Category Archives: Jefferson

The Incredible, Shrinking, Supreme Court: Thoughts on the Overturning of Roe v. Wade



Here is my editorial on the Supreme Court’s decision today, June 24, 2022, overturning a Supreme Court decision of nearly fifty years’ standing, and, for the first time, restricting an individual right that it had once recognized itself. The Court’s reputation will likely fall in the days ahead, in no small part because of the specious arguments in its majority opinion, signed by Samuel Alito. Abortion rights will remain a divisive issue dividing Americans, as this billboard, in a photograph taken by Carol Highsmith, makes clear. It is likely to become more divisive still as a result of the shortcomings in the Court’s reasoning in this decision, which makes no attempt to reconcile the contradictions between this decision and previous ones, cases sometimes including ones decided by Alito and his fellow majority on the Court this week.

Billboard on 9/11 and Abortion

Billboard commemorating 9/11 and folding in one side of the divide on abortion in America. Photo by Carol Highsmith, donated copyright-free to the Library of Congress.


Watergate at Fifty: June 17, 1972 to June 17, 2022



Watergate complex

What was Watergate all about? What was Nixon guilty of and how was he brought to heel? What are the myths that still encrust the story of Watergate? In this episode, this historian fills in the background, exposes the “Woodstein” myths that conceal the truths about Watergate, and briefly makes some cursory comparisons and contrasts with the darker threats to democracy that exist today, with the Trump scandals.