typically denied that sta- for one, she spent time with sufferers of demur, Well, I’m a writer, shrug- tus, but their substance use does a disease called Morgellons, which causes ging, trying not to make too big a deal out often get them cast as wounded and in- its victims to believe they have mysterious of it.” Instead, midway through her earnest teresting. People of color with substance- fibers emerging from their skin. Jamison account, a half-senile old-timer interrupts, use issues, by contrast, are more likely to sought not simply to extol empathy but to “This is boring!” be depicted as criminals than as victims. grapple with its limits and vanities. As one Perhaps part of the reason he found her These general observations are not new, representative sentence put it, “empathy is story boring is that there was no obvious but Jamison’s critique adds depth and nu- always perched precariously between gift trauma or other hardship that led her to the ance: “The crack mother was the negative and invasion.” balm of booze. Her alcoholism was almost image of the addict genius: She wasn’t Jamison, who had previously published tautological: She needed to drink because someone whose dependence fueled her a novel, The Gin Closet, was hailed as an she needed to drink. Starting at the Uni- creative powers. She was someone whose heir to Susan Sontag and Joan Didion, versity of Iowa, where she enrolled in the dependence meant she’d failed to create and The Empathy Exams is undeniably im- MFA program; then in New Haven, where the way she was supposed to.” pressive. Nearly every page is dense with she moved for a PhD program in English While this taxonomy shows how our insight, expressed in tautly constructed at Yale; and then back in Iowa, with some culture divides addicts, AA meetings, in sentences. Sometimes reading it feels like travel to Central America along the way, Jamison’s account, work a reverse alchemy: sitting in on a therapy session with a hyper- “Intoxication had become the feeling I was They bring together people of different introspective, hyper-articulate patient—an most interested in having.” demographics and classes. As a graduate appraisal some might interpret, but I don’t Nor were there any catastrophic con- student at Yale, Jamison finds herself at intend, as pejorative. But it has shortcom- sequences for Jamison. She maintained meetings with homeless men and sorority ings common to many essay collections. loving relationships with her family. She girls. In AA, social background seems to lose While the volume is ostensibly knit to- published a novel and continued to amass some salience, as does individuality. In the gether by the themes of pain and empathy, fancy credentials. During this time, she had stories that make up the heart of the meet- some pieces, such as a brief account of a a long-term relationship with a fellow grad ings, the parallels stand out to fellow AA trip to a writers’ conference, feel like filler. student, and while her drinking caused ten- members much more than the differences. The book can also come across as overly sion, their relationship was relatively stable As a writer who had always been taught performative. It is easier to admire than for years before they amicably separated. A to prize originality, Jamison initially chafes to enjoy. recent profile of her in New York magazine against this emphasis on sameness. She The Recovering covers some of the same was titled “Where’s the Train Wreck?” wants her contribution to shine. She also autobiographical territory as The Empathy Why, then, did Jamison need to quit? It cringes at the frequently invoked catch- July 2/9, 2018 The Nation. 33 phrases: “Feelings aren’t facts” or “Some- consciousness in astonishing ways. (LSD, sion spiritual experiences in that part of the times the solution has nothing to do with the which we think of as the most “synthetic,” population known as “healthy normals.” problem.” Ultimately, however, she comes originates in a fungus known as ergot, Pol- Crucially, the subjects in these experiments to see the value of both of these aspects lan reports.) take the drugs under controlled conditions of AA. Clichés, she realizes, can serve the Pollan always researches his subjects intended to maximize the likelihood of a same purpose as mantras or prayers; their exhaustively and doesn’t shy away from “good trip.” They do so in comfortable familiarity is a source of solace. They point getting his hands dirty, often literally. For rooms, with vaguely New Age interior to another way in