ILLEGAL ATTACK ON SYRIA OFF TO THE RACISTS PHYLLIS BENNIS DONNA MINKOWITZ

MAY 14, 2018

To understand why evangelicals support HOW the president, look to the founder of MARTIN Protestantism. LUTHER BY MICHAEL MASSING PAVED THE WAY FOR DONALD TRUMP The Pope is a true werewolf. Sad!

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A Worthy Tribute legal construct, but what does it mean in the real world? How is it that a Victor Navasky, who knows a thing person comes to our shores seeking or two about the enduring power of refuge, and we incarcerate him for an political cartoons (see his brilliant indefinite but lengthy period under book on the subject, The Art of Con- poor conditions, although he has troversy), is wise to celebrate Robert done exactly as we prescribe asylum Grossman [“Comic Genius,” April Subscribe wherever you seekers should do? And how dare we 16]. Grossman was my friend since get your podcasts or go to tell him that he hasn’t been tortured the age of 19, through thick and thin, TheNation.com as our children grew up together and enough to merit our help? /StartMakingSense Kevin McKinney as our later chapters intertwined in a camden, s.c. to listen today. swell, enduring friendship. This man was a one-of-a-kind What Took So Long? KAREEM ABDUL-JABBAR genius who knew how to use his wit, Re “A Voice of Dissent in the GOP,” wisdom, artistic talent, and sweetness MARGARET ATWOOD by Barry Yeoman [April 2]: I was a to make our struggling American teenager and young adult while the CHARLES BLOW NOAM CHOMSKY democracy more aware of its foibles Vietnam War raged. I knew then PATRICK COCKBURN DAVID COLE and challenges. His most powerful that the United States had no busi- works were often his portraits and MIKE DAVIS BARBARA EHRENREICH ness fighting there and, moreover, strips on the dreadful failed politi- KEITH ELLISON SUSAN FALUDI that the war was unwinnable. The cians who have let us down again and futility and idiotic lack of reasoning FRANCES FITZGERALD again. My favorite was his “Emperor’s behind the debacle was even more ERIC FONER THOMAS FRANK New Clothes” illustration of Richard evident after the publication of out- Nixon, Spiro Agnew, John Mitchell, ALEX GIBNEY AMY GOODMAN standing books by Gary Hess, Neil et al., marching forth to their own ADAM GOPNIK CHRIS HAYES Sheehan, David Halberstam, and destruction in nothing but their un- others. This lesson has stuck with MARGO JEFFERSON derwear. More recently, his “Dump me throughout my life. NAOMI KLEIN LAILA LALAMI Trump” bags to collect your dog’s Republican Congressman Walter droppings made me laugh in celebra- NORMAN LEAR GREIL MARCUS Jones Jr. is a decade or so older than tion once again. Anne B. Zill JANE MAYER BILL MCKIBBEN portland, maine I am. I fail to see why he had to wait WALTER MOSLEY JOHN NICHOLS until after our Iraq War effort caused Beyond the Border of Cruelty JOSHUA OPPENHEIMER such chaos and mayhem in the Middle East to finally figure out that these RICK PERLSTEIN LAURA POITRAS Laila Lalami’s description of the shift in US immigration policy “from types of conflicts must be avoided. KATHA POLLITT ROBERT REICH the corrective to the punitive, and Why didn’t he learn that lesson from JOY REID FRANK RICH BERNIE now to the abusive” [“The Cruelty the Vietnam experience? SANDERS ANNA DEAVERE SMITH of ICE,” April 16] is spot-on. A few Barry Yeoman’s praise for the EDWARD SNOWDEN REBECCA months ago, I visited two inmates at congressman’s stance against further a for-profit immigration detention ventures of this sort seems a bit mis- SOLNIT OLIVER STONE center. One of the men was an asylum placed. Yes, it is certainly better that MARGARET TALBOT CALVIN TRILLIN seeker from an African nation where, Jones finally gleaned some obvious KATRINA VANDEN HEUVEL as a conscript, he had suffered incar- lessons regarding his uncritical sup- JOAN WALSH AMY WILENTZ ceration and torture. He had been port for this country’s wars, but what at the center for over a year. He told took him 35 years? It seems that The GARY YOUNGE DAVE ZIRIN me that during his asylum hearing, Nation could find better “heroes” to —Hosted by Jon Wiener the judge had ruled that his claims of enlighten progressives about. torture were “well-founded but not Harry E. Antoniou sufficient.” I’m sure that statement redondo beach, calif. made sense in terms of some accepted [email protected] UPFRONT

12 Online Privacy: Sell-By The Nation. Data; 13 India: Protest since 1865 3 Red-State Rebellion 4 Illegal Attack on Syria Phyllis Bennis 5 Q&A: Daniel Ellsberg 6 An About-Facebook? Micah L. Sifry Red-State Rebellion COLUMNS 8 The Liberal Media No News Is Bad News Eric Alterman 12 Between the Lines n the days since House Speaker Paul Ryan announced his After the Raid retirement from Congress, much of the commentary has Laila Lalami 13 Deadline Poet focused on his failures. Barring a sudden bout of legislative John Bolton Replaces I H.R. McMaster productivity, Ryan will relinquish the Speaker’s gavel with Calvin Trillin a deficit-expanding tax cut for corporations and the rich as his only significant achievement. Fortunately, his career- Features defining goals to privatize Social Security, convert Many states are facing similar funding chal- 14 How Martin Luther Medicare into a voucher system, and dismantle the lenges. In all, 29 states are now spending less per Paved the Way for rest of the social safety net remain unfulfilled. And student on K–12 education than they were a decade Donald Trump then, of course, there is his humiliating failure, ago, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Michael Massing dating back to the 2016 campaign, to stand up to Priorities. A number of these states have also cut The paradox of the President Trump. income taxes. Notably, the 10 states that have expe- Reformation and its legacy. Ryan’s legacy, however, is far bigger than any rienced the largest percentage decline in spending 18 Off to the Racists single policy or political battle. For the past decade, per student since 2008 all currently have Republican Donna Minkowitz he has been the leading advocate of an ideology governors and Republican-controlled legislatures. The Trump phenomenon that divides Americans into “makers” and The ongoing wave of teacher-led activ- is emboldening more white nationalists to run for office. “takers,” as he infamously put it, and EDITORIAL ism in red states is heartening for several whose main function is advancing the reasons, not least of which is the fact that 22 How Progressives economic interests of the former at the the teachers are achieving real victories. Can Engage Russia David Klion expense of the latter. By putting a friendly Last month, striking West Virginia teach- Whoever our next president face on punishing, plutocratic policies, ers won a 5 percent raise, among other is, one immediate problem Ryan hoodwinked a credulous media es- advances. Oklahoma lawmakers approved facing him or her will be tablishment into believing that he was an an increase in teacher pay funded in part how to deal with Russia. earnest wonk instead of the cruel reac- by higher taxes on the oil and gas industry, Books & tionary he really is. And while his ideas though they failed to provide additional the Arts have mostly stalled at the federal level, funding that is still badly needed. they have thrived in Republican-controlled states Meanwhile, the groundswell of support that 27 Progress and Poverty around the country—to devastating effect. teachers have received from students, parents, and Steven Hahn The consequences of Ryan-style conservatism activists is further evidence of what progressives 32 Ode to the Belt (poem) have provoked a growing backlash in the form of have long known: that the Republican Party’s devo- Sam Sax teacher demonstrations in West Virginia, Okla- tion to gutting public services is deeply unpopular, 33 Seeing Through homa, Kentucky, and Arizona. In Oklahoma, where including with many of the party’s own voters. As a Glass teachers staged a nine-day walkout in April, tax cuts one parent who supports the protesting teachers Barry Schwabsky for the wealthy beginning in 2004 were followed in Arizona told The New York Times, she normally 36 Hook Me in the by deep cuts to spending on public services. These votes Republican but “would switch party lines” First Five cuts deprived public schools of more than $350 over education funding. Briana Younger million per year, according to the Oklahoma Policy The key question, in these states and elsewhere, is 37 Waste My Life (poem) Institute, contributing to low teacher pay, large class how to effectively counter the ascendant right-wing Hera Lindsay Bird sizes, deteriorating textbooks, and four-day school populism that has enabled Republicans to retain weeks in parts of the state. Before teachers began power in spite of their policies. One promising model VOLUME 306, NUMBER 14, planning the walkout, which ended on April 13, state can be found in the Working Families Party, which May 14, 2018 lawmakers had not merely neglected these pressing recruits progressive candidates to run in Democratic The digital version of this issue is issues for years; they had exacerbated them by pass- primaries and mobilizes grassroots activists in 19 available to all subscribers April 19 ing additional tax cuts for the rich and renewing a states. (The party made headlines on April 14 by en- at TheNation.com. massive tax break for oil and gas companies. dorsing Cynthia Nixon against incumbent Democrat Cover illustration by Sabine Formanek. 4 The Nation. May 14, 2018

BY THE Andrew Cuomo in New York’s gubernatorial race.) That are legitimately singled out—along with weapons like NUMBERS includes West Virginia, where the founder of the state’s cluster bombs, which the United States has used with WFP chapter played an active role in the recent teacher impunity, and white phosphorus, an Israeli favorite in strike. In 2017, the Working Families Party supported Gaza—for their particularly indiscriminate nature. But more than 1,000 candidates in state and local elections, we cannot accept the hypocrisy of those who rage against nearly two-thirds of whom won their races. Randy Bryce, a still-unconfirmed chemical attack even as they remain the leading Democratic candidate to take over Paul Ryan’s silent about—or in some cases even applaud—the killing congressional seat in Wisconsin, is also a longtime WFP of Syrian and Iraqi civilians by US drones and bombers member. And the party recently announced that Maurice (according to the British monitoring group Airwars, US Mitchell, a veteran of the Movement for Black Lives, will and coalition air and artillery strikes have likely killed 60% become its national director, sending a strong signal about between 3,940 and 5,937 Syrian civilians, perhaps more, the Working Families Party’s commitment to advancing since August 2014); of Palestinian journalists and children Decline in multiracial progressive populism across the country. by US-armed Israeli sharpshooters; of Yemeni families newspaper employment Political scientist Corey Robin has suggested that by Saudi and United Arab Emirates bombers refueled in between 1990 the red-state teacher protests could mark a progressive midair by US Air Force pilots. and 2016, mark- turning point, parallel to the one presaged by California’s The Constitution makes clear that only Congress, ing the lowest passage of Proposition 13 in 1978, which helped usher in not the president, can declare war. The War Powers levels on record the Reagan Revolution. He may be right. But it’s up to Resolution allows a president to use military force on since 1978 those who oppose Ryan’s ideology to offer working peo- a very temporary basis without congressional approval ple who are fed up with Republican policies an alterna- only when there is an “attack upon the United States, its 2016 tive and inclusive vision that transcends race, region, and territories or possessions, or its armed forces”—none of Year with the partisan affiliation. As Mitchell recently told The Nation, which apply to Syria. The fact that Congress, in recent lowest daily- all working Americans deserve “a real political home.” decades, has largely abandoned its authority and allowed newspaper circulation presidents to go to war without its consent does not make numbers since unilateral White House wars legal. 1940 (2017 There have been important exceptions to this con- numbers aren’t Illegal Attack on Syria gressional acquiescence. The Congressional Progressive yet available) Caucus has called on President Trump “to immediately Only Congress, not the president, can declare war. reverse his policy of denying protections to Syrian refu- 34% he April 13 missile strikes by the United gees fleeing violence. Syria’s civil war continues to be a Approximate States, France, and Britain against three complex regional conflict,” the caucus notes, “and it has percentage of sites in Syria, ordered in response to an become increasingly clear that U.S. military interven- newspapers that alleged chemical-weapons assault by Bashar tions will likely add to the mass suffering in Syria.” have changed T ownership al-Assad’s army on the city of Douma on In terms of international law, there is no legal justi- since 2004 April 7, were launched in violation of both US and interna- fication for the current US troop presence in Syria, let tional law. The claims by these countries that they sought alone air or missile strikes. Perhaps anticipating that 600 to defend another aspect of international law does not concern, Defense Secretary James Mattis told the House make the missile strikes legal. And they’ve done nothing to Armed Services Committee that the April 13 attack on Minimum help bring the seven-year Syrian war to an end. Syria could be justified as self-defense because the 2,000 number of US newspapers Furthermore, the allied attack took place before we US troops on the ground there must be protected. What that have closed found out what actually happened in Douma. The Or- he ignored, of course, is that the US soldiers in Syria since 2004 ganization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, have not been attacked by Assad’s army—but even if they which has a United Nations mandate and is the only had been, the UN Charter’s self-defense exception does 63% internationally credible agency on chemical not apply when one country’s soldiers are Decline in weapons, was already headed to Syria, hop- We still maintaining an illegal presence in another. newspaper ad ing to begin its investigation by April And even if it’s proven that the Assad regime revenue from 14. But that mission was delayed after need violated the chemical-weapons treaty in the 2006 to 2016 the allied attack; the OPCW team diplomacy Douma attack, no individual country has only arrived in Douma on April 17. to end the the right to enforce that treaty’s provisions 72% The problem is that knowing what or deter further violations; such unilateral US households happened—even knowing who was Syrian war. actions are also violations of international that the right- COMMENT responsible—doesn’t come with an law. Equally important, they do nothing to wing Sinclair obvious checklist of what to do about it. This is a clas- provide real justice or protection for the victims. Broadcast sic “even if” situation: Even if we knew that chemical The latest US attack on Syria has undermined—not Group will be able to reach if weapons were used, and even if we knew who ordered strengthened—international efforts to prevent the use of its purchase of their use, that still doesn’t tell us how to respond in a chemical weapons. We still need diplomacy, not further Tribune Media way that would uphold international law, prevent future military aggression, to end the Syrian war. PHYLLIS BENNIS is approved violations of the anti-chemical-weapons treaty, hold the —Madeleine Han perpetrators accountable, and provide some modicum of Phyllis Bennis is director of the Institute for Policy Studies’ New justice for the victims. Internationalism Project and the author of Understanding ISIS Chemical weapons are indeed horrifying, and they and the New Global War on Terror: A Primer. May 14, 2018 The Nation. 5 Q&ADANIEL ELLSBERG

Daniel Ellsberg, a longtime friend of The continental ballistic missiles], MH: What should the peace which are a first-strike weapon, movement be doing now? and declaring a no-first-use Nation, is best known for leaking the DE: We’ve got to find new tac- policy—which are the first two tics and strategies; the older Pentagon Papers, a trove of government things I’d suggest doing to ones are not working. One dismantle this doomsday situa- documents that revealed how Democratic essential is to change public tion. But the military-industrial awareness. This threat is seen as and Republican administrations complex essentially said no, not so urgent, maybe because alike had lied about the Vietnam MH: You write that a US first and Obama reversed course. He War. But Ellsberg’s greatest con- strike would trigger Russian re- wanted to get the [New] Stra- we’ve gone 70 years without cern has long been the United taliation and result in a “nuclear tegic Arms Reduction Treaty blowing up. But people don’t States’ nuclear arsenal and its winter.” What is that? approved by the Senate, and to know about the many times we’ve had near misses. secret plans for launching a first DE: In a nuclear war between do that he had to commit to a I also wonder if China could strike—a policy that, he says, re- the superpowers, hundreds of massive $1.2 trillion moderniza- mains in place today and threat- nuclear weapons would explode. tion of the US arsenal. be a leader on this issue. China ens virtually all life on Earth. He The resulting firestorms from has a much smaller arsenal than spoke with us about his new MH: So the military-industrial burning buildings, roads, and so the US and Russia—about 300 book, The Doomsday Machine: complex exercises veto power forth would generate a massive weapons—and a no-first-use Confessions of a Nuclear War over US nuclear policy? amount of smoke. That smoke policy. They know they have no Planner. —Mark Hertsgaard would be carried into the strato- DE: These are delusional pur- way to disarm the US and Rus- MH: You open the book describ- sphere, circle the globe, and suits, but they are very profit- sian arsenals, and they choose ing a memo that you read in the eventually block an estimated able delusions for Boeing and not to pursue such delusions. White House in 1961. President 70 percent of the sunlight from Northrop Grumman and other Could China lead a global effort Kennedy had asked the Joint reaching Earth. This darkening- weapons-makers. The dooms- to say that the current situation Chiefs of Staff how many peo- and-cooling effect would be a day machine has to be kept on is insane, and let’s move in a ple would be killed overseas if nuclear winter. The smoke would high alert for the sake of profits, new direction? Q US plans for a nuclear attack kill harvests, causing food sup- but also for the jobs and the were carried out. The answer, plies to run out within months. votes they bring. you write, was “600 million By the end of the year, the at- dead. A hundred Holocausts.” tacker would die, along with You assert that launching a first almost everyone else. That’s why I call strike has remained US policy That’s why I think it’s fair to this a “doomsday ever since. Most Americans call this a “doomsday machine.” don’t know that, but do even It’s not just suicidal. It’s not machine.” It’s not most decision-makers in just genocidal. It’s omnicidal, just suicidal. It’s Washington? because it would kill virtually not just genocidal. DE: It’s important to distinguish all human beings on the planet, It’s omnicidal. between first use and first strike. as well as the large animals and “First use” means initiating species of vegetation. nuclear war at some level; “first MH: You write that Barack strike” refers to an attempt to Obama was the only president disarm a highly armed nuclear who considered ending this state. In the case of Russia, a first-strike policy. first strike would attempt to an- nihilate Russia’s major cities and DE: Yes, Obama urged consid- its power to make war. Today, eration of that in the 2010 Nu- I don’t assume that any given clear Posture Review. And again policy-maker knows that first in 2016, he raised the possibility strike remains US policy. of getting rid of ICBMs [inter-

