In my most recent essays for Salon, I approach a series of political and cultural with a careful eye, and pugnacious spirit.

In the first, I interview John Mueller, one of the world’s leading researchers on terrorism and public safety. We have an insightful dialogue on the dangers of exaggerating the terror threat, and wasted trillions on “chasing ghosts.”

Next, I write about the hypocrisy and inconsistency of right wing opponents of “political correctness.” While I agree that politically correct liberalism is foolish, boring, and often tyrannical (see post below on the new Devil’s Dictionary), the right wing is not the true champion of free speech and open culture. In fact, they are often the worse purveyors of speech codes and taboos. Read my explanation.

Finally, in my most recent essay, I dismantle the inescapable cliche that what America really needs is a “businessman in the White House.” Subscribers to this naive idea betray their own historical ignorance and political illiteracy.

In my new essay for Splice Today, I eviscerate the lexicon of political correctness polluting cultural discourse, and creating conditions of mediocrity. With apologies to the brilliant, and increasingly relevant, Ambrose Bierce, I offer a new Devil’s Dictionary to “delineate definitions more honest and representative than what explicators of contemporary jargon believe they’re illustrating.”

See my own definitions of the terms ugly and stupid terms, “whitesplain,” “mic drop,” “concern troll,” and others at Splice Today.

My new book on Metallica is currently available. For the book, I had the thrill of interviewing all of the members of the band, producer Bob Rock, and Jason Newsted.

For all coverage related to the book, go to the the 33 1/3 website. You’ll find an “apologia” addressing why I wrote the book, an interview I conducted with DX Ferris about the relationship between Metallica and Slayer, and much more.

To discuss the book, I also had the pleasure of appearing on Jacques Lamore’s podcast, and then the podcast of thrash metal frontman, Howard Smith.

Buy the book from Bloomsbury or at Amazon.

In my new article for AlterNet, I enumerate six particularly despicable and dangerous state laws punishing the poor for their poverty. No longer content to merely neglect the needs of the poor, many right wing state governments have become actively abusive – weaponizing public policy, and transforming the arm of governance into an aggressive apparatus of destruction against America’s most vulnerable citizens.

Read the article at AlterNet.

Shortly after the publication of my article, the Daily Report – a radio program in Minneapolis, Minnesota – invited me on to discuss the “war on the poor.” Listen to the discussion at 950 AM, Minneapolis.

In a new essay, I give my take on the madness of Donald Trump’s popularity. He acknowledges that America is a society in decline, and this resonates with many ordinary Americans who feel the pain of economic contraction and cultural decay in their own lives. Like a true demagogue, Trump then panders to Americans by locating the source of all their misery in foreign countries and emanating from foreign people. As the Trump candidacy demonstrates, there is a bottomless appetite for xenophobia in much of America.

Read the full essay at AlterNet.

Recently, I examined the higher ed. hustle – saddling students with debt, relying on part time faculty – and students’ weak and meek response to it.

For my full take on how higher education in America has become an exploitative enterprise, and a microcosm of an increasingly unequal society, go to AlterNet.

In the immediate wake of the horrific tragedy of Dylann Roof’s massacre in Charleston, SC, I interviewed Rev. Jesse Jackson on the distinction between the “Confederate flag and the Confederate agenda,” and why removing and revoking the latter is more important.

Read the article at Salon.

Martin Luther King exemplifies real bravery in Selma...

In my new essay for AlterNet, I compare the conflicting notions of heroism and manhood playing out in the cinema between Selma and American Sniper and Martin Luther King and Chris Kyle. Then, with a little help from King, Gore Vidal, Paul Newman, Jim Harrison, and Bruce Springsteen, I also present a case for America to progress beyond its macho glorification of violence, and move toward a manhood that allows for tenderness, sensitivity, and compassion.

Read it at AlterNet.

In my new essay for AlterNet, I offer a wide ranging take on America’s history of racist, sexual oppression, using as a springboard, the brilliant book, Policing Sexuality by Jessica Pliley. Pliley is a historian at Texas State University, and her book should become mandatory reading for every high school history student in America.

From the beginning of my essay:

For anyone willing to look right in the face of America’s sexual repression, sexist assumptions, and racist fears, Policing Sexuality: The Mann Act and The Making of the FBI by Jessica R. Pliley, is at once a magnifying glass and flashlight. It is an indispensable history of all the American anxieties, hang ups, and priggish obsessions in one neat, little package.

Read the rest at AlterNet.