It’s official. After mounting calls from the Democratic establishment, President Joe Biden has exited the 2024 race. The American public had long called for it. For at least the last two years, even a majority of Democrats have wanted the president to step aside.
Biden leaving the race is not just significant but historic. No president has willingly exited this close to an election. It’s humiliating to be the first. But many progressives, some of whom formerly supported Biden,...
Opinion
Taxing the rich is no silver bullet for saving Social Security
“Make the very wealthy begin to pay their fair share.” That was President Biden’s response when asked at last month’s presidential debate what he would do to address the looming insolvency of the Social Security trust fund. Combined with his opposition to benefit reductions of any kind, the implication is that Social Security’s finances should be stabilized by taxing the rich alone. In practice, this tax-only approach is like trying to patch a cracking dam with duct tape. Indeed, rather...
Preventive care is under threat: PrEP now or pay later
A long-awaited court decision has finally arrived, with disturbing health implications: The ruling exempts select employers from fully covering a daily pill that can prevent a person’s chances of getting HIV by up to 99 percent.
But the effects of the Braidwood Management v. Becerra case extend beyond HIV care. The case could invalidate a startling range of free preventative services, and lead to a big jump in patient’s payments for cancer screenings, preventive drugs for hear...
Mindfulness, meditation can help calm American political anger
Twelve years ago, before the MAGA movement emerged on the right and the streets erupted in progressive protest from the left, we noticed something troubling in Congress: Our colleagues and constituents were getting angrier.
We saw it in the flushed faces at our town halls. We heard it in expletive-laden phone calls opposing the Affordable Care Act. We felt its toll in the increasing turnover of our burnt-out, battle-fatigued campaign workers. Most of all, we sensed it in the c...
Bet on Nancy Pelosi to show Joe Biden the door
Nearly 50 years ago, Richard Nixon resigned the presidency. Now, another presidency is in crisis.
Former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has signaled to her colleagues in Washington and beyond that doing nothing about President Joe Biden’s obvious mental acuity decline is not an acceptable course of action. The irony of this situation is that Pelosi is nearly three years older than Biden.
Pelosi watched as Biden ran for political cover to t...
Supreme Court ruling on presidential immunity is more limited than it appears
The Supreme Court’s new presidential immunity rule, announced in Trump v. United States, seems on its face to cut against the grain of the court’s recent jurisprudence.
This court has deliberately curtailed executive power, has shown a strong preference to decide only questions before it and no more, and has strong institutionalist and textualist leanings. A new, broad presidential immunity rule, which is how many commentators understand its ruling in the Trump case, seems in...
To win, Biden and Democrats must go all-in against Trumpism
As President Biden fights to stay in the race for a second term, his message needs to change. He should not just run to keep Donald Trump out of the White House — he should run to purge Trumpism from Congress and the U.S. Supreme Court.
Biden should push all his chips to the center of the table and prove his mettle by leading a counterrevolution against the MAGA horde.
As we all know by now, most voters are unhappy with the federal government and democrac...
The real reason drug costs are so high in America
Earlier this month, President Biden and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) published an oped about “the outrageous prices that the pharmaceutical industry charges the American people for prescription drugs.” It is the latest step in Sanders's ongoing campaign about drug prices.
In June, Sanders, who is chairman of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, announced that Lars Jorgensen, chief executive officer of Novo Nordisk, one of the world’s largest pharmaceu...
The real reason drug costs are so high in America
Earlier this month, President Biden and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) published an oped about “the outrageous prices that the pharmaceutical industry charges the American people for prescription drugs.” It is the latest step in Sanders's ongoing campaign about drug prices.
In June, Sanders, who is chairman of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, announced that Lars Jorgensen, chief executive officer of Novo Nordisk, one of the world’s largest pharmaceu...
Face it, Democrats: Not all unions are allies
Lost in the deluge of campaign coverage these days is any meaningful coverage of one of the Biden administration’s signal achievements.
Less than a year ago, the president made history by walking a United Auto Workers (UAW) picket line demanding that General Motors give the nation’s blue-collar workers a raise. The union’s president, Shawn Fain, declared at the time, “We know the president will do right by the working class."
When the UAW prevailed, anyone pay...