ILLUSTRATION BY ANDY FRIEDMAN 6 The Nation. May 14, 2018

IMMIGRATION A few of us at the conference, led by the tech- Deportation nologist Zeynep Tufekci, argued that because Acceleration An About-Facebook? individual voter data was being weaponized with People are demanding a new deal with tech. behavioral-science insights in ways that could be n April 10, the Depart- finely tuned and also deployed outside of public ment of Justice an- n the summer of 2012, a group of view, the potential now existed to “engineer the Onounced its plan to scholars at the Annenberg School for public” toward outcomes that wealthy interests suspend a service that provides Communication at the University of would pay dearly to control. No one listened. legal assistance to detained im- Pennsylvania, led by Joseph Turow, put Until last year, it was almost impossible to get a migrants facing deportation. I out a national survey on public attitudes major American foundation to put a penny behind The Legal Orientation Program, toward targeted political advertising. The results efforts to monitor and unmask these new forms of run by the Vera Institute of Jus- were stark: Nearly nine out of 10 Americans said hidden persuasion. tice, assists more than 50,000 they didn’t want political ads tailored to their per- If there’s any good news in the revelations about people a year in 38 detention centers across the country. The sonal interests. Eighty-five percent agreed with Cambridge Analytica’s acquisition and use of the program was created under the the statement “If I found out that Facebook was profile data of an estimated 87 million American George W. Bush administration sending me ads for political candidates based on Facebook members, it’s this: Millions of people to speed up trials in immigra- my profile information that I had set to private, I are now awake to just how naked and exposed tion court. In a 2012 study, the would be angry.” they are in the public sphere. Facebook CEO DOJ determined that it helped The report got healthy coverage in mainstream Mark Zuckerberg’s testimony before Congress is reduce the backlog of pending outlets like The New York Times and NPR’s Mar- an inflection point. Clearly, people care a lot more immigration cases, saving the ketplace, as well as industry journals like ClickZ. about the political use of their personal data than government $18 million that year. But it had zero impact on political advertisers. At they do about someone trying to sell them a pair of But in its aggressive attempt the time, Rich Masterson, the chair- shoes. That’s why so many people are to make headway in the nearly man of CampaignGrid, a political- “Privacy suddenly talking about deleting their 700,000 pending cases, the DOJ advertising firm, told me, “There are Facebook accounts. says it needs to conduct another many surveys that indicate Americans is the That said, we have a big problem, review to determine whether the do not like negative campaign adver- and it isn’t just with Facebook or Cam- program, along with Vera’s tele- fountainhead tising, exercise, or health diets. The bridge Analytica. Nearly the entire In- phone helpline for non-detained of all other immigrants, is cost-effective. fact that Americans do not like these ternet is based on the following trade: Vera responded in a statement: things does not make them bad.” rights.” You give us intimate personal data, “Every day this program is not Jim Walsh and Chris Massicotte, and we give you magical services for in operation puts family unity then the CEO and COO of free. This bargain is the original sin, at risk, harms our communities, DSPolitical, a Democratic firm that claims to and almost every major website you visit, with and infringes on the right of all have invented the “political cookie,” an online the exception of Wikipedia and Craigslist, com- people to make informed deci- tool for targeting individual voters, told me that mits it. And then there’s a sin of neglect: Instead sions about their legal claims.” digital targeting was essentially following of building public spaces online where all people Also in April, the DOJ an- the same path as direct mail: “Just like any are equally free to participate, in the same way nounced a new quota system, de- new technology, it comes with a level of that one can walk into a public park without fear manding that immigration judges apprehension, but once people know more of being tracked, our leaders let private capital clear at least 700 cases a year about what it can do—namely spare them colonize the digital public sphere. in exchange for a “satisfactory” from being flooded with useless political Imagine that when you go browsing for books, performance rating, a move that COMMENT critics say is intended to deport ads that they would prefer not to see— the bookstore monitors which books you take off more people without sufficient more people will accept it.” the shelves, which pages you flip to, how much judicial review. For the Trump After Barack Obama won reelection in 2012, time you spend on each, and ultimately which administration, there’s only one voter targeting and other uses of Big Data in books you buy—and then makes that informa- path to immigration efficiency: campaigns were all the rage. That spring, at tion available to advertisers, including political deportation without due process. a conference on “Data-Crunched Democracy” campaigns. That, in essence, is the deal most —Sophie Kasakove that Turow organized with Daniel Kreiss of the Americans have tacitly made with Google and University of North Carolina, I listened as Ethan Facebook. Now imagine that when you go to a Roeder, the head of data analytics for Obama’s political rally in a park, the campaign holding the campaigns, railed against critics. “Politicians exist rally has made a deal with the telephone company to manipulate you,” he said, “and that is not going to acquire the cell-phone number and subscriber to change, regardless of how information is used.” information of everyone attending—including He continued: “OK, maybe we have a new form yours. When you complain about it, the phone of manipulation—we have micro-manipulation— company says: “Well, you agreed to give up your but what are the real concerns? What is the real privacy when you started using the phone you problem that we see with the way information is bought from us.” Shocking, right? But today, the being used? Because if it’s manipulation, that ship Democratic data firm TargetSmart will sell you has long since sailed.” To Roeder, the bottom line a model database of hundreds of thousands of was clear: “Campaigns do not care about privacy. people who likely attended one of the 200 big- All campaigns care about is winning.” gest Women’s Marches in January 2017, based (continued on page 10) LAILA LALAMI

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SCIENCE Matters Eric Alterman of Facts

hile the phrase “fake Wnews” has become No News Is Bad News ubiquitous, the per- nicious influence of “fake science” Without independent journalism, Trump and other charlatans will thrive. has yet to be fully acknowledged. The Outline recently spotlighted the sensationalist YouTube had a different column in mind when I which is in the process of laying off roughly two- channel called Ridddle, which woke up on deadline day, but I wrote this thirds of the newsroom. The remaining staff have has nearly 2 million subscribers. one instead—not because any major news embarked on a campaign to find a savior. They Ridddle posts explainer videos I had broken (yes, the FBI raided the office have made a public demand for Alden to cease its about “scientific” phenomena, of President Trump’s personal attorney), assault on the people’s right (and need) to know such as one of its most popular but because our country and our democracy are in what is going on in their communities and their clips, which purports to detail the midst of a crisis, and our embattled media are country. As one reporter tweeted, “The @denver- what would happen if a nuclear unable or unwilling to explain it. post is being murdered by its owners. It’s the most bomb was detonated in the What inspired my switch was Politico’s publica- heartbreaking, panic-inducing thing I’ve seen in Mariana Trench. The video has tion of the results of a study that demonstrated “a 20-plus years of writing for daily newspapers. We informed more than 14 million clear correlation between low [newspaper] sub- need a new owner, or we are going to get shut viewers that such an event could scription rates and Trump’s success in the 2016 down (and soon).” result in nothing less than the end election, both against Hil lary Clinton What news outlet would replace of the world. This is nonsense, and when compared to [Mitt] Romney the local paper? Well, there are the TV according to expert geologists in 2012. Those links were statistically stations owned by the Sinclair Broad- and planetary scientists. But significant even when accounting for cast Group, whose Pravda style of the clip has more views than all but one of the videos on Alex other factors that likely influenced robotic reporting is specially designed Jones’s Infowars channel, and, voter choices, such as college educa- to mislead viewers and turn them given typical ad rates, Ridddle tion and employment, suggesting that into unwitting victims of Trump- has likely racked up tens of thou- the decline of local media sources by friendly disinformation. Thanks to sands of dollars in revenue. itself may have played a role in the a video compiled by the sports-news According to a recent study election results.” It’s an enormously site Deadspin, we now have striking in Science, fake news about sci- detailed study, and the data confirm evidence of Sinclair’s deliberate cam- ence travels faster and further what newspaper reporters and editors have been paign to undermine the ability of Americans to than real news on social-media trying to tell a complacent public for years: “Lose us get the truth about their country from their local outlets like Twitter. Research- and you lose your democracy.” Walter Lippmann media. Then there are the naked plays by right- ers found that such unverifiable explained the problem in The Atlantic Monthly back wing billionaires like the Koch brothers, Sheldon theories often reached between in 1919: “The quack, the charlatan, the jingo, and and Miriam Adelson, and Robert and Rebekah 1,000 and 100,000 people, while the terrorist, can flourish only where the audience Mercer to publish hateful propaganda under the similar (but accurate) scientific is deprived of independent access to information.” guise of “news.” These reporting rarely reached more However flawed our most important media oligarchs feed bile and than 1,000. Given a presidential institutions may be, this deprivation is something bullshit to the people Our country and administration that questions or your columnist has been shouting about for as they oppress, and con- ignores the scientific consensus, long as he’s been a columnist. Today, according vince them to blame our democracy are the spread of fraudulent science to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, we have lost immigrants, African in the midst of only undermines the research that more than half of the newspaper jobs we had just Americans, Arabs, should inform our policies on ev- a crisis, and our 15 years ago. What is less widely known is how (some) Jews, and up- erything from climate change to embattled media gun control to disease prevention. much worse the problem is in the middle of the pity women for their —Emmalina Glinskis country, where Trump has been so successful in plight. Robert Mercer, are unable or suckering people into voting against their own we learned recently interests. According to a 2017 Politico report, 73 from the Center for unwilling to percent of all Internet publishing jobs are con- Responsive Politics, explain it. centrated in coastal cities like New York, Los funds not only the hate Angeles, and Washington, DC. site Breitbart News and These numbers, together with the more re- the secret spy company Cambridge Analytica but cent Politico study, bring the extraordinary battle also something called Secure America Now, which currently being waged by the remaining staff is dedicated to ginning up fear of imminent “Mus- members at The Denver Post into sharper focus. lim takeovers of France, Germany and the United The newspaper, which serves a city of 700,000, States,” as The Washington Post put it. has been systematically decimated by its greedy We don’t know how much money these people

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enterprises, because so-called dark-money organizations ers.” Close examinations of Trump’s tweets demonstrate are not required to release the names of their funders. a near perfect relationship between the malevolent mus- And, to be honest, I don’t think the source of these ap- ings of the show’s hosts and the nonsense that emanates parently endless funds is what’s most important here— from the presidential Twitter feed. On average, accord- Our political not when you consider that Rupert Murdoch’s empire, ing to PunditFact, commentators on Fox, Fox News, and particularly Fox News, does the same thing openly and Fox Business say things that are true or “mostly true” a system has with virtually no backlash or personal embarrassment mere 22 percent of the time, and lie 60 percent of the clearly fallen for its owners and executives. It’s hard to imagine a more time—much of it racist and sexist, and 100 percent of it victim to terrifying scenario than allowing this country to be led stupid. (That last statistic was my own calculation.) “the quack, by a man who takes his cues from nefarious know-noth- Our political system has clearly fallen victim to “the the charlatan, ings like Laura Ingraham, Tucker Carlson, and Sean quack, the charlatan, the jingo, and the terrorist,” and the jingo, and Hannity. But, lo and behold, we’re living that waking too many of our most powerful and influential individu- nightmare. The lunatic imaginings of the jerks on Fox als are letting it happen with barely a whimper of protest. the terrorist.” & Friends now guide the most powerful person on earth. It’s not just Trump’s buildings (or his “pants,” as Pundit- As The Guardian reports, “The show manages to serve Fact would have it) that are on fire; it’s the Constitution as a court sycophant, whispering in the ear of the king, and, potentially, the country itself. I’d say we are long criticizing his perceived enemies and fluffing his feath- past the moment for shouting. Q

(continued from page 6) ers. That has happened. But what we failed other rights.” It is “the right to a self [and] on mobile-device data that it got from to recognize was how much power Internet what gives you the ability to share with the telecom companies. users were giving away at the same time to world who you are on your own terms.” If In the early days of the Internet, we data aggregators and brokers like Facebook, we don’t insist on a digital public sphere thought that the rise of connection tech- Google, and the many intermediaries amass- that treats the information of individuals nologies would give ordinary voters all kinds ing their own data troves as well (not to as private by default, we will be no more of ways to band together, have a voice, and mention the NSA). than rats in a maze built and owned by a shift power from insiders to outsiders, from “Privacy,” as Edward Snowden has elo- few digital wizards and their investors. If entrenched incumbents to vibrant challeng- quently argued, “is the fountainhead of all we want a way out of this mess, it starts by recognizing that we have to remake the Internet into a MATT BORS COMIX NATION public square owned by us. In May, when Europe’s General Data Protection Reg- ulation starts to take effect, forcing tech platforms to get the express consent of users to collect, store, and monetize their data, we will all see a subtle shift in our online expe- riences. That’s because these companies all operate in Eu- rope, and the regulation also covers citizens of European countries living in places like the United States. There’s a lesson here: Software code is not law. It can be bent to fit local laws. So if we want to stop companies like Facebook from amassing huge profiles on us and selling them to ad- vertisers, the solution is not to delete your account. It is to demand real action from government. MICAH L. SIFRY

Micah L. Sifry is the president and co-founder of Civic Hall and the author of The Big Disconnect: Why the Internet Hasn’t Trans- formed Politics (Yet). South Africa

Beyond Apartheid | SEPTEMBER 22–OCTOBER 3, 2018

Immerse yourself in a South Africa rarely seen 2
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For more information, e-mail us at [email protected], call 212-209-5401, or visit TheNation.com/SOUTH-AFRICA 12 The Nation. May 14, 2018 Laila Lalami After the Raid Trump’s immigration crackdown could devastate an entire generation.

ONLINE PRIVACY ast January, Immigration and Cus- tends to be a bit more lenient with people who are toms Enforcement officers raided primary caretakers, and that often means women. Sell-By dozens of 7-Eleven stores nation- For example, of the 97 meatpacking-plant workers Data Lwide, arresting 21 workers. In Feb- who were arrested in April, 32 were later released, hen artist Deng ruary, ICE detained 100 people many of them mothers of young children. The fa- Yufeng displayed across several counties in Southern California and thers who remained in immigration detention will W the personal data of arrested another 232 over the course of a four-day now be absent from their children’s lives. some 346,000 Chinese citizens sweep in the Bay Area. These raids attracted na- The Bean Station ICE raid also affected fami- during an April exhibition at the tional coverage, but relatively little attention has lies with no direct connection to the meatpacking Wuhan Art Museum in central been paid to the aftermath of these mass arrests. plant. For instance, in the days following the ar- China, the idea was to highlight How are families and communities affected? rests, some 300 immigrant parents set up power- the sheer amount of personal A recent case in rural Tennessee provides the of-attorney documents to grant custody rights information easily available to clearest evidence yet that ICE’s raids, supposedly over their children to a third party in case they corporations and the state. But a deterrent to undocumented im- too were detained by federal agents. as The New York Times reports, migration, are instead causing last- BETWEEN A climate of such pervasive fear af- two days after its opening, the ing damage to an entire generation fects the entire town’s safety, because exhibition was shut down by of young Americans. Early on the it makes it unlikely that crimes wit- police on suspicion that the data had been illegally acquired. morning of April 5, federal immigra- nessed or suffered by immigrants will Legal or not, the method was tion agents raided the Southeastern ever be reported. cheap: Deng spent only $800 Provision meatpacking plant in Bean It’s easy to see, then, how a single for more than 300,000 people’s Station, Tennessee, a town of about ICE raid can have cascading conse- names, gender identities, phone 3,000 people. Officials arrested 97 THELINES quences for hundreds of young Ameri- numbers, online-shopping re- Latino workers, put them in white cans. Perhaps most distressing of all cords, license-plate numbers, vans, and transported them to a Na- is that what happened in Tennessee and travel histories. Such infor- tional Guard armory in nearby Morristown, where has happened before. It is happening now in every mation is illegally but perva- they were processed. The effect on this small part of the United States, and it will keep hap- sively brokered to corporations community was felt immediately: The next day, pening unless we are in China. As the Times reports, about 550 children missed school, a number that prepared to approach tech companies also regularly represents more than 20 percent of the county’s immigration not as a hand over the same information Hispanic student population. law-enforcement issue, The next day, to the Chinese government. Of course, the problem Deng The children, some of whom could be native- but as a family issue 550 children sought to illuminate isn’t unique born citizens, might have missed school because and a labor issue. missed school, to China. By Facebook’s own es- they depended on a parent to drop them off. Or The Southeastern timate, the data firm Cambridge they might have needed to be at home to watch a Provision plant first a number that Analytica harvested some 87 younger sibling. Or they might simply have been came under investi- represents more million users’ information for too distraught to go to class after being separated gation when it was targeted political messaging. In from a parent or relative. The absences are likely discovered that the than 20 percent early April, Facebook CEO Mark to taper off, but research has shown that the deten- managers, James and of the county’s Zuckerberg appeared before tion or deportation of a parent increases a child’s Pamela Brantley, with- Congress, where lawmakers at- risk of mental-health problems. Students with drew large amounts of Hispanic students. tempted to grill him about his detained or deported parents can also become cash from the local company’s negligence. Instead, as disengaged from academic and career goals, which bank every week, presumably to pay their em- many commentators have noted, can have lasting effects on their future adjustment ployees. In a federal affidavit, the IRS alleges that the lawmakers revealed only and achievement. James Brantley had been evading payroll taxes and their own ignorance: They didn’t understand what data Facebook In addition, children whose parents are detained filing false tax returns for years. A confidential made available and how it was face the economic uncertainty that comes with a informant also reported that plant workers faced used. If they don’t understand the sudden and dramatic loss of income. One recent unsafe labor conditions, including exposure to industry, how can they regulate study found that families lost, on average, 70 per- harsh chemicals without suitable protection. it? Perhaps it’s time for Deng to cent of their earnings within six months of a par- And yet, while the workers were rounded up and open a show in Washington, DC. ent’s detention or deportation. This abrupt change placed in Tennessee’s immigration jails, the plant’s

