How to Use the Coronavirus to Reshape Our Politics

How to Use the Coronavirus to Reshape Our Politics

Mike Davis on the virus, Christopher Shay on the crisis, and Amy Wilentz on Jared and Ivanka.

Start Making Sense and Jon Wiener
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It’s time to think big about the coronavirus crisis and the 40 million workers who have lost their jobs—while the rest struggle to hold on to what they’ve got. Everything seems more fragile now, and the cruelty of the system has never been clearer. For some big thinking about where we need to go and how to get there, we turn—again—to Mike Davis.

Also: Christopher Shay talks about The Nation’s special issue on thinking big about the political requirements, and political opportunities, of this historic moment. He’s a senior editor at The Nation.

And we have a new episode of The Children’s Hour, stories about Ivanka, Jared, Don Jr. and little Eric, told by Amy Wilentz—today, Jared’s failed effort to procure PPE for FEMA, and some outrageous remarks from Don Jr. and Eric—while Ivanka celebrates “exciting platforms the private sector has created to upskill our workforce!” (her exclamation point).

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We now confront a second Trump presidency.

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Today, we also steel ourselves for the fight ahead. It will demand a fearless spirit, an informed mind, wise analysis, and humane resistance. We face the enactment of Project 2025, a far-right supreme court, political authoritarianism, increasing inequality and record homelessness, a looming climate crisis, and conflicts abroad. The Nation will expose and propose, nurture investigative reporting, and stand together as a community to keep hope and possibility alive. The Nation’s work will continue—as it has in good and not-so-good times—to develop alternative ideas and visions, to deepen our mission of truth-telling and deep reporting, and to further solidarity in a nation divided.

Armed with a remarkable 160 years of bold, independent journalism, our mandate today remains the same as when abolitionists first founded The Nation—to uphold the principles of democracy and freedom, serve as a beacon through the darkest days of resistance, and to envision and struggle for a brighter future.

The day is dark, the forces arrayed are tenacious, but as the late Nation editorial board member Toni Morrison wrote “No! This is precisely the time when artists go to work. There is no time for despair, no place for self-pity, no need for silence, no room for fear. We speak, we write, we do language. That is how civilizations heal.”

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Onwards,

Katrina vanden Heuvel
Editorial Director and Publisher, The Nation

Start Making Sense Start Making Sense is The Nation’s podcast, hosted by Jon Wiener and coproduced by the Los Angeles Review of Books. Subscribe on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts for new episodes each Thursday.  


Jon Wiener Jon Wiener is a contributing editor of The Nation and co-author (with Mike Davis) of Set the Night on Fire: L.A. in the Sixties.


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