which the individual can his book on architecture, he built a hut in design, often lying on couches, wearing recede. “You weren’t responsible for what his backyard; for The Omnivore’s Dilemma, eyeshades, and listening to music. Most im- got said, because you were all parts of a he shot a pig. For this book, it was prob- portant, their trips are overseen by trained machine bigger than any one of you…. Cli- ably inevitable that he would seek guides who gently give instructions chés were the dialect of that machine, its to acquire firsthand knowledge such as “Trust the trajectory” ancient tongue.” As for the repetitiveness of the wonders of psyche- and “TLO—Trust, Let Go, of the testimony, Jamison begins to cher- delics, although doing so Be Open.” ish the resemblances between her story pushed him outside his Pollan interviews a and those of others who shared the same comfort zone. “I gen- number of subjects and struggles and overcame them. “Our stories erally prefer to leave researchers, and they were valuable because of this redundancy, my psychic depths un- unanimously rhapso- not despite it.” disturbed, assuming dize about their drug- In writing The Recovering, Jamison re- they exist,” he writes. induced odysseys. A veals, she wrestled with these challenges: Still, he overcame his researcher named Bill not only how to tell a story that has been trepidation to embark Richards tells Pollan: told many times before, but how to recon- on several psychedelic “‘Awe,’ ‘glory,’ and ‘grat- cile her literary impulse for originality with “journeys.” itude’ were the only words her newfound appreciation for the virtues of Pollan has also long dem- that remained relevant.” Like clichés and redundancy. Part of her answer onstrated an enchanting facility Jamison, Pollan sometimes winces is to incorporate this conundrum into her with the English language and a knack for at the clichés he encounters, though he rec- inquiry. She salutes the value of unoriginal- conjuring the offbeat characters he encoun- ognizes that the problem lies partly in the ity but does not embody it. Her analytical ters in his research and reporting, from inadequacy of language to capture these in- sharpness and assiduous attention to words Johnny Appleseed to the entrepreneurs of effable experiences. Sometimes the people are the very reverse of reaching for the organic farming. As opposed to Jamison’s providing the reports are themselves self- nearest truism. quotable one-liners, his gifts manifest in conscious about this. One researcher wrote: a playfulness whose magic accretes over “I have at times been almost embarrassed by running theme throughout The Re- paragraphs. This virtuosity and charisma them, as if they give voice to a cosmic vision covering is the relationship of alcohol are less evident in How to Change Your of the triumph of love that one associates to truth. “In vino veritas was one Mind (starting with the title, which is no derisively with the platitudes of Hallmark of the most appealing promises of Omnivore’s Dilemma). Perhaps ironically, cards…. Love conquers all.” A drinking: that it wasn’t degradation given the topic, the writing is more, well, but illumination, that it wasn’t obscuring sober. But it is always lucid, and there are ollan came of age in the 1970s, in the truth but unveiling it,” Jamison writes. For parts—such as his portrayal of an eccentric midst of the LSD backlash, and his ex- her, at least, that promise proved illusory. mycologist who considers mushrooms to be posure to psychedelics was limited to But as Pollan’s book argues, psychedelics a virtual panacea for the world’s ills—where a couple of mild trips on mushrooms. really can deliver illumination. While they his old mischievous charm reappears. P Now approaching 60, he takes a series have acquired associations with visual hal- Pollan starts by reviewing what he calls of trips, all but one under the supervision lucinations, users overwhelmingly report a “renaissance” in the study of psychedelics. of underground guides. (He had hoped to that they don’t distort reality so much as A rich body of research was conducted by participate in a study, but a suspension of reveal it for the first time. The other, related scientists in the mid–20th century. But after research in “healthy normals” eliminated hallmark of the psychedelic experience is Timothy Leary famously urged an entire that option.) While apprehensive, he is the dissolution of the ego, the melting of generation to drop acid in the 1960s, and reassured by his research: Psychedelics