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Elon Musk for the Not-So-Perplexed
Quinn Slobodian and Ben Tarnoff’s “Muskism” is a much-needed critical study of the world’s first trillionaire. But Musk is no enigma—and no mere symptom…
 • Victor Shammas
AI and the Means of Intellectual Production
AI isn’t so much a break with past history as a continuation of capitalism’s accelerating tendencies—with humanity’s collective data as its training…
 • Victor Shammas
Have Denmark’s Right-Leaning Social Democrats Finally Learned Their Lesson?
Denmark’s recent elections suggest the Social Democrats’ rightward turn on immigration won’t always win. Voters expect more from the left—even in the…
 • Victor Shammas
Picaresque Postmodernism in Dangerous Times
Why Paul Thomas Anderson's "One Battle After Another" doesn't work in this political moment.
 • Victor Shammas
Harris’s 107 Days and the Missing Reckoning: Gaza
Early coverage of Kamala Harris’s campaign memoir, 107 Days, has been unfair. Yet Harris still won't adequately deal with the Biden administration's…
 • Victor Shammas
The Poverty of Abundance
Abundance liberalism won't defeat fascism.
 • Victor Shammas
Norway's Right is Obsessed With Immigration and Crime
Norway is a safe, prosperous, and diverse society. So why can't the right stop talking about immigration and crime?
 • Victor Shammas
Ringo's "Peace and Love" and the Problem of the Empty Signifier
Ringo Starr just wants "peace and love." What could possibly be wrong with that?
 • Victor Shammas
Review: Not Enough Fight
'Fight' by Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes offers a gripping account of the 2024 presidential election, placing blame on both Biden and Harris for…
 • Victor Shammas
The Dangers of TACO
Trump Always Chickens Out, or TACO, was a playful way of criticizing Trump's early second-term policies. But goading Trump into taking a firmer stance…
 • Victor Shammas
Shock and Subordination: The First 100 Days of Trump 2.0
Trump's desire for power seems limitless. But people are beginning to wake up to the real-world consequences of his policies.
 • Victor Shammas
The Great American Decoupling
Under Trump 2.0, the U.S. is decoupling from the world—and the world from it. Both are worse off for it.
 • Victor Shammas
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