—Joseph Hogan is not distributed equally along gender lines. ICE president and general manager was not arrested. It’s ANDY FRIEDMAN DENG YUFENG; TOP RIGHT: LEFT: May 14, 2018 The Nation. 13

entirely possible that Brantley will not face any criminal mean the obvious—the undocumented workers who are charges, but will instead have to pay fines. He may even be being underpaid and exploited, and who must live under able to go back to operating his meatpacking business. In constant risk of detention and deportation. I also mean this way, the cost of food production in the United States these workers’ children, who are starting out in life with continues to be borne by undocumented workers. significant disadvantages, including growing up in broken While the The outcome of the ICE raid on Southeastern Provi- homes and dealing with psychological trauma, loss of in- workers were sion exposes the disturbing dynamic between labor and come, and educational disruptions. rounded up law enforcement. When undocumented workers are We have seen what mass incarceration has done to free to work, they provide cheap and unprotected labor. African Americans in the United States: The “tough on and placed in When they are detained in immigration jails, they be- crime” approach to minor drug offenses contributed to immigration come sources of revenue for private prisons, where they the breakup of hundreds of thousands of families. We jails, the plant’s can be forced into unpaid labor. Either way, they make may be witnessing the early signs of a similar disaster with president and money for others, while they and their families remain Hispanic Americans. An entire generation is coming of general manager vulnerable to being broken up. age while their undocumented parents are being detained was not arrested. Slowly but surely, the immigration crackdown that the and deported. These young people are conditional citi- Trump administration promised, and that ICE is carrying zens, their right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happi- out, is giving rise to a permanent underclass. I don’t just ness curtailed through no fault of their own. Q

John Bolton Replaces We’ve said our farewells to McMaster, SNAPSHOT / ADNAN ABIDI H.R. McMaster Who all hoped would stave off disaster. Disgrace We’ve now got in charge A tiny protester participates in an anti-child-rape Calvin Trillin demonstration in New Delhi on April 15. Protests A nutcase at large. erupted across India after a series of such rapes Deadline Poet were reported. Police officers and a politician are The end of the world may come faster. under investigation in two unrelated cases. REUTERS The Nation. HOW MARTIN LUTHER PAV To understand why evangelicals support the president, look to the founder of Protestantism.

The Pope is a true werewolf. Sad! ED THE WAY FOR by MICHAEL MASSING DONALD TRUMP

he support of white evangelicals for don- cal hack” who “is rapidly rebranding evangelicalism as a ald Trump continues to exasperate and perplex. belief system marked not by faith, hope, and love but by About 80 percent of them voted for him in fear of Muslims and homophobia.” T 2016—the most recorded for a Republican The alarm over the evangelical embrace of Trump candidate since 2000—and his approval rating reached a crescendo with Michael Gerson’s cover story among them remains high. In June, some 1,000 evangeli- in the April issue of The Atlantic, “How Evangelicals cal pastors plan to meet the president, both to “celebrate” Lost Their Way (and Got Hooked by Donald Trump).” his accomplishments (as one leading pastor put it) and to Gerson—perhaps the most prominent evangelical writ- rally Christians for the midterm elections. Neither Trump’s ing in the mainstream media—stated that “Trump’s relations with Stormy Daniels, nor his endorsement of background and beliefs could hardly be more incompat- alleged sexual abuser Roy Moore, nor his reference to ible with traditional Christian models of life and leader- “shithole” countries, nor his toxic tweets, recurrent racism, ship.” The president’s “unapologetic materialism” is “a or general crudity have proved a deterrent to most conser- negation of Christian teaching”; his trib- vative Christians—to the dismay of many commentators. alism and hatred for “the other” “stand in Pray tell: “I’m stunned at the evangelical support for this direct opposition to Jesus’s radical ethic Then-candidate president,” Mika Brzezinski remarked recently on the of neighbor love”; his worship of strength Trump prays with MSNBC show Morning Joe. “I don’t understand it. It’s and contempt for “losers” “smack more ministers during a almost like they’re excited to be in the White campaign visit to House and get access to him.” Those in the Las Vegas in 2016. evangelical community who are writing books about the president, she added, “are overlook- ing the most humongous moral failings.” Peter Wehner, a former speechwriter for George W. Bush, took to the op-ed pages of The New York Times in December to ex- plain “Why I Can No Longer Call Myself an Evangelical Republican.” Throughout his life, Wehner wrote, he had identified with evangel- icalism and the Republican Party, but Trump and Moore were causing him to reconsider his affiliations: “Not because my attachment to conservatism and Christianity has weakened, but rather the opposite. I consider Mr. Trump’s Republican Party to be a threat to conserva- tism, and I have concluded that the term evangelical— of Nietzsche than of Christ.” Christianity, Gerson de- despite its rich history of proclaiming the ‘good news’ of clared, “is love of neighbor, or it has lost its way. And this Christ to a broken world—has been so distorted that it is sets an urgent task for evangelicals: to rescue their faith now undermining the Christian witness.” from its worst leaders.” The death of the Rev. Billy Graham in February set The verdict is clear: In supporting this thrice-married, off a new round of chiding. In Politico, Stephen Prothero, coarse, boastful, divisive, and xenophobic president, evan- a professor of religion at Boston University, wrote that gelicals are betraying the true nature of Christianity. In “to chart the troubled recent course of American evan- making such charges, however, these commentators are gelicalism—its powerful rise after World War II and its championing their own particular definition of Christian- surprisingly quick demise in recent years”—one need ity. It is the Christianity of the Sermon on the Mount, in look no further than the differences between Graham which Jesus blesses the meek, disdains the rich, welcomes and his eldest son, Franklin, who took over his empire. the stranger, counsels humility, and encourages charity. Where the father “was a powerful evangelist who turned “Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on evangelicalism into the dominant spiritual impulse in the right cheek, turn the other also,” he declares—a most

REUTERS / MIKE SEGAR modern America,” Prothero wrote, his son is “a politi- un-Trumpian sentiment.

ILLUSTRATION BY SABINE FORMANEK May 14, 2018 15 16 The Nation. May 14, 2018

Yet this irenic message is just one strain in the New Testament. There’s Romans, Luther had his great intellectual breakthrough: another, more bellicose one. In Matthew, for instance, Jesus says, “Do not Salvation comes not from doing good works but through think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring faith in Christ. Upon discovering this truth, Luther later peace but a sword”—to “set a man against his father, and a daughter against wrote, “I was altogether born again” and “entered para- her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law.” In John, he dise itself through open gates.” In thus describing his sud- declares, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life,” and “no one comes to the den spiritual transformation, Luther provided a model Father except through me”—a statement long used to declare Christianity the for millions of later Protestants seeking similar renewal. one true path to salvation. The Book of Revelation describes with apocalyptic Being born again is one of the defining characteristics of fury the locusts, scorpions, hail, fire, and other plagues that God will visit upon evangelicalism, and it was Luther who (along with Paul the earth to wipe out the unbelievers and prepare the way for the Messiah. and Augustine) created the template. Another key feature of evangelicalism is the central rom the earliest days of the faith, this militant strand has place of the Bible, and here, too, Luther provided the coexisted with the more pacific one. And it was the former that foundation. In his view, neither popes nor councils nor stirred the founder of Protestantism, Martin Luther. In his fierce theologians have the authority to define the faith—the Bi- F ideas, vehement language, and combative intellectual style, Luther ble alone is supreme. In his famous To the Christian Nobility prefigured modern-day evangelicalism, and a look back at his life can of the German Nation Concerning the Reform of the Christian help explain why so many evangelicals support Trump today. Estate of 1520, Luther described his world-altering con- In defending the cause of Christ, Luther was uncompromising. No one, he cept of the priesthood of all believers: Every lay Christian, wrote, should think that the Gospel “can be advanced without tumult, offense no matter how humble, has as much right to interpret the and sedition.” The “Word of God is a sword, it is war and ruin and offense and Bible as any pope or priest. Luther was thus shifting the perdition and poison.” In Luther’s famous dispute with locus of authority from credentialed elites to ordinary be- Erasmus of Rotterdam over free will and predestination, lievers, empowering them to define their own faith. the renowned Dutch humanist suggested that the two of In Europe, however, these populist ideas were quickly them debate the matter civilly, given that both were God- snuffed out. Kings and princes together with bishops and fearing Christians and that the Bible was far from clear Luther abbots cracked down on all who sought to apply them. on the subject. Exploding in fury, Luther insisted that took as his The most dramatic case came during the German Peas- predestination was a core Christian doctrine on which he watchword ants’ War of 1524–25, when farmers and laborers— could not yield and that Erasmus’s idea that they agree to inspired, in part, by Luther’s tracts—rose up against their disagree showed he was not a true Christian. Romans secular and spiritual overlords. They were put down in In his later years, Luther produced venomous attacks on 13: “Let a savage bloodletting that left more than 100,000 dead. groups he considered enemies of Christ. In his notorious Luther himself—fearing anarchy and furious at those On the Jews and Their Lies, he denounced the Jews as “boast- everyone who invoked his writings to better their lot—endorsed ful, arrogant rascals,” “real liars and bloodhounds,” and be subject the slaughter in a lurid pamphlet titled Against the Robbing “the vilest whores and rogues under the sun.” In Against the to the and Murdering Hordes of Peasants. “Let everyone who can, Roman Papacy, an Institution of the Devil, he called the pope smite, slay, and stab” the peasants, he wrote. “It is just as “a true werewolf,” a “farting ass,” and a “brothel-keeper governing when one must kill a mad dog; if you do not strike him, he over all brothel-keepers.” When in 1542 a Basel printer authorities.” will strike you, and a whole land with you.” was preparing to bring out the first printed Latin version Although the killings had started before Luther’s of the Quran, Luther contributed a preface explaining why pamphlet appeared, he was strongly urged to retract his he supported publication. It was not to promote interfaith Nailed it: In 1517, screed. He reluctantly prepared An Open Letter on the understanding. By reading the Quran, he wrote, Christians Martin Luther posted Harsh Book Against the Peasants, but, rather than disavow could become familiar with “the pernicious beliefs of Mu- what became known his position, he restated it in even starker terms. To those hammad” and more readily grasp “the insanity and wiles” as the 95 theses who said he was being unmerciful, he wrote, “this is not a to a church door in of the Muslims. The learned must “read the writings of the Wittenberg, Germany, question of mercy; we are talking of God’s word.” Luther enemy in order to refute them more keenly, to cut them to propelling him to was incapable of apologizing. pieces and to overturn them.” fame. Luther’s peasant tracts badly damaged his reputation Luther arrived at his own not only among the peasants interpretation of the Gospel but also among many of his after experiencing years of de- fellow reformers. The experi- bilitating doubt as an Augustin- ence hastened his own retreat ian friar. The prescribed rituals from his early radicalism into and sacraments of the Roman a reactionary intransigence in Catholic Church—designed to which he opposed all forms offer a clear path to salvation— of resistance to injustice and provided little relief. No matter maintained that the only prop- how often he went to confes- er course for a Christian was to sion, no matter how fervently accept and acquiesce. He took he prayed the Psalter, Luther as his watchword Romans 13: felt undeserving of God’s grace. “Let everyone be subject to the Sometime around 1515, while governing authorities.” It was lecturing on Paul’s Epistle to the the individual who had to be re- May 14, 2018 The Nation. 17

formed, not society. Luther also believed in the concept of the “two kingdoms,” the secular and the spiritual, which had to be kept rigorously apart. Christ’s Gospel was to apply only in the spiritual realm; in the secular, the government’s role was to maintain order and punish evildoers, not to show compassion and mercy. The Lutheran churches in Ger- many and Scandinavia (like most estab- lished churches in Europe as a whole) became arms of the state, developing a top-heavy bureaucracy that bred com- placency, discouraged innovation, and caused widespread disaffection.

ot so in america: with no established churches to con- front and freedom of worship guaranteed by Modern martyr: in Just as I Am, his autobiography, “we are saved only the Constitution, American Christians have County clerk Kim because of what Christ has done for us. I will not go to N Davis, who refused been free to create their own spiritual path- to issue marriage Heaven because I have preached to great crowds. I will go ways. Over time, Luther’s core principles of faith in licenses to gay to Heaven for one reason: Jesus Christ died for me, and I Christ, the authority of Scripture, and the priesthood of couples, celebrates am trusting Him alone for my salvation.” This intense fo- all believers became pillars of American Protestantism— her release from jail. cus on the Bible and on salvation through faith in Christ especially of the evangelical variety. came directly from Luther. Consider, for example, the Southern Baptists. With In the recent eulogizing of Graham, there has been more than 15 million members and 47,000 churches, the a tendency to gloss over his aggressive early evangelism. Southern Baptist Convention is the largest Protestant He was a strident anticommunist, a tireless critic of por- denomination in the United States; through its seminar- Many nography, and a fawning supporter of presidents. While ies, publications, public-policy office, and network of evangelicals he insisted on integrating his crusades, he shunned the missionaries, it has profoundly affected American social, see the broader campaign for civil rights. Graham refused to par- cultural, and political life. The Southern Baptists’ various ticipate in the 1963 March on Washington and dismissed statements of belief bear Luther’s stamp throughout. The proper Martin Luther King Jr.’s conviction that political protests “starting point” of everything related to their churches, role of the could create a “beloved community” in which, even in they declare, is each individual’s “personal faith in Jesus government Alabama, “little black boys and little black girls will join Christ as Savior and Lord of their lives.” Under the related hands with little white boys and white girls.” Graham de- doctrine of “soul competency,” the Southern Baptists af- to be clared that “only when Christ comes again will the little firm “the accountability of each person before God.” This imposing white children of Alabama walk hand in hand with little is a plainspoken version of Luther’s doctrine of sola fide (“by order, not black children.” In both his obsequiousness toward the faith alone”). The Bible, they further maintain, is the “su- powerful and his opposition to social change, Graham preme standard” by which all human conduct and religious showing was very much Luther’s heir. opinion must be measured—a restatement of Luther’s mercy. Luther’s impact on American life is most apparent when principle of sola scriptura (“by Scripture alone”). Finally, looking at the place of the Bible in it. According to surveys, the Southern Baptists explicitly embrace the idea of the nearly nine in 10 American households own a Bible, and priesthood of all believers, asserting that “laypersons have nearly half of all adult Americans say that the Bible is the the same right as ordained ministers to communicate with inspired Word of God. Bible-study groups have proliferat- God, interpret Scripture, and minister in Christ’s name.” ed in schools, workplaces, locker rooms, and government Needless to say, there are some significant differences offices, including the White House under Democratic and between the beliefs of the Southern Baptists and those Republican presidents alike. The massive new Museum of of Luther. The Southern Baptists, for instance, practice the Bible in Washington, DC, with its multitude of bibli- adult baptism, which Luther vigorously opposed. On cal artifacts, is the creation of Steve Green, the president many key points, however, their beliefs parallel those of of the Hobby Lobby craft-store chain and a member of a Luther, even though his influence is rarely acknowledged. prominent evangelical family. All of this can be traced back Billy Graham himself was deeply affected by Luther. to Luther’s belief in Scripture as the sole authority. From the fall of 1949, when he led his first major cru- Michael Massing Many evangelicals are animated by the same type sade, until the 1980s, Graham was the face of evangelical is the author of of faith- and Bible-based individualism that Luther es- Fatal Discord: Christianity in America. Invoking the Bible as his sole au- Erasmus, Luther, poused. This outlook can be seen in the motivational ser- thority, he offered a simple message centered on Christ’s and the Fight mons of Joel Osteen, the purpose-driven appeals of Rick atoning death on the cross for humankind’s sins and his for the Western Warren, and the defiant statements of Kim Davis, the resurrection from the dead for its salvation. “No matter Mind, on which Kentucky county clerk who in 2015 refused to issue mar-

