If you're wondering just how dangerous the GOP has become, consider the words of Tom Nichols, a Republican trying, in his own words, to fumigate his party... To continue reading this article, please go here. As a Banter Member you'll get access to our beautiful, ad free digital ...read more
Yesterday, Bernie Sanders announced his bid to seek a third term in the Senate this fall. The move has provoked more speculation about his potential run in 2020, and filled many on the left with a sense of hope or dread about the future of liberal politics in America. If Sanders ...read more
The Banter Long Read: There's a quiet revolution happening in America's courtrooms that promises to radically change how brown skin is treated by our extremely racist criminal justice system. It's a small revolution but it's growing and once it gets large enough to threaten the ...read more
Days like these, I often stare at my blank computer screen, unable to zero-in on a topic to cover. Clearly there are way too many tantalizing bombshells bursting forth from the ongoing fire-hose of news. As a political writer, I'll never complain about an overly abundant news ...read more
The Banter Long Read: I've said for years that libertarians are the perfect intersection of arrogance and ignorance. They will smugly declare that the free market can handle everything and that anyone who disagrees is simply too stupid to understand the sheer brilliance of Ayn ...read more
Donald Trump made perhaps his most fatal foreign policy blunder so far this week by signing a memorandum authorizing the U.S.'s resumption of sanctions against Iran, violating the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), also known colloquially as the Iran Deal. Trump's ...read more
I've long been an admirer of Matt Taibbi's journalism and writing style -- so much so that it helped inspired me to become a writer myself. Early on as a writer, I would read as much of his work as I could, quote him at length in pieces I struggled to find the right words for, ...read more
Rarely do I ever complain about my work. Frankly, I feel quite lucky that I get to do what I love every day. However, sometimes it's a lonely job, observing American politics and reporting back to you about what I'm seeing. The specific downside is that I'll occasionally sift ...read more
The Banter Long Read: We've all read the stories about the creeps who have two families living in different cities. They live with one family for days or weeks at a time and then leave "for work" to go live with the other one. They raise their kids, love their wives, clean the ...read more
There are some days when I think American style capitalism is the greatest economic system to have ever been created. When we've had a good week at the Banter, or my (admittedly rather small) stocks and shares portfolio gets a boost, I tell myself that the success I am ...read more
The Banter Long Read: Even at my lowest points, when everything looks bleak and horrible and the light at the end of the tunnel is all but eclipsed by a deranged orange Death Star, I know mankind will get past this. I know this because I have something that conservatives will ...read more
One of the many supremely stressful aspects of the Trump era is the very real danger that President Trump's style of erratic, racist, bullying, misinformed politics will continue beyond Trump, further eroding institutions and obliterating the functioning of government as we know ...read more
Last Friday, the controversial Canadian psychologist and anti-leftist polemicist Jordan Peterson came on Real Time with Bill Maher to discuss the ills of political correctness, why you should discipline your kids, and the problem with identity politics. It was standard Jordan ...read more
The Banter Long Read: Republicans have a demographic problem. No, not the one about blacks and Latinos and, no, not the one about Baby Boomers dying off. This is a new one and potentially even more lethal to the long term prospects of the GOP... To continue reading this article, ...read more
For some time now, there have been random stories and more than a few rumors about the Republican Party's links to Russian money and, more importantly, Russia's attack on our democratic institutions. We generally know the extent of what the head of the party, President David ...read more
I recently finished watching "Wild Wild Country", the six part Netflix series about the Indian guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh (later known as "Osho"), his power hungry assistant Ma Anand Sheela, and their community of followers in the Rajneeshpuram in Oregon. It was an astonishing ...read more
The Banter Long Read: After Bill Maher leapt to Laura Ingraham's defense against the dreaded power of the Parkland teens and their oppressive boycott, it kicked off the debate on the left again about freedom of speech versus progressive censorship, particularly on college ...read more
We could probably spend weeks listing all of the reasons why Trump voters ultimately cast their ballots for the Mad King. What's truly baffling to me, even more than the reasons for their votes, is how they can continue to celebrate their guy while their tiny brains are routinely ...read more
I have a personal story about Tony Robbins that confirmed many of my worst suspicions about the self help/positive thinking guru. It involves a close friend of mine who may face legal consequences for his run in with Mr. Robbins, and for that reason this article has to go behind ...read more
One of the main reasons I became a journalist was to push back against the disinformation I saw coming from Bernie Sanders supporters when he first entered the race for President in 2015. Whenever I would post even the mildest critique of him online, an army of white, ...read more
The Banter Long Read: This is not going to be a popular message but it's a necessary one: The election of Donald Trump has only delayed the inevitable rise of widespread domestic terrorism in America. These terrorists will not be self-radicalized Muslims or Black Lives Matter ...read more
A while back, I coined my very own rule about the corruption and despotism of Donald Trump. If you're at all familiar with my work, you likely recognize this: "Trump always makes things worse for Trump." Ninety-nine percent of the time, it absolutely applies to every Trump ...read more
In the wake of the #MeToo movement that swept across America and much of the western world in October of 2017, I was so taken aback by the speed and intensity of it that I genuinely struggled to come to terms with what was going on. The sheer number of horrendous stories that ...read more
In the debate about gun control, everything comes back to the validity and applicability of the Second Amendment in a modern context. What's its purpose? Why is it still necessary? Honestly, while I understand the arguments of the gun culture, I don't grasp why, in a modern ...read more
Before we get started, let's clear one thing up: Of course I have male privilege. I'm a male. Duh. Taken on the whole, I can almost guarantee I got paid more, was promoted quicker, and had an easier time in my professional life than my female coworkers. As a particularly tall and ...read more
