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DEPARTMENTS 5 EDITOR’S NOTE by ALEXANDRA TEMPUS Round and Round We Go 6 COMMENT by ANNE NELSON They Have a Plan for That 8 FURTHER COMMENT by JOHN NICHOLS Kamala Harris Is Keeping Abortion Rights Front and Center 10 NO COMMENT 11 BLAST FROM THE PAST 12 LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 14 ON THE LINE by MOHAMMAD SABAANEH AND HANK KENNEDY Drawing Under Occupation 24 SMOKING GUN Trump vs. Biden on the Climate Emergency 29 ONE QUESTION Q: What Do We Do About the Supreme Court? Alexa Barrett, Mark Tushnet, and Lisa Graves reply 56 FIRST-PERSON SINGULAR by RACHEL LITCHMAN Medicaid Unwinding Unfairly Puts Patients at Risk 59 INTERVIEW WITH JESSICA PISHKO by ZACH D. ROBERTS A New (Old) Sheriff in Town 62 BOOK EXCERPT Antidemocratic: Inside the Far Right ’s 50-Year Plot to Control American Elections by David Daley 64 BOOK REVIEWS That Librarian: The Fight Against Book Banning in America reviewed by Bill Lueders Managing Chaos: Adventures in Alternative Media reviewed by Norman Stockwell Jesus and the Abolitionists: How Anarchist Christianity Empowers the People reviewed by Erik Gunn 69 POEMS by NAOMI SHIHAB NYE Ours and Gaza VOICES 16 MIDDLE AMERICA by RUTH CONNIFF Don’t Believe the Trumpworld Hype 18 SMART ASS CRIPPLE by MIKE ERVIN When Polling Places Aren’t Accessible, Either 20 WORK WON’T LOVE YOU BACK by SARAH JAFFE Toward a Just Transition 22 FIRST THINGS FIRST by BILL LUEDERS Moving Forward, Looking Back 67 ONCE UPON A TIME IN AMERICA by WAJAHAT ALI Reform the Supreme Court or Bow to MAGA 68 EDGE OF SPORTS by DAVE ZIRIN Caitlin Clark and the Weaponization of Whiteness 70 VOX POPULIST by JIM HIGHTOWER When Corrupt Justices Define Official Corruption and Corporate Executives Should Have to Feel the Summer Heat ON THE COVER Doug Chayka is freelance illustrator and educator working from New Jersey and Berlin, Germany. He is a frequent visual contributor to the The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, as well as many other U.S. and international newspapers and magazines. 4 | AUGUST / SEPTEMBER 2024 PUBLISHER Norman Stockwell GUEST EDITOR Alexandra Tempus MANAGING EDITOR David Boddiger SENIOR EDITOR Emilio Leanza ASSOCIATE EDITOR Michaela Brant WEB EDITOR Delaney Nelson EDITORS-AT-LARGE Ruth Conniff, Bill Lueders ART DIRECTOR Susan Webb DIRECTOR OF ADVANCEMENT AND ENGAGEMENT Daniel K. Libby OFFICE MANAGER Elizabeth D. Miller DIGITAL ENGAGEMENT COORDINATOR Sheriffer Chisanga POETRY EDITOR Jules Gibbs PROOFREADERS Sarah Baum, Catherine Cronin, Elizabeth D. Miller INTERNS Zane Badawi, Christopher Cruz, Anna O’Donnell, Nell Srinath, Julia Wright The full-time staff at The Progressive are members of NOLSW/UAW Local 2320. Founded in 1909 by Senator Robert M. “Fighting Bob” La Follette, The Progressive tackles the forces distorting our economy, corrupting our democracy, and imperiling our planet, and champions peace, civil liberties, equality, and justice. Editorial correspondence should be addressed to The Progressive, P.O. Box 1021, Madison, WI 53701, or editorial@progressive.org. Subscription rates U.S. - One year $29.70 International One year $45 Libraries and institutions One year (Domestic) $50; (Canadian) $65; (Foreign) $98 Send all subscription orders and correspondence to: The Progressive, P.O. Box 1021, Madison, WI 53701. For questions about subscriptions, call toll-free 1 (800) 827-0555. The Progressive is published bimonthly with combined issues in February/March, April/May, June/July, August/September, October/November, December/January. Copyright © 2024 by The Progressive Inc., 931 E. Main Street, Suite 10, Madison, WI 53703. Telephone: (608) 257-4626. Publication number (ISSN 0033-0736). Periodicals postage paid at Madison, WI, and additional mailing offices. Printed in the U.S.A. Donations: The Progressive depends on donations from readers. Contributions are tax-deductible. Mail checks to The Progressive, P.O. Box 1021, Madison, WI 53701 or visit www.progressive.org/donate. Postmaster: Send address changes to: The Progressive, P.O. Box 1021, Madison, WI 53701. www.progressive.org
page 5