REUTERS / CHRIS TILLEY who we are or what we have done,” Graham observed this essay draws. (continued on page 26)

May 14, 2018 The Nation. 19

ews…commit a disproportionate number of mass shootings,” “ Wisconsin Republican congressional candidate Paul Nehlen lied on Facebook recently. Earlier, he had tweeted: “Poop, incest, and J pedophilia. Why are those common themes repeated so often with Jews?” Another GOP House hopeful, Pennsylvania’s Sean Donahue, recently told me, “The United States was intended to be white.… I don’t see why we had to have the Fair Housing Act.” Welcome to Trump’s America, where a rash of white nationalists are run- ning for office. Depending on your definition, anywhere from nine and 17 white supremacists and far-right militia leaders are currently running for House and Senate seats, governorships, and state legislatures. Most have little chance of winning, but as with the neo-Nazi Arthur Jones, Pod willing: who recently ran unopposed in the Republican primary for the Third Con- Wisconsin’s gressional District in the Chicago area and garnered 20,458 votes, their mere Paul Nehlen has candidacies, along with their growing acceptance by other Republicans as le- to white supremacy. In this media land- appeared on the racist podcast gitimate stakeholders in the party, are a dangerous development. “They are, by scape, the effect of having avowed white Fash the Nation. their very presence, shifting the pole of what most Ameri- nationalists running for office is to push cans find to be acceptable political discourse,” said Eric K. the limits of acceptable public racism even further. It not Ward of the Western States Center, a progressive organi- only provides cover for the “merely” anti-immigrant, anti- zation that works in seven states where white-nationalist Muslim, and anti-Latino candidates and officials; it can also groups have been active. radically shift the Overton window, a term that describes Heidi Beirich, director of the Southern Poverty Law the range of ideas that the mainstream media deem politi- Center’s Intelligence Project, pointed to an August 2017 cally acceptable. Washington Post/ABC News poll indicating that 9 percent These new candidates are not limited by existing of Americans now find it acceptable to hold neo-Nazi norms, “so they can imagine genocide, they can seri- views. (Among strong Trump supporters, 17 percent say ously play around with deporting millions of people,” they accept neo-Nazi views, and 13 percent say they have said Spencer Sunshine, a longtime writer and researcher no opinion one way or the other.) “This is a Trump phe- on the far right. As such notions enter the public dis- nomenon,” Beirich told me. “In the past, [white-power cussion via the far-right media, racist violence becomes groups] saw no space for themselves in the public sphere more likely. “White nationalists’ milieu is super-violent,” at all. You’d see the Aryan Nations saying, ‘We never re- “California Sunshine said, “so any rise in their movement,” includ- ally thought politics was worth our time.’” Both Trump is full of ing mainstream publicity for their candidacies, will be and a new clutch of racist candidates, she added, have had crap. Stop “accompanied by violence.” With Trump’s election and the effect of “reengaging white supremacists in the politi- the rise of alt-right media, we’re already seeing a spike in cal system. Before, they were basically apolitical.” sanctuary racist attacks. According to a study by the Anti-Defama- In the new Republican universe, a flood of so-called alt- cities!” tion League’s Center on Extremism, white supremacists lite media organs and activists have become enormously — Corey Stewart, in killed 18 people in 2017, around double the number from influential. Sites like The Daily Caller, The Gateway Pun- a tweet linking to an the previous year; meanwhile, hate crimes in major cit- dit, The Rebel Media, Infowars, GotNews, and other “mini- article with the headline ies jumped 20 percent in the same year, according to the Breitbarts” have championed the alt-right, employed white “Thousands of pounds Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California nationalists as editors and writers, and expressed views of human waste.” State University, San Bernardino. similar to white nationalism. And through their popular- ity and their ties to Trump staffers, they’ve been able to he growing profile of such candidates influence the White House and demonstrate that there is means they sometimes have a legitimate shot room for the advocacy of openly racist policies in the US at winning office. When he was running for political system. President Trump has read and reacted to T governor in Virginia last year, Corey Stewart, at least one article from GotNews, which is run by the racist chairman of the Prince William Board of Internet troll Chuck Johnson. (The piece was about a sup- County Supervisors, made several appearances with Jason posed leak by deputy chief of staff Katie Walsh, with Po- Kessler, the white nationalist who would soon organize litico reporting that she left the White House shortly after.) Donna the violent “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville. Alt-lite solo media man Mike Cernovich—who has said Minkowitz is (Kessler has been charged in state and federal lawsuits “diversity is code for white genocide” and “I like choking the author of with conspiring to incite violence at the neo-Nazi rally.) a woman until her eyes almost go lifeless”—has demon- the memoirs Stewart came within one percentage point of winning the strated access to the White House through his scoops on Growing Up Republican nomination by devoting virtually his entire personnel matters and Trump’s strike on Syria last April. Golem and campaign to defending Confederate monuments. That Ferocious Both Donald Trump Jr. and Kellyanne Conway have pub- is to say, he won 43 percent of the GOP vote in a purple Romance: What licly praised Cernovich, with the president’s son saying he My Encounters state clutching a huge Confederate flag and holding events deserves “a Pulitzer.” Cernovich has announced he’s con- With the Right attended by white nationalists. Stewart also palled up to sidering running for Congress in California this year. Taught Me Cernovich, sitting with him for an interview, and used the Many of these far-right media activists maintain what About Sex, racist, sexist, white-nationalist terms “cuck” and “cuck-

ILLUSTRATIONS BY NURUL HANA ANWAR; TOP RIGHT: AP PHOTO / STEVE HELBER TOP RIGHT: BY NURUL HANA ANWAR; ILLUSTRATIONS their own comrades call “plausible deniability” with regard God, and Fury. servative,” applying them in a Reddit chat to his primary 20 The Nation. May 14, 2018 opponent, Ed Gillespie, and to then–Democratic Governor Terry McAuliffe. the media and reposting articles from The Daily Stormer, (The terms come from so-called cuckold porn, in which a white man—the a neo-Nazi blog. With Ryan’s announcement that he will “cuck”—watches, humiliated, as a black man has sex with the cuck’s white wife.) not seek reelection, Nehlen’s only opponent in the Au- This year, Stewart is running for Senate against Democrat Tim Kaine. He gust 14 Republican primary is Nick Polce, who boasts a isn’t emphasizing the Confederacy this time, but he continues to speak in lan- mere 609 “likes” on Facebook (as opposed to Nehlen’s guage designed to appeal to the alt-right. In January, he falsely claimed on Twit- 41,000-plus). A source familiar with Wisconsin politics ter that Michael Moore had “call[ed] for the ethnic cleansing of white people in told me it’s expected that “credible” Republicans will America,” and later that McAuliffe had incited the violence in Charlottesville. jump into the race before the June 1 filing date, but so Commenting on an article from an Orange County newspaper with the headline far State Assembly speaker Robin Vos, ex-White House “Thousands of pounds of human waste,” Stewart tweeted, “California is full of Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, and others have declined crap. Stop sanctuary cities!” to run, leading to the frightening possibility that Nehlen So far, Stewart is leading in polls of Republican voters, though Kaine beats could win the nomination. every Republican hopeful in a hypothetical matchup. As the Board of Supervi- Two men of color running for Congress in long-shot sors chair in Prince William County, Stewart is best known for rounding up un- races are also making broad appeals to white nationalists. documented immigrants, getting county police to turn over 7,500 individuals to Shiva Ayyadurai, an Indian American running against Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and calling for mass deportations. It’s Senator Elizabeth Warren in Massachusetts, has made a hard to tell whether he’s a Trumpian opportunist flirting with white nationalism fast friend of Charlottesville tiki-torch-holder Matt Col- for political gain or a die-hard true believer, but in the end it might not matter. ligan, who has said repeatedly that “Hitler did nothing As Sunshine has noted, in far-right demonstrations throughout the country, wrong.” (The candidate appeared on a live video broad- Trumpists have been sharing bullhorns with virulent white cast with Colligan, calling the neo-Nazi “one of our great supremacists, anti-Semites, and militia members. supporters.”) Ayyadurai has also issued campaign pins And Stewart’s spokesman, Noel Fritsch, has even deep- featuring Groyper, a cartoon toad that’s become a white- er connections to white nationalism. At one point, Fritsch nationalist symbol. His candidacy occurs in an interna- was the main political consultant for Paul Nehlen, the tional context in which far-right, anti-Muslim politicos in white supremacist who challenged House Speaker Paul India have aligned themselves with Nazism. Meanwhile, Ryan in the 2016 GOP primaries (and who will attempt to contemporary white identitarians, like Richard Spencer, win the Republican nod for Ryan’s seat in the 2018 mid- have sometimes sought to include in their organizations terms). Fritsch worked for Nehlen during a period when fellow “Aryans” from India and Iran. he appeared on the racist podcast Fash the Nation, retweet- And Edwin Duterte, a Filipino American running ed encomiums to the neo-Nazi march in Charlottesville against Democratic Representative Maxine Waters in as “an incredible moment for white people,” and told his California, has purchased a premium membership on African-American interlocutors on Twitter to “Run along, Gab, a platform popular with white supremacists, where Tyrone.” Fritsch also served as a spokesman for former “Poop, he’s referred to his opponent as “low-IQ Maxine,” echo- Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore’s campaign, and incest, and ing a racist comment made by Trump. Asked about it in is heavily involved in the far-right “news site” Big League pedophilia. a phone interview, Duterte just giggled and said, “It’s a Politics, which, according to a Daily Beast investigation, is good nickname.” He is also insisting that a debate with owned and primarily operated by alt-right-friendly politi- Why are his Republican primary opponents include as modera- cal consultants and publishes favorable articles about their those tors the neo-Nazi known as Baked Alaska (Tim Gionet) clients, including Stewart, Nehlen, and Moore. common and a Twitter personality named folkloreAmericana, who Dwayne E. Dixon, a lecturer at the University of recently retweeted a warning against “Juden Tricks” and North Carolina, Chapel Hill, and an anti-Nazi protester themes who identifies his own video broadcast as “alt-media for at the Charlottesville rally, wrote on a faculty listserv that repeated so all.” In our interview, Duterte bizarrely called for getting on February 7, Fritsch and another man (who turned out the Crips, the Bloods, and the alt-right together “in a to be Patrick Howley, the founder of Big League Politics) often with room and see what they all agree on.” accosted him with a video camera in the hallway to his of- Jews?” Though segments of the Republican Party have con- fice, physically tried to prevent him from leaving, and in- — Paul Nehlen demned these candidates, other GOP institutions are terrogated him with questions like “Are you responsible treating white nationalists as normal or even desirable. A for the death of Heather Heyer?” (Heyer was the 32-year- Republican women’s group from South Carolina hosted old woman killed when James Fields, a self-proclaimed Nehlen as the guest speaker at its Presidents’ Day dinner, white supremacist, allegedly rammed his car deliberately and militia groups with ties to white supremacists, such into a crowd of counterprotesters in Charlottesville.) A as the Oath Keepers and Three Percenters, have forged source close to Dixon said that when he tried to get away strong alliances with the GOP establishment in states from the two, “Fritsch bodychecked him so he couldn’t like Oregon, Arizona, and Michigan, and have even been get past, trying to pin him so he’d have to fight them.” asked to provide security at party events. When Dixon slipped out and hid under a desk in a near- Sitting politicians are also embracing white-nation- by office with a colleague and the colleague’s 12-year-old alist supporters and groups. Two Republican congress- son, Fritsch and Howley “physically surrounded the desk men up for reelection—Matt Gaetz of Florida and Dana so that none of them could get out.” The men finally left Rohrabacher of California—have associated themselves after Dixon called the police. (Fritsch and Stewart both with GotNews’s Chuck Johnson, whom Gaetz invited to declined to comment for this article.) Trump’s first State of the Union address and from whom Yet Nehlen is even scarier, compiling lists of Jews in Rohrabacher accepted a bitcoin donation worth $5,400. May 14, 2018 The Nation. 21

Along with GotNews, Johnson is best known for creating the white-nationalist fund-raising site 1 Joey Gibson WeSearchr, which has helped underwrite The Daily 6 John Abarr Stormer. Forbes has reported that Johnson worked 8 Shiva Ayyadurai with the Trump transition team—especially exec- 2 Paul Nehlen 0 utive-committee member Peter Thiel—on hiring Arthur Jones 7 4 Ryan Bundy Sean Donahue decisions. Among others, Johnson pushed for the 9 Michael Peroutka hiring of Ajit Pai, who became head of the Federal 5 Corey Stewart Communications Commission. 3 Then there are Representative Steve King (R- Edwin Duterte IA) and former Maricopa County sheriff Joe Arpaio, now running for the Arizona Senate, who aren’t usu- ally classified as white nationalists but deserve a place on this list because of their racism while in office. In Alt-Right on December, King approvingly quoted the authoritar- the Ballot ian prime minister of Hungary, Viktor Orbán, who had said, “Mixing cultures will not lead to a higher 1 Joey Gibson, founder of the National Wildlife Refuge, is running 8 Shiva Ayyadurai, who made quality of life but a lower one.” Earlier, King sug- right-wing Patriot Prayer group, is for governor of Nevada. campaign buttons with alt-right gested that only white people had contributed to civ- running for Senate in Washington. 5 Corey Stewart, who appeared symbols, is running for Senate in ilization. Arpaio, of course, was found by the Justice 2 Paul Nehlen, who said Jews with Charlottesville rally planner Massachusetts. Department to have initiated “a pervasive culture “commit a disproportionate Jason Kessler, is running for 9 Michael Peroutka, an ex- of discriminatory bias against Latinos” and to have number of mass shootings,” is Senate in Virginia. member of a neo-Confederate violated their constitutional rights as sheriff. Arpaio running for Congress in Wisconsin. 6 John Abarr, who advocated group, is running for reelection is also connected to the Oath Keepers through the 3 Edwin Duterte, who wanted for an “inclusive” KKK, is running to the County Council of Anne an online troll to moderate a GOP for the Montana State Legislature. Arundel County, Maryland. Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Associa- debate, is running for Congress in 7 0 tion, an anti-federal-government organization that Sean Donahue, who said Arthur Jones, a Holocaust California. the US “was intended to be denier and ex–American Nazi Party he helped found; as reported in Rolling Stone, the 4 Ryan Bundy, part of the 2016 white,” is running for Congress in member, is the GOP nominee for CSPOA shares leaders with the paramilitary group. militia occupation of Malheur Pennsylvania. Congress in Illinois’s Third District. And on the local level, Michael Peroutka, a member until 2014 of the neo-Confederate hate tional Guard troops to the Mexican border, despite the group League of the South, is running for reelection af- fact that arrests for undocumented border crossings have ter one term as County Council chair in Anne Arundel decreased by 1.4 million since the year 2000. Trump also County, Maryland. He is also a Christian Reconstruc- issued a memo requiring that immigrants be detained un- tionist, meaning that he wants to enact a theocratic gov- til their court dates, even if those dates are several years ernment run by fundamentalist Christians. away. Additionally, the director of Trump’s Office of Refu- “The United gee Resettlement keeps a spreadsheet of detained undocu- his year’s conservative political action States was mented teenagers who want abortions, so he can try to Conference was in many ways the politi- intended to prevent them from obtaining the procedure. cal center of the Republican Party. There, Another danger of white-nationalist candidacies is Trump addressed white nationalists like be white. I that “we know electoral campaigns are one of the surest T Nick Fuentes, Peter Brimelow, and Marcus don’t see ways of increasing one’s base and raising dollars,” Ward Epstein, as well as alt-lite figures now influential in the noted. The more that racists run for office, the more they GOP, like Cernovich. Although CPAC has continued to why we had will develop a political infrastructure. “Campaigns create ban Spencer, these other open racists were free to attend. to have the an influx of cash that can be used to run ads and pay sala- As the line separating Trumpists from white nationalists Fair Housing ries that allow white nationalists to organize.” grows finer, the president’s radical policies—such as end- They also often force the left to spend time prevent- ing the admission of most refugees, detaining pregnant Act.” ing catastrophically racist policies from being enacted women in ICE facilities, and seeking to curtail legal — Sean Donahue instead of fighting for the things they want. “If the real immigration—are increasingly being seen as reason- issue is the lack of living-wage jobs in a community,” Ward able political decisions. “White-nationalist candidates told me, “a white-nationalist candidate can derail that by can make a very hard-right candidate look moderate,” turning it into a discussion of immigration.” Ditto with warned the Western States Center’s Eric Ward. issues like working conditions, addiction, gentrification, The public conversation around immigration in par- and lack of access to health care, where white-nationalist ticular has shifted so far to the right that it’s almost unrec- candidates can transform the discussion from commu- ognizable from the mainstream discussions four years ago. nity needs to the supposed oppressions visited on white Shockingly, a senior fellow at the prestigious Brookings people. In the end, one of the most meaningful ways to Institution, William Galston, recently said on WNYC’s protect this country from the dangers posed by the white- The Brian Lehrer Show that the United States’ five-decade- supremacist movement is to strengthen a multiracial, long policy of family reunification—what Trump calls multiregion movement for economic justice. If the left “chain migration”—had been “a failure” and should be can’t do that, this year could be the start of a wave of white abolished. Trump, of course, recently ordered 4,000 Na- nationalists riding Trump’s coattails into office. Q How Progressives America’s security depends on defeating oligarchy abroad and at home.

