Symposium: Michael Tomasky  

I’m not qualified to answer question two, so consider this a response to the other three questions. Internet, film, television, and popular music are rather broad categories, each containing nutritious wheat and faddish chaff. By “television,” do we mean The …







The President and the Prosecutor  

If Bill Clinton were impeached or forced to resign over the Lewinsky case, the incident might force a national examination of how men in power treat female subordinates. The most important question his alleged behavior raises, after all, is not …



The Left and Crime  

I have observed, in the course of my reporting on New York City politics in recent years, the odd phenomenon of liberal Democrats muttering in vague opposition to the fantastic decreases in the city’s crime rate. This is not done …



Michael Tomasky Responds  

Elliott Currie is a criminologist, and I’m a journalist, so I feel no shame in confessing that he knows more about criminology than I do. I’m happy to hear of my “straw men” that there are “fewer of them all …



Why Health Care Reform Failed  

Sometime in late 1992, there was a rally in Little Rock, Arkansas, where President-elect Bill Clinton was busily sorting through résumés and position papers. Although the rally drew about a thousand people, it was little noted in the major media; …