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Joseph A. Palermo
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Associate Professor of History, California State University, Sacramento. Professor Palermo is the author of the forthcoming book, The Eighties (Pearson), which will be available in February 2012. He has also written two books on Robert Kennedy: In His Own Right: The Political Odyssey of Senator Robert F. Kennedy (Columbia University Press, 2001); and Robert F. Kennedy and the Death of American Idealism (Pearson Longman, 2008). Before earning a Master's degree and Doctorate in History from Cornell University, Professor Palermo completed a double major Bachelor's degree in Sociology and Anthropology from the University of California, Santa Cruz; and a Master's degree in History from San Jose State University. His expertise includes the 1980s; political history; presidential politics and war powers; social movements of the 20th century; social movements of the 1960s; and the history of American foreign policy. Professor Palermo has also written articles for anthologies on the life of Father Daniel Berrigan, S.J. in The Human Tradition in America Since 1945 (Scholarly Resources Press, 2003); and on the Watergate scandal in Watergate and the Resignation of Richard Nixon (CQ Press, 2004).

Blog Entries by Joseph A. Palermo

Stephen Colbert Befuddles Some Political Commentators

51 Comments | Posted January 23, 2012 | 1/23/12

Stephen Colbert's super PAC exposes the corporate news media's incapability to express what would be in normal life circumstances a totally justified sense of righteous outrage. Why do people become upset with the notion of anonymous corporate donors filling the coffers of Super PACS and corporations being considered...

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Five Right-Wing Political Obstacles That Must Be Sidelined

144 Comments | Posted January 1, 2012 | 1/1/12

Going into the 2012 elections people on the progressive end of the political spectrum need to ask the simple question: How will the first post-Citizens United presidential election affect the outcomes for those desperately seeking social change? The most likely result, unfortunately, is that after the mountains of anonymous campaign...

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The End of the Iraq War and the Beginning of an Election Year

42 Comments | Posted December 19, 2011 | 12/19/11

Despite the redeployment of U.S. troops out of Iraq, during this dismal period of "austerity" the public isn't likely to see any discernible difference in the government's misplaced priorities. Our representatives in Washington recently passed a "bipartisan" military budget of $662 billion. That level of "defense" spending, about...

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Billionaire Leon Cooperman Writes "Open Letter to President Obama"

Posted December 7, 2011 | 12/7/11

The Wall Street "veteran" Leon Cooperman has written an "Open Letter to President Obama" that provides us with a glimpse into the mindset of our 21st century corporate overlords. He's upset not with President Obama's Treasury Department or his Securities and Exchange Commission, or even his Department of...

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Ross Douthat's Hit Job on JFK

Posted November 28, 2011 | 11/28/11

Appearing in the New York Times' "Sunday Review" on the first Sunday following the 48th anniversary of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy is the conservative commentator Ross Douthat's take on the former president. Right-wing pundits rarely make good amateur historians and Douthat's short hit piece, dripping...

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Occupy Wall Street: American as Apple Pie

Posted November 11, 2011 | 11/11/11

Those loud right-wing voices in our political discourse that are trying to make Occupy Wall Street look like something "foreign" to American culture are barking up the wrong tree. When David Crosby and Graham Nash recently showed up at Zuccotti Park for an impromptu sing-along with...

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Occupy Wall Street: 'Brother, Can You Spare A Dime?'

Posted October 29, 2011 | 10/29/11

When MSNBC's Rachel Maddow recently asked the journalist and commentator Frank Rich on her show if he believed the "physical manifestation of discontent" was imperative to the Occupy Wall Street movement's cause, Rich replied that it was "not always that important" since the movement was polling...

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Occupy Wall Street's "Gullible" and "Unsophisticated" Protesters

Posted October 18, 2011 | 10/18/11

In an admirable bit of reporting, Nelson Schwartz and Eric Dash of the New York Times did us all a favor by asking bankers, hedge fund and money managers what they think about the Occupy Wall Street protesters. Said one top hedge fund director who wished to remain...