by DAVID KLION Can Engage Russia

hat is the left’s foreign-policy approach to russia? US institutions, but as an especially dramatic example of Long before the advent of the Trump presidency, pro- how those institutions have been made vulnerable to ma- gressives had been vocal critics of US actions overseas. nipulation by foreign governments and financial interests. Yet they have given much less thought to what US for- Most Democrats and Republicans in Congress are eign policy should be in the plausible event that a left- committed to punishing Vladimir Putin and the network leaningW Democrat wins the White House in 2020. of oligarchs surrounding him by expanding the sanctions Whoever the next president is, one immediate problem facing him or her regime first imposed by the Obama administration fol- will be how to deal with Russia, which most Democrats—as well as indepen- lowing Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014. Congress dents like Bernie Sanders—hold responsible for interfering in the 2016 election has attempted to force Trump’s hand by imposing new to help Donald Trump. Even apart from this apparent meddling, managing sanctions in retaliation for the alleged election interfer- relations with Russia will be a top priority for any new administration. The next ence, but the Trump administration has been lax in en- president will face immediate pressure from the national-security establishment forcing them. However, even properly enforced sanc- to implement a tougher approach to Russia in Trump’s tions cannot solve the underlying problem: Russia is wake. This could include new and rigorously enforced functionally a kleptocracy, and the United States bears sanctions, increased arms sales to Ukraine, a renewed push some responsibility for making it that way. for NATO expansion, more pressure on Bashar al-Assad’s The next In the 1990s, Washington encouraged the rapid and regime in Syria, a new cyberoffensive against Moscow in president’s blatantly rigged privatization of Russia’s economy, result- retaliation for 2016, and covert support for opposition ing in skyrocketing inequality, the impoverishment of mil- movements in Russia and its former satellites. Russia lions, and the elevation of a tiny billionaire elite. While This agenda is unlikely to make America or the world policy should Putin has claimed credit for a revival of economic stability more secure, since it will simply further escalate the cur- and a measure of prosperity in the 2000s, driven to a large rent dangerous tensions with Russia and increase the risk reflect an extent by high energy prices, over time he has consolidated of future attacks on US institutions. So what should the agenda of power at the top of a fundamentally corrupt system. The next president do instead? combating United States has emerged as a leading destination for Russia’s elite to park their fortunes, often at the expense of Take On Russia’s Oligarchs—by Taking On America’s corruption, middle-class Americans in major real-estate markets like obert Mueller’s investigation into the Trump inequality, New York, and with the help of banks and law firms happy R campaign’s alleged collusion with Russia has been and abuses to turn a blind eye to corruption overseas. Russian money largely opaque, but from the indictments issued laundering through high-end real estate is also a major is- so far, as well as the recent subpoena of the Trump Orga- at home. sue in London, where Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn nization’s records, it is clear that a central issue is money has proposed tackling it in response to the recent poison- laundering. Trump’s former campaign manager, Paul ing of former Russian intelligence officer Sergei Skripal Manafort, and his deputy, Rick Gates, have been indicted and his daughter. Going after the money is far more likely on a variety of charges, from laundering millions of dol- to produce meaningful results than expelling diplomats, lars to tax evasion, bank fraud, and violating the Foreign the strategy that the United States and its European allies Agents Registration Act (FARA) by working as unlicensed have so far pursued. Some of the recent sanctions, which lobbyists. Yet what many in Washington have portrayed as target a list of wealthy Russians for enumerated corrupt shady financial maneuvers in a new Cold War looks a lot activities, are more promising, but they still represent a like something else: large-scale white-collar crime. flawed attempt to punish individuals close to Putin rather It should not have taken an international political scan- than a comprehensive effort to reduce global corruption. dal before the perpetrators were held accountable. Un- The United States has little standing to condemn Rus- fortunately, much of the illegal activity that Manafort and sia’s oligarchs while the Trump administration openly loots Gates were allegedly engaged in is common in Washington the public with a tax-reform bill designed to benefit the and New York, where foreign governments, both allies and wealthiest Americans and with taxpayer dollars constantly adversaries, routinely funnel money in order to promote funneled through Trump Organization properties. The their interests. Consider the president’s son-in-law, Jared next administration should make the case that the trans- Kushner, who is under scrutiny from Mueller not only for national oligarchy stretching from New York to London his contacts with Russia, but also because officials in the Influence peddling: to Moscow poses a national-security threat by undermin- United Arab Emirates, China, and Israel sought to influ- Jared Kushner, above, ing the integrity of our political process. It should expand ence him. This is the context in which Russian interference and Paul Manafort, FARA and end foreign lobbying, both legal and illegal, on K below, have both should be understood: not as an unprecedented attack on come under scrutiny Street. It should crack down on money laundering through for their connections banks and real estate, as well as offshore tax havens. David Klion has written about US-Russia relations for The with shady foreign Contrary to what some writers on the left have ar- New York Times, The Guardian, The New Republic, and actors. gued, the American public is legitimately interested in

BOTTOM: AP PHOTO / MATT ROURKE BOTTOM: AP PHOTO / MATT other publications. He tweets @DavidKlion. the Trump-Russia scandal and isn’t going to stop pay-

ILLUSTRATION BY CURT MERLO May 14, 2018 23 24 The Nation. May 14, 2018 ing attention. But rather than singling out Russia, the next president should of Assad’s regime. While there is no justifying Russia’s or pledge to take on kleptocrats everywhere, using Trump’s outrageous corrup- Assad’s atrocities, the United States also played a role in tion (including but certainly not limited to his Russia ties) to make the case for stoking this civil war in the first place and bears responsi- a more just economic order. bility for its interventions in Iraq and Libya, which Putin In addition, the next president should place a champion of global environ- opposed and whose results have been catastrophic. Mos- mental justice in charge of the State Department, rather than an ExxonMobil cow views Washington’s enthusiasm for toppling dicta- CEO (the recently departed Rex Tillerson) or an outspoken Islamophobe and tors as destabilizing, and while this view is motivated by climate-change skeptic (the yet-to-be-confirmed Mike Pompeo), to make clear Russian geopolitical interests, that doesn’t make it wrong. that the oil-and-gas industry is not in charge of US foreign policy. Exxon, like The next president must be willing to work for a nego- other energy companies, has lobbied for normalized US-Russia relations so that tiated peace between all factions in Syria, accepting that it can exploit Russia’s vast natural resources, and was even fined by the Trea- Assad will be left in control of much of Syria’s territory for sury Department for violating the sanctions regime against Russia by signing an the foreseeable future, with the long-term goal of with- agreement with the oil giant Rosneft while Tillerson was still CEO. drawing US and Russian forces from the region. Finally, the next administration should seek to once Work for Peace and Recommit to Disarmament more engage Russia in negotiations over nuclear weap- he consensus in Washington is that the United ons. During the Obama administration, the United States T States must contain Russia’s imperial revanchism and Russia signed the 2011 New START accord aimed at on every front, as though the Cold War never dramatically limiting the deployment of strategic nuclear ended. But this only encourages a similar consensus in arms by both countries. Trump, however, has disparaged Moscow, empowering hard-line nationalists who see their the treaty and recently committed the country to a new country encircled by US proxies and consider neighbor- nuclear-arms race. If there is one lesson to be drawn from ing former Soviet republics to belong in Russia’s rightful Trump’s volatile and unpredictable behavior as presi- sphere of influence. Those countries, including flash points dent, it’s that nuclear weapons are far too destructive for like Ukraine and Georgia, are entitled to sovereignty un- Russian any nation to possess. The United States and Russia must der international law, and Russian encroachment on that hackers recommit to diplomacy with the aim of further arms re- sovereignty, from Crimea and the Donbass to Abkhazia ductions and a stronger global nonproliferation regime. and South Ossetia, deserves condemnation. But the next have Break Up Tech Monopolies president must also make clear that the United States does exposed a not intend to expand its own sphere of military influence flaw in our t is reasonable for the United States to want to hold via NATO or in any other capacity. I Russia accountable for its 2016 interference, includ- Moscow opposed, and still deeply resents, the expan- political ing the dissemination of fake news via social media sion of NATO into the Baltic states and Eastern Europe in system and the e-mail hacks of the Democratic National Com- the 1990s and 2000s, in particular the 1999 NATO mili- mittee. A proportionate response would be to release em- tary campaign against Yugoslavia, which proceeded despite created by barrassing information about the shady finances of Putin a Russian veto at the UN Security Council. With consid- years of and his inner circle. But this may have already occurred in erable justification, Russian military planners see NATO coddling the form of the Panama Papers, a giant info dump on the as existing primarily to surround and isolate Russia. global oligarchy published in early 2016 that Putin blames For better or worse, Washington is now committed monopolies. on the US government (along with distorting evidence in to the security of its Baltic allies. But the next president the Russian Federation’s Olympic doping scandal). should affirm that the United States does not have long- It is in neither country’s interest to pursue this tit for term designs on a military alliance with Ukraine, Geor- tat indefinitely, although arguably both Americans and gia, or any other country on Russia’s border. This does Unaccountable? Russians benefit from the exposure of their elites’ secrets. not mean abandoning those countries; the United States Facebook CEO Mark Ultimately, there will have to be negotiations, including and its European allies should commit to negotiating a just Zuckerberg recently other major powers like China, to establish rules of the faced questioning on peace that will preserve Ukraine’s territorial integrity, and Capitol Hill regarding road for cybersecurity. At the same time, the United States must work to ensure that Russia complies with the 2014 the company’s should embrace strong campaign-finance laws in order to Minsk Protocol. Russia must not be rewarded for the ille- treatment of user data. insulate itself from interference not only by foreign powers gal annexation of Crimea, which should but by oligarchs and corporate interests not be recognized as long as Putin is in everywhere. power. Down the line, negotiations on But if the United States wants to a UN-sponsored referendum to de- prevent Russian cyberattacks in future termine Crimea’s fate could be held if elections, one crucial step would be to tensions ratcheted down. The reality, begin dismantling the tech monopolies as most policy-makers in Washington that have left the US electorate exposed are well aware, is that the citizens of to foreign influence. In 2010, Russia’s Crimea would be unlikely to choose to then-president, Dmitry Medvedev, vis- return to Ukraine in any fair and inde- ited Silicon Valley as part of the Obama pendent vote. administration’s ill-fated “reset” policy. With respect to Syria, Washington An impressed Medvedev met with the is understandably wary of rewarding CEOs of companies like Apple and

Russia’s horrific conduct in defense Google. While Medvedev’s dream of a REUTERS / AARON BERNSTEIN May 14, 2018

Russian Silicon Valley remains unrealized, Russia has plen- ty of homegrown tech talent, as seen in the “troll factory” that sought to manipulate American swing voters. The next US president should make clear to the public that the biggest tech companies have gotten too powerful, and that their hoarding of private data for profit under- mines national security and election integrity. Social me- dia can be a powerful tool for political organizing and pro- testing authority, but when it is regulated only by the free market, it becomes a way for wealthy interests—including foreign governments—to manipulate people. Renewed antitrust enforcement should be a priority in general, but with regard to Silicon Valley it would offer the additional benefit of countering foreign influence and restoring the credibility of real news. The candidate: Russia. Putin uses the perception of Western designs on Russian hackers have exposed a flaw in the US politi- Vladimir Putin Russia to maintain his legitimacy and to justify his most addresses supporters cal system created by years of coddling unaccountable mo- at a rally near the aggressive policies. nopolies. Lawmakers have pressured companies like Face- Kremlin. Though he is Putin will eventually leave power, but it is not Wash- book and Twitter to crack down on Russian bots, but this still popular, support ington’s place to facilitate this, nor is it an inherently desir- doesn’t address the underlying threat that for-profit social for Putin has slipped able outcome. No one knows what will follow in Putin’s in the largest cities. networks pose to the democratic process. The extent of this wake, or who could fill his role after nearly two decades threat is clear from the revelations about how Cambridge (and counting) in the Kremlin. And no one doubts that Analytica used Facebook data, acquired without the con- Putin is genuinely popular, although support for him in sent of Facebook users, to help the Trump campaign target the largest cities, where he has faced mass protests from voters. As Tamsin Shaw, a professor at New York Univer- educated younger Russians, has slipped. sity who has written about cyberwarfare, told The Guard- The United States should not ignore human-rights ian, “Silicon Valley is a US national security asset that [Rus- abuses in Russia. But principled criticism is only under- sia has] turned on itself.” The only effective solution is to mined by the perception that civil-society groups in Russia break these monopolies up and regulate them like utilities. serve as fronts for US intelligence, and Russia has become increasingly hostile to such groups. The next administra- Support Human Rights, Not Regime Change tion should make clear that the United States is not trying espite the claim by New York Times national- The United to bring Putin down, and that its support for human rights D security correspondent Steven Lee Myers that States is genuine. It should be wary of directly supporting op- Putin is “a hero for the world’s populists, strong- has little position figures, who are easily tarred as US puppets. And men and others occupying the fringes of global politics, it should lead by example and hold its allies accountable both left and right,” few on the left are under the illusion standing to for their human-rights abuses and elite corruption as well. that Russia is a utopia. As Jeremy Corbyn wrote recently, condemn Ultimately, the best way the United States can help “Labour is of course no supporter of the Putin regime, Russia’s civil society in Russia is by normalizing relations enough its conservative authoritarianism, abuse of human rights that private civil-society groups from the United States or political and economic corruption. And we pay tribute oligarchs and other countries can more effectively work in tandem to Russia’s many campaigners for social justice and hu- while Trump with their Russian counterparts. It is hard to argue that the man rights, including for LGBT rights.” Bernie Sanders US-Russian tensions following the failure of Obama’s at- has voiced similar sentiments, stating that “our goal is to loots the tempted “reset” have done Russian civil society any favors. not only strengthen American democracy, but to work in public with Punish the Real Culprits solidarity with supporters of democracy around the globe, a tax bill including in Russia. In the struggle of democracy versus designed to n short, the next president’s Russia policy should authoritarianism, we intend to win.” I reflect an agenda of combating corruption, inequal- Putin has attacked civil society, consolidated control of benefit the ity, and abuses at home. If the US political system is the media, and marginalized opposition parties. One of the wealthiest vulnerable to interference from abroad, it is only because most prominent opposition leaders, Alexei Navalny, was it has decayed from within. Thus, while Russia should be barred from running for president this year in what ev- Americans. held accountable for its intervention, the greater priority eryone understands were sham elections. Many journalists must be to hold accountable those Americans who accept- and politicians have been murdered, and LGBTQ people ed Russia’s assistance in order to enrich themselves at the have faced discriminatory laws throughout Russia and a expense of the public. The most important thing the next brutal purge in Chechnya. And with the close cooperation administration can do to prevent another 2016 is to root of the Orthodox Church, Putin has stoked xenophobic na- out the institutionalized corruption in Washington that tionalism, homophobia, misogyny, and jingoism, not only Russia successfully exploited, and to investigate, expose, at home but with his support for far-right parties across and prosecute everyone in Trump’s orbit who knowingly Europe. The left has an interest in countering this influ- facilitated Russian interference. The only way to secure ence, but the next president must do so in a way that is not American democracy from foreign influence is to make