EDITOR’S NOTE ROUND AND ROUND WE GO This time of year, those of us living in the United States often return to routines—of work, of school, of mass civic participation. Yet in an age of upheaval, many of our usual cycles seem to have been dramatically disrupted. As we finalized this issue, Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump was grazed by a bullet in a July 13 shooting at a Pennsylvania campaign rally. One week later, incumbent President Joe Biden exited the race with just a few months left until Election Day, endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris as the Democratic candidate. This episode was perhaps the climax in a grimly cartoonish election season, highlighting a system that is, as John Nichols writes in these pages, “showing signs of severe strain, as one party evolves into a cult of personality, while the other has been torn apart” over concerns about an aging, genocide-enabling, President Joe Biden. Other stories here illuminate the same. Just in time for the bell to ring in another academic year, our lead Public Schools Advocate project fellow, Jeff Bryant, lays out the opposing populist visions dueling for the soul of our schools. Elsewhere, Mindy Isser takes readers into the quagmire parents must navigate to find child care, or what labor leader Ai-Jen Poo famously calls “the work that makes all other work possible.” Yet these aren’t disruptions so much as a degradation of cycles that were vicious to begin with: a calcified, corporate ballot; public schools perennially starved of funds and resources; workers who have never been guaranteed parental leave or child care. In addition to leaving our elections ineffective, our schools ideological battlefields, and our workforce broke and burned out, these tired political pathways perpetually lead us to the worst possible ends: genocide and the ever escalating threat of nuclear war. In this issue, you’ll see explorations of both—from Palestinian political cartoonist Mohammad Sabaaneh’s wrenching interpretations of the assault on Gaza to Jim Carrier and Roger Rapoport’s breakdowns of a nuclear industry committing to dangerously new and old technologies, respectively. None of this is a rebuke of cycles themselves. Over the past few years, I’ve been immersed in writing my first book, which explores how climate change is affecting the places where we live, and whether we can live there at all. As I drove cross-country to document this phenomenon, from Wisconsin to South Carolina to California and back, I confronted a durable truth: We need routines and patterns and cycles to live. We need familiar places—now disappearing—to which we can reliably return. We need the rotation of seasons, now warping, to sustainably grow plants. We need dependable goods and services at regular intervals to ensure we can enable our continual needs to sleep, eat, and breathe—let alone cultivate a just, democratic society. The challenge, then, is not only to dismantle oppressive cycles but also to initiate new ones that work for us all. Inside these pages, readers will find powerful testament to doing just that: from the story of the political alliance that brought about the New Popular Front’s stunning progressive victory in France, to a report on ballot initiatives making gains for voters who have been failed by politicians, to ideas from leading thinkers for reimagining the Supreme Court, to Sarah Jaffe’s coverage of Ohio electric vehicle workers’ historic wins in the United Auto Workers union national agreement with automakers. These offerings show how we might meet the uncertainty of the moment: not by yielding to the chaos but by finding the routines, patterns, and cycles—the organizing tactics, term limits, labor demands, municipal blueprints, and more—that will lead us collectively home. In solidarity, Alexandra Tempus KEEPING UP WITH THE NEWS With a print magazine, there is always danger that something changes between the time a piece is written and is published. We update articles just before press time, but the historic events of June and July have challenged us. These include earthshaking decisions by the U.S. Supreme Court on presidential immunity and judicial deference, an end (for now) to the classified documents case against former President Donald Trump, an apparent assassination attempt on Trump by a young man with an AR-15-style rifle, and a Republican National Convention in Wisconsin that anointed Trump with near-messianic status. Then, on July 21, President Joe Biden announced that he would not seek re-election— the first time an incumbent President had done this since Lyndon B. Johnson announced on March 31, 1968, that he would not run. As of this writing, we are in uncharted waters. It is unclear how things will unfold at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. Whatever happens, The Progressive will be there to cover these events and to offer the insights and analysis of our writers. Please watch our website for updates—all delivered with the progressive perspective you expect and deserve. —Norman Stockwell, publisher THE PROGRESSIVE | 5

