Commentary

I talk a lot about how a fundamental fear of change is at the heart of most opposition to new, denser housing, zoning reform, and affordable housing developments. These are things we need, but far too many of us are far too good at finding reasons they should go somewhere else. Most people that oppose the policies I advocate for aren’t driven just by misanthropy, malice, or greed, but by a combination of those fears.

In August 2020, Joe Biden accepted the Democratic nomination for president, promising to “choose a different path.” Instead of governing a country “becoming angrier, less hopeful, more divided,” Biden would help us “to heal, to reform, to unite.” Now, Donald Trump, accepting the Republican nomination four years later, also pledges to unite.

When hyperthermia claims a life, it’s said the body undergoes a horrifying transformation. Initially sweating profusely, the victim quickly stops sweating as their skin becomes hot and dry. Organs fail as the core temperature soars. The brain swells. Muscle tissue breaks down. The heart, strained beyond its limits, eventually succumbs to cardiac arrest.

Last week, the U.S. Treasury announced that the gross national debt reached $35 trillion – that’s more than $266,000 per U.S. taxpayer. To put it in perspective, it would take 22 years to pay off this debt if every family in the country donated $1,000, per month. Worse, it is projected to double over the next 10 years! Folks, this is a national crisis.

Maryland voters must know by now that the stakes are high in the U.S. Senate race between Prince George’s County Executive Angela Alsobrooks and former Gov. Larry Hogan. It’s within the realm of possibilities that the outcome could tip the balance of Senate leadership from Democratic to Republican if Hogan wins. So, under these extraordinary circumstances, is it really too much to expect these candidates — both experienced public speakers and campaign veterans — to square off in multiple debates?

Among the last things Gene Oishi wrote, the preface to the new edition of his 1988 memoir refers to “the resurgence of racial prejudices and animosities in the United States.” But then it veers away from that troubling subject and resists reference to Donald Trump. “My memoir,” Oishi wrote in March, “is not about the state of our country, but about how I view my place in it.”

Building homes is a fickle business. Over the last twenty years, the United States has weathered a dramatic sequence of ups and downs in the residential housing market. An enormous construction boom from 2004 to 2006 gave way to a spectacular crash, bringing the entire global economy to a screeching halt in 2008. A slow and sluggish recovery followed, eventually picking up steam in the mid-2010s before accelerating into a second boom in the pandemic era, 2020 through 2022.

Most Americans, at least those who follow Capitol Hill politics, are surely aware of the House Freedom Caucus, the Republican subgroup that wields considerable influence in the U.S. House of Representatives. The far-right group, which spun out of the Tea Party movement and tussled prominently with GOP House Speakers John Boehner and Kevin McCarthy, is closely aligned with former President Donald Trump and is somewhat secretive about its membership (which is reportedly by invitation only).