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Magic Mountain Talks Announces Summer 2026 Lineup in Boulder for the Ongoing Series Exploring Literature and Politics

BOULDER, Colo. — Magic Mountain Talks, a Boulder-based public event series exploring the intersections of literature and politics, announces its Summer 2026 program featuring acclaimed writers, philosophers, critics, and scholars in conversation.

Organized by Arne Höcker, with Hermione Hoby, Claire Kelley, Benjamin Kunkel, Júlia Martins-Rodrigues, and Nathan Schneider, the series is presented in partnership with the University of Colorado Boulder’s Center for Humanities & the Arts, with support from the Department of Germanic & Slavic Languages & Literatures. Magic Mountain Talks is also partially funded through a grant from CU Boulder’s 150th Initiative Fund. The series launched in January 2026 and will continue through 2027.

Magic Mountain Talks are held monthly at Trident Booksellers and Café and feature guests with a conversation partner for a wide-ranging public dialogue, followed by audience Q&A and book signings.

Upcoming Summer 2026 Events:

Jeff Sharlet on “Our Slow Civil War”

In conversation with Nathan Schneider

June 18, 2026 | 6–8 PM MDT

Trident Booksellers and Café

New York Times bestselling author Jeff Sharlet discusses his acclaimed book The Undertow: Scenes from a Slow Civil War, a National Book Critics Circle Award finalist. Sharlet’s work has appeared in Vanity Fair, Harper’s, Rolling Stone, and the New York Times Magazine. He will be joined by Nathan Schneider, associate professor of media studies at CU Boulder and author of Governable Spaces.

Amia Srinivasan on Politics and Psychoanalysis

In conversation with Hermione Hoby

July 16, 2026 | 6–8 PM MDT

Trident Booksellers and Café

Oxford philosopher and bestselling author Amia Srinivasan joins novelist and critic Hermione Hoby for a conversation on feminism, desire, politics, and contemporary intellectual life. Srinivasan is the author of The Right to Sex and Chichele Professor of Social and Political Theory at the University of Oxford.

Francesca Wade on Gertrude Stein’s Afterlife

In conversation with Claire Kelley

August 20, 2026 | 6–8 PM MDT

Trident Booksellers and Café

Francesca Wade is the author of the widely praised Square Haunting: Five Writers in London Between the Wars and has written for the New York Review of Books, Paris Review, and Granta. She will discuss her new biography, Gertrude Stein: An Afterlife, with Claire Kelley, contributor to Library Journal and publishing professional at Seven Stories Press.

All events are free and open to the public. More information and registration details are available at magicmountaintalks.org.

MEDIA CONTACT:

Claire Kelley

hello@magicmountaintalks.org

All posters designed by Júlia Martins-Rodrigues

###

The post Magic Mountain Talks Announces Summer 2026 Lineup in Boulder appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.

This piece is part of Yellow Scene Magazine’s Opinion section. The views expressed here are those of the author and do not represent a reported news position. At Yellow Scene, opinion pieces speak freely, challenge assumptions, and say the quiet parts out loud.

Several months ago, while returning from a mountain bike ride on the local single track, I was knocked for a loop by a teenager riding an E-bike. He was inattentive, not reckless, and sort of apologized when I regained my senses while attended to by the Mountain View Rescue Team. A few days later, I declined to “testify” in some legal action taken against the kid.

I can well imagine that I would have been an E-bike rider if such things were available back – way back! – in the day. But they weren’t – and that’s a very good thing.

There’s much to dislike about those machines, even if you’re not a crash victim.

Most unfortunate is what is lost to this generation. Among my life’s greatest joys has been pedaling an actual bicycle. It started at age 8 or 9, when I would pack a PB&J and head down a street that turned into a country road, pedalling through cornfields and past red barns. In those days, we called such adventures “bike hikes.” 

My sense of independence and self-reliance was profound and seasoned with a dash of romance as the route took me by Carol Hathaway’s house. She was a 4th grader’s blonde-braided dream, although I cannot recall ever speaking to her. The round trip may have been all of three miles.

With a break for a little bit of college and a lot of Army, pedaling a bike has been a gentle pleasure and an intense thrill. 

When I was a new dad, I took 50-mile bike hikes into the splendid hills and valleys east of Cleveland, Ohio, starting at sunrise and returning in time to make pancakes. When our kids were grown enough, I spun through our suburban neighborhood with my daughter in a bike seat and son in a backpack. I cycle commuted to work as a necessity and a bit of a game. 

For much of several years, I cycled everywhere I could, year-round, including to business meetings wearing rain gear and packing a wrinkle-free suit in a waterproof backpack. I did Superman changes in gas station toilet stalls or corporate lavatories. I learned to balance on ice and brake with my feet when wet pads failed.

I thought then, and think now, that the world is best experienced at bicycle speed.

Later, I raced bikes. Not for everyone, I suppose, but there are few life experiences more vivid than riding shoulder-to-shoulder, wheels inches apart, through sharp corners at 30mph.

Bike riding under your own power is empowering. I learned that as a child and regret that so many children today have lost the beauty and freedom of pedaling through a three-mile bike hike, seeing, hearing, and smelling their world.

