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The PROGRESSIVE POPULIST,
the People's Voice in a Corporate World.

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Selections from the April 1, 2024 issue

COVER/Dana Milbank
Biden gave $90 billion to Rural America. The thank you went to spam.

EDITORIAL
Biden goes long and scores!

JIM HIGHTOWER
Is ‘Icarus’ the solution to climate change?
What if there was a natural substitute for plastic? There is!
How corporate lobbyists can engineer a train wreck.
What happened to the ‘miracle of meatless meat’?

FRANK LINGO
Solar revolution is on the way

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

DON ROLLINS
The southern border: When suffering begets suffering

RURAL ROUTES/Margot McMillen
‘Show Me’ bad legislative ideas

DISPATCHES
‘Social Security is on the ballot,’ say advocates, as Trump threatens cuts.
Trump team takes over RNC, slashes staff.
Trump’s affection for dictators is at heart of his plan for America — and Ukraine.
To regain youth support, groups say Biden must embrace ‘Finish the Job’ youth agenda.
Trump endorses Gaza genocide: ‘Finish the Problem.’ ...
Senators call for new ‘war profiteering’ panel.

ART CULLEN
Iowa has robins in February and we can barely water the hogs

ALAN GUEBERT
The growing disconnect between hard numbers and soft policy

JOE CONASON
Over congressional Republicans, Putin casts his dark shadow

MARTHA BURK
Backlash: Women’s History Month in a post-Roe world

JOHN YOUNG
Tales of the embryonic highway patrol

SETH SANDRONSKY
Closing California prisons will save taxpayers money, budget watchdog agency reports

DICK POLMAN
During the pandemic, his fraudulency got a lot of people killed. Has that slid down the memory hole?

TOM SCHALLER and PAUL WALDMAN/ The Daily Yonder
Lack of political competition harms rural Americans

DAVID McCALL
Defying the South’s corporate lackeys

JOSEPH B. ATKINS
Workers once again try to organize the South

MARK ANDERSON
Support for aid to Ukraine is waning


ROBERT KUTTNER
Civil War II

THOM HARTMANN
The Saudi & Putin scheme for screwing Biden’s election hopes


SONALI KOLHATKAR
Countering corporate propaganda


CHRIS MILLS RODRIGO
We need a ‘Marshall Plan’ for public media

HEALTH CARE/Joan Retsinas
Welcome to the Twilight Zone: Strange rulings in family care

SAM URETSKY
The pandemic has long-term effects on the economy

PHYLLIS BENNIS
Gazans are starving — don’t cut aid now

WAYNE O’LEARY
Big Pharma on the defensive

GRASSROOTS/Hank Kalet
An assault on campus speech

JASON SIBERT
Military rivals of the US in the second Cold War

JUAN COLE
Trump, like Biden, supports Israeli campaign against Gaza: ‘You’ve got to finish the problem’

N. GUNASEKARAN
‘The world cannot afford conflict in Asia’

JAMIE STIEHM
The Roberts Supreme Court: Too exteme for voters

BARRY FRIEDMAN
Summer of discontent/Part 2

SATIRE/Rosie Sorenson
Say it ain’t so, Joe

RALPH NADER
Count the real Gaza death toll


DAVE MARSTON
Glen Canyon Dam has created a world of mud

ROB PATTERSON
‘The Crown’ was a crowning TV achievement

ELWOOD WATSON
The creep of Christian nationalism

FILM REVIEWS/Ed Rampell
Pan African Film Festival offered new media for Black History Month

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Meet the Cartoonists

Cartoonists and columnists whose work you see in The Progressive Populist are featured in this podcast produced by the Cagle Cartoons Syndicate.

 

More on our features:

Featured in the Essays section are collections of articles and resources on Health Care, Social Security and Voting Security, among other topics. Also see our collection of resources on 9/11 and the aftermath of terror attacks on the United States.

We mainly cover current events, but in an effort to provide historic background, our Populist Reader offers texts such as the Preamble to the People's Party Platform, which formed the rhetorical underpinning for the Populist movement, the People's Party Platform of 1896, which represented the Populist demands at the peak of the agrarian/labor revolt, and more. And Mark Twain's "War Prayer," written in response to the Spanish-American War, is as relevant as ever.

Also featured in the Essays section is "Democratic Money: A Populist Perspective", with Lawrence Goodwyn, William Greider and Tom Schlesinger of the Southern Finance Project discussing the Populism of the 1890s and how those historical lessons relate to the prospects for financial reform today.

Also see reminiscences by two former Alabama journalists about the late George Wallace, the former Alabama governor who transformed American politics with his combination of racism and populism. Claude Duncan remembers the good George Wallace in "George Wallace Joins the Ghost Brigade", while Peggy Roberson reminds us of the bad George Wallace in "Remembering George Wallace"

We also offer Eugene J. McCarthy's remarks on his career in politics on the event of his 80th birthday, as well as his remembrances of Chicago as the Democrats returned to the scene of the crime in 1996 after 28 years. See James McCarty Yeager's remembrance of McCarthy, some notes on McCarthy by Sam Smith and a short film on McCarthy, "Sorry I was Right," at Free Speech TV. Also see a website devoted to McCarthy's legacy.

Another feature that we hope you will check out is Dan Yurman's Samizdat: Militia News from Idaho; Blood Oaths and Fish Stories Swim in Political Waters. This collects a series of dispatches, analysis and commentary by Yurman on militias, wise-use and white-supremacist movements in Idaho and the Rocky Mountain states. Please tell us what you think.

 

See previous postings in our weblog archives:

 


"We believe people are more important than corporations"

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Copyright © 1995-2024 The Progressive Populist

By the way, the name is Progressive Populist, not populous, populace, papalist or populisp. And Donald Trump is not a populist.

