John Peeler: That our bureaucracy was simply not up to such a major crisis should not be a surprise: since at least Ronald Reagan we have devalued and defunded most of the federal government (excepting only Defense)
John Peeler
John Peeler is a retired professor of political science at Bucknell University, specializing in Latin American and international affairs. After growing up in Florida and Georgia, he moved north as a teenager, and began a lifelong leftward migration. He’s been writing primarily for LA Progressive since 2008. He continues to live in central Pennsylvania.
Trump and the Virus: It’s Still About the Base
The thing is, this incoherence is not just Trump’s: he is both reflecting and feeding the partisan and ideological divide of our society.
Common Decency Lives
John Peeler: Faced with the imminent loss of in-school meals for needy students, as schools shut down, a local businessman and volunteers worked to make sure that those students would still get good meals.
Incompetence
John Peeler: Personal qualities that we have seen in Donald Trump for more than three years have come back to bite us in this crisis.
Biden Marches On
John Peeler: These last couple of weeks have confirmed that the party’s left wing remains a minority of the Democratic electorate; the majority clearly believed Biden had the better shot.
A Progressive Immigration Policy
John Peeler: A progressive immigration policy starts with the premise that America is strengthened, not weakened by immigration. Every wave of immigrants began by confronting nativist discrimination, fear and hatred; each has in the end contributed its genius.
Democrats’ Durable Dichotomy: Super Tuesday 2020
John Peeler: There truly is no love lost between Bernie and the Clinton/Obama/Biden establishment. Bernie’s chance at the nomination thus depends on a first ballot victory, and he’s not going to get there.
White Fragility
John Peeler: White fragility comes into play when people who don’t think they are racists are challenged on that.
The Tsar, the Don and the Preacher: Russia and Our Elections
John Peeler: Why support Bernie? The right wing will say, of course, he’s a socialist which is the same as a communist. That’s complete nonsense.
The Transgressor: Transcending Trump
John Peeler What compels our obsession with him: he deliberately, defiantly debunks our normal expectations of common decency and constitutional probity?
Trump’s Middle East Plan: Confirming Apartheid
John Peeler: Today a generation of right-wing Israeli governments have left Zionist idealism behind, and seem entirely comfortable with a perpetual occupation of Palestinian land without according the Palestinians the rights of Israeli citizens.
Worst President—Or Best? Trump the Polarizer
John Peeler: His very hyper-urban, superrich persona, reaching out to them, saying what they’ve been saying among themselves, this reaffirms that they are important, that they matter.
Iran: Trump’s Incoherence Again
John Peeler: The fundamental problem, as with so much of Trump’s foreign policy, is incoherence: the pieces not only don’t fit together, they work against each other.