The impact of technology is similarly disempowering. Digital representation of life is not life itself. Children’s brains are too busy with iPhones and iPads to make room for imagination and invention. ChatGPT and other manifestations of AI may be pragmatically helpful, but are replacing discovery, ingenuity, and diligence. 

An April 19 New York Times column by Molly Worthen explicates the shallow “learning” offered by games, computer simulations and other highly profitable educational shortcuts. Technology in schools is a plague, offering the illusion that machines can make education more cost-effective and entertaining. As Worthen points out, there is a powerful correlation between increased technology in schools and decreased scores on standardized measures. I don’t give a damn about standardized measures, but this correlation shows that ed-tech fails to reach even its own dismal goals.

My paired critique of E-bikes and school technology is not a contrivance. In each case, the benefits of work are sacrificed to effortless entertainment and illusory gains. I suggest, with supportive evidence, that pedaling a bike for 30 minutes is better for the brain than a full day of digitized educational games.

When lying helpless in rehab after a paralyzing spinal cord injury, I visualized riding a bike again. My brain knew I could do it before my body could move. I could, I did, and, in addition to my wife, a daily mountain bike ride became my salvation when much else was lost.

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The post Nelson’s Corner -E-bikes and iPhones: The Devil’s Technological Spawn appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.

“Hitler did some good things.” – Donald J. Trump

It takes a certain kind of stupidity to favor Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf over Maya Angelou’s I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.

But that’s the Trump administration for you. Maya Angelou is banned from the Naval Academy library, but two copies of Mein Kampf remain.

In response to a New York Times report on this library malpractice a reader commented:

“The midshipmen are among the best and the brightest of young adults. They don’t get to the Naval Academy by being incurious.  Banning books and censoring speakers will just inspire them to find out what is so dangerous that it needs to be hidden.”

If only.

I offer no argument that midshipmen are not bright young adults. But the reader’s second sentence is naive. They do get to the Naval Academy by being incurious — in part.

The American system of secondary education is designed to extinguish curiosity. It is a system that rewards “right”answers and has little patience for questions. By the time ambitious kids run the gauntlet of standardized tests, honor rolls, PSATs, SATs, APs and perfect GPAs, they have little appetite for curiosity.

I have often told, with relish, the story of my former student Abby, a delightful girl of color who had matriculated at Princeton with curiosity intact, thanks to a progressive education and fierce independence. In a freshman seminar, the professor asked students to write an essay.

Several nervous overachievers asked, “What should we write about?”

The prof answered, “Anything you want. I just want to get a sense of how you think and write.”

“But, but, what do you want us to write??”

“Just write about what you’re interested in.”

“But, but, what are we supposed to be interested in?”

Abby was amused.

So I suspect the Trumpers had no cause for worry. Earnest midshipmen would be unlikely to withdraw either Mein Kampf or I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings from their library.

Fierce competition reduces intellectual breadth. Right wing zealotry suffocates it.

Shortly after the banning of “woke” and “DEI” books from the Academy library, the Supreme Court heard a case involving the rights of parents to remove their children from school if storybooks with LGBTQ+ themes were being discussed. The Montgomery County (MD) system initially allowed opt-out, but then changed course, finding that opt-out was unmanageable and also stigmatized LGBTQ+ kids and families.

Religious parents sued, saying that books like Uncle Bobby’s Wedding violated the First Amendment’s protection of the free exercise of religion. I am amused and amazed that faithful folks are consistently insistent that the mere existence of gay folks violates their “free exercise” of religion. Strange religion, that.

They are likely to prevail. SCOTUS has already supported a web designer who felt that crafting a website for a gay couple caused theological agony. They affirmed the right of a football coach to conduct a public school prayer meeting on the 50-yard line, and they cheered on Catholic social workers in Philadelphia who refused to work with same-sex couples applying to take in foster children.

In America’s accelerating slide into a Christian nationalist, oligarchical fascism, no warning should be dismissed as hyperbole. The seemingly disparate threads with which I began this piece are the ingredients of a parallel to the Hitler Youth.

Starting small, in the 1920s, Hitler’s youth movement gradually subsumed all others and grew to eight million members by 1940. Membership became mandatory and any parents who refused were “investigated.”

At first glance, our contemporary version may appear relatively isolated and benign. But there is a brick-by-brick dismantling of a secular public system while a school choice movement is diverting public funds to conservative Christian schools.

I am not broadly comparing Christianity to Nazism. But the particular form of Christianity being propagated by America’s right wing is frighteningly similar. LBGTQ+ folks are marginalized and dehumanized. Immigrants are kidnapped in broad daylight by hooded thugs and “disappeared.” Disabled women, men and children are denied services and dignity.

And I encourage my Jewish friends to be very, very wary of the right wing’s use of antisemitism as a cudgel against Palestinians and their supporters. That cudgel is likely coming your way too. If you think the Christian nationalists surrounding Trump are supporters of Jews, I’ve got a Tesla Cybertruck to sell you.

In an October 2024 interview with the New York Times, John Kelly, the longest-serving chief of staff in the first Trump administration, warned that Trump met the definition of a fascist and that Trump had said that “Hitler did some good things.”

I’m afraid that’s the world we’re living in.

