For Obama supporters, the last eight years have been a victory of wise leadership over the forces of darkness in Congress and the world at large. For critics of the outgoing president, Obama could do no right as he plunged the United States into the worst crisis in...
If there's one certainty that emerged in the 2016 elections, it was that Hillary Clinton’s unexpected defeat stemmed from her loss of four so-called "Rust Belt" states: Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania, which had previously been Democratic strongholds, and Ohio,...
From her home in Berks County, Pennsylvania, Karen Feridun is helping stage a growing citizen pushback against the expansion of natural gas extraction. But a far-reaching global deal recently signed halfway around the world may make her job much harder. Feridun got...
This commentary is a joint publication of Foreign Policy In Focus and TheNation.com. Along the path toward the creation of a global capitalist system, some of the most significant steps were taken by the English enclosure movement. Between the 15th to 19th centuries,...
Despite the best efforts of activists, public scholars, and countless others throughout the world, the U.S. and trade ministers from 11 other Pacific Rim nations announced recently that they'd reached a deal on the Trans-Pacific Partnership, or TPP — a massive new...
This commentary is a joint publication of Foreign Policy In Focus and TheNation.com. Pope Francis waxed radical on a number of big issues during his recent speech to the U.S. Congress, where he condemned the arms trade, war profiteering, and even the war on terror...
After years of secret negotiations and silence in the media, the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) has risen to headline news. Now that Congress has voted to give President Obama “fast-track” trade promotion authority to push the deal through the House and Senate with...
One of the most controversial aspects of the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) is the fact that the Obama administration has tried to impose a public blockade on the text of the draft agreement. When Congress votes on whether to grant the president "fast-track...
Imagine an international event sometime in the near future known as the Apology Games. It's held every four years and features teams of professional diplomats, politicians, and conflict resolution specialists (with a few actors thrown into the mix). There are many...
In a move that elicited a collective groan from virtually all of progressive America, the Obama administration and congressional Republicans reached a deal on April 16 on so-called “fast track” trade authority. This is the legislation needed to ram new trade...