AP PHOTO / PAVEL GOLOVKIN AP PHOTO / PAVEL a cover for empire and is not aimed at regime change in America more genuinely democratic. Q 26 The Nation. May 14, 2018 (continued from page 17) The Nation. riage licenses to same-sex couples and went to jail for it. She said: EDITOR & PUBLISHER: Katrina vanden Heuvel I never imagined a day like this would come, where I would EXECUTIVE EDITOR: Richard Kim; PRESIDENT: Erin O’Mara be asked to violate a central teaching of Scripture and of MANAGING EDITOR: Roane Carey Jesus Himself regarding marriage. To issue a marriage LITERARY EDITOR: David Marcus license which conflicts with God’s definition of marriage, SENIOR EDITORS: Emily Douglas, Lizzy Ratner, Christopher Shay with my name affixed to the certificate, would violate my CREATIVE DIRECTOR: Robert Best COPY DIRECTOR: Rick Szykowny conscience. It is not a light issue for me. It is a Heaven or DEPUTY MANAGING EDITOR: Rose D’Amora Hell decision.… I have no animosity toward anyone and COPY EDITOR: Mike Laws harbor no ill will. To me this has never been a gay or lesbian MULTIMEDIA EDITOR: Francis Reynolds issue. It is about marriage and God’s Word. ENGAGEMENT EDITOR: Annie Shields ASSISTANT LITERARY EDITOR: Matthew McKnight ASSISTANT COPY EDITORS: These remarks recall Luther’s concluding statement at the Diet Lisa Vandepaer, Haesun Kim WEB COPY EDITOR/ PRODUCER: Sandy McCroskey of Worms of 1521. Ordered by a representative of the Holy ASSISTANT TO THE EDITOR: Ricky D’Ambrose Roman Emperor Charles V to recant his writings, Luther resisted: INTERNS: Safiya Charles, Emmalina Glinskis, Madeleine Han, Joseph Hogan, Sophie “Unless I am convinced by the testimony of the Scriptures or by Kasakove, Andrew Tan–Delli Cicchi, Sabine Formanek (Design) clear reason…I am bound by the Scriptures I have quoted, and WASHINGTON EDITOR: George Zornick; ASSOCIATE EDITOR: Zoë Carpenter my conscience is captive to the Word of God. I cannot and I will NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENTS: William Greider, John Nichols, Joan Walsh not retract anything, since it is neither safe nor right to go against INVESTIGATIVE EDITOR AT LARGE: Mark Hertsgaard conscience.” Luther’s bold defense of his religious conscience has EDITORS AT LARGE: D.D. Guttenplan, Chris Hayes, John Palattella become a hallmark of the Protestant tradition, and Davis, con- COLUMNISTS: Eric Alterman, Laila Lalami, Katha Pollitt, Patricia J. Williams, Kai Wright, sciously or not, stands squarely within that tradition. Gary Younge The message from evangelical pulpits is overwhelmingly one of DEPARTMENTS: Architecture, Michael Sorkin; Art, Barry Schwabsky; Civil Rights, Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II, Defense, Michael T. Klare; Environment, Mark Hertsgaard; Films, self-reliance, personal responsibility, individual renewal, scriptural Stuart Klawans; Legal Affairs, David Cole; Music, David Hajdu, Bijan Stephen; Poetry, authority, and forging a personal relationship with God and Christ. Steph Burt, Carmen Giménez Smith; Sex, JoAnn Wypijewski; Sports, Dave Zirin; American evangelicalism has further assumed the populist stance of United Nations, Barbara Crossette; Deadline Poet, Calvin Trillin the young Luther. His rebellion was directed at the dominant insti- CONTRIBUTING EDITORS: Robert L. Borosage, Stephen F. Cohen, Marc Cooper, Mike tution of his day—the Roman Catholic Church. He denounced the Davis, Slavenka Drakulic, Bob Dreyfuss, Susan Faludi, Thomas Ferguson, Naomi Klein, Melissa Harris-Perry, Doug Henwood, Max Holland, Richard Lingeman, Michael ordained clergy, anointed theologians, and university scholars who, Moore, Christian Parenti, Eyal Press, Joel Rogers, Karen Rothmyer, Robert Scheer, appealing to custom and tradition, sought to silence and discredit Herman Schwartz, Bruce Shapiro, Edward Sorel, Jessica Valenti, Jon Wiener, Amy him. Protestantism, in short, arose as a revolt against the elites, and Wilentz, Art Winslow Luther’s early appeals to the common man and his disdain for the en- CONTRIBUTING WRITERS: James Carden, Michelle Chen, Bryce Covert, Liza Featherstone, titled lent the movement a spirit of grassroots empowerment that re- Laura Flanders, Julianne Hing, Joshua Holland, Richard Kreitner, Dani McClain, Collier Meyerson, Scott Sherman, Mychal Denzel Smith mains alive to this day. His insurgent nature further implanted in the LONDON BUREAU: Maria Margaronis faith a reflexive adversarialism—a sense of being forever under siege. EDITORIAL BOARD: Deepak Bhargava, Kai Bird, Norman Birnbaum, Barbara Ehrenreich, Luther’s rebelliousness was, however, paradoxically joined to Richard Falk, Frances FitzGerald, Eric Foner, Greg Grandin, Philip Green, Lani an opposition to real-world change. While rousing the masses, he Guinier, Ilyse Hogue, Tony Kushner, Elinor Langer, Malia Lazu, Deborah W. Meier, refused to endorse measures that would concretely address their Toni Morrison, Walter Mosley, Khalil Gibran Muhammad, Victor Navasky, Pedro needs. This combination of incitement and passivity is apparent Antonio Noguera, Richard Parker, Michael Pertschuk, Elizabeth Pochoda, Andrea Batista in contemporary American evangelicalism, with both its ceaseless Schlesinger, Rinku Sen, Dorian T. Warren, David Weir ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER, SPECIAL PROJECTS: Peter Rothberg agitation against the centers of power and its shunning of any real VICE PRESIDENT, COMMUNICATIONS: Caitlin Graf program to address the underlying sources of resentment and dis- DIGITAL COMMUNICATIONS MANAGER: Sarah Arnold satisfaction. In accord with Luther’s doctrine of the two kingdoms, ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER, CONSUMER MARKETING: Katelyn Belyus many evangelicals see the proper role of the government to be im- CIRCULATION FULFILLMENT COORDINATOR: Vivian Gómez posing order, not showing mercy. ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER, DEVELOPMENT: Sarah Burke Donald Trump has followed this approach. On the one hand, DEVELOPMENT ASSISTANT: Yubei Tang he has played on the conviction of evangelicals that they are an op- ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER, ADVERTISING: Sky Barsch ADVERTISING ASSISTANTS: Vanessa Dunstan, Kit Gross pressed minority who have been prevented from practicing their DIGITAL PRODUCTS MANAGER: Joshua Leeman religion as they see fit. He has vigorously defended the right of the TECHNOLOGY MANAGER: Chris Harford faithful to say “Merry Christmas,” of pastors to speak freely in their IT/PRODUCTION MANAGER: John Myers pulpits, of church-run hospitals and health-care organizations to re- PRODUCTION COORDINATOR: Mel Gray fuse to offer contraceptives. He has also appointed judges commit- DIRECTOR OF FINANCE: Denise Heller ted to those principles (and adamantly opposed to abortion, a key ASSISTANT MANAGER, ACCOUNTING: Alexandra Climciuc issue for this group). At the same time, Trump has carefully avoided HUMAN RESOURCES ADMINISTRATOR: Lana Gilbert BUSINESS ADVISER: Teresa Stack taking on the powerful financiers and magnates who have helped to PUBLISHER EMERITUS: Victor Navasky create the economic system that has inflicted such hardship on his LETTERS TO THE EDITOR: E-mail to [email protected] (300-word limit). Letters are subject to base. Trump’s insults, invective, and mocking tweets against enemies editing for reasons of space and clarity. real and perceived seem a long way from the Sermon on the Mount, SUBMISSIONS: Go to TheNation.com/submission-guidelines for the query form. but they very much mirror the pugnacity, asperity, and inflammatory Each issue is also made available at TheNation.com. Printed on 100% recycled 40% post-consumer acid- and chlorine-free paper, in the USA. language of the first Protestant. Q Books & the Arts.

PROGRESS AND POVERTY The America that emerged out of the Civil War was meant to be a radically more equal place. What went wrong? by STEVEN HAHN he Gilded Age, as Mark Twain own. Still, the Gilded Age has never re- The Republic for Which It Stands enduringly described it, sticks out ceived the scholarly attention lavished on The United States During Reconstruction like a sore thumb on the American Reconstruction or the Progressive era— and the Gilded Age, 1865–1896 historical landscape. It is a symbol the periods before and after—though it is By Richard White T of corruption, greed, extravagance, generally attached to the latter as a way Oxford University Press. 968 pp. $35 and exploitation, of a country gone wild of explaining the eventual swing toward with excess. It also serves as a yardstick to a long period of reform. two “gestated together,” he writes—and, measure the indiscretions and inequali- Richard White takes another ap- in so doing, casts both in a different light ties of subsequent times, not least our proach. In his impressive new book The while raising new questions about a na-

THE BOSSES OF SENATE Republic for Which It Stands, the latest tion born in the cauldron of civil war. In- Steven Hahn teaches history at New York volume in the ongoing “Oxford History deed, there’s a sense in which White has University and is the author, most recently, of of the United States,” White links the the Gilded Age effectively encompass A Nation Without Borders. Gilded Age with Reconstruction—the the Reconstruction era; both periods, he JOSEPH KEPPLER, 28 The Nation. May 14, 2018 argues, were defined by ongoing, and often both the West and the South. To that end, that the abolition of slavery appeared to explosive, struggles over the fundamentals the federal government extended and ex- make possible. of society and state in postbellum America: panded the power that it had accumulated Here White turns to Howells, who Who would rule and be ruled, whose vision during the Civil War into the postwar period seemed to put his finger on the political of political economy and social relations and created new institutions to enact this vi- dilemma that most of his fellow liberals would prevail, and who would pay the price? sion. On the other hand, this newly powerful found themselves confronting. “The era’s White thus speaks of the “twins” that were federal government still lacked the adminis- problem, as Howells saw it, was adjust- conceived in 1865. The first was “the world trative capacity to see such projects through. ing the ideal of liberty to the necessity of [that Americans] anticipated emerging from The Freedmen’s Bureau was to supervise the order,” he writes; the solution “was to sever the Civil War,” which “died before being transition from slavery to freedom in the ‘administration’ from democracy” and, in born”; the second “lived” but was “forever former Confederacy, ensuring that contract Howells’s words, “evolve order out of chaos, haunted by its sibling.” The book’s pro- rather than coercion mediated new labor government out of anarchy.” For Howells logue, “Mourning Lincoln” (acknowledg- relations, but the bureau was understaffed and other liberals of the era, this meant ing an important study of the same name and underfunded. The Reconstruction Acts, free trade, civil-service reform, a return by Martha Hodes), makes the case for the the high point of Republican Radicalism, to the gold standard, limitations on male larger social meaning of Lincoln’s assassi- enfranchised African-American men, but the suffrage, opposition to women’s suffrage, nation and sets the tone for the many pages rapidly shrinking US Army of Occupation and replacing elected government officials that follow. The Republic for Which It Stands was often unable to protect the exercise of with appointed ones. The liberal sensibili- offers a sobering and generally dispiriting their new rights. (In both of these cases, ties that had once nourished the antislavery view of the nation’s contested road from the White draws on the important recent work movement were now fractured by the chal- end of the Civil War to its emergence as an of the writer and historian Gregory Downs.) lenges of “free labor” and had given way to industrial-capitalist power by the turn of the The results predictably saw African Ameri- a deepening suspicion of democracy itself. 20th century. cans sink into the mire of a “coercive labor system, which although not slavery, was not iberalism’s retreat into an antidemo- here are no small challenges to recon- free labor either,” dependent as it was on “ex- cratic search for order was not precipi- ceiving the three decades of American tralegal violence, coercive laws, burdensome tated by the ambitions of Radical Re- history that White covers in his book, debt relations, and the use of convict labor.” construction alone. It was also encour- especially given the demanding stan- In the trans-Mississippi West, part of L aged by one of Radicalism’s offspring: T dards of comprehensiveness to which the “Greater Reconstruction” (a term that anti-monopoly. As a movement and a set of the Oxford series is devoted. Readers will White borrows from the historian Elliott ideas, anti-monopoly had its roots in the find a veritable kaleidoscope of subject mat- West), the federal government—acting as 1820s, when workingmen’s parties and their ter, from electoral politics, political econo- an “imperial state”—extended its reach and intellectual allies pushed back against the my, and industrial warfare to popular cul- promoted railroad development at the ex- market expansions of the era. But it was in ture, literature, and sports. They will find pense of Native peoples, who fought back the post–Civil War era that anti-monopoly figures of political and cultural prominence with ferocity and determination before developed a mass following and made its as well as those who are now relatively ob- being relegated to reservations. In effect, presence felt in American politics. scure, but who at the time were consequen- the government engaged in a form of land Anti-monopoly expressed the vision tial for their ideas and activism. And they redistribution that it had refused to impose and aspirations of Lincoln’s America in a will find geopolitical breadth, as White— in the South, transferring lands from the world in which the prospects for its sur- drawing on his expertise in Western US his- control of Native Americans into the hands vival were rapidly eroding. Anti-monopoly tory—makes sure that the trans-Mississippi of aspiring white agricultural operators sentiments took hold among urban work- West and its racially and ethnically mixed (through the Homestead Act) and railroad ers, family farmers, and small-town mer- denizens figure significantly in the un- corporations (through the Pacific Railway chants and retailers, fed by the traditions folding story. Holding the more than 900 Act and a raft of other incentives). As White of Euro-American republicanism, free-labor sprawling pages together is a framework in portrays it, Reconstruction—in the South ideology, and socialism. They would find a which party politics and national elections and the West—was largely an uneven pro- geographical base in the South and West, are set as the chronological markers for a cess of state-building that advanced a highly but especially in what White, channeling the developing battle between the forces of lib- repressive brand of capitalist development. writer Hamlin Garland, calls the “Middle eralism and anti-monopoly, all carried along In this way, despite the gains of eman- Border” (effectively the Upper Plains and by the commentary of the novelist, editor, cipation and of advancing the principles the Missouri River Valley). They would also and critic William Dean Howells, whose of civil and political equality, Reconstruc- find organized expression in the Grange, intellectual journey in many ways mirrored tion laid the groundwork for the Gilded the Greenback-Labor Party, the Knights of the political drift of the times. Age, with its growing wage-labor force, ex- Labor, the Farmers’ Alliance, and, eventu- White’s early chapters on Reconstruction panding industries, swelling cities, massive ally, the Populists. unspool many of the thematic threads that he population movements, and unprecedented Anti-monopolists bridled at the inequal- then weaves together for the remainder of consolidations of wealth and power. Recon- ities of wealth that surrounded them. They the book. On the one hand, Republicans in struction also threw a dominant liberal ide- decried the voracious markets that enabled Congress looked to extend Lincoln’s Amer- ology into crisis, as the dramatic expansion a small elite to monopolize society’s most ica—exemplified by Springfield, Illinois, a of the federal state and the mobilizations of vital resources and undermine the inde- place in which artisan shops, small manufac- working people in the South, North, and pendence of small producers in town and turers, and family farms predominated—to West posed new questions about the world country. And they blamed the moneyed TRUMP’S TERRIBLE HIRES CRITICISM IN THE TWILIGHT DAVID DAYEN NICHOLAS DAMES