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The post Nelson’s Corner | May 2025 appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.

“Look at this little girl over here, everyone. Look at her.”

“Your voice Is meaningless.”

These were just a few of the comments made from the podium at a GOP town hall in Idaho. The comments were directed at a female protestor who was subsequently dragged out of the room by unidentified men, ostensibly enabled by the local sheriff, who encouraged their aggression.

The incident was alarming, but not particularly surprising. Since Trump’s 2016 campaign, bullying has been in vogue and free speech is endangered.

The most salient variable in the 2024 election was the aggressive reassertion of white male rights. The gender divide in the electorate was gaping. Trump’s victory was a result of many factors, but the overwhelming endorsement from white men stands at the top. White men in every age group preferred Trump and it had nothing to do with the price of eggs or some nuanced dimension of foreign policy.

When the history of this era is written, a primary theme will be the perceived assault on white male authority and the resulting backlash. It will be noted that white male authority was only slightly dented, never rejected. In every measurable way, white male dominance has persisted throughout my lifetime.

The “little” white men in Idaho are just like the “little” white men in every corner of our failing and flailing nation. Trump and his DOGE-y pal Elon are “little”white men. The simpering sycophants in the GOP Congressional caucus are “little” white men.

For years I’ve argued that the post-Obama years have been a long-simmering eruption of resentment over gay rights, women’s rights and civil rights. Because there were constitutional, rational and human rights justifications for social progress, the resentments were often subterranean, playing out more in passive-aggressive behavior. One wouldn’t have to visit many bars and sporting events to know that social change was far from universally embraced.

Most white men were restrained by polite society or at least modestly chastised by the women in their lives. But that changed dramatically with Trump’s ascension. The simmering resentments boiled over. 

The possible/probable shredding of human rights in the United States is saturated in deep irony. The white men who reassert their social hegemony with apparent glee seem to believe that they can unwind the hard-won rights of “the other” with no impact on their own. That is wishful thinking. Fascism may ride in on a white horse of restoring a more advantageous social order, but fascism is ultimately only beneficial to the fascists. As has been true of authoritarian, fascist regimes for all time, the common folks are attracted to a bright populist flame that soon enough scalds them too. 

In the case of Trump, his disdain for his own supporters is plain. He was and is a pathetic social climber. He is reliably stupid, but instinctively craven. He knew there was a deep reservoir of white male resentment and tapped into that to power his narcissistic and insatiable ambitions.

The angry “little” white men, like those in Idaho, think Trump “gets” them — is like them. On the contrary, Trump has spent his whole life trying desperately to not be like them. He knows, at some subconscious level, that without his father’s money he might still be a second-rate hustler in Queens. It’s why he sits on golden toilets, builds monuments to himself, and thinks he should be on Mt. Rushmore.

Many folks who analyze politics cite the impact of so-called “woke ideology.” Liberal pundits argue that the Democratic emphasis on things like Critical Race Theory (CRT), DEI, trans-rights and immigrant rights caused the loss of political power. As a habitual reader of comments appended to New York Times pieces, I observe a majority of allegedly progressive readers who parrot the same conventional wisdom. If only we weren’t so damn sensitive to other’s rights!

But consider the glaringly obvious . . .

The opposite of CRT is a worldview where race plays only a modest role. The opposite of diversity is homogeneity. The opposite of equity is inequity. The opposite of inclusion is exclusion. It’s easy math. The sum of homogeneity, inequity and exclusion is white male dominance.

Polls will never capture the full impact of white male insecurity. “Little” men in Idaho or elsewhere will never admit to it — or have insufficient self-awareness to see it.

They’ll come up with any number of other reasons to explain away their support of the monster who will eventually devour them too.

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The post Nelson’s Corner | March 2025 appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.

Early in former President Trump’s term, he had a big idea to prevent undocumented immigrants from crossing the southern border, and it was not a wall.

“I want a big, deep moat!” He exclaimed to Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielson. According to Miles Taylor, Nielson’s Chief of Staff, Trump explained that he wanted this moat filled with snakes and alligators to, as Taylor put it, “eat people alive if they fell into it.”

This bizarre exchange was described by Taylor in his book Blowback: A Warning to Save Democracy from the Next Trump, a book I have read and highly recommend. But be warned– it is horrifying.

The snake and alligator-infested moat would be one of Trump’s many “bad idea bonfires,” and Taylor and his colleagues would find themselves repeatedly trying to extinguish them using various tactics of distraction, delay, or compromise.

In another disturbing example, according to Taylor, Trump frequently expressed confusion over why he could not simply order federal law enforcement officers to use violence against migrants or Black Lives Matter protesters. This account has been corroborated by former Defense Secretary Mark Esper, who quoted Trump as saying, “can’t you just shoot them? Just shoot them in the legs or something.”

Distracting Trump from doing horrible things to people was exhausting work that would ultimately lead to Trump’s Chief of Staff, John Kelly, describing Trump in this way:

John Kelly during his time in the white house. Photo credit: Boston Globe

“He is the most flawed person I have ever met in my life,” – former Trump Administration Chief of Staff John Kelly

Like his colleagues, Miles Taylor joined the Trump Administration as a believer—a Trump supporter willing to go to political war for this unconventional firebrand. Trump was shaking up the American political landscape in ways that engendered a fanatical following among a large swath of the conservative American electorate, and Taylor was eager to be a part of the movement.