are boundaries between the self and the world. the drug escaped the bounds of the lab, panic actually very safe; there is no known fatal These two features make psychedelic trips ensued. Before long, federal funding dried dose, nor are they addictive. revelatory, sometimes mystical experiences up for research on these substances, which As we might expect from a writer of Pol- that can affect their beneficiaries for years. were now seen as unacceptably subversive. lan’s caliber, his accounts of his trips largely Pollan’s oeuvre is usually associated with Starting in the early years of this cen- avoid the generalities and platitudes that food, but his subject, really, is broader: the tury, however, the US government began characterize the typical descriptions. He intersection of humanity and nature. His to quietly sanction new research into these tries valiantly to chronicle his experiences second book, A Place of My Own (1997), took drugs. The new studies have corroborated with fidelity and specificity. “The word and on building and architecture: how people the findings of past work and extended sense of ‘poignance’ flooded over me dur- convert the planet’s materials into shel- them, revealing the power of psychedelics ing the walk through the garden,” he writes ter. And now his latest book explores how to ease the fear of dying, to break addic- of a mushroom trip. “[O]ne’s usual sense certain earthly substances can change our tions, to overcome depression, and to occa- of oneself as a subject observing objects in 34 The Nation. July 2/9, 2018 space—objects that have been thrown into don’t typically become terrorists or Twitter different. A trip on mushrooms or LSD is relief and rendered discrete by the appar- trolls. “I believe this could revolutionize passive: You feel that “the doors of percep- ent void that surrounds them—gave way mental health care,” one researcher tells tion,” as Aldous Huxley famously put it to a sense of being deep inside and fully Pollan, an opinion prevalent among psyche- (borrowing a line from William Blake), are implicated in this scene, one more being in delic researchers. opening for you. And this state of mind is relation to the myriad other beings and to not sustainable; even if the insights can stay the whole.” or many who are familiar with psyche- with us, it would not be practical to cry Pollan goes on to have more intense delics, it is intuitive that they could with joy all day as we floss our teeth and experiences at higher doses. He is flooded help ease anxiety about dying and lift drive to work and help our kids with math with love for his family, compassion for vari- depression. Less intuitive is the notion homework. AA, by contrast, is mundane ous people from his past (his beleaguered F that a drug might hold the key to sur- and involves effort—sometimes very pain- fourth-grade music teacher makes an ap- mounting addiction. And yet psychedelics ful effort. It’s about showing up even when pearance), and gratitude not just for his life seem to hold great promise in that regard as you don’t want to. It’s about drinking bad but “for the very fact of being, that there well. The mechanism appears to be a kind of coffee in unpleasantly lit church basements. is anything whatsoever. Rather than being “reboot of the system—a biological control- It’s about going through the motions on the necessarily the case, this now seemed quite alt-delete,” one researcher says. A potent days when you’d really rather knock back the miracle, and something I resolved never experience can shake addicts out of a martini or six. It’s about real- again to take for granted.” ingrained mental patterns and izing that external actions are Other than the insights commonly deliv- grant them new flexibility, sometimes more important ered by psychedelics, Pollan arrives at sev- while putting the cravings than your internal mind- eral additional conclusions. He learns that of the self into a larger set—and that the former one unusual aspect of the effects of these perspective. can change the latter. As drugs is their durability. It’s not the chemi- Pollan speaks to Jamison beautifully puts cal reaction that matters; it’s the resulting several participants in it, “Action could coax be- experience, which, afterward, remarkably, a smoking-cessation lief rather than testifying continues to seem legitimate. Users con- study, which offered to it.” sistently believe, after the chemical has cognitive-behavior thera- A distinction is fre- worn off, that they’ve been granted access py followed