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OCTOBER 16, 2017 THENATION.COM 30 The Nation. May 14, 2018 corruption of party politics for their collec- limits of anti-monopoly as a mass movement. faced in the Gilded Age, proved to be the tive plight. To readjust the balance in favor Although some efforts were made by Green- animating image. of small producers, they set their sights on backers and the Knights of Labor to court Yet, as White sees it, reform’s very capa- the privately controlled national banking the support of African Americans, these anti- ciousness was also its weakness. “Reform- system and large railroad corporations; to monopoly groups, like George himself, were ers pushed against the bonds of the status restore the integrity of the political system, adamantly hostile to Chinese immigrants, quo,” he writes, “but when they broke those they rallied voters to the banners of inde- whom they saw as symbols of heathenism bonds their own lack of common purpose pendent political parties. and slavery (Chinese workers were often became all too apparent.” They achieved For anti-monopoly struggles, the so- derided as “coolies”). “Look to the Midwest, piecemeal victories, but a larger reconstruc- called money question—how much currency East, and South,” White observes, “and the tion seemed elusive, especially given the should circulate, what it should consist of, Knights seemed the vanguard of at least juggernaut of centralization and industrial and who should issue it—was key. White a limited racial equality; look to the West consolidation they were up against. White’s does an excellent job of explaining the com- and they appeared very different. At vari- treatment of Populism, the largest of these plex manifestations involving gold, green- ous times, the Knights distrusted Italians, movements and the one best embodying backs (the paper currency first issued by the Finns, Hungarians, and more, but the one the Greenback and anti-monopoly tradi- federal government during the Civil War), racial or ethnic group they banned from the tions, thus emphasizes both its “essential and silver. Coining silver as well as gold organization was the Chinese.” moderation” and its contradictory views of served inflationary ends and won the favor the state: simultaneously distrusting federal of many small producers whose debt burdens hite’s critique of the racism that power and demanding federal intervention would be lightened; it also stoked the enmity anti-monopolists embraced, or at in the American economy to the benefit of of bankers and financiers, who were creditors least failed to shake, frames his in- small producers. If anything, the changing and thus worshipped at the altar of gold. terpretation of the course of Gild- demographics of the country (especially the But it was greenbacks, not gold or silver, W ed Age reform. On the one hand, declining size of the rural population) and that became the center of anti-monopoly his heart is very much with anti-monopolism the reform currents already under way (in- politics—both because they would increase and the related reform impulses of the pe- cluding the achievement of some demands the volume of currency in circulation and, riod, and no one could be a sharper critic regarding taxation and farm legislation) especially, because they would put the federal of the alliance between capital and the state marked Populism’s effective irrelevance. government, rather than private banks, in that emerged out of the Civil War. Readers charge of the money supply. of Railroaded, White’s 2011 book, will see hat is missing from White’s nearly Still, anti-monopoly was far more than a much of what they admired there in this exhaustive book is a vision of the single-issue movement. To attract farmers volume, including deft treatments of policy- United States in the Gilded Age and industrial workers, it embraced a wide making and corrupt bargains at all levels. world—of its foreign relations range of issues, from railroad regulation, Vivid chapters on the “Great Upheaval” W and of how it emerged as a world cooperative purchasing and marketing, and of the 1880s and on “Dying for Progress” power. White doesn’t attempt to duck this the eight-hour workday to mechanics’ lien demonstrate the human costs that industrial matter: “Most of the changes examined laws, land reform, and progressive taxation. development imposed on the country and in this volume took place on national and Henry George, one of the most formi- many of its people. regional scales, not the transnational,” he dable anti-monopoly theorists, saw On the other hand, White has se- notes in the introduction. “Transnational land monopoly as the cause of rious misgivings about the era’s developments mattered, but during the economic impoverishment radicals and reformers. Over Gilded Age the nation took shape in re- and catapulted to national the last half of the book, he sponse to these larger changes rather than and international fame shows us the expanse and as a simple reflection of them.” after the publication of depth of reform activ- Perhaps. But America’s imperial presence his immensely influen- ity across the United in the world was central to the capitalist so- tial Progress and Pov- States—though he ciety that came into being. After all, this was erty (1879). In 1886, tends to be dismis- the period that saw the appearance of newly George nearly won sive of the socialists, configured nation-states on the country’s election as the mayor who were crucial to northern and southern borders (the Domin- of New York City on a the mobilization of the ion of Canada in 1867 and the Porfiriato in United Labor Party plat- immigrant working class Mexico in 1877, both overlapping with Re- form that included a land and eventually left their construction); massive new US investments tax and a critique of wealthy special mark on the country’s in Mexico and the Caribbean Basin; the landlords (garnering more votes midsection—and he reminds us of purchase of Alaska (in 1867) and the annexa- than a young Republican named Theodore the remarkable spectrum of people reform tion of Hawaii (in 1898); and the crafting of Roosevelt in the process). Meanwhile, anti- attracted, including renegades from the a commercial imperialism that emphasized monopoly tickets—some associated with liberal elite like Howells. For all of these re- the Pacific and Asian markets. (William the Knights of Labor—emerged victorious formers, whether workers and farmers who Seward, the Republican luminary and Lin- in towns small and large across the country. faced impoverishment and dependency or coln’s secretary of state, played a central role William Dean Howells also came under temperance advocates who attempted to in this, while the anti- monopolist farmers, George’s (and anti-monopoly’s) spell. tie the evils of drink to those of industri- as William Appleman Williams long ago Yet George’s politics also exposed the alization, the “home,” and the dangers it showed, bought into it readily.) May 14, 2018 The Nation. 31

There were also the US invasions of and failed politics,” he tells us at the very doubt about who led the charge against Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines beginning of the book, “and now I finish political democracy, not only in the South, (we call this the “Spanish-American War”), it in a parallel universe.” White’s treat- where that effort had the most repressive which give wider meaning to White’s im- ment of Reconstruction and the Gilded effect, but in the Northeast, Midwest, and portant points about the federal state dur- Age gives the lie to any argument about West as well: the businessmen, financiers, ing the Gilded Age. The West, 19th-century “laissez-faire” as and liberals of the Gilded Age, along with he argues, “became the kin- the progenitor of American the planters and other large-scale agricul- dergarten of the American capitalism, and helps us tural interests. state.” Indeed, in many understand the histori- Yet while White may underestimate the ways the West became cal depth of capital’s radicalism of these popular movements an imperial laboratory dependence on the and overestimate their fit within a reform (White refers, correctly state and vice versa. mainstream (many of the policies they had in my view, to the fed- (“Laissez- faire was earlier championed were enacted in pared- eral government of this planned,” as Karl down form only after their own defeat), period as an “imperial Polanyi once put it.) his disappointment and disenchantment state”). The federal gov- Without state action at are worth reflecting upon. The racism of ernment created a num- many levels—defeating these movements was endemic and can- ber of large new territories slaveholding antagonists, not be explained away by reference to in the trans-Mississippi West securing private property political overtures across the lines of race during the Civil War to secure its and commercial contracts, of- and ethnicity; it grew out of a deep hostil- power and authority there. It then kept fering generous incentives to devel- ity toward the propertyless poor and those those territories under federal control for a opmental entrepreneurs, repressing labor who symbolized the slave and the abjectly lengthy period and established a number of agitation, and sending Native peoples dependent (thus the Chinese as well as substantial hurdles involving race, religion, to isolated reservations through military African Americans). Only rarely was a new family (“home”), and belonging that all had means—capitalism’s traction would have direction charted, and it usually required to be cleared before the territories could been shakier and more limited. extraordinary leadership and a lengthy pe- be admitted to the Union as states. The White also highlights the violent con- riod of incubation. trans-Mississippi West, that is to say, served frontations that Gilded Age capitalism pro- Equally important, the economic analy- in many ways as a proving ground for the voked and the wide-ranging popular cri- sis of the anti-monopoly movements, es- overseas occupations that followed. tique it nurtured. The proponents of anti- pecially Populism, proved of less and less The same holds true for the US Army, monopoly mounted a withering attack on the which not only served as the military wing sources and nature of power in American so- of state authority and imperial reach; it also ciety—a more fundamental attack, I believe, became an important vehicle for capitalist than White allows—that rallied millions of development. The Army suppressed In- Americans to their side, whether through in- dian resistance to infrastructure-building dependent parties or a large variety of social and white settlement; broke labor strikes; movements. Progress and Poverty, a long and Advertising and supported the work of industrialists in difficult work of political economy, outsold the trans-Mississippi regions. Many of the every other book in the 19th century except Opportunities same soldiers and officers then served in for the Bible and Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Never the Philippines and the Caribbean during before, or since, have national elections been the Spanish-American War. The Jim Crow more closely contested or “third” parties— segregation that increasingly characterized Greenback-Labor, Knights, Readjusters, the South in the 1890s and early 1900s Populists—more successful in competing needs to be considered in relation to the for power at the state and local levels. Al- apartheid policy of reservations, while the though these parties were gone by the early escalating racism and anti-Catholicism of 20th century, they would leave important the period—both absorbed and reconfig- social-democratic legacies for Progressivism ured by reformers—fueled the imperial and the New Deal, and for us to recognize

warfare of the late 1890s. Which is to say and appreciate. OCTOBER 16, 2017 THENATION.COM that the regional, national, and transna- But not to emulate. Contemporary activ- tional were intricately connected and to- ists looking for inspirations from history— gether made up the United States that a “usable past”—often find this period rich Special packages available for emerged at the turn of the 20th century. in examples. And there can be little doubt small businesses, authors, and nonprofit organizations. Options for that a commitment to democratic practice regional and national campaigns s was true of the earlier Railroaded, was most strongly embraced by those who with modest budgets. White seems quite mindful, in The marched under the banners of Radical Republic for Which It Stands, of the Republicanism and anti-monopoly—espe- resonance between past and pres- cially African Americans, whose political More information at A ent. “I have written a book about struggles don’t get the attention they de- TheNation.com/advertise a time of rapid and disorienting change serve in this volume. There can also be little 32 The Nation. May 14, 2018

relevance as the “producers” these move- ments comprised increasingly fell into the ranks of the working class. Anti-monopoly identified exploitation mainly in the sphere of exchange; its focus was on control over the money supply (greenbacks), cooperative marketing (subtreasury), and the regulation of vital infrastructure, especially railroads. Ode to the Belt Anti-monopoly was far less concerned with relations of power in workshops, on farms, and in families, which often involved women it’s clear the future does not bode well for the living as well as people of color; nor did it adequate- ly address the challenges of industrial labor, my man wont let me forget where leather comes from aside from a commitment to the eight-hour workday. Thus the anti- monopolist South- the engineered animal bent over in chemical grass ern Farmers’ Alliance (composed mainly of landowners) not only excluded African Americans (who were mostly farm laborers the slit thing hanged & blood slunk skin stripped and sharecroppers) from membership, but also brutally crushed a black cotton-pickers’ & tanned in order to keep a man decent i know strike in 1891 that the Colored Farmers’ Alliance had supported. Populism, and anti-monopoly sensibili- how to keep a man the belt knows how to keep order ties more generally, lived on in a variety of forms, mostly veering left through the the sound of his unbuckling’s pavlovian a sidewalk 1930s and veering right thereafter. That the “populist” label can be attached today split into drooling meat. he beats me into my evening to movements of the left and the right (though mostly of the right) is an indication of both its continued rhetorical salience blush, i clutch pearls, eyes the color of a little red cloak. and its limited usefulness as a way forward for progressives, despite the lift that Bernie bless this bridle wrapped around my throat while he Sanders and Elizabeth Warren have given it. Democracy in the 19th century was bloods me, bless the constricted windpipe’s unlikely music widely understood in the gendered terms of masculinity and patriarchy, and could be

imagined as a central component of populist bless any thing that can be remade to eke out pleasure and anti-monopoly movements whose so- cial base was constituted by male household from stone, bless all this life thrashing against death’s heads. Democracy today cannot possibly be imagined without including relations garish precipice, o bless me lord, bless me doorman, of power that 19th-century populism and anti-monopoly for the most part ignored or actively excluded: those involving racial- bless me cormorant & courtship & torture & husbandry, ized groups, stateless people, and women and men as well as the rich and poor, or the give me enough compression to remember i once lived “people” and the “interests.” In The Republic for Which It Stands, Rich- ard White re-creates the rich textures of here & i’ll accept in the end not even death will wife me a world that still speaks to ours and from which we have much to learn—a world that SAM SAX created forms of wealth and power that still bedevil us, while invigorating notions of economic justice that had emerged across the 19th century and would remain con- sequential well into the 20th. But from the 21st-century perspective of what many see as a second Gilded Age, it is clear that we need a language of struggle and a vision of the political future that the first Gilded Age simply did not provide. Q May 14, 2018 The Nation. 33

SEEING THROUGH A GLASS Perhaps Joan Jonas has been making her “late” work all along by BARRY SCHWABSKY

he maturity of the late works of recorded performances, more than the words ine? If linearity is only one aspect of time as significant artists does not re- and sounds that accompany them, time itself we experience it, and time’s simultaneity is semble the kind one finds in seems to be the main material Jonas works just as significant, then we should be wary fruit,” Theodor Adorno once with, manipulating it as a sculptor might of parsing an artist’s oeuvre into early and T wrote. “They are, for the most mold, tear, and recombine bits of clay. “I deal late phases, or at least careful that we’re part, not round, but furrowed, even rav- with space in a very physical and a conscious not looking for earliness and lateness in the aged.” The current exhibition at the Tate way,” she says in a conversation reprinted in wrong places. Memory puts the present- Modern in London devoted to the unclas- the exhibition’s catalog. “In video and film and ness of the present into question as much sifiable American artist Joan Jonas, 81, is performance, time accompanies that. How as it does the pastness of the past, and so an occasion for thinking again about late long to move from here to there? How long does forgetting. What’s lost when memory works—and especially in ways that Adorno does it last? Give it time. Flash an image—a is suppressed is the knowledge captured by could not have done in 1937, when he was memory. I work with time, but I don’t plan William Faulkner’s famous observation that

© 2018 (PHOTOGRAPH BY SERAPHINA NEVILLE © TATE PHOTOGRAPHY) © 2018 (PHOTOGRAPH BY SERAPHINA NEVILLE TATE writing about Beethoven’s late style. ahead of time. I juxtapose different times, “The past is never dead. It’s not even past.” That’s because Jonas does strange things curious about how they’re going to affect It remains with us, however elusively, like with time. More than the objects she makes or each other.” the ghosts that pass through so many of the

REANIMATION finds, more than the moving and still images When what we experience as the present stories that inspire Jonas. she creates with a camera or by her incessant is always a palimpsest of other times—of Perhaps it is the case that Jonas has practice of drawing, more than the bodies (her recurrent pasts and emergent futures—can been making her late work all along, or that

