Author: Heather Cox Richardson

Data from the Commerce Department showed that the U.S. economy grew at an astonishing rate of 4.9% in the third quarter. We also learned that in Lewiston, Maine, a single shooter killed at least 18 people, more people than died by gun homicide in Maine in the whole of 2021, and injured at least 13 others. These two things are the results of two dramatically different worldviews. President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, and the administration’s other economic advisors have resurrected the idea that the government can promote economic growth by regulating businesses, protecting...

“The U.S. spent billions during the Cold War to prevent Russian aggression. Now, we have spent less than 3% of our defense budget in Ukraine to help the Ukrainian military, and they have destroyed half of the Russian army. It is the best investment ever for American security.” – Lindsey Graham, U.S. Senator The House of Representatives passed a continuing resolution on September 30 to fund the government for 45 days—until just before Thanksgiving—by a vote of 335 to 91. The maneuver was a huge blow to the MAGA caucus that was demanding dramatic cuts to the government, the...

In Tempe, Arizona, President Joe Biden spoke on September 28 at the dedication ceremony for a new library, named for the late Arizona senator John McCain, who died in 2018. Biden used the opportunity not only to honor his friend, but to emphasize the themes of democracy and to call out those who are threatening to overturn it. While Biden has made the defense of American democracy central to his presidency, he has never been clearer or more impassioned than he was today. Biden recalled that when McCain was dying, he wrote a farewell letter to the nation that...

In the early afternoon of August 26, a heavily armed, 21-year-old White Supremacist in a tactical vest and mask, who had written a number of racist manifestos and had swastikas painted on his rifle, murdered three Black Americans at a Dollar General store in Jacksonville, Florida. He had apparently intended to attack Edward Waters University, a historically Black institution, but students who saw him put on tactical gear warned a security guard, who chased him off and alerted a sheriff’s deputy. As David Kurtz of Talking Points Memo put it two days later, “America is living through a reign...

“The GOP has completely gone off its rocker, incapable of passing House spending, ranting and raving at AG, cooking up ludicrous and baseless impeachment, unable to greet Zelensky with joint session. This is not normal. This is egregious. You’d think the reporting would reflect it.” – Jennifer Rubin, September 21, “Washington Post” Indeed, the House Republicans remain unable even to agree to talk about funding the government, let alone actually passing the appropriations bills Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) agreed to four months ago. Right-wing extremists in the House blocked a procedural vote o September 21 over a Pentagon funding...