But, like many of his colleagues, Taylor experienced on the inside a funhouse mirrored terror mansion of chaos led by an aspiring strongman with no regard for democratic principles, governing standards, or basic human decency. As a result of this experience, Taylor did something extraordinarily bold.

Photo Credit: New York Times

In 2018 he wrote an anonymous New York Times op-ed titled “I Am Part of the Resistance Inside the Trump Administration.” The subtitle of this shocking article read: “I work for the president, but like-minded colleagues and I have vowed to thwart parts of his agenda and his worst inclinations.”

The op-ed sent President Trump into a rage as he vowed to root out the mole in his midst. The hunt was unsuccessful. Taylor revealed himself as “Anonymous” when he resigned his position in the Trump Administration more than two years later, in October 2020. For months afterward, Taylor endured relentless death threats and harassment.

One may read into Taylor’s action an act of treason. A White House insider actively working against the will of the President and Commander in Chief? And therein lies the heart of exactly why a demagogue like Donald Trump is so incredibly dangerous for the future of American democracy. It reveals that the strength of our democracy lies purely in the hearts and minds of the men and women whom we entrust to lead our nation as elected representatives.

We may have a constitution, but the reality is that it isn’t worth anything unless our elected representatives carry out their democratic duties in good faith and in alignment with constitutional principles.  Our democracy rests on a foundation, not of a document, but of a set of unwritten principles and traditions voluntarily adhered to by those who we, the people, entrust with enormous power and responsibility.

George Washington, our first president, set the standard for one of those principles—respect for the peaceful transfer of power. It is a sacred obligation that, after almost two and a half centuries, was shattered by Donald Trump’s failure to concede a lost election and his systematic attempts to unconstitutionally overturn its results to keep himself in power, including the incitement of a violent attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021.

This historical context brings us to the reason why Project 2025 presents a profound danger to the future of America. While the media has mainly focused on the many draconian policy ideas within the document, they are largely failing to articulate that the greater danger is that Project 2025 is a playbook for removing the guardrails from a second Trump presidency—one that he has already stated will be driven by retribution in a second term of vengeance and political targeting.

The first three words in the 930-page Project 2025 document are “We want you!!”

Published in early 2023 voluntarily by the Heritage Foundation, a long-standing conservative political think tank, Project 2025 is a call to arms. It is a recruitment tool to create a standing army-in-waiting of MAGA loyalists who will be ready, eager, and specifically trained to fill the ranks of the civil service (what Trump calls the “deep state”) to carry out the orders of the next Trump presidency without question or hesitation. These institutions harbor great powers within them that, if used against the American people at the behest of a vengeful president, can destroy our republic and our democracy as we know it from within.

The primary objective of Project 2025, therefore, is not about draconian policy ideas like abolishing the Department of Education. It is about turning the management of the traditionally non-partisan civil service into a cabal of MAGA loyalists who will act on political rather than professional directives.

The Project 2025 document explicitly states that the “next conservative president” must be willing to grab extraordinary executive powers so that he can then “hand the power back to the people” once the federal government has been overhauled to match the vision of MAGA.

This is an egregiously dangerous perspective when their favored candidate already tried once to overthrow the American government after losing an election. Do they really think that, once power is grabbed through their playbook, Trump would behave like Washington and not like Orban or Mussolini?

The authors of Project 2025 must know that Trump is no Washington, which is why the document is so sinister in nature. The logical conclusion is that the Project 2025 authors want an authoritarian Trump who will steamroll over our democracy to achieve their objectives of “making America great again” by their definition only.

After all, the current Heritage Foundation President, Kevin Roberts, recently stated on Steve Bannon’s “War Room” podcast that “we are in the process of the second American revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it.”

The main mechanism of this so-called “revolution” is the planned overhauling of the administrative state, replacing career civil servants with political loyalists. This goal is explicitly stated on pages 20 and 21 of Project 2025:

“…the new administration must fill its ranks with political appointees.”

“When it comes to ensuring that freedom can flourish, nothing is more important than deconstructing the centralized administrative state. Political appointees who are answerable to the President and have decision-making authority in the executive branch are key to this essential task. The next Administration must not cede such authority to non-partisan “experts.”

This recruitment drive for loyalists is so core to the Project 2025 agenda that it is represented as one of its four main pillars, specifically stated in the document as “a personnel database.”

Kevin Roberts, President of the Heritage Foundation, has claimed “We are building a pipeline of conservative talent that is ready to step into key roles and implement our vision for America.”

Former head of Project 2025 Paul Dans claimed “We have a database with over 10,000 people from all walks of life entering into this, aspiring to serve. We want people who’ve been canceled, who’ve figuratively given blood for the movement. These are mums who’ve challenged school boards. These are people who’ve stood up in their companies and said, ‘Enough with [diversity, equity, and inclusion] and the whole woke agenda.’”

Many of these recruits are people who have filled out the vetting questionnaire on Project2025.org — political loyalists rather than the non-partisan experts who have traditionally filled the ranks of the civil service since the late 1800s.