by the adminis- quently drawn between reli- to great truths, and often the revelations tration of psilocybin (the active gion and spirituality, two differ- stay with them and change their lives in ingredient in “magic mushrooms”). ent but overlapping spheres. In this profound ways. To increase the odds of such It was a small study, but the results were context, it seems to me that psychedelics outcomes, Pollan comes to believe in the striking. Six months after their trips, 80 embody a certain form of spirituality—di- critical importance of a set of rituals, guide- percent of the participants had not resumed rect access to revelation, a realm where lines, and authorities to direct the powerful the habit. (A year later, this figure had words are both inadequate and unneces- experiences unleashed by these molecules. dropped to 67 percent—still better than sary—while AA typifies religion, meaning Indeed, other societies that sanction the the results obtained by established meth- a set of rules and rituals performed in the use of psychedelics have typically put such ods.) One participant told Pollan: “It put context of a supportive community. In a re- protocols into place. The imperative to do smoking in a whole new context. Smoking ligion, words are essential: the text of the sa- so, he realizes, might have been the key les- seemed very unimportant; it seemed kind of cred scriptures (AA’s Big Book, the 12 steps, son of the 1960s. stupid, to be honest.” As for alcoholism, the the sayings) as well as the primary means of Pollan also revises his understanding evidence is similarly intriguing, although communicating with co-religionists (recov- of the word “spiritual.” He had always as- more research is needed. In the 1950s ery stories). sociated it with a belief in the supernatural, through the ’70s, thousands of alcoholics Perhaps that’s the lesson we can derive which he didn’t, and still doesn’t, possess. received psychedelic treatment, but many from both of these books: We need the But his psychedelic excursions showed him of the studies had flawed designs. A 2012 epiphanies and the rites, the inward reflec- the possibility of transcendence that re- meta-analysis of the best studies, however, tion and the community, and perhaps part quired no faith; it was a matter of seeing did find a “significant beneficial effect on of the problem with modern life is that these and feeling more deeply and of loosening alcohol misuse” from one dose of LSD, are so often missing. The paths of these two the grip of the ego. “The usual antonym lasting up to six months. authors may differ, but both offer us some for the word ‘spiritual’ is ‘material,’” he Here we return to the parallels between equipment for living in a fuller and more writes. “Now I’m inclined to think a much psychedelics and AA, some of which Pollan authentic fashion. Psychedelics are not the better and certainly more useful antonym notes. Both involve a recognition of a power only route to mystical experience, but they for ‘spiritual’ might be ‘egotistical.’” beyond the self (not necessarily supernatu- provide an unusually reliable introduction Finally, another peculiarity of psyche- ral); both encourage a diminution of the ego to that state of mind. AA tells its members to delics, Pollan shows, is that they often and an embrace of connection with others. acknowledge the limits of their autonomy, lead their enthusiasts to become evangelical An integral part of AA is helping others to to commit to unsparing honesty with them- about their potential usefulness for all of achieve sobriety, just as the evangelists for selves, to dedicate their lives to helping oth- humanity. This impulse makes sense, and psychedelics seek to promote the benefits of ers. We could all do worse than to live by not just from an altruistic perspective. After these extraordinary molecules. these principles—even those of us who can all, people convinced of the unity of all be- But, of course, psychedelic trips and the enjoy a single glass of Pinot Grigio and call ings and the supreme importance of love work of a 12-step program are also very it a night. Q July 2/9, 2018 The Nation. 35

SEPARATE AND UNEQUAL Black and white intellectuals and the politics of multiculturalism by ROBERT GREENE