Prior to the end of 2016 the average American rarely even thought about Russia, almost never thought about Vladimir Putin, and had no idea what a Kremlin was. Now hatred for Russia is at the forefront of consciousness in mainstream America, and now infected the UK as well and is ...read more
I had the good fortune of talking to David Corn this week, who, with Yahoo! News's Michael Isikoff, has written what is sure to be remembered as one of the best books on the 2016 election, Russian Roulette: The Inside Story of Putin's War on America and the Election of Donald ...read more
This is a difficult topic for me to write about for various reasons, the primary being my pride and self image -- both of which have changed as a result of what I am about to discuss. As a person who has always been largely in control of their emotions and anxiety, experiencing a ...read more
Apparently Donald Trump thinks he's finally potty-trained enough to earn himself a pair of big boy pants. Reports from inside the White House this week suggest that Trump feels as though he's learned enough about being president to call his own shots without the aid of his ...read more
Donald Trump had 62,979,879 Americans on his side for the 2016 Presidential election. While a seemingly large number, it was only 46.1 percent of the vote, with Hillary Clinton leading with 48.2 percent. Trump, of course, cleaned up the Electoral College and became our 45th ...read more
Dateline: end of February. I was in the middle of a cross-country move from Santa Rosa, California to Washington, DC that week, but I didn't miss any of the harrowing Trump news that's dropped during my downtime. In fact, I kept notes of all the things. Here's my list, exactly as ...read more
When Donald Trump said that Chinese President Xi Jinping's move to repeal the country's term limits law last month was "great" and that "maybe we'll have to give that a shot some day," you should believe him. And you should also be very, very worried. To continue reading this ...read more
The Banter Long Read: There is legitimate reason to criticize the FBI and local law enforcement over their handling of the Parkland shooting before, during and after the event. There should be a thorough investigation into the intelligence failings regarding Cruz and the botched ...read more
The Banter Long Read: CPAC is the yearly gathering of the right wing's loudest and nastiest elements. It's the weekend when the media gets a good look at the true face of conservatism and immediately develops amnesia by Monday morning. But while CPAC is always filled with the ...read more
Early on in our working relationship, I must confess to being somewhat intimidated by Chez. He was an award winning producer, author of a book praised by the likes of Arianna Huffington (who wrote the foreword to "Dead Star Twilight"), and a writer so gifted media moguls like ...read more
The Banter Long Read: Trump-Republicans have much to answer for. On top of electing this incompetent, misinformed Russian agent, Donald Trump, to the presidency, saddling us all with the responsibility of containing then cleaning up the decades worth of mess he's making, ...read more
The Banter Long Read: Last week, Jimmy Kimmel once again found himself the unlikely spokesperson for the anger Americans feel towards the Republicans who offer thoughts and prayers in the wake of mass shootings, but nothing else. Before 2017, he had been one of the least ...read more
Stop me if you've heard this one before. A lawyer walks into a bar, orders a drink and explains to the bartender that he just paid $130,000 in hush-money -- out of his own pocket, no less -- to silence a porn star who somehow managed to fuck the lawyer's client, who, by the way, ...read more
The Banter Long Read: It's been over two years since Trump oozed his way down that escalator and launched his explicitly racist campaign to be a white nationalist president. Yet, the media is still reluctant to call him racist and his followers still clutch their pearls when ...read more
As part of the budget that Trump proposed on Monday that almost exclusively targets the poorest Americans, along with horrifying cuts to public health insurance and federal housing vouchers, the president is aiming to slash billions of dollars from food stamps by introducing one ...read more
Everything Trump says, every tweet, every childish nickname or insult, every deviation from political norms is causing damage to the system. It's happening incrementally, one egregious trespass after another, and some of us might not even notice that Trump is establishing all new ...read more
I didn’t watch the Super Bowl last night. My allegiance doesn’t lie with the New England Patriots or the Philadelphia Eagles. My concern is with the hyper-masculinity that is celebrated and rewarded within the sport so many people love... To continue reading this article, please ...read more
Two major news stories dropped yesterday, so let's cut right to the chase. First, we learned that Donald Trump apparently demanded that Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein pledge his loyalty to Trump, asking Rosenstein if he's "on my team." The meeting occurred this past ...read more
Shortly after the inaugural last January, acting Attorney General Sally Yates warned Donald Trump that his National Security Adviser, Michael Flynn, had been less than forthcoming regarding his conversations with Russians. Trump's immediate response was to fire Mrs. Yates... To ...read more
White Republican voters are in the middle of a slow motion Civil War redux and instead of simply lopping off part of the country and declaring themselves free from the United States and its annoying ban on slavery, the are walling themselves off in an alternate reality. There, ...read more
Tens of thousands of teenagers will undergo conversion therapy before they turn 18. This has already happened to around 350,000 kids and another 350,000 adults, and will happen to many more if action isn't taken to stop it. Vice President Mike Pence is widely rumored to support ...read more
You might've noticed that the congressional Republicans have amped up their efforts to undermine the integrity of the FBI and the Mueller investigation. The latest chapter in the Trumpers' "deep state coup" narrative has arrived and it goes a little like this: they're focusing on ...read more
The Banter Long Read: As a militant atheist, I generally don't keep my rock bottom opinion of religion to myself. I do, however, reserve most of my criticism for the religious right because they're not just everything wrong with religion, they dial it up to 11. They're so ...read more
In 2013 when the movie 'Zero Dark Thirty' came out, Glenn Greenwald wrote a predictably pedantic and scathing review about its complicity with the pro Obama/pro CIA/pro neo imperialist/deep state. A reader cheekily left a comment on the piece asking the Guardian that they should ...read more
With the #MeToo movement comes so many people taking a hard look at their dating and sex lives and wondering if they are respectful and doing it right in the age of rape culture. It’s long overdue, of course, though so many have been trying to change this culture for a very long ...read more