The Republican national committee seems to think they're socialist. Dick Cheney dubbed them part of, you know, the "Old Europe," suggesting they're locked in a useless past. In any case, they've nothing to teach us, right?

Not so fast.

In a world searching for answers to multiple assaults,...

Want to know the root of the global economic crash? Go to Florida.

Yes, the state's become infamous for its manic house "flipping," but in a deeper sense the crash can best be understood by paying attention to other disturbing news from Florida. Just drive northwest from Miami to...

It was a Martin Luther King Day like none other! Via videos, both Barack and Michelle Obama movingly called us to get out and make it a National Day of Service. I was thrilled, hearing of millions of Americans connecting in common purpose -- many, for the first time....

In Paris, sixty years ago today, the U.N. General Assembly passed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Access to food is the right of "everyone," says its Article 25. Yet, a new World Public Opinion poll reports that one in four Americans still rejects its premise -- that it is...

Days of infamy sear our psyches. We never forget. "Where were you when JFK was shot?" In Indiana volunteering in a home for the mentally ill ... "When the assassin's bullet found MLK?" In Philly going door to door for the Welfare Rights Organization" ... "On 9-11?" Approaching New York...

With talk of terrorist "pals" and melanoma prognoses, can this presidential campaign get worse? Probably.

But maybe meaner and scarier is not the way to reach the undecided -- still somewhere between 5% and 18% percent of us. (Whatever their numbers, they will choose our next president.) If they...

What a weekend to be hanging with the guys from Farm Aid: historic financial meltdown, plus, breaking news -- ignored by virtually all big media -- that by the beginning of this year the food price crisis had pushed 75 million more people into hunger and that as...

Except for Iraq, the world has not seen a sustained increase in deaths from terrorism; after the horrific 2001 spike, terror fatalities returned to levels of the late 90s. In fact, by mid-2007, outside Afghanistan, Iraq, and other "insurgency theaters," says Virginia-based think-tank The Intelcenter, fatalities from Islamist attacks around...

For too long Democrats have been derided as economically clueless tax-and-spenders. No wonder Americans so often vote against their own common interests.

We should know better. And now we do.

Alan S. Blinder, in The New York Times, drew recently (9.30.08) from Unequal Democracy, a new book by...

In early Obama--that is, pre- nominee presumption--I heard a music-to-my-ears refrain. It went something like this: This historic moment is not about me -- a new, courageous leader breaking the race barrier. It is about YOU: Only you can make history, only you -- Citizen America -- can reverse our...

...tell 'em to talk to my friend Harry Rhodes. He's proof that "healthy, local, and organic" isn't just for foodies and the so-called well-heeled.

For seven years, his Chicago-based non-profit, Growing Home, has provided jobs and training for the homeless, the previously incarcerated, and people with low incomes....

Too bad.

I depend a lot on NPR, so my heart sank as I listened to Morning Edition's recent series on the world hunger crisis. Using Honduras as its case study, the four-part series reinforces dangerous myths that actually block us from seeing the real solutions to hunger...

If you Google "food scarcity," you'll find hundreds of thousands of links. It's everywhere -- including at the recent G8 Summit in Japan. Even as the members there enjoyed seven lavish courses and a "G8 Fantasy Dessert" -- you can't make this stuff up -- food scarcity was all they...

"Finish your supper, Francie, children are dying in China," I heard growing up. It didn't make sense to me then, and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown's retake this week makes even less.

He's now scolding Brits for not eating every last pea on their plates: Britons all need to...

As about 30 countries scramble to protect their citizens from hunger by limiting food exports, the title of a front-page New York Times article calls out: "Hoarding Nations Drive Food Costs Ever Higher."

But where does responsible government action end and hoarding begin? (If the Irish government had...

We know Hillary Clinton is smart, and we so can assume that for some time she has known, as well as anyone, that it is virtually impossible for her to become the Democratic nominee for President in 2008. So what could explain her continuing to battle, risking her party's approbation?...

As commentators vie to predict the impact of Obama's March 18, 2008, "race speech" on his candidacy, it's easy to fixate on what it tells us about Obama the person -- his steady courage, his nuanced thinking, his mastery of imagery and storytelling. All are important attributes to...

Can you help me? I just finished Al Gore's The Assault on Reason and I'm baffled. Gore has written a brave indictment of America's retreat from democracy. In masterly prose, he kept me rapt. Then, just as my heart was soaring because finally, finally, a political leader is telling me...

Among progressives, a big ah-ha of 2005 was the need to get serious about "framing" our message. But here we are, 2006 is moving on and we still aren't doing the hard work of honing our message with the words we use.

We have a language of Marxism, historian Lawrence...

Thomas Friedman, are you listening?

I sure hope so. This week, a U.K economic research outfit flattened your "flat earth" myth.

Your 41-weeks-as-a-Times-best-seller The World is Flat celebrates revolutions in transportation and communications that have "leveled the playing field" so poor people are now rushing on to...