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While nearly all Americans head to family and friends to celebrate Thanksgiving, the Senate is gearing up for a vote on Monday or Tuesday that goes to the very heart of who we are as Americans. The Senate will be voting on a bill that will direct American military resources not at an enemy shooting at our military in a war zone, but at American citizens and other civilians far from any battlefield — even people in the United States itself.

usa

Rachel Maddow has had an "aha" moment which is sort of hilarious but is also sort of scary. Basically she's decided that Herman Cain is a joke—not in the sense that we all know he's a joke because he has very few qualifications to be president and also has overly simplistic policy ideas and does incredibly stupid things like harass women. No, she thinks he is a joke in the performance art sense—like he is the Borat of Republican presidential candidates. Is that even possible? Could someone run for president as a joke and get this far? Maybe? Yes? Or maybe he's not even in on the joke?

hermancain USA

There are two ways of cutting a deficit: raising taxes or reducing spending. Raising taxes means taking money from the rich. Cutting spending means taking money from the poor. Not in all cases of course: some taxation is regressive; some state spending takes money from ordinary citizens and gives it to banks, arms companies, oil barons and farmers. But in most cases the state transfers wealth from rich to poor, while tax cuts shift it from poor to rich.

So the rich, in a nominal democracy, have a struggle on their hands. Somehow they must persuade the other 99% to vote against their own interests: to shrink the state, supporting spending cuts rather than tax rises. In the US they appear to be succeeding.

tax USA

In his new book, A Queer History of the United States, the cultural critic Michael Bronski runs the film backward, through 500 years of American life, showing there were gays and bisexuals in every scene, making and remaking America. They were among some of the country's great icons, from Emily Dickinson to Calamity Jane to perhaps even Abraham Lincoln and Eleanor Roosevelt. The rioting drag queens of the Stonewall Inn arrive only on page 210 of a 250-page book that argues gay people weren't merely present at every stage—they had a historical mission in America. It was to expose Puritanism, scolding, and sexual intolerance. Yet in a strange and disagreeable turn, Bronski concludes that in the final act of this story, gays have en masse abandoned their mission by demanding the most domestic and Puritan goal of all: monogamous marriage.

history USA homosexuality

It should have been a national story with heavy coverage. The hook, on its face, seems tailor-made for breathless coverage: last week in Spokane, Washington state, a suspected rightwing terrorist attempts to murder multiple parade-goers who are out to celebrate the life of an American hero killed by a rightwing terrorist 43 years ago. The talking heads would have an endless series of important-sounding questions to ask – with "political vitriol" and "hate", no doubt, figuring highly. Experts in counterterrorism, hate groups and racial politics could be brought on as guests, alongside shocked near-victims of this thwarted bombing, which FBI officials have described as sophisticated and potentially able to kill numerous people.

USA terrorism

Burn the Confederate Flag Day is a protest against the right's exploitation of racial prejudice for political gain. We urge you to burn the Confederate flag, a long-time symbol of racial hatred, on Sept 12, the date when the racially-divisive Tea Party h

USA

Spurred by an administration he believes to be guilty of numerous transgressions, self-described American patriot Kyle Mortensen, 47, is a vehement defender of ideas he seems to think are enshrined in the U.S. Constitution and principles that brave men ha

USA satire