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DEPARTMENTS 5 EDITOR’S NOTE by

ALEXANDRA TEMPUS Round and Round We Go 6 COMMENT by ANNE NELSON They Have a Plan for That 8 FURTHER COMMENT

by JOHN NICHOLS Kamala Harris Is

Keeping Abortion Rights Front and Center 10 NO COMMENT 11 BLAST FROM THE PAST 12 LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 14 ON THE LINE by

MOHAMMAD SABAANEH AND HANK KENNEDY Drawing Under Occupation 24 SMOKING GUN Trump vs. Biden on the

Climate Emergency 29 ONE QUESTION Q: What Do We Do

About the Supreme Court? Alexa Barrett, Mark Tushnet, and Lisa Graves reply

56 FIRST-PERSON SINGULAR

by RACHEL LITCHMAN Medicaid Unwinding

Unfairly Puts Patients at Risk 59 INTERVIEW WITH

JESSICA PISHKO by ZACH D. ROBERTS A New (Old) Sheriff in Town 62 BOOK EXCERPT Antidemocratic: Inside the Far

Right ’s 50-Year Plot to Control American Elections by David Daley 64 BOOK REVIEWS That Librarian:

The Fight Against Book Banning in America reviewed by Bill Lueders Managing Chaos:

Adventures in Alternative Media reviewed by Norman Stockwell Jesus and the Abolitionists:

How Anarchist Christianity Empowers the People reviewed by Erik Gunn 69 POEMS by NAOMI SHIHAB NYE Ours and Gaza

VOICES 16 MIDDLE AMERICA

by RUTH CONNIFF Don’t Believe the Trumpworld Hype 18 SMART ASS CRIPPLE

by MIKE ERVIN When Polling Places

Aren’t Accessible, Either 20 WORK WON’T LOVE YOU BACK

by SARAH JAFFE Toward a Just Transition 22 FIRST THINGS FIRST

by BILL LUEDERS Moving Forward,

Looking Back

67 ONCE UPON A TIME IN

AMERICA by WAJAHAT ALI Reform the Supreme Court or Bow to MAGA 68 EDGE OF SPORTS

by DAVE ZIRIN Caitlin Clark and the

Weaponization of Whiteness 70 VOX POPULIST

by JIM HIGHTOWER When Corrupt Justices

Define Official Corruption and Corporate Executives Should Have to Feel the Summer Heat

ON THE COVER

Doug Chayka is freelance illustrator and educator working from New Jersey and Berlin, Germany. He is a frequent visual contributor to the The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, as well as many other U.S. and international newspapers and magazines.

4 | AUGUST / SEPTEMBER 2024

PUBLISHER Norman Stockwell GUEST EDITOR Alexandra Tempus MANAGING EDITOR David Boddiger

SENIOR EDITOR Emilio Leanza ASSOCIATE EDITOR Michaela Brant

WEB EDITOR Delaney Nelson

EDITORS-AT-LARGE Ruth Conniff, Bill Lueders ART DIRECTOR Susan Webb DIRECTOR OF ADVANCEMENT AND ENGAGEMENT Daniel K. Libby OFFICE MANAGER Elizabeth D. Miller DIGITAL ENGAGEMENT COORDINATOR

Sheriffer Chisanga POETRY EDITOR Jules Gibbs

PROOFREADERS Sarah Baum, Catherine Cronin,

Elizabeth D. Miller

INTERNS Zane Badawi, Christopher Cruz, Anna O’Donnell, Nell Srinath, Julia Wright

The full-time staff at The Progressive are members of NOLSW/UAW Local 2320.

Founded in 1909 by Senator

Robert M. “Fighting Bob” La Follette, The Progressive tackles the forces distorting our economy, corrupting our democracy, and imperiling our planet, and champions peace, civil liberties, equality, and justice.

Editorial correspondence should be addressed to The Progressive, P.O. Box 1021, Madison, WI 53701, or editorial@progressive.org.

Subscription rates U.S. - One year $29.70 International One year $45

Libraries and institutions One year (Domestic) $50; (Canadian) $65; (Foreign) $98

Send all subscription orders and correspondence to: The Progressive, P.O. Box 1021, Madison, WI 53701. For questions about subscriptions, call toll-free 1 (800) 827-0555.

The Progressive is published bimonthly with combined issues in February/March, April/May, June/July, August/September, October/November, December/January. Copyright © 2024 by The Progressive Inc., 931 E. Main Street, Suite 10, Madison, WI 53703. Telephone: (608) 257-4626. Publication number (ISSN 0033-0736). Periodicals postage paid at Madison, WI, and additional mailing offices. Printed in the U.S.A. Donations: The Progressive depends on donations from readers. Contributions are tax-deductible. Mail checks to The Progressive, P.O. Box 1021, Madison, WI 53701 or visit www.progressive.org/donate. Postmaster: Send address changes to: The Progressive, P.O. Box 1021, Madison, WI 53701.

www.progressive.org

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