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While Joe Biden has pledged an “ironclad commitment to Israel’s security,” many Democrats in Congress, and outside of Congress, have been moving away from unquestioning support for Israel since the Israeli attacks on Gaza last week. John Nichols reports.
Plus: It’s probably the most radical show that’s ever been on TV: Exterminate All the Brutes, the 4-part, 4-hour documentary about colonialism and genocide, by Raoul Peck, playing now on HBO Max. Historian Robin D.G. Kelley comments.  5-26-2021

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A group of moderate Republicans led by Mitt Romney are offering Joe Biden a bipartisan compromise on infrastructure-one trillion that would fund traditional roads and bridges, leaving out all of his proposals for a Green New Deal. Will he go for it? Harold Meyerson comments.
Also: As many Democrats urge Biden to take steps toward self-determination for Palestinians, Adam Shatz recalls the life and work of Edward Said, the most prominent voice of Palestinians in America until his death in 2003.
Plus: we celebrate Bob Dylan’s 80th birthday with Ella Taylor by watching “Don’t Look Back,” the wonderful 1967 documentary by D.A. Pennebaker, about Dylan’s 1965 tour of England.  5-27-2021

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Palestinians and Israel: Saree Makdisi talks about what Netanyahu has called “the second front”: Palestinian citizens of Israel, who are increasingly subject to attack by right-wing Jewish mobs, and who are increasingly active in support of Palestinians in East Jerusalem and Gaza (photo at right). Saree is a professor of English and comparative literature at UCLA and his work has appeared in the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Guardian, and the London Review of Books, as well as The Nation.
Also: The big TV event of the month-—maybe of the year—is The Underground Railroad, a ten-part series on Amazon Prime Video, directed by Barry Jenkins and based on the Colson Whitehead novel. It’s being called “the most ambitious take on American slavery since Roots”—and that was on TV almost 40 years ago. Eric Foner comments on the imagined and real history in the series; he wrote the book on the hidden history of the underground railroad: it’s called Gateway to Freedom.  5-19-2021

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Harold Meyerson talks about breakthroughs in the House and the Senate on Palestinian human rights–including a Senate letter from Dems initiatied by Jon Ossoff.  Also: remember Jared Kushner’s mideast peace plan?
Plus: The Palestinians’ ‘Second Front,” inside Israel: Saree Makdisi explains the roles of Palestinian citizens of Israel in the current crisis.
Also: our TV Critic Ella Taylor talks about “Crime of the Century,” the new Alex Gibney documentary on HBO about how Big Pharma pushed Oxycontin, which has killed half a million Americans.  5-19-2021

Rachel Kushner: “Apartheid, and the constant violence and humiliation that is enacted by Israel to maintain that apartheid, is never peaceful.”
read our interview about her visit to the Shuafat refugee camp, in Jerusalem, at TheNation.com, HERE
5-14-2021

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Conflict between Israel and Palestine has been escalating this week.  For this podcast we have two segments about Palestinians; neither is about the current crisis, which changes daily. Rachel Kushner visited a Palestinian refugee camp in 2016 – Shuafat, the only one inside Jerusalem – alongside a community organizer as he tried to solve massive problems. Her report, published originally in the New York Times Magazine, appears in her new book of nonfiction, “The Hard Crowd.”
And Adam Shatz talks about Edward Said, the leading voice of Palestinians in the US before he died in 2010.  Said was also The Nation’s classical music critic, and Adam Shatz, now an editor for the London Review of Books, was The Nation’s literary editor–his work included editing Edward Said’s pieces for the magazine.  5-12-2021

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Rachel Kushner reports on Palestinian life inside the refugee camp that’s inside Jerusalem, and on the current crisis–her report, originally published in the New York Times magazine, appears in her new book of essays, “The Hard Crowd.”
also: Harold Meyerson comments on Gavin Newsom’s plan to give money to almost all Californians, and to provide massive funding for homeless housing and universal preschool.
and our critic Ella Taylor talks about “The Underground Railroad,”premiering Friday on Prime video–10 one-hour episodes of a historical drama about American slavery, and escaping from slavery.  People are saying it’s “the most ambitious take on American slavery since ‘Roots’” –that was on TV in 1977, more than 40 years ago.  5-13-2021

A thousand Kentucky lawyers at the Kentucky Bar Association’s 2021 annual meeting attended a Zoom event on “The Trial of the Chicago 7” and its significance today, with Jody Armour and me, which included questions from the audience moderated by Christine L. Stanley.  Topics included the federal anti-riot law of 1968, the 1968 DNC protests, and the storming of the capitol on January 6.  May 12, 2021.   https://www.kybar.org/page/2021achome

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Blake Bailey’s new book about Philip Roth was taken out of print by the publisher after Bailey was accused of rape and attempted rape and “grooming” his teenage students for sex with him when they reached 18. Nation columnist Katha Pollitt argues that, while she believes the women—Bailey probably was a rapist, as well as a misogynist and a creep—readers should nevertheless have the chance to buy the book and come to their own conclusions.
Also: Literature, art, and the idea of ‘freedom’ during the Cold War, from George Orwell to James Baldwin to The Family of Man: Louis Menand has been thinking about all of this. His new book is The Free World: Art and Thought in the Cold War. Menand teaches at Harvard and writes for The New Yorker.  5-5-2021

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Mazie Hirono, Senator from Hawaii: She’s the only immigrant currently serving in the Senate, and she was the first Asian American woman elected to that office, starting in 2013. She talks about the need for filibuster reform and Supreme Court reform, about the storming of the capitol on January 6. Her new autobiography is Heart of Fire: An Immigrant Daughter’s Story.
Plus: Harold Meyerson talks about the politics of the billionaires in LA, starting with Eli Broad, who died last week – he co-chaired Democrats for Nixon in 1972. His other big cause: charter schools.
And our TV critic Ella Taylor talks about “Exterminate All the Brutes,” a 4-part documentary now streaming on HBO Max –a sweeping historical argument about four cenuries of white supremacy, colonization, and genocide. It’s amazing that such a radical documentary would be streaming on the prestige channel in America – which suggests the world is changing after Donald Trump on the one hand and black lives matter on the other.  5-6-2021