Social Policy Review

    Three years ago, January 6, 2021, the United States government was almost toppled in a coup d’etat. It was led by President Donald Trump in which thousands of protesters at the “Stop the Steal” rally stormed the capitol. It was a medieval siege. The insurgent mob - waving American flags, Trump flags, Confederate flags, Gadsden flags (“Dont Tread on Me”), Vietnamese flags, Arizona flags – were armed with bats, hockey sticks, tear gas, bear spray, hand guns, knives, hatchets, hammers etc. They were intent on overturning the election of President Joe Biden and retaining Donald Trump as president. To describe the uprising as anything but a coup is a serious mistake. It was a four-hour attack in which the Capitol of the United States was overrun by hundreds of right-wing militias. Thousands were outside watching and waiting. The insurrectionists took control of the House and Senate, and in so doing, the United States government. Members of Congress were evacuated (rescued...

Autopsy: The Democratic Party in Crisis Before the Democrats get carried away with the prosecution of Trump, they better go back in time and take a look at why they blew it in 2016 with Hillary Clinton. My sense is that they haven’t learned a thing. While they might get rid of Trump as the Republican frontrunner, it’s not inconceivable that another Republican could slip into the race and defeat Biden. In October 2017, a team of progressive researchers published “ Autopsy: The Democratic Party in Crisis ,” which probed the causes of the disastrous 2016 election defeat. The report came in the wake of the party leadership’s failure to do its own autopsy. In a cover story for The Nation , William Greider wrote that the “Autopsy” is “an unemotional dissection of why the Democrats failed so miserably, and it warns that the party must change profoundly or else remain a loser.” Now, “Democratic Autopsy: One Year Later” evaluates how well the Democratic Party has done in charting a new...