JOAN JONAS, own or those of others) that appear in live or time really be the linear sequence we imag- the work she was doing in the late 1960s 34 The Nation. May 14, 2018 and early to mid-’70s might, accord- than might at first have been obvious ing to Adorno’s formulation, be later with the burgeoning postmodernism of than her art of more recent decades. the time. Her artistic aspirations were Jonas’s chronologically early works are very different from those of the various the ones that are expressionless and types of blunt-impact minimalism in distant yet somehow ravaged. They are works by her colleagues in that era—of a the ones in which the artist’s subjectiv- sculpture like Richard Serra’s 1968 Prop, ity is revealed mainly by what Adorno a rolled sheet of lead holding another calls “the irascible gesture with which sheet flat against the wall, or a com- it takes leave of the works themselves. position like Philip Glass’s Music With It breaks their bonds, not in order to Changing Parts (1970), with its intricately express itself, but in order, expression- patterned rhythmic modules creating less, to cast off the appearance of art. unexpected shifts of texture within an Of the works themselves it leaves only unremittingly consistent pulse. fragments behind, and communicates Jonas has repeatedly emphasized the itself, like a cipher, only through the importance of modernist poetry for her blank spaces from which it has disen- developing aesthetic; Yeats, Williams, gaged itself.” Pound, and H.D. are the names that crop up again and again in her inter- he blank spaces in which we see views. That means her sense of “image” Jonas’s subjectivity most directly has always been as literary as it is vi- appear in the earliest piece in sual—what Pound called “an intellectual the Tate exhibition (which was and emotional complex in an instant T curated by Andrea Lissoni and of time.” And it means that, like Wil- Julienne Lorz and will be on view liams, Pound, and H.D. (whose long through August 5, after which it will 1961 poem Helen in Egypt became the travel to the Haus der Kunst, Munich, inspiration for Jonas’s 2002 installation and the Serralves Museum of Contempo- they might have been, to fill in the blanks. In and performance Lines in the Sand), Jonas rary Art, Porto). Wind (1968) is a silent these images, the mostly urban backdrops are would eventually expand from a poetics of black-and-white film—displayed here on often just as striking as the actions they frame. the single, condensed image to one based on video—that shows a group of black-caped For Jonas, now, in retrospect, the blank a multitude of images in contiguity, implying figures, two of them with mirrors cover- spaces of the city where most of the pieces that each instant of time might in some way ing their costumes, as they perform (or were made emerge as active forces in the cre- be simultaneous with, or in communication attempt to perform) a sequence of mysteri- ation of the works: “some parts of New York with, many others. ous, sometimes comical-looking, perhaps looked like ruins,” a wall label quotes her as Another of Jonas’s acknowledged liter- ritualistic movements on an empty beach saying, referring to the city as it was in the ary progenitors is Jorge Luis Borges, whose on Long Island’s North Shore. The wind 1960s and ’70s. (It is one of the exhibition’s intellectual games with time and space sug- blows so hard against the performers that it strengths that the labels feature the first- gest an even more radically nonlinear sense sometimes seems to thwart their efforts, yet person voice of the artist herself.) “These were of temporality than that of his American at other times it appears to be a necessary places to explore. SoHo was relatively empty, and Irish predecessors. Think of his story partner in their strange dance through this and artists were able to move into old, recently “The Aleph,” which presents a point in space inhospitable winter landscape at the water’s abandoned factory lofts there that had the where all other points coexist, or of his “The edge. Jonas calls it “a comedy of chaos,” but beauty of another time. It wasn’t expensive to Garden of Forking Paths,” which suggests its comedy is austere and rueful. find a place to perform or exhibit one’s work, that time can be conceived as the simultaneity For Adorno, it is symptomatic of a stereo- and you could work on these streets, lots and of all possible outcomes of any given action. typical misreading of late works as expres- docks without an official permit. My perfor- sions of untrammeled subjectivity that they mance and video reflected that setting. It was he most recent installation in the Tate are thereby “relegated to the outer reaches an atmosphere grainy and rough.” show, Stream or River, Flight or Pattern of art, in the vicinity of document,” but this “Grainy and rough” is how I would char- (2016–17), which was shown last sum- seems unavoidable if he is right that they re- acterize the photographs themselves, as well mer in New York, contains three video cord the process of shedding artistic appear- as the films and videos made in these early T projections on freestanding screens ance and leave “only fragments behind.” As years—it’s almost the essence of their style. In that are surrounded by enlarged drawings is common in exhibitions that include perfor- a 2003 interview with Hans Ulrich Obrist, re- of birds on wooden boards and paper kites, mances and other similarly transient works, a printed in the Tate exhibition’s catalog (which made in Vietnam, hanging from the ceiling. section of documentary photographs of video also reprints an interview that I did with Jonas The imagery in the videos—now crisp and recordings and descriptions of several of Jo- last year), she recalls how “that grainy quality clean enough to satisfy any filmmaker— nas’s performance pieces from 1968 through of early video was so strange, even other- spans the globe: We see what are essentially 1980 has to communicate the nature of these worldly. That was the aesthetic that we all portraits of the feathered inhabitants of a works by indirection. Those of us who were really liked. Filmmakers hated it, of course.” bird sanctuary in Singapore, as well as mosaic not there at the time have to try, from what is Jonas’s aesthetic of fragments was a pro- floors in Venice and the redwoods of Califor- truly a handful of fragments, to conjure what longation of modernism, and less in keeping nia, to name a few. Some of the most strik- May 14, 2018 The Nation. 35 ing footage, filmed in a village near Hanoi, a room, Stream or River, Flight or Pattern of- convex. One of the most striking of Jonas’s shows a ritual in which large, colorful paper fers no perspective from which things resolve early works is titled Glass Puzzle II (actually, models of animals are taken first to an altar, into a whole. Each of its videos can command it’s dated 1974/2000—that is, as both an then to a pyre, where they are burned. The your rapt attention, yet in the back of your early work and a fairly late one, in accord strange thing is that this ceremony is carried mind, and perhaps the corner of your eye, the with Jonas’s way of turning time back on out in an absolutely unceremonious way, as others solicit equal consideration; concentra- itself). The black-and-white video shows if the sacrifice of elaborate paper simulacra, tion and its dispersal are solicited in equal the artist carrying out a sequence of move- made for no other purpose but sacrifice, were measure. That’s also one of Jonas’s techniques ments and actions while another performer, of no importance, just a banal necessity like for populating her images with the ghosts of the painter Lois Lane, attempts to “mirror” taking out the trash. others—the ones that might be reeling off her gestures. But their actions are both seen, These vérité shots from Jonas’s travels are behind you or off to the side. But other works as it were, through a glass darkly—shot interspersed with others, taken in a studio in of hers put the viewer in a fixed relation to the off a monitor, which we can tell because of New York, in which a couple of children, and image. I’m thinking in particular of a group of the reflections. the artist herself, perform their own strange, pieces called “My New Theater,” which she’s Jonas has spoken of how video can cre- quasi-ritualistic but also gamelike sequences been making occasionally since 1997. ate “an illusion of boxed space,” explaining of movements while similar travel footage is These are long wooden boxes, each of that “I wanted to alter it; to climb inside, to projected behind and onto them. The “real” which houses a video screen that’s set at a dis- use the reflective surface, to tape the lay- performers become something like ghosts tance from the opening through which one ers of reflection and interior image fed to haunting landscapes to which they are for- views it. It’s almost as if the device funnels its the monitor by a second camera.” In the eign and which their gestures can’t affect. imagery directly to the eye, while at the same installation that she built around this single- As children, the performers represent time maintaining an insuperable distance channel video in 2000, she added a small the future, but here they seem cut off from between them. Set in the space between the monitor showing color footage of some of the present, as does Jonas, around 80 as she screen and the viewer are occasionally various the same activity, along with props that seem was making this piece. There is a poignant small props and sometimes pictures. De- to have emerged from the grainy footage sense that one is always too early or too picted in the videos are mostly a few simple of decades earlier—yet in this context, the late to be at home in the now; and, as a actions, such as tap dancing or drawing, that material objects can be seen as mere images viewer wandering through this environment turn out to be more complex than they might of the ones glimpsed in such an intangible of juxtaposed images, moving and still, one at first seem. way in the video. If the 1974 Jonas wanted is always at a distance from things—objects One of the most charming of these to climb inside the illusory box and see what that are doubles of other objects and images pieces is My New Theater VI: Good Night its limits might be, the 2000 Jonas opened that layer various traces of various times in Good Morning ’06 (2006), a sort of remake that box and spilled out its contents in a single frame. of a work from 30 years earlier. In the video, space—without accepting the notion that In Stream or River, Flight or Pattern, as Jonas’s reflection appears in a convex mirror space’s three dimensions are any more real in other recent works—among them Re- as she bids herself good night, then good than the image’s two. This is one of the animation, which began as what Jonas calls a morning, night after night and day after underlying stories of the exhibition and of “lecture-performance” in 2010 and took its day. We see her groggy and rumpled in the Jonas’s career: how the video art of the 1970s present form as an installation in 2013; or morning, drowsy as she’s preparing herself unfolded itself from inside the monitor to They Come to Us Without a Word, not shown in for bed. The artist, genially informal for occupy the bigger box of the room as what London, which she made for the US Pavilion once, is performing the self she is when she’s we now call video installations—a genre that at the 2015 Venice Biennale—Jonas mani- not in performance, the self that’s not seen Jonas and a few others had to make up as fests, in an oblique way, a preoccupation with by anyone but her mirror (and her dog). they went along. our environmental crisis. Not that there’s any Each day the position of the mirror changes, Video technology and the mirror have preaching about climate change, but the re- so we keep seeing the same room from a this in common: that in reduplicating some current (I could almost say obsessive) circling different angle. It’s like a running joke that’s fragment of the world, they introduce at least back to images of birds, trees, bees, and the always told a little differently. But is Jonas a very small spatial or temporal division into land in general takes on an elegiac tone, as if talking to herself, to the mirror as a sort of reality. The reflection is always at a greater these life forms, which we need much more imaginary interlocutor, or to anyone who or lesser distance—and if I try to take what than they need us, were in the process of might happen to see the piece? I see in the mirror as a guide for my move- taking leave of their connection to the world ments, I will always be in the paradoxical of humans. orges was the reason I started situation of trying to follow something that Is all this beauty nearing its end? Jonas’s using mirrors,” Jonas has said. is following me. camera gives things a lingering look, as if It’s the most persistently recur- In the 1970 performance Mirror Check, in secret hope that a moment of perception ring metaphor or device in her the performer (Jonas herself at the time, could hold for eternity. Stream or River, Flight B art, one she began to use in 1968, though during a night of performances at or Pattern could be a late work, not just in the often to produce a note of unease. Jonas in- the Tate a different performer took her place) career of its maker, but in that of the civiliza- troduces the mirror to fragment, obscure, or stands naked, systematically inspecting her tion of which it is a product. That’s a kind of recompose the image; rarely does she use it body, inch by inch, using a small circular mir- late work that Adorno might not have been in the disarming manner of My New Theater ror. The audience never sees what she sees. In able to imagine in 1937, even as the disaster VI. Video, too, is one of her mirrors—and, of a way, we see more than she does, but what of World War II was looming. course, until flat screens became the norm, her eyes see is lost to us. We will never see With its many elements spread throughout the surface of a video monitor was typically enough of our world or ourselves. Q 36 The Nation. May 14, 2018

HOOK ME IN THE FIRST FIVE Young Fathers attempt to make a mainstream pop album by BRIANA YOUNGER

ost artists have to push themselves song structures, more refined production), continuing to widen its sound palette—and to to be more experimental, but the but some people are just destined to stick out. make its audience uncomfortable. challenge that Young Fathers face is Massaquoi, the band’s lead vocalist, summed being more conventional. This was it up for The Guardian earlier this year: “If we s far as contemporary pop albums go, M the task that the Edinburgh trio— try and put ourselves in a box, it’s gonna end Cocoa Sugar, released on March 9, Alloysious Massaquoi, Kayus Bankole, and up with spikes coming out.” is as singular as it is disarmingly gor- Graham “G” Hastings—set for themselves For about a decade, Young Fathers have geous. The first track, “See How,” when they took to the studio to create their made their name by pushing the formalist A features a rumbling bass line that latest album, Cocoa Sugar. As the story goes, notions of genre and song structure to their anchors the song’s chorus, which invites lis- the band had come to find their idiosyncratic limits, drawing comparisons to groups like teners—and perhaps Young Fathers them- mix of everything from rap to punk to gospel TV on the Radio, Suicide, and Massive Attack selves—to drop all their expectations and to pop just a wee bit boring and wanted a new in the process. Their first two mixtapes, con- just “see how it goes.” But no sooner do the sound. The result is something like the weird veniently titled Tape One (2011) and Tape Two feel-good croons come in than the album kids trying to fit in at the popular kids’ lunch (2013), were fuzzy lo-fi blends of (in the band’s jolts in the opposite direction with the table: The signifiers are there (traditional own words) “white-boy beat” and “black-boy second track, “Fee Fi,” an eerie song with rhythm.” Dead, their debut LP, was a sensory tribal drums and piano chords fit for a John Briana Younger is a New York–based writer overload of experimental fusion that earned Carpenter film. In this way, Cocoa Sugar whose work has appeared in The Washington Young Fathers the coveted Mercury Prize seesaws through its 12 tracks, juxtaposing Post, Pitchfork, and Rolling Stone, on NPR, in 2014. That album’s follow-up, White Men harmonious light with dark discord. and elsewhere. Are Black Men Too (2015), revealed a band The standout “Lord,” for example, be- OF NINJA TUNE) BANKOLE, MASSAQUOI, AND HASTINGS (PHOTOGRAPH BY JULIA NONI / COURTESY FROM LEFT: YOUNG FATHERS, May 14, 2018 The Nation. 37 gins as a gentle piano ballad but grows harsher as the lyrics turn more sullen. The lines “Her love is blind / Her love is kind / Her love is mine” are set to soft keys and sung with a boy-band breathiness. Waste My Life Moments later, the lines “Love wants to give / Hate wants the thrills” are delivered sleep, boredom, gossip, cruelty in a stark monotone atop ragged stabs of imaginary feuds and small resentments reverb. The song evokes hope and despair, various, complex plans that amount to nothing passion and dread, all at the same time. at some point, every poet has to admit art is just a distraction from The vocals on Young Fathers’ previous releases were often distorted and obscured the boredom of life by layers of electronic feedback; here, ev- erything is right out front. To call Cocoa every morning I get dressed Sugar “sparse” would be misleading, but and I walk past the road outside the Salvation Army by the group’s own standards it is certainly overflowing with toys and clothes and plastic crap restrained. Even so, their sense of what I think they probably deserve it for being so explicitly homophobic in would pass for fitting in that mainstream box remains draped in their own idiosyncrasies. their core organizational values They know how to write catchy hooks and melodies—as on “In My View” or “Picking I work all day in a bookshop You”—but those elements come packaged in each night when I come home clamorous instrumentation and clouded by it’s dark, and the rain is falling ambiguous lyrics. With its winding riddim, “In My View” covering the world in black diamonds may be the album’s most orthodox song, but some days I feel so deep inside my life I don’t think I’ll ever get out taken with the video, it is also the most self- again referential. The hook sets up a pair of hard lessons: “In my view, nothing’s ever given I never read the Russians but I have read most of the Babysitters Club away / I believe to advance that you must I can’t remember the meaning of poetry pay / In my view, love will never come my way / So when I leave, you’ll be dancing on other than it’s a broken telephone my grave.” The video features a stunning with which to call the dead set of images—a young man bowing rever- and tell them a joke ently before a priest, a woman emotionally embracing her lover, an older gentleman life is great in joyful dance—before it reveals itself as a how-to for “The Art of Making People it’s like being given a rare and historically significant flute Care” (the steps are to “Hook Me In The and using it to beat a harmless old man to death with First 5-Seconds”; “Use Shock & Surprise”; “Give Me Emotional Highs & Lows”; and I used to think the more something hurt, the more meaningful it was “Show Me Your Softer Side”). In this way, but I never learned anything useful from pain the song and video serve as an allegory for I just drank a bottle of wine and tried to fall asleep Young Fathers’ attempt to make a more mainstream record; it’s easy to imagine that when you’re unhappy you can’t think these directives were pulled from a music pain is just boredom with the stars turned up executive’s e-mail to the group. Young Fathers have always coaxed lis- there’s not much I like in this world teners into a more active engagement with I’m always walking away too early in a conversation and having to yell the music, but now they’ve perfected their own formula by streamlining some aspects apologetically back over my shoulder of it and exaggerating others. Cocoa Sugar is their most accessible record to date because I don’t think good art comes from happiness either of its overt use of pop-music formulas, and but who said good art was the point the group’s ironic self-awareness situates the album in the sweet spot just outside their HERA LINDSAY BIRD comfort zone and just inside a pop audience’s. From the cover art down to the abrupt final note, Cocoa Sugar revels in its bittersweet- ness—at once unsettling and captivating, off-balance yet beautiful. Q 38 The Nation. May 14, 2018 Puzzle No. 3464

JOSHUA KOSMAN AND HENRI PICCIOTTO

1`2`3`4`5`6`7`8 DOWN `~`~`~`~`~`~`~` 1 Odd enchantress, rising to ensnare copper (9) 9``````~0`````` 2 Feeling sorry for everyone (including children) after `~`~`~`~`~`~`~` destruction (5) 3 Infusion distressed the bear (4,3) -````````~=```` 4 `~~~`~~~`~`~`~~ Greeting very quiet orange beast (5) 5 Gets ready to run away, reciting something Chaucer q`w```e````~r`t might have written about a seabird? (5,4) `~`~~~`~`~~~`~` 6 Mathematical figure otherwise circumscribing edge (7) y``~u`````i```` 7 Orgiastic romp with titan of great consequence (9) ~~`~`~`~~~`~~~` 8 Participant in rogue’s shindig: One can be educated or o````~p`[```]`` wild (5) `~`~`~`~`~`~`~` 14 Salmon I’d cooked holding unknown instruments (9) \``````~a`````` 15 Engineer overlooking crazy impression (9) `~`~`~`~`~`~`~` 17 Cheer up large bobtail horse with a clown (9) s`````````````` 19 Something you could eat for breakfast: fish sandwiches, ACROSS without a doctor’s orders (7) 1 Momentous heart? (5-10) 20 Former African strongman raised stipulation to put in 9 Essential energy reflected the sound of a cat and the silver (7) sound of a bird (7) 21 Bad time coming up for soldiers (5) 10 Backslide and return psychic’s gift with warning, mostly (7) 23 Start dinner late—it is stimulating (5) 11 No! A thousand times no! Teasing is unacceptable! (9) 24 Family member in French city taking a bite of éclair (5) 12 Mona Lisa’s home is beyond standard (5) 13 Between drinks, sorcerer’s way to make money (7,4) SOLUTION TO PUZZLE NO. 3463 16 and 18 Refuse destination, even after rejecting Teddy

Roosevelt (3,3) ACROSS 1 ME + NAG + ERIE 6 D{EMU}R MENAGERIE~DEMUR 9 {RAT}IONS 10 {COW}[b]ARDS A~O~R~A~N~A~A~I 19 Elevated less serious reader’s implement (11) 11 COM{BAT}MISSION (&lit.) RATIONS~COWARDS 21 Termination of ailment by licking a fish (5) 13 {ASS}EMBLE[m] 14 S{CAT}HE K~I~O~C~A~N~X~E 18 AT{HEN}S 20 F{ANT} + ASIA 23 26 ~~COMBATMISSION 22 Plenty from Chaplin’s tabletop performance in The Gold B(ROTH{ELK})EEPER S{PIG}OTS D~E~S~L~P~~~S~~ 27 TR{APE}ZE (final letters) 28 {DOG}MA Rush (9) 29 SC + {RAM}BLED ASSEMBLE~SCATHE T~~~E~Y~L~Y~~~D 25 DOWN 1 2 defs. 2 anag. 3 G(ROOM Chant about Baltic capital with one type of Asian art (7) 4 ATHENS~FANTASIA + S + M)EN RASC (anag.) + ALLY ~~O~~~C~M~O~U~M 26 Mesa, Arizona’s leader follows behind schedule, turning 5 ENCA + MP (rev.) 6 DAW (rev.) + NS 7 MAR(XIS)T (rev.) 8 anag. 12 DAT A BROTHELKEEPER~~ up outside (7) (rev.) 15 anag. 16 rev. 17 LAM + ENTER A~T~O~A~N~L~R~V 19 21 22 27 [s]HOOTING anag. CLAS(P)S SPIGOTS~TRAPEZE Common bird, once carrying only letters from Singapore (&lit.) 23 B(AS)ED 24 HO + OH + A E~N~H~P~E~S~A~N (9,6) 25 V + END DOGMA~SCRAMBLED

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