any Americans think of the South Walker directs our attention elsewhere: to The Burning House only in terms of two events: the those intellectuals who, in the second half of Jim Crow and the Making of Civil War and the civil-rights move- the 20th century, sought to save some of the Modern America ment. This has also been buttressed, unique qualities of Southern culture. By Anders Walker M since the 1960s, by an interest in The South, Walker argues, did more Yale. 304 pp. $30 the “Southern strategy” that the Republican than offer heroic moments of black auto- Party began to pursue with Barry Goldwater’s emancipation and shameful moments of not defenders of segregation; in fact, most vote against the Civil Rights Act in 1964 and white supremacy; it also served as the arena were active in helping tear it down. But they that reached an apex with Richard Nixon’s for an ongoing debate over multiculturalism. feared that the region might also lose some of mastery of racial code words (“states’ rights,” This might seem like a strange assertion at its cultural heterogeneity: In particular, they “law and order”) in the 1968 presidential first, as the politics of multiculturalism are worried that it might lose its distinct white campaign. A new history by Anders Walker, usually framed in the context of the late and black cultures and become flattened into The Burning House: Jim Crow and the Mak- 20th century, when conflicts over how to the more homogeneous culture found in the ing of Modern America, touches on many of define a country’s cultural identity exploded rest of America. these events and their lingering legacies, but in Europe. But Walker’s provocative thesis One might argue with this thesis on a is this: Beginning in the 1940s, black and variety of accounts. Thinking of the South Robert Greene is a PhD candidate in history white writers—from Zora Neale Hurston to as having two distinct cultures, one white, at the University of South Carolina and has Robert Penn Warren—began to worry about one black, as opposed to one culture that previously written for Jacobin, In These Times, what might happen to the South’s culture in was a mixture of the two, is already highly and Dissent. the wake of integration. These writers were questionable. For that matter, it is unclear if ILLUSTRATION BY TIM ROBINSON 36 The Nation. July 2/9, 2018 the rest of the nation was truly as monocul- tion overturning it. Other writers discussed embracing a view of African-American cultural as some of the intellectuals in Walker’s in the book, such as Faulkner, promoted a tural separation. When the two met in 1964, book seem to believe. The work of historians similar ideology of the South being cultur- Carmichael had not yet made his complete like Jon Lauck, for instance, reminds us ally superior to the rest of the nation due turn to Black Power. But the ideas that that the Midwest has its own rich literary to the biracial and bicultural system arising formed the basis of the movement—self- and cultural heritage—to say nothing of from Jim Crow. reliance and a pride in African-American the significant racial and ethnic cultures Walker doesn’t pull any punches when culture—were already there for Carmi- that permeated other regions of the United it comes to these white intellectuals. Their chael to adopt. In the interview, Warren States outside the South. arguments for a biracial culture ultimately asks Carmichael why nonviolence mattered. Even so, Walker has opened up a fresh served to empower white Southerners, not Carmichael explains: “I never took the ap- way of thinking about the intellectual his- black ones, and Walker’s story is very much proach we’ve got to teach them to love us…. tory of the South during the civil- about the untenable nature of I thought that was nonsense from the start. rights movement, and he also their position. White South- But I was impressed by the way [the dem- asks some tough questions ern liberals had to choose onstrators] conducted themselves, the way about how we should between civil and they sat there and took the punishment.” remember its legacy. human rights, on the For Carmichael, the compelling feature A professor of law at one hand, and white- of the civil-rights movement’s nonviolence Saint Louis Univer- supremacist re- wasn’t its ethical appeal, but that it repre- sity, Walker focused gimes, on the other; sented an act of black resolve, a symbol of his first book, The there was no middle independence and black Americans’ power Ghost of Jim Crow, ground. Seeking to on their own. on the white South- preserve the South’s For Warren, Walker notes, this “in- ern moderates who, biracial character, cipient iteration of Black Power proved a under the guise of pro- in a context in which coup…enabling him to demonstrate that moting gradual progress black Americans