Kathleen Geier

Heather Parton, aka the blogger many of us know and love as Digby, will on Tuesday be granted a prestigious honor. She’ll be receiving the 2014 Hillman Prize for Opinion and Analysis Journalism. The award is named after the great labor leader Sidney Hillman. In my view, there is no blogger more deserving of this […]

Gary Becker, the Nobel Prize-winning economist, has died. He was 83. Becker was a giant within economics and his work had a profound impact not only within the field but beyond it. Becker, who declared that “the economic approach provides a framework applicable to all human behavior,” was notable for expanding the range of econ […]

I want what Timothy Egan is smoking. Clearly, he’s been bogarting the good stuff. Egan recently wrote a column for the New York Times that, ludicrously enough, argues that professional sports is “the most progressive force in America.” His argument focuses on the Donald Sterling scandal and on the racial progress that has been made […]

The Coathangers are a wonderful all-female punk trio based in Atlanta. This song, “Drive,” is from their new album, Suck My Shirt, which is excellent.

Doug Henwood’s cover story for The Nation this week concerns the cyber-currency known as bitcoin. Bitcoin gets taken seriously by many people who should know better. Take, for instance, this inane propaganda video about bitcoin on Vox. The film, which is narrated by Ezra Klein, and was written by Klein and Tim Lee, disses the […]

Condi Rice was invited to be the commencement speaker at Rutgers this year. But Associated Press is reporting that she has abruptly backed out due to protests by some students and faculty over her role in the Iraq War. The AP article, which says that students were stagings sit-ins, notes that the decision to withdraw […]

Today I came across this very interesting, albeit depressing, bit of data. It’s an analysis by a travel site called Hopper that shows that it costs more to fly in states that have the lowest median incomes. For example, the study found that in Mississippi, the poorest state, a “good deal” round-trip flight costs about […]

It’s with a heavy heart that I approach this weekend’s blogging stint here at Political Animal, because it will be my last. I’m leaving for happy reasons: I’m getting more freelance work, and I have a lot less free time these days. I’ve recently begun writing three blog posts a week for The Baffler’s excellent, […]

Richard Kim has written a incisive and provocative piece in the current issue of The Nation about the current state of the LGBT rights movement. He says, “If the recent shape of mainstream gay activism is any indication, then I’m all for winding it down.” Why? This is why: In 2012, the Human Rights Campaign […]

Last Sunday, Man Men began its seventh and penultimate season. As always, the season premiere revealed a few surprises, but perhaps the biggest surprise of all this year turned out to be the show’s low ratings. The Huffington Post reports that only 2.3 million viewers tuned in last week, a number that is down almost […]