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Localism Index

Are we doomed to an economy controlled by a few corporate giants? Maybe not. Independent businesses are making a comeback.

Stacy Mitchell

Bad Credit: How Payday Lenders Evade Regulation

The $30 billion-a-year industry continues to fleece borrowers with high rates and shady terms.

Kai Wright

In Baltimore, a Test for an Alternative to Payday Loans

Small-dollar loan programs are providing a cushion for the poor in Maryland—and spreading around the country.

Adam Doster

Reclaiming the Politics of Freedom

Since the ’70s, liberals and leftists have misidentified the source of conservatism’s appeal.

Corey Robin

The Roots of the Côte d’Ivoire Crisis

How the demand for chocolate—yes, chocolate!—helped fuel the country’s civil war.

James North

Paul Ryan’s Plan to Destroy Medicare

The threatened government shutdown was averted, but Democrats agreed to $38 billion in budget cuts. Here’s what we’ll see in the next negotiations.

The Editors

Curbing Big Money

Momentum is growing to reform campaign finance and rebalance our election system.

Nick Nyhart and David Donnelly

Noted.

John Nichols on JoAnne Kloppenburg’s narrow win in Wisconsin; various contributors on Manning Marable

Various Contributors

Jimmy Carter: Lift Trade Embargo Against Cuba

The former US president calls for open travel for US citizens and freedom for Alan Gross and the Cuban Five.

Peter Kornbluh

Axis of Fundamentalism: Gainesville to Mazar-i-Sharif

With all due respect to the First Amendment, we need to be careful about incendiary public speech.

Patricia J. Williams

Fox: The Liars’ Network

The problem with Fox is not that it’s conservative—it’s that it’s full of falsehoods.

Eric Alterman

Reclaiming the Politics of Freedom

Since the ’70s, liberals and leftists have misidentified the source of conservatism’s appeal.

Corey Robin

On the Case: On Simon Wiesenthal

As Tom Segev’s biography makes clear, in the entire pantheon of Jewish superheroes there is no more unlikely figure than Simon Wiesenthal.

D.D. Guttenplan

Swans and Zombies: Neoliberalism’s Permanent Contradiction

Modern capital is in crisis, and neoliberalism, which redistributes wealth upward, keeps the zombie shambling forward, hungry and blindly grasping.

Joshua Clover

Rattles

Kim Chinquee

‘You’re So Pretty’: On Laurel Nakadate

Most of what we think we see in the photos and films of Laurel Nakadate is our own projection.

Barry Schwabsky

Letters

Our Readers

Puzzle No. 1627

Frank W. Lewis