The century-and-a-half long tradition of filling federal government positions with non-partisan experts is one of those unwritten foundational principles that has kept our democracy intact. Past presidents going back at least to Grover Cleveland have understood and largely adhered to the necessity of keeping political influence out of the day-to-day responsibilities of civil servants ranging from EPA environmental scientists to FBI investigators.

Project 2025’s brazen call to reverse this tradition and suggest that these career positions be qualified, not by experience and training in their field, but by a loyalty test to the MAGA movement, is dangerous. It becomes profoundly alarming if the occupant of the oval office has already stated and demonstrated anti-democratic and authoritarian tendencies, and has already tried once before to overturn the will of the people.

Overhauling the civil service (i.e., “deep state”) with political loyalists would require firing and replacing tens of thousands of federal government employees. Most of these jobs typically carry over from one administration to the next. So how would the next Trump carry out this hostile takeover?

There is a plan for that, and it was already enacted once by Trump at the end of his last term. In October 2020, anticipating re-election the next month, Trump signed an executive order instituting “Schedule F,” which created a new employment category for federal employees that gives the president the authority to directly hire and fire vastly larger numbers of federal employees to the tune of many tens of thousands.

This order was immediately rescinded by President Biden upon his taking office in 2021, like putting a risen demon back into the earth. But there is no question that Trump would re-institute this order probably on day one of his presidency—one of the many “dictator-for-a-day” orders he may sign on January 21, 2025.

Trump would likely use the power of the executive order to push through an agenda that would have no chance in the legislative chambers. This possible landslide of executive orders would need to be implemented by the thousands of civil servants in the various federal agencies involved. Schedule F creates the mechanism for the next MAGA president to stuff the executive branch with loyalists who, rather than preventing the president from doing horrible things, would likely carry out his vengeful orders.

And this is where the Supreme Court’s recent ruling on presidential immunity comes in, supercharging this danger to alarming levels. Prior to this decision, Project 2025’s playbook for MAGA authoritarianism was still a road full of rocks and potholes. The conservative super-majority Supreme Court just paved that road over with a red carpeted conveyor belt for the first American dictator to ride into unchecked power.

Photo credit: Adam Szuscik via Unsplash

For almost two hundred and fifty years, the American people lived under the belief that no American, even the president, was above the law. The U.S. Supreme Court in Trump vs. The United States changed that overnight in what many legal scholars have called one of the most misguided and dangerous rulings in its entire history. Their ruling largely grants the U.S. president broad immunity from prosecution for anything arbitrarily deemed an “official act.”

While this ruling caused a prosecutorial delay in the January 6th-related cases against Trump (Federal and State of Georgia), it may not insulate him from conviction in those cases as federal prosecutors argue that his actions were undertaken as a candidate for office, not as president, and therefore cannot be considered “official acts” of the president. The merits of that argument, however, are untested under the new presidential immunity powers granted by the Supreme Court.

The danger, however, lies in a future President Trump who may seek to legally insulate his directives by declaring them official presidential acts. Furthermore, the Supreme Court explicitly protected the president from prosecution over any interaction between the president and the Department of Justice, opening the door wide open for targeted prosecution of political opponents or extrajudicial crackdowns on U.S. Citizens under easily fabricated emergency powers such as the Insurrection Act

The Supreme Court decision on presidential immunity arguably throws a wet blanket on any future Trump Administration insiders who may still be left trying to hold up the now rickety guardrails against his criminality if for no other reason than to protect their own skin.

Combine that with a president’s broad power of the pardon, including the preemptive pardon, and you have a wide-open path for the next (and even current) president to do almost whatever he or she wants with little fear or threat of future prosecution.

When Trump distances himself from Project 2025, he is playing a game the media is buying into by focusing on the policy proposals in the document. Trump does not care about those policy ideas. He can refute and disown them for political cover. What Trump is interested in from Project 2025 is the playbook for a power grab and its pre-vetted loyalist political army-in-waiting so that he can punish his political enemies and carry out his often horrible and immoral ideas without obstruction (i.e., “just shoot them in the legs or something.”)

Make no mistake; if Trump is re-elected, he absolutely has a clear path to dictatorship, cut wide open by the playbook that is Project 2025 and the legal cover that this conservative Supreme Court just unleashed.

Many frustrated Americans may relish the idea of a Trump dictatorship to relieve their problems and perceived grievances. For almost a decade the MAGA movement has stoked and reinforced the fear and anger of their followers. They are angry because they are told they should be. They are fearful because they are told they need to be. They are hateful because they are told it’s okay to be.

But modern history is fraught with examples of this foolishness. When democracy is undermined by a vengeful demagogue who plays on the people’s fear, anger, and hatred, it ends badly for everyone. Only a few decades ago authoritarian regimes, whether fascist or communist, in Europe and elsewhere promised grand authoritarian solutions (and retribution for trumped up grievances), but ended in the horrific destruction of whole societies, genocides, and wars of annihilation.

It would be hyperbolic to conclude with certainty that a second Trump Administration will lead us into such horrific turmoil. But it would be equally naive to assume that we can take another giant step onto that slippery slide of fascism and assume we will be able to arrest our accelerating descent towards its terrifying destinations.

