A March 2024 survey by independent pollster PRRI found that 68% of voters will take LGBTQ rights into consideration at the polls. Fully 30% stated that they would vote only for a candidate who shares their views on the issue. It is no coincidence, then, that LGBTQ rights issues feature prominently in the party platforms.
Commentary
The Contradictions of ‘Minnesota Nice’
After Kamala Harris selected Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as her running mate, much of the media coverage zeroed in on Walz’s Midwestern roots, with some pundits using the phrase “Minnesota nice” to describe his appeal. Minnesota nice, whether represented in policies or in being kind to neighbors, is a worthy ideal. But looking at the experiences of Vietnamese refugees in Minnesota, the trope of Minnesota nice has a more complex history – especially when it comes to nonwhite people.
Hurricanes Spawned Politics and Finger-Pointing Even in Hemingway’s Time
Ernest Hemingway, then a resident of Key West, provided an eyewitness account of the catastrophic storm that leveled Upper Matecumbe Key and Lower Matecumbe Key and took the lives of more than 400 people, many of them World War I veterans. Then, as now, the aftermath of a natural disaster included political finger-pointing.
New College’s Descent from Stellar Florida College to ‘Eugenicon’
Steve Sailer, a “eugenicon” who believes Black people are genetically inferior to whites, race is biological, interracial marriage is wrong, and “core Americans” are by definition white, has been invited to speak at one of New College’s “Socratic Stage Dialogues.” Socrates himself would not know whether to laugh, cry, or take an even bigger swig of hemlock.
Hamas’s Yahya Sinwar’s Death Will Not End Netanyahu’s Wars on Gaza and Lebanon
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sinwar’s killing – long a major objective of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) – would signal the “beginning of the end” of the war. But he made clear the war is not over. Benny Gantz, a former defence minister and member of the war cabinet, said the IDF would continue to operate in Gaza “for years to come,” while Netanyahu wants to demolish Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Politicians Love to Warn of American Decline
Politicians’ warnings of decline persist because they invoke fear for the country’s security, anxiety about another country gaining more power and anger about the United States’ various problems. While Trump’s messages of American carnage are dramatic, exchanges of this sort are not uncommon in U.S. politics.
Looking Past Trump’s Lies to Understand Temporary Protected Status
Former President Donald Trump and his running mate, U.S. Sen. JD Vance, have criticized the Biden administration’s decision to allow Haitian nationals who are in the U.S. to apply for permission to stay under a legal classification called Temporary Protected Status. Here is what this designation means and how it’s made.
Will Rogers’s Charitable Political Wisdom
For those trying to come to terms with a particularly tumultuous election year full of deep divisions, ideological invective and personal insults, guidance can come from Will Rogers, a historical figure whose insights into American politics still prove useful.
The Nobel Peace Prize to Japanese Atomic Bomb Survivors’ Group
The 2024 Nobel peace prize has been awarded to Nihon Hidankyo, a Japanese grassroots organisation created by survivors of the two US atomic bombs that were dropped on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945.
Trump’s Lies Politicize FEMA’s Disaster Relief
Rumors and lies about government responses to natural disasters are not new. Those rumors don’t usually come from former presidents. Yet in the wake of hurricanes Helene and Milton, former President Donald Trump spread falsehoods about the federal government’s response to the disaster. Misinformation on the topic became so widespread that the Federal Emergency Management Agency, known as FEMA, set up a webpage to debunk the rumors spawned by Trump.