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The Progressive Populist is an independent newspaper that reports from the Heartland of America on issues of interest to workers, small business people and family farmers and ranchers.

We produce our newsprint edition and PDF versions twice monthly with updates and resources online.

We also produce a daily supplement, delivered by email, with additional columns by our writers, such as Joe Conason, Amy Goodman, Alan Guebert, Froma Harrop, Jim Hightower, Jesse Jackson, Robert Kuttner, Gene Lyons, Ralph Nader, Robert Reich, Mary Sanchez, Jamie Stiehm, John Young and others, as well as features such as OtherWords.com and other news and commentary. The daily service is available to regular subscribers who want more of their favorite writers.

We hope you enjoy our website, which includes the blog below as well as other resources, including samples of articles from our current newsprint issue, recent editorials, online essays and resources you might find useful and a summary of what we're all about.

We also hope you'll try a subscription to our twice-monthly tabloid newspaper or email version of the paper under our special discount introductory rate of $24 for six months (11 issues). That rate is good for addresses in the US as well as our email version. And if you're not satisfied with the first three issues we'll refund the entire $24.

 

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See our Progressive Populist Gift Shop with items for men, women and children.

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If you can't find the book you're looking for at your local independent bookstore, Powell's Books is an indy bookseller in Portland, Ore., with whom we have partnered. Get your book there and help support our website. See our book page for more suggested titles.

 

A Few Good Weblogs
to keep you from getting your work done:

The American Prospect
Center for American Progress
Juan Cole's Informed Comment on Middle East politics, history and religion.
Common Dreams
Crooks and Liars
Daily Kos (Democratic politics)
Democratic Strategist journal of public opinion and political strategy by William Galston, Stan Greenberg and Ruy Teixeira.
Digby's Hullabaloo.
Eschaton by Atrios (politics)
Media Matters for America
Mother Jones
Charles P. Pierce's Politics blog at Esquire.
Progressive Review Undernews
Political Wire by Taegon Goddard
Raw Story
Poynter Media News (journalism scuttlebutt)
Salon
Greg Sargent's Plum Line at WashingtonPost.com.
Talking Points Memo by Josh Marshall
Talk Left, the politics of crime.
This Modern World, by Tom Tomorrow
Campaign for America's Future, progressive insights
Washington Monthly Political Animal
Washington Spectator
Economic Policy at WashingtonPost.com.

For international news which the US media such as the Chicago Tredibune, the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times and the Washington Post might not see fit to print:

From Canada
Globe and Mail of Toronto, for Canadian news and perspectives on its southern neighbor.
Toronto Star, a liberal Canadian newspaper.

From Britain
The Guardian, a liberal newspaper in London (formerly the Manchester Guardian). See also its US-oriented website, Guardian America.
The Independent, a liberal newspaper in London
Daily Mirror, liberal tabloid in London.
New Statesman, British Socialist weekly.
• BBC World News

From Elsewhere:
Al Ahram, English-language weekly based in Cairo, for Arab perspective on Mid-East
Dawn, of Karachi, centrist English-language Pakistan daily.
The Frontier Post of Peshawar, Pakistan, for news from the front lines of the war on terrorism in Afghanistan.
Haaretz, Israeli liberal daily with English language edition
International Herald Tribune, Paris-based daily operated by the New York Times.
Le Monde Diplomatique, English language monthly digest of the French daily newspaper.
Mail and Guardian, daily web edition of South African liberal weekly.
Mexico City News, the English language daily in our neighbor to the south.
South China Morning Post, independent Hong Kong and Pacific news (registration required).
Spiegel, English version of
German newsweekly.
Sydney Morning Herald, for news from Down Under.
Watching America, links to articles in foreign press about the USA, with translations of articles originally written for foreigners about the US. Updated daily.
World Press Review, a monthly magazine with analyses and English translations of articles in the international press, as well as an excellent directory of publications by nation, with ideological leanings.

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They say a picture is worth a thousand words; well, here are some good cartoon sites:

Jules Feiffer

Jeff Danziger

Mark Fiore

Forever Dada, an animated political cartoon created by California artists Louis Dunn & Steve Campbell.

This Modern World, by Tom Tomorrow. (And he has a pretty good links page.)

Ted Rall, our cartoonist/columnist.

Tom the Dancing Bug, by Ruben Bolling

Matt Wuerker

Also see our Links to Independent Media

See links to health care reform

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See our recent editorials at The Progressive Populist Today blog, and older editorials at our editorial archives page. And like us on Facebook.

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This World Wide Web site not only features selections from the newsprint edition of the Progressive Populist, to which we hope you will subscribe. It also gives you another crack at selected articles from back issues as well as texts of populist speeches and essays on populism that we could not otherwise fit into our printed edition.
Watch our Global Trade site for information on the World Trade Organization, the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and citizen efforts to check the globalization of corporate power. And after you have bookmarked our site, go to the Links for pointers to other web sites that you might find of interest.


The Progressive Populist started in November 1995 as a monthly newspaper with editorial offices in Austin, Texas, and business and production offices in Storm Lake, Iowa. In October 1999, after four years, The Progressive Populist switched to twice-monthly publication. Our editorial offices moved to Manchaca, Texas, just south of Austin, in 2005.

We aim to make the Progressive Populist the antidote to the monopoly daily news, throw a lifeline to progressives who feel like they are stranded in a sea of conservatives, and maybe play a role in reviving political and economic debate. We hope this web site is useful to you.


If you would like to hear more about our project, or if you would like to comment on our web site or receive a sample copy of the Progressive Populist, drop me a line by email or regular post.

Also, register below to receive email updates on news and features or to donate to our enterprise.

-- Jim Cullen, Editor

E-mail populist@usa.net
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