Project 2025 is a playbook that gives extraordinary powers to the presidency in the foolish expectation that the president who benefits from that power would then voluntarily dilute it again. That is the dangerous plan.

The reality is that a vengeful and aging President Trump will likely use those powers, newly unhindered through the installation of an army of pre-vetted political loyalists operating under the cover of a preemptive pardon and the Supreme Court’s presidential immunity decision, to potentially unleash an American presidential fury that could send the nation into a dark vault of political chaos and even violence.

Supreme Court Justice Sotomayor was not speaking in hyperbolic terms in her rebuttal to the catastrophic presidential immunity decision when she wrote, “with fear for our democracy, I dissent.”

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The post Project 2025: Red Carpet to American Autocracy appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.

It is often useful to step back from the trees and take a gander at the forest.

In April, the latest inquisition by the Republican House featured the cowering performance of Columbia University President Nemat “Minouche” Shafik. She and her companions gave new life to the Wizard of Oz’s Cowardly Lion — Roar-ee the Lion being the official Columbia mascot. In addition to her secular grovel, she cheerily agreed with Republican Representative Rick Allen, who was flabbergasted that she would invite God’s wrath onto campus by not adequately disciplining all the antisemites who dare criticize Israel’s near-genocide in Gaza.

Shafik, having smilingly groveled before the McCarthyesque proceedings, got her roar back when returning to campus and summoning the NYPD to break up a merely hours-long pro-Palestine encampment on the campus lawn. So brave, lioness!

Last fall, Dartmouth College’s president similarly called the local police to arrest two students who occupied tents on the front lawn of her huge campus mansion. Maybe it’s an Ivy League aversion to tents.

I vividly recall the anti-war protests of the ‘60s and ‘70s. In early ‘66, I ignored, with amusement, the several Vietnam War protestors on my college quad, clad in camouflage, sitting by a small campfire. I was a privileged preppy — albeit a liberal one — who had not paid much attention to the war. Six months later I was marching through the “campus” of Fort Benning, GA wearing a real Army uniform in basic training. The Selective Service had selected me, and it was not an honor.

By 1970, I had served as an Army officer without distinction and returned to college to resume my academic career by actually attending classes. The slaughter of students on May 4 at nearby Kent State sparked particularly vehement protests, including on my new campus quad. This time I paid attention.

The shackling of more than 100 Columbia students in April drew surprising commentary from the usually reliably liberal-ish New York Times readership. The vast majority applauded the university for standing up to the rule breakers. Many comments came from parents who deeply resented the protestors’ interruption of their children’s inexorable march toward MBAs, especially after they had committed some of the proceeds of their own MBAs to the perpetuation of their privilege. It generally went without mention that the encampment inhibited nothing, although fairness requires that I acknowledge that a few pro-Palestinian protesters said some ugly stuff.

Those are a few of the trees. Here’s a glimpse of the forest from my corner.

Colleges and universities — and society — have become nearly unrecognizably corporatized since the ‘70s. Boards are comprised of donors, occasionally limousine liberals, with deep commitments to capitalism and the protection of their own capital. They hire leaders, like Minouche Shafik, who won’t rock the boat — or their yachts.

Humanities are shrinking toward extinction, and business majors have proliferated. Schools are assessed as “superb” based on the exorbitant earnings of graduates. In my later days as head of a Manhattan school, the quality of “elite” preschools was judged by the earnings of their grads!

Politics are equally skewed. Today’s “progressives” are essentially Eisenhower Republicans. Today’s Republicans are essentially to the right of John Birch. It seems nearly everyone, including too damn many Democrats, rail against the “radical left.” There is no “radical left” except perhaps in the fevered imaginary world of Truth Social.

Protestors then and now do not always comport with Emily Post’s rules of etiquette. But is something not deeply amiss when students are locked up for camping while yahoos with AR-15s parade through America’s streets with impunity? I guess some Amendments are more important than others.

Lip service is paid to the right to protest. One such lip server suggested that the protesters be removed to a place where others wouldn’t have to hear them. In cities large and small, protests are confined to cordoned-off corrals where spectators can view them, and a few AR-15 toters can taunt them from the perimeter.

Protests are meant to disrupt. In a culture that has grown more conservative and complacent, protest is demanded. I may not always agree, as is the case with some of the pro-Palestinian rhetoric, but thank goodness there are young — and older — folks who care deeply enough to take a stand for justice. And while I abhor violence, sometimes violence is all that will get the Establishment’s attention.

Yes, I abhor violence, but I’ll reserve my abhorrence for 34,000 dead in Gaza — mostly children and women; 43,000 gun deaths in the U.S. last year; violence against women by men and legislation; law enforcement killing of Black boys and men; the violence of child poverty; and the violent, right-wing assault on kindness and decency in our culture.

The post Nelson’s Corner | May 2024 appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.

