Page 14 - Eric Alterman News Today

Philip Roth As a rule, I read few biographies, and certainly not of authors, people whose most significant life events are spent alone. In my case, Churchill, Swift, and Dostoyevsky are the exceptions that prove the rule; world-historical figures who cant be understood outside the context of their times. So Id already decided not to bother with Blake Baileys ballyhooed new book, Philip Roth: The Biography—even though Roth was a friendly acquaintance whod given me help and encouragement way ...

Former US ambassador to Israel, Daniel Kurtzer, speaking in 2009. We were bound to talk endlessly about the April 27 Human Rights Watch report accusing Israel of the “crime of apartheid” — but the news justifies us being a broken record. The report is getting a lot of attention in ways that earlier apartheid findings have not, including in the New York Times, and it appears to be filtering into the U.S. discourse. The report has the capability to build moral urgency about Palest...

Given the accusations of abuse made against Blake Bailey, Gene Lyons writes, he has no interesting “at all” in reading Bailey’s Philip Roth biography. As a rule, I read few biographies, and certainly not of authors, people whose most significant life events are spent alone. In my case, Churchill, Swift and Dostoyevsky are the exceptions that prove the rule: world historical figures who can’t be understood outside the context of their times. So I’d already decided not to bother with B...

An émigré architectural historian who teaches across disciplines in California, at a public university near Apple’s lair in the Bay Area (close to San Francisco), is posting an essay. Since architectural stories are surprising rare on the edge of the continent, he needed a shtick; no matter what’s his connoisseur-ish personal tastes and leftist political dispositions. Simon  Sadler published an essay on March 13/2013 in The Design Observer Group: “Steve Jobs: Architect” Top: Apple ...

Altercation: Celebrating Ellsberg at 90 and DeGrom at Just One The stories of the guy who snitched on Dan, and the Mets who still can’t hit Alex Menendez/AP Photo Daniel Ellsberg, right, speaks with Lowell Bergman, director of the Investigative Reporting Program at the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism, August 27, 2014. Beginning on April 30, there will be a star-studded—by peacenik national-security metrics—conference on the life and influence of Daniel Ellsberg, and esp...

The advertisement, paid for by an anonymous organization called BDS Report, was released as the CUNY student government prepared to consider dueling resolutions addressing antisemitism at a meeting last weekend. It was only the most striking of what students on both sides said was a flurry of outside advocacy that poisoned an already deeply divisive debate. Both of the resolutions, the latest in a spate of similar initiatives at campuses across the country, dealt with the very definition of ant...

When I think of Cornell Professor Walter Lafeber these days I also think of legendary basketball player Michael Jordan. It’s not that Lafeber was a global icon (although he should be) or that he had superhuman leaping abilities (although Lafeber was a star basketball player in high school in Indiana in the 1950s). It’s because to watch Lafeber perform his craft — university teaching and scholarship — left you in awe of his talent. His lecturing skills were leaps and bounds a...

BBC News By Jude Sheerin Former President Donald Trump was often accused of having a complete disregard for the truth. Yet some of his predecessors falsehoods ranged from the bizarre to the horrifying. So how does Trump truly compare? When Saddam Hussein invaded the oil-rich emirate of Kuwait in August 1990, President George HW Bush snarled: "This will not stand." But as US troops were scrambled to the Gulf, the American public was dubious about the justification for military action. The Kuwait...

The Nation, check out our latest issue. Subscribe to Support Progressive Journalism The Nation is reader supported: Chip in $10 or more to help us continue to write about the issues that matter. Sign up for our Wine Club today. Did you know you can support The Nation by drinking wine? Overtures to Trump Voters1 Pramila Jayapal says “we must pay attention to why more than 74 million people voted to reelect Trump” [“Biden’s First 100 Days: Congress,” Jan. 11/18]. Trump sponsore...

Alexis Grenell (@agrenell) as monthly columnists, and announced that national affairs correspondent Jeet Heer (@heerjeet) will expand his remit to include a new monthly column, “Morbid Symptoms,” a nod to philosopher Antonio Gramsci’s famous remark: “The crisis consists precisely in the fact that the old is dying and the new cannot be born; in this interregnum a great variety of morbid symptoms appear.” Bromwich’s column, “No Offense,” will deal with civil liberties, America’...