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The Big Banks Lose Control of the Optics

Posted October 6, 2011 | 10/6/11

The mainstream press has been predictably abysmal in its coverage of the Occupy Wall Street protests. Andrew Ross Sorkin, one of the "money honeys" over at the New York Times, looks at the demonstrators as anthropological curiosities, as if they're from a remote tribe in Papua New Guinea....

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The "Jobs Creators" Brand Gets a Little Tarnished

Posted September 29, 2011 | 9/29/11

Corporate and financial elites have largely succeeded in seizing the current economic crisis of their own making to ram through attacks on social programs they've always despised. With the politicians and the Supreme Court in their pockets they apparently believe that now is their time to contort the institutions of...

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A President Standing in Quicksand

Posted September 15, 2011 | 9/15/11

It was never a question whether or not President Obama can make a stirring speech. We've heard them before and I've tapped my foot to them. His failure lies in the delivery of those great-sounding items he outlines with inspiring rhetoric. We all know that in the Republican House of...

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Obama's Jobs Speech: Prepare to Be Underwhelmed

Posted August 24, 2011 | 8/24/11

President Obama's much anticipated speech outlining his jobs agenda for the 2012 election year will sound a lot like a tiny mouse trying to make a loud roar. Instead of clarity, we'll get hedging; instead of "bold," we'll get wishy-washy. The principal aim of the speech will be...

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The Perils for Obama of Not Talking About Poverty in America

Posted August 10, 2011 | 8/10/11

Back in 1980, on the campaign trail Ronald Reagan repeated an apocryphal story about an individual who personified the undeserving poor. There was a woman in Chicago he called a "welfare queen" who "had eighty names, thirty addresses, twelve Social Security cards" and "collected veterans' benefits on four non-existent husbands."...

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For Progressives, Debt Ceiling "Deal" Was a Real Downer

Posted August 4, 2011 | 8/4/11

Largely lost in the media din in the closing 48 hours of the debt ceiling "debate" was the fact that the Chamber of Commerce and Wall Street high rollers were urging their servants in Congress not to throw the nation into default because it was going to hurt their bottom...

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It'll Be an All-Cuts Budget "Deal" (Just Like California)

Posted July 26, 2011 | 7/26/11

For many years now in California we've witnessed an extremist Republican minority in the legislature hold the state budget hostage through manipulating the "two-thirds rule" that allows a legislative minority to dictate to the majority whether any new revenues can be raised. The debt ceiling gambit that Republicans in the...

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California: Where the Democratic Governor Triangulates Against Democrats

Posted June 17, 2011 | 6/17/11

Governor Jerry Brown's veto of the budget passed by the Democratic majority in the legislature, (as draconian in terms of gutting public resources as any in the nation), has tipped his hand: Jerry's triangulating. He's aligning himself with the Republican minority in forging a path forward out of...

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Anthony Weiner Hands Republicans a Twofer

Posted June 7, 2011 | 6/7/11

New York Representative Anthony Weiner literally got caught with his pants down. The Democrats lost a liberal stalwart who unlike most of the rest of the pusillanimous bunch actually has a pulse (hence his passion for racy photos of himself in cyberspace). And the Republicans won a twofer:...

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The Republican Supreme Court Sticks It to the Little Guy (Again)

Posted May 15, 2011 | 5/15/11

Once again the United States Supreme Court under Chief Justice John Roberts has shown the nation it will always favor corporations over people even if it means conjuring new law out of thin air. Like Citizens United, the recent 5-4 ruling in AT&T's favor gutting the power of consumers to...

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A Tale of Two Town Halls

Posted April 27, 2011 | 4/27/11

The Republican House members who voted for Paul Ryan's Ayn Rand wet-dream budget are apparently getting an earful from their constituents. And the earful isn't coming from people wearing Bradley Manning T-shirts, but from crusty old baby boomers who probably voted for the GOP in the last election....

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In California the Battle To Save Higher Education Continues

Posted April 12, 2011 | 4/12/11

On April 13, California State University students and faculty are organizing demonstrations at all 23 CSU campuses across the state to protest the latest wave of brutal budget cuts. CSU students, faculty and staff, alumni and their families have a special obligation to make their voices heard in...

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