Palin’s Emails: What Her Remarkably Lucid Prose Says About the Art of Teaching Writing
Sarah Palin’s emails are telling us something about remedial writing classes at our universities and colleges, and it’s not what you think. Call her defensive or parochial based on the cache of her spontaneous writings while serving as governor of Alaska, but something easy to miss is that Palin, in contrast to her meandering, involuted speaking style, is a thoroughly competent writer—more so than a great many people most of us likely know, including college graduates. READ MORE >>
Crimes and Punishments
Trump Talk
Watching Donald Trump’s interview the other week with CNN’s John King about the release of President Obama’s long-form birth certificate, one couldn’t help but notice something novel about the way he spoke: Trump’s talk was almost pathologically first-person-focused, with his “I’m proud of myself” and “I’ve done a great job” a near constant refrain. What kind of person speaks like that? And, given its ugly yet undeniable appeal, what does it mean for the future of political speech? READ MORE >>
Rapper’s Delight
Watching Republicans clutching their pearls to see the rapper Common invited to the White House on a poetry night Wednesday has revealed a party whose stars are grievously out of touch with the culture they hope to lead, as well as to culture in general, apparently. READ MORE >>
Color Blind
Moving While Black
Swearing In
Frances Fox Piven, Jim Sleeper, and Me
A point of order. READ MORE >>
Nice Speech, But We Won't Be Coming Together
The President’s speech last night was beautiful but ultimately, a magnificent punt. It was brave for Obama to crisply dismiss the idea that partisan rhetoric is what drove Jared Loughner to kill, given how much currency that idea now has among the bien-pensant kinds of people who elected him. But for the next thread to be that we must be more “civil” in our discourse because it’s what those killed on Saturday would have wanted represents a willfully Shirley Temple perspective on what political debate consists of. READ MORE >>
