To Make the Internet Great Again, Trump Must Smash Facebook and Its Tech Oligarch Friends

Unreliable narrator though the President may be, people are indeed waking up to the tech oligarchs massive and largely unchecked power, and the consequences of turning over our channels of communication to them.

NoBanNoWall Rally at San Francisco City Hall, Feb. 4, 2017

Lurching to a New Weimar

America seems to be heading inexorably toward a Weimar moment, a slide toward political polarization from which it could be increasingly difficult to return.

John Cox, Republican Candidate for Governor of California

The Golden State Won’t Glitter for Republicans

California’s Republican Party was once a force to be feared, not only in the state, but across the country. Nowadays, it’s at most a mild irritant and sometimes a convenient whipping boy for the Democratic progressives…

How About a Fusion Party in the Golden State?

What California needs is not a new Republican Party — at least at the state level — but what the late Kevin Starr called “the Party of California.” This party would target the growing independent constituency, now larger than Republicans, as well as Democrats who might be disaffected by their party’s relentless move to the left.

The American Republic Has Lost Adult Supervision

The ship known as the American Republic sails on, but its crew is made up of irresponsible and vicious children cast from “Lord of the Flies.” Prisoners of their own emotions, they increasingly seem impervious to the notion that their gyrations might topple their own vessel.

Tel Aviv Museum of Art

Middle East Cities Should Look Forward—and Back

by Joel Kotkin and Ali Modarres — The Middle East may well be the birthplace of cities, and maybe capitalism itself, but for the most part, it continues to lag in developing a modern, workable urbanism.

Autonomous car

Autonomous Cars Are Our Real Future

As one member of the California Transportation Commission notes, the state’s planners largely ignore the role of technologies — including home-based work, ride hailing and autonomous vehicles — that offer the best hope for resolving our transportation woes.

Photo credit: Gage Skidmore

America Keeps Winning Regardless of Who is President

Ever since the election of Donald Trump, many of our leading academic voices predicted everything from a stock market crash to a global recession. Yet now the United States stands as by far the most dynamic high-income economy in the world…

California Must Stop Trying to Stomp Out Suburbia

We may be celebrating — if that’s the right word — the tenth year since the onset of the financial crisis and collapse of the real estate market. Yet before breaking out the champagne, we should recognize that the hangover is not yet over…

Ten years After Lehman Collapsed, We’re Still Screwed

by Joel Kotkin and Wendell Cox — The collapse of Lehman Brothers 10 years ago today began the financial crisis that crippled and even killed for some the American dream as we had known it…