[ Local ]

• Colorado Senate Republicans block a measure that would have allowed child sexual abuse victims to sue their abusers past the current statute of limitations
• Elizabeth School District decides to replace Scholastic Book Fair with a conservative book group, citing concerns about LGBTQ+ stories, Critical Race Theory, and “dark magic”
• GreenLatinos celebrate their 15-year anniversary advocating for safer communities, cleaner transit, and racial equity
• Paramedic who injected the lethal dose of Ketamine that killed Elijah McClain avoids jail time and is sentenced to 14 months of work release and probation instead
• Colorado ranchers are upset after newly released wild wolves killed a handful of calves, the Ranchers will be compensated for their losses. Wolves are key in maintaining balance in the ecosystem

[ National ]

• Protests, sit-ins, and demonstrations against the Israeli war in Gaza rock multiple campuses across the nation, sparked by Columbia University students, with authorities responding variously from mass arrests to apathy
• News organization NPR is in the news themselves following a scathing op-ed by a former editor, and a NYT piece on the supposed left-wing bias and internal division of the newsroom
• Trump is ruled in contempt of court, threatened with jail time, by the judge during his current Supreme Court trial after Trump refused to stop posting comments about the ongoing trial on social media
• Arizona lawmakers vote to repeal Civil-War era abortion ban, with some Republicans breaking party lines to vote with Democrats to advance the measure after state court previously upheld the ban
• O.J. Simpson passes away, ending his life-long search for Nicole Brown’s killer

[ International ]

• Israel and Iran exchanged missile, drone attacks prompting a brief scare that the war would widen, however tensions seemed to have calmed after both strikes supposedly caused minimal damage
• Haiti forms a transitional government looking to rebuild major institutions after a massive collapse in power and take-over by numerous warring violent groups
• Trials for international money laundering by the mega-wealthy stemming from the Panama Papers investigation began earlier this month, nearly a decade after the secret off-shore accounts were first revealed
• Wanna-be strongman Erdogan is voted out in Türkiye (Turkey) following latest election results in a positive sign for the nation straddling Europe and the Middle East

Quotes

“I take firearm safety very seriously. This is a humbling experience and I will reaffirm my commitment to responsible handling procedures” – CO State Rep. Don Wilson (R) on leaving his loaded handgun in a Capitol building restroom

“I’ll give you the truth why I’m not Speaker, It’s because one person, a member of Congress, wanted me to stop an ethics complaint because he slept with a 17-year-old” – Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy on the reason he was ousted earlier this year

“People have to stop having such thin skins… What’s more is we also believe that being offended is a sufficient reason for attacking something — but actually, everything offends somebody, always” Salman Rushdie during his appearance on the Daily Show, talking about the person who attacked him

By the Numbers

2 Feet

More accurate measure of sea-level chops an average of 2 feet off of Colorado’s 14k+ foot peaks

81, 89

Colorado Ammendment  81 — an abortion ban — fails to gather enough signatures, while 89 enshrining abortion access, is successful at getting on the ballot for this November

55,000

Residents near Boulder who had their power cut by Excel Energy without proper notice for a pre-planned outage in early April

$96 Billion

Amount in latest military aid approved by the US to send to Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan

116°

Temperatures soar to unbearable heights in the Philippines. Southeast Asia is expected to see already life-threatening temperatures rise in the coming decades

The post Month in Review | March 2024 appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.

As I begin my tenure in the Corner, I offer a few thoughts on the craft we practice in these pages.

Journalism is a threatened species. The primacy of social media marginalizes and handicaps real journalists as objective reporting offers little seduction in a world where Facebook, TikTok, and Instagram are considered reliable sources. Even the most — allegedly — reliable arbiters of complex matters are inclined to sell their wares with a dash of sensation or dollop of “give them what they want.” It is not hard to find a writer’s or editor’s implicit bias in a supposedly “objective” news story, even in the venerable The New York Times. In this corner, there will be no implicit bias. The bias will be quite explicit, as befits opinion writing.

One aspect of the surrender to commercial pressure is bending over backward to appear “objective,” thereby aiding and abetting a culture of false equivalence. The most absurd recent stumble was the 5-day reign of Ronna (Romney) McDaniel as a contributor to NBC News. This opportunistic Republican operative was so deep in Trump’s pocket that I’m surprised the NBC execs found her at all. You may wonder, “What were they thinking?” The answer is: “They weren’t.” The New York Times, Washington Post, MSNBC, and other purported “liberal” outlets hire conservative opinion writers to appear balanced. In rare cases, the efforts are useful but more often are contrived. As Stephen Colbert quipped at the 2006 White House Correspondents’ Dinner, “Reality has a well-known liberal bias.”

Despite reality’s liberal bias, I recognize the dangers of claiming the exclusive “truth.” In many complex matters, a variety of thoughtful perspectives can be illuminating. Good citizenship is cultivated through honest debate. But when you spend too much time bending over backward, falls like the McDaniel debacle are inevitable. Professor Walter Kotschnig offered cautionary advice in 1940 when he urged Mount Holyoke College students to keep their minds open — “but not so open that your brains fall out.”

The most rankling iterations of progressive surrender are found in the sad capitulation to the culture war barrages from the right flank. Take this paragraph from a recent New York Times op-ed by columnist Pamela Paul about Threads, the Meta version of Twitter/X:

“If progressives and liberals were provoked by Trumpers and Breitbart types on Twitter, on Threads they have the opportunity to be wounded by their own kind.

