Politics

The chairman of the Republican Party on Thursday renounced the GOP’s racially polarizing “Southern strategy” of the late 1960s, under which Richard M. Nixon used such issues as desegregation and forced busing of schoolchildren to woo white voters and win the presidency. Republican National Committee chief Ken Mehlman made the comments in Milwaukee to the … Read more

Poking around Google a few weeks back to see how various television reporters were playing the healthcare debate, I searched for “Candy Crowley.” Back came the expected raft of citations: government stories, pieces from Election 2008, a link to Crowley’s award-studded bio. There was a mention of her elegant obituary of Ted Kennedy. And this: … Read more

Even in spring its grounds are encased in snow. When classes are in session, its students wear uniforms to school. They pour out of the Atwater metro stop, clomp along St. Catherine Street and trudge through three sets of yawning oak double doors. They are the students of Westmount High School, and four decades ago … Read more

Carolina Barrero, 35, said she has been threatened with expulsion, imprisonment and torture due to her activism and involvement in demonstrations against the Cuban government. (Tracy Wilkinson / Los Angeles Times) It took two Cuban intelligence officers to carry art historian and activist Carolina Barrero, her hands and feet cuffed, from the protest she was … Read more

They are a Baltimore prosecutor whose husband was appointed to the federal bench by Ronald Reagan, a renowned civil rights lawyer here who is legally blind, a veteran prosecutor who became the highest ranking African American in the Los Angeles district attorney’s office, a Latino activist in Chicago who worked as a U.S. attorney and … Read more

Conservatives and even some liberals are increasingly trying to peddle the muddled theory that cutthroat competition in a market economy is great for everyone, everywhere. That isn’t true even in America, where most often it is the average worker who gets bashed by unlimited competition while corporations increase their profits. A particularly grievous example is … Read more

For many with student loans, the interest hurts the most. This congressman would know Forty-three million Americans owe a collective $1.6 trillion in federal student loan debt. About $85,400 of that belongs to Eric Swalwell. His debt has followed him from law school to the Alameda County district attorney’s office and the Dublin City Council. … Read more

The Supreme Court building in Washington. (Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images) President Trump had predicted that the Supreme Court would finally decide who won this year’s presidential election, but if so, he lost again on Tuesday. Without comment or dissent, the high court turned away the first appeal from Trump supporters to reach the high … Read more

From the beginning, it was a case of opposite extremes: the gay Republican politico with a drug habit, whose best friend was a Hollywood celebrity known for her Democratic politics and her recovery from drug and alcohol abuse. But on Feb. 26, when R. Gregory Stevens died in Carrie Fisher’s home, the attraction of opposites … Read more

Nothing so clearly demonstrates the Clinton Administration’s capacity for getting things wrong on the economy than its apparent decision to make military conversion a footnote to its deficit-cutting agenda. By July 1, the Defense Base Closure and Realignment Commission will present Bill Clinton with its final recommendations for boarding up military bases across the country. … Read more