and pluralism reigned even among young black and “respect” for African- their culture were not activists, who demonstrated little interest American culture, tried to treated equally, figures like in joining white society or culture.” But slow the implementation of the Warren ended up only help- it’s hard to ignore the cynicism operating Supreme Court’s landmark Brown v. ing to reinforce African Americans’ here. Warren and other white Southerners Board of Education ruling in the late 1950s. In unequal status in the South. And so it is not who wanted to see Southern white culture The Burning House, we get a different set of surprising that many of these arguments were preserved had found few allies within the ghost stories about the afterlife of Jim Crow, later invoked by people like Powell. civil-rights movement; with figures like but it’s a book that follows the same line of Walker’s argument becomes trickier Baldwin and Carmichael, Warren wanted reasoning, showing how the multicultural when it involves those black writers who to show black Americans were making a arguments made by intellectuals who wanted also expressed trepidation about the future similar argument. Baldwin and Carmichael, to sustain the South’s cultural heterogeneity of the South’s black culture and wanted to on the other hand, felt they had little in had their own unintended consequences, find a way to preserve it. In particular, many common with someone like Warren. Be- ending up being used by Supreme Court Jus- of these black intellectuals and activists wor- tween them was a large gulf: Warren was in tice Lewis Powell in his effort to undermine ried about what would happen if, as Baldwin pursuit of a cultural pluralism for the sake affirmative action’s constitutional standing. put it, black culture was integrated into the of a once-dominant culture; Baldwin and “burning house” of the United States. For Carmichael wanted a pluralism that might o tell this story, Walker gives us a Walker, this is what makes this generation help emancipate and protect a culture that wide-ranging intellectual and literary of black writers so historically intriguing. for centuries had been violently suppressed. history, beginning with the rise of They found the moderate position taken by the Southern Agrarians in the early white Southern liberals like Warren baneful, alker picks up some of these ambi- T 1930s. Hurston and Warren, as well as and they frequently challenged it. Yet they guities in the second thread of his James Baldwin, William Faulkner, Harper also questioned the bleak, materialist ethos book, which chronicles the story of Lee, Richard Wright, Ralph Ellison, Flan- of modern American culture and hoped Lewis F. Powell Jr. A Virginia-born nery O’Connor, Eudora Welty, and Stokely that black culture might be able to preserve W lawyer who served as a Supreme Carmichael, all make appearances. Not all some of its unique characteristics—espe- Court justice from 1972 to 1987, Powell of these people were from the South— cially black culture as it existed in the South. is infamous among progressives for the Baldwin and Carmichael grew up in New In one of the more eye-opening sections so-called “Powell Memo,” which he wrote York, for instance—but nearly all of them of The Burning House, Walker explores War- in 1971 to the US Chamber of Commerce, spent much of their lives fighting against ren’s interview with Carmichael just as the arguing that American business should be- or writing about the region’s segregation. latter was beginning to enter his more radi- come more involved in politics. What is For these writers, culture and politics were cal phase in the mid-1960s. Warren initially less known—but for Walker is of immense never far apart. This was particularly true expected Carmichael and other young black importance—is the role that Powell played for Warren, who saw the cultural strength activists to support the integrationist drive in defining a conservative idea of “diversity” of the South as proof that the region needed not only in civil society and legal institu- in several Supreme Court decisions in the nothing more than to reform its Jim Crow tions, but also on questions relating to cul- 1970s concerning school segregation and system—as opposed to a wholesale revolu- ture. So he was surprised to find Carmichael affirmative action in college admissions. July 2/9, 2018 The Nation. 37

