Today's Liberal News

Community Spotlight: There’s something fishy about this week’s rescued stories

It’s not because we have shorter attention spans than goldfish that this week’s rescued stories shifted focus from the 2020 election. The goldfish myth has been debunked—by fish themselves demonstrating to researchers that their memory is just fine. Fish recognize and learn from each other, have complex spatial maps of their habitats, and when taught to avoid a trap, they will remember that lesson for at least a year.

The Commons

The Constitution Counted My Great-Great-Grandfather as Three-Fifths of a Free PersonIn the October issue, Danielle Allen wrote about why she loves the flawed document anyway.Danielle Allen says of James Wilson, “We have nonetheless all but forgotten him.”It is true that Wilson was one of the most influential members of the Philadelphia Convention, where the Constitution was forged, and is now rarely mentioned in our history.

20 Movie Families to Spend Your Holidays With

The coming holiday season will be a particularly strange one, with family gatherings limited and travel options diminished because of the coronavirus pandemic. One of my favorite traditions as fall edges into winter is watching movies, whether that means corralling the family to catch new releases at the theater, or arguing over the best film to enjoy at home on the couch.

The Major Difference Between Black Male and Female Voters

Since the years following the New Deal, when the majority of Black voters left the Republican Party, Black men and women have turned out in spectacular numbers for Democrats in presidential elections. No other racial group has been as consistent for the Dems. This year’s contest was no different; roughly 90 percent of this bloc cast ballots for President-elect Joe Biden and Vice President–elect Kamala Harris.

Why You Don’t Mess Around With Presidential Transitions

In his new memoir, Barack Obama reveals that there was a terrorist threat on his Inauguration Day. As he addressed the nation, he was prepared to interrupt himself to read evacuation instructions for the millions gathered on the National Mall. Obama had been in the job just seconds, and he was experiencing his first stomach drop—the possibility of a mass-casualty event.The presidency comes at you fast; it helps if you prepare. This would seem to be axiomatic.

Go Ahead, Forgive Student Debt

President-elect Joe Biden could conjure a sweeping financial-relief policy into existence on the first day of his presidency, without the participation of Congress, the Federal Reserve, or any other institution. That is, he could forgive student loans.On Monday, Biden said that loan forgiveness figures into his plan to rev up the American economy, citing a provision in the House’s stalled-out HEROES Act that would pay off $10,000 a person in student loans.

‘So much of what he said was simply not true’—even Fox News was able to fact check Giuliani presser

Fox News finds itself in the interesting place of trying to perform a 24-hours-a-day paradox. During the day time, they’re pretending to be a normal, fact-driven news network, while during primetime and into the wee hours, they are the fact-free, rhetorically incendiary bigotry factory we have come to expect for the last couple of decades. Why they’re doing this is probably a mixture of reasons.

Mnuchin picks a fight with the Fed in trying to hamstring Biden administration on economic recovery

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, headed out the door with the rest of the Trump administration, decided to try to hamstring President-elect Joe Biden’s coronavirus efforts, and picked a fight with the Federal Reserve while he was at it. The CARES Act passed back in March allotted $454 billion for emergency lending programs run by the Fed and the Treasury in tandem.