Mask-off outbursts by Maga insiders and most strikingly, the destruction and reconstruction of the presidential seat, with a huge new $300m ballroom, means Trump isn’t planning to leave the White House when his term ends, writes LINDA PENTZ GUNTER
Latest editorial
The Musk-Trump demolition derby begins
Musk’s ‘Doge’ is already dismantling institutions and destroying lives with shocking rapidity, while legal challenges and protest movements finally begin to mount against the chaos and cruelty, writes LINDA PENTZ GUNTER
Anti-cuts protesters rally on Capitol Hill in support of federal workers, Washington, February 17 2025
BEN CHACKO speaks with Knesset member OFER CASSIF about rising political violence, the prospects for peace and his continuous ‘silencing by suspension’
The City is leaning on Rachel Reeves to cut welfare spending — when what’s needed is cuts to all the benefits given to the mega rich, corporations and banks to help them not pay or blatantly dodge their fair share of tax, explains BERNIE EVANS
The choice between two Blairites to revamp the tepid centrism of our ruling party doesn’t even come as cold comfort as we wander the city streets suffering from their third decade of austerity and the fifth of wage stagnation, writes MATT KERR
ANN HENDERSON looks at the trailblazers of the Women’s Trade Union League and their successful fight for female factory inspectors — a battle that echoes in today’s workplace campaigns
HENRY FOWLER puts the strike of public-sector workers in New Zealand in the wider context of deteriorating employment conditions throughout the world’s major economies
MAT COWARD looks back at a protest 105 years ago this month, whose reporting by the media bears uncomfortable similarities with demos today
“ALL that is solid melts into air,” wrote Karl Marx. In the US today, all that was once solid is being smashed into pieces.
We are staring at the shattered remains of what was an already deeply imperfect democracy. Institutions are being dismantled, lives and livelihoods destroyed. The illusion once known as the American dream has melted into air along with the financial and psychological wellbeing of millions of working people.
The man wielding the axe is Elon Musk, the de facto US president. If there were any remaining doubts about that, they were dispelled at the first gathering of Trump’s full cabinet this week when he deferred to his billionaire puppet-master to open the meeting.
Similar stories
Student Mahmoud Khalil’s arrest and threatened deportation are terrifying — but the moribund Democrats are still failing to mount any meaningful resistance against the slide toward autocracy, reports LINDA PENTZ GUNTER
Last week the CPUSA launched a new Rapid Response project aimed at mobilising a popular resistance to policies enacted by the new government. CAMERON HARRISON explains
The US president has cancelled all federal union contracts as ‘un-American,’ saying ‘It’s our dream to have everyone work in the private sector,’ writes MARK GRUENBERG