In Keyes v. School District No. 1 (1973), have a tendency—and it is an unshakable a “smoking gun” to indicate that Powell gave Powell wrote a concurring opinion insisting tendency—to want to share common social credit to Warren for his Supreme Court rul- that local community control of schools— clubs, common churches, common restau- ings. Likewise, as Baldwin and Carmichael and therefore de facto segregation—was rants,” an argument that runs very closely to would have noted, there’s a world of differ- constitutional. If, for example, various the one being made by those in the North ence between the cultural pluralism of black government programs had pushed African and the South who sought to resegregate writers seeking an independent African- Americans into lower-income areas with schools and neighborhoods. American culture and white ones seeking fewer sources of funding for their schools, Had The Burning House’s sections on some continuation of the “Southern way of then so be it: The federal government, in the 1970s included Albert Murray, Walker life.” After all, the Southern way of life for Powell’s view, had no power to change such would have found a fascinating foil for the much of America’s history meant a world of conditions, because to do so risked damag- arguments made by the likes of Warren and slavery and racial hierarchy. That was hardly ing the cultural autonomy of local commu- Powell. While offering glowing portraits the kind of Southern culture that black intel- nities. “As Powell saw it, Brown demanded of black culture in the South, Murray also lectuals were calling for. an end to overtly segregationist law, nothing argued in his 1970 The Omni-Americans that Nonetheless, The Burning House is a more,” Walker writes. Integration was a it was through these different cultures that worthwhile book for anyone interested in the laudable goal, Powell claimed, but it could a national American culture would emerge. continuing importance of the South to the na- not be administered by the federal govern- “Ethnic differences,” Murray wrote, “are tion’s culture and politics. The recent off-year ment, only by local school districts. More the very essence of cultural diversity and election in Virginia and the Senate special importantly, however, this opinion was an national creativity.” One could have a cul- election in Alabama have proved that the road example of Powell arguing publicly that the tural pluralism while also not giving way to to a progressive future for the United States South was, in Walker’s words, “no more Warren’s vision of a dual Southern culture, goes through the South. The Burning House guilty of racial injustice than anyplace else.” or Powell’s use of “diversity” to defend de reminds us that this road will be marked by One can begin to hear how Warren’s facto segregation and racial inequality. That twists, turns, and hazardous pitfalls. “Ethnic multicultural argument intersects with Murray’s argument never gained a larger differences are the very essence of cultural di- Powell’s defense of segregation in the Keyes audience in his time was a symbol of the versity and national creativity,” Murray wrote concurrence. But Powell’s biggest contribu- dominance of an American culture that, in in the introduction to The Omni-Americans. tion to the modern history of race and law the 1970s, wanted to move beyond concern Understanding the fraught relationship became in the Court’s decision in Regents of about the antiblack racism associated with tween diversity and power—whether eco- the University of California v. Bakke (1978), images of marches in the South. Threading nomic, political, or social—is something that when he argued that diversity could be the needle on race, culture, and diversity still eludes most Americans. Q taken into account as a factor in college would be a bit easier if more intellectuals had admissions, but not to respond to historical wrestled with Murray’s example. injustice against African Americans. In- stead, Powell thought that the only reason cholars and historians of the South diversity could be taken into account was have, in recent years, started to reflect when it was designed to promote “academic on the diversity of thought in the freedom.” As Walker notes, this kind of region. Zandria Robinson’s This Ain’t argument, like the Southern moderates’ S Chicago makes a compelling argument position examined in his first book, pur- for the differences between African Ameri- portedly seeks to protect the “diversity” of cans in the North and the South. Jason cultural institutions but is, in fact, “hostile Sokol’s There Goes My Everything attempts to aggressive government efforts aimed