In a new book, Isabella Weber argues that Democrats underestimated inflation’s political costs. Her prescription is provocative, but not without risks.
Ideas and Culture
Essays and criticism on ideas and culture: the history, arguments, and cultural shifts behind American politics and public life. Includes our Books coverage, with reviews and essays on the new books shaping debates over policy, history, and democracy.
Posted inIdeas and Culture
We’re All High School Debaters Now
I went to judge a national debate tournament and came away less worried about the teenagers than the politicians and pundits who argue just like them.
Posted inBooks
Hannah Arendt’s Life in Friendship
The many bonds the German theorist built and maintained across disagreements were beautiful—and ungeneralizable to America’s crisis of comradery today.
Posted inBooks
Is Neoliberalism to Blame for America’s Health Care Woes?
Horror stories about private equity-owned hospitals are part of a deeper trend, a new book argues.
Posted inBooks
Not Post-Literate Yet
Discouraging surveys and a semi-illiterate president notwithstanding, reports of the death of reading are exaggerated.
Posted inBooks
A Feminist Humanist’s Last Word
Gloria Steinem’s surprising and impossibly beautiful last book has lessons for us all.
Posted inBooks
The Case for a Shadow Court
Our constitutional system is being torn asunder. Enter an intriguing idea from a great legal mind.
Posted inBooks
Who Enabled Trump’s Second Act?
From GOP leaders to titans of business, those who might have mitigated the president’s second term lawlessness instead bent the knee. Each had their reasons.
Posted inBooks
Barney Frank’s Last Harsh Warning to the Left
The late congressman’s posthumous book condemns dogmatic insistence on unpopular ideas and offers a roadmap for reconciliation between the center and the left.
Posted inBooks
25 Years After 9/11, What Have We Learned?
A new history of the war on terror shows how badly both America and its enemies misunderstood the consequences of their own actions.
