WASHINGTON – Do you sometimes feel as if our democracy is coming apart at the seams? Gridlock, hate speech, dark money, negative ads, political parties at each others throats instead of working together for our common good? It’s almost enough to make you give up on American democracy. But please,don’t go there. Because I know […]
by Hedrick Smith What struck me when I began reporting on grassroots citizen reform movements in states as varied as Florida, Connecticut, and South Dakota was how creative and ingenious political amateurs were in generating ideas for reform and how gutsy and resourceful they were in mobilizing millions of voters to adopt state-level reforms […]
Washington – Except for the race for the Democratic Presidential nomination, our national media is so mesmerized and monopolized by the political war zone in Washington that you’d think nothing important ever happens in the rest of the country (except perhaps natural disasters). Unfortunately, that means the major media have largely missed one of the […]
WASHINGTON – The news flow has been pretty rough in the closing weeks of 2019 – the harsh conflict over impeachment, threats from North Korea and the persistent challenge of China, the dangers of fresh Russian interference in the 2020 elections, relentless partisan warfare. But there’s another story about American Democracy that gets little play […]
Washington – When it comes to the influence of political money on our election campaigns, you know the bad news, but you probably don’t know the good news – or even that there is good news. The bad news is that billionaires and corporations are pouring tons of money into our elections to buy influence […]
Washington – If like most Americans you’re angry that our democracy feels broken, that elections are being corrupted by billionaire and corporate money, and that politicians are rigging elections through gerrymandering, we’ve got good news for you. Grass Roots America is staging a political comeback. Citizen rebellions against the politicians and the power brokers are […]
Our political world is feeling the after-shocks of Campaign 2016. The question now is whether President Trump and the GOP in Congress will deliver on Candidate Trump’s promises of a better deal for working middle class Americans or whether Trump’s new allegiance to the elite and the ideological conflicts within the Republican Party will do the […]
Highlights – Ralph Nader Interviews Hedrick Smith : “Certainly Trump didn’t intend to do this, nor did Steve Bannon, his Rasputin in the White House, but you know, accidentally and unintentionally, they have triggered and ignited a fire in the political prairies of this country.” “I don’t think we’ve seen this kind of electricity, this kind of […]
Hedrick Smith, who conceived this website and is its principal writer and architect, is a Pulitzer Prize-winning former New York Times reporter and Emmy award-winning documentary producer for PBS and PBS FRONTLINE. more »
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