at to unveil the reactions of white Southern- achieving equality.” Like Warren, Powell ers to the revolution taking place around made a case for multicultural pluralism that them. The Burning House fits well within the ultimately weakened the idea of social, as growing literature about the modern South, well as cultural, integration. a literature that does not assume “Southern It is no coincidence that Powell’s rise exceptionalism”—the view that the South’s to the Supreme Court in the early 1970s history and culture are radically different came just as the nation was attempting to from the rest of the nation—but, instead, reckon with the meaning of “Southernness.” attempts to understand the region from a Scholars like John Egerton, who wrote The variety of different viewpoints. Americanization of Dixie, and politicians like Even so, one weakness of The Burning Jimmy Carter had started to ask serious House is that it’s not entirely clear that Pow- questions about what it meant to be a white ell was directly influenced by the Southern Southerner after the successes of the civil- writers profiled in the first two-thirds of the rights movement. As a result, Walker argues, book. It would be easy to assume that he it was not only Powell and his fellow con- came from the same ideological tradition as servatives who found in cultural pluralism most of the white writers in Walker’s book, a means to enliven Southern identity; it was an ideology that criticized the worst excesses also liberals like Carter, who argued during of Jim Crow while also remaining uncom- his 1976 presidential campaign that “people fortable with integration. But there’s never 38 The Nation. July 2/9, 2018 Puzzle No. 3469

JOSHUA KOSMAN AND HENRI PICCIOTTO

1`2`3`4`5`6`7~~ DOWN `~`~`~`~`~`~`~8 1 White South African protects woman in arbor (5) 9``````~0`````` 2 At first, Tupac MC’d in a corner (7) 3 What comes across heroic, if Fox Entertainment backs `~`~`~`~`~`~`~` away by virtue of one’s position (2,7) -``~=`````````` 4 Understand corpulent Spanish man halfway (6) ~~`~`~`~`~~~`~` 5 Some evergreen growth definitely has to be in France, q`````~w``e```` bearing weight (3,5) `~~~`~r~`~`~~~` 6 Discharges, second time around (5) t`y`````~u``i`` 7 Colleagues ultimately choose to accept the man’s a `~`~~~`~o~`~`~~ specious reasoner (7) p```[``````~]`\ 8 Loud newspaper tirade that comes out smelling like a rose `~`~`~`~`~`~`~` (8) a``````~s`````` 13 Eastern European snake eats half-slice of nectarine (8) 15 Doctor Oakland squad, maintaining elegance in driving `~`~`~`~`~`~`~` contests (4,5) ~~d```````````` 16 What the NSA collects from you and me (fanfare ACROSS imitation): thanks (8) 1 Nonetheless, bring back Congressman Hoyer to worry 18 In bar, order tall part of a beer can (4,3) about large devices for capturing flashes of color? (9,4) 20 Mansion caretaker’s beginning to despise gold (7) 9 Exhaust our team before a defeat (4,3) 21 Thick hose doesn’t begin to hold a bit of heat (6) 10 An urge for every moan (7) 23 Meditative soldier in playful upset (5) 11 and 24 Compensated agent with help (6) 25 For example, do away with uplifting and sad musical work (5) 12 Healthy beauties in Paradise, head to toe in brief romance (11) 13 Summons editor inside to dress up (6) 14 Sell James a blood feud (8) SOLUTION TO PUZZLE NO. 3468 17 Fashionable dice for parts of a joint support group? (3,5) ACROSS 1 JEANS + I + BELIUS (anag.) ~~JEANSIBELIUS~ 9 T + RUER 10 PHOENI (anag.) + CIA A~O~B~E~R~A~N~P 19 Living symbol seen in mother’s bed (6) 11 MAN’S + PLAIN 12 hidden 13 “sticks” TRUER~PHOENICIA 22 Sweet song associated with Frank Sinatra, except involving 14 FL(U + ID)OUNCE 17 L + AMPS + O~R~U~I~W~C~L~N HADES 19 IRO (anag.) + N 22 hidden MANSPLAIN~ELECT class (5,3,3) 23 HOT + SPRING 26 anag. ~~E~T~~~R~L~A~H 27 [d]ICING 28 TRI(PLED + E)CKER 24 See 11 STYX~FLUIDOUNCE DOWN 1 JO(URN)EY 2 A(BRUP)T E~~~P~O~C~T~~~O 26 Island smuggled in giant iguana (7) (burp anag.) 3 SE(PI)A 4 pun LAMPSHADES~IRON 5 L + AN + [o]CELOT 6 UNCLE + A + N F~I~Y~T~~~U~A~~ 27 After transport of uranium to the front, one kind of power is 7 anag. 8 P(ANT)HEON (phone anag.) 13 [h]SELF + MADE (rev.) MEDIC~HOTSPRING incomprehensible (7) 15 L(OATHS)OME (mole anag.) A~Y~H~S~H~T~N~I 28 16 PSY (anag.) + C + HSUP (rev.) DRESSCODE~ICING Ha—clues became cryptic, which is what you get by stirring 18 anag. 20 2 defs. 21 U(P(T)IC)K E~A~U~M~M~C~E~S together elements from three Across entries (8,5) 24 THE + ME 25 2 defs. ~TRIPLEDECKER~~

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