Threads’ algorithm seems precision-tweaked to confront the user with posts devoted to whichever progressive position is slightly lefter-than-thou. It knows, for example, exactly where — on the left, bien sûr — you stand with regard to the Middle East, gender ideology, D.E.I., body positivity, neurodivergence, Covid …”

The Middle East “standing” she apparently references is that of objections to the indiscriminate slaughter and starvation of Palestinians in Gaza. At least in that matter, the historic plight of Jews and the inhumanity of Hamas offer a plausible realm for discussion. But “gender ideology”? What precisely is that? Do she and others believe that gender identity is just a political gimmick on the left — a belief that should be balanced by good old heteronormative religious hokum? Or the nearly universal disdain for D.E.I, as though the acronym itself presents a clear danger to civilization? Or, heaven forbid, that women, in particular, should refrain from positive regard toward their own natural shape? Or “neurodivergence,” which, perhaps to Ms. Paul, is better expressed by “weird” or “disabled”? And what on earth is an oppressively progressive view on COVID-19?

The right wing and its morality goon squad have successfully marginalized or reversed much of the hard-won social progress of my lifetime. They have Stone-Aged women’s rights, outlawed anti-racism and the teaching of real history, burned books that exude a whiff of gayness, scrapped affirmative action, replaced bibliographies with Bibles, and demonized the most vulnerable in society. Protesting venomous speakers is recast as “cancel culture.” Sensitivity to the vulnerability of Black and other college students in the minority is ridiculed as “snowflake safe spaces.”

It is exceedingly disappointing to find that so many so-called liberals jump right on that apologetic bandwagon, often postulating that progressive “overreach” will cost elections. The best defense is a good offense. Liberals, Democrats, and Progressives (aka sane and humane people) should fight like hell for women, racial equity, the protection of the most vulnerable, and the need for social, judicial, and legislative efforts to those ends.

I expect to continue fighting like hell. I hope you’re in my corner.

Always happy to hear from you: stevehutnelson@gmail.com.

The post Nelson’s Corner | April 2024 appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.

By Jacqueline Keeler. This article was originally shared on Pollen Nation. We share it here with permission of the author.

The post The New York Times Outs Pretendian Andrea Smith | OP-ED appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.

The New York Times has taken note of Boulder’s role in producing new natural food businesses. Quinn Snacks, profiled in our October issue, was highlighted along with other local companies building a national reputation.

“Boulder is perhaps best known for craft beer and bicycles — there’s almost one for every person living here — and for being home to Mork and Mindy. But among foodies, it is also known as the place where new companies are challenging the old guard in the food business,” the Times wrote.

It then mentions several Boulder-based businesses, including Purely Elizabeth, Made in Nature and Good Karma Foods, all of which relocated here from various cities across the country, thanks to a community that rewards innovation and supports local, small businesses. It’s not just the small guys finding a home in Boulder, either. KeHE, the second-largest natural food distributor, has been in Boulder since 2013 and the Rodale Institute is bringing a satellite office here to continue its research on organic farming, something for which Boulder County has long had a reputation.

Businesses of all sizes are finding support from natural-food customers and industry experts alike. Organizations like Naturally Boulder help budding natural product entrepreneurs. As a leader in the natural foods movement, Boulder has a national reputation, but it’s nice to see startup food brands cite the small-town feel and business-friendly reputation for drawing them to Boulder.

The post Boulder’s foodie industry in the spotlight appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.

The Psychedelic Furs

On October 29, the Gothic Theatre will host a night of nostalgic alt-rock revelry. The Psychedelic Furs and the Lemonheads are on tour together, and that Denver show is a must see. We grabbed original Fur Tim Butler to find out what we can expect…O

The Psychedelic Furs play with the Lemonheads at 8 p.m. on Wednesday, October 29 at the Gothic Theatre; 3263 S. Broadway, Englewood; 303-789-9206; $35

Yellow Scene: It’s been a while since you were here – what have you been up to?

Tim Butler: We’ve toured pretty regularly. I’ve been working, trying to sort out a new record. We have the song ideas, we’re just waiting for Richard [Butler, singer] to get up to speed on the lyrics.

YS: It’s been a while since the last record…

TB: Oh yeah, it’s been since 1992. Of course, we took a break. Rich and I formed Love Spit Love. Then I left that and formed my own band, which didn’t do anything. We got back together in 2000. It’s not so long. But it’s still 14 years since we got back together, so I’m starting to get a bit agitated too.

YS: In those three years, has the line-up changed at all?

TB: No, it’s pretty solid. I think this is the best line-up we’ve ever had.

YS: Do you enjoy playing Colorado?

TB: Oh yeah, and especially the Gothic Theatre. It’s one of my favorite places in America. I love the old cinema with the bottom level taken out and the second level seats. The atmosphere at those sort of places and the Gothic in particular is a favorite of the whole band.

YS: What are your plans for the set?

TB: The hits and the almost-hits, of course. You get lynched if you don’t do those. The last few outings, we’ve been doing stuff that we haven’t played for a while from the first album and the second album.

The post Editor’s Picks – Bands and Burlesque appeared first on Yellow Scene Magazine.