In the months after the 2016 election, it was an article of faith among Trump supporters that election interference was a ridiculous notion. Forget collusion, the prospect of Russian influence or attempted influence alone was nothing but…

Bill Bell in In Interesting Times

Jan 29, 2018

All that happened today

Republican members of the House intel committee voted to release a memo that is overwhelmingly partisan but full of sensitive information; the Department of Justice has said that the release would be “extraordinarily reckless.” The president pushed out a leader of the FBI; the…

Bill Bell in In Interesting Times

Mar 6, 2017

Not serious, only cruel

I suppose the Trump administration’s revised immigration ban is an improvement over the previous attempt. Yesterday’s executive order removes preferential treatment for Christians living in Iran, Somalia, Sudan, Yemen, Syria, and Libya, which previously had been an explicit case of…

Bill Bell in In Interesting Times

Feb 28, 2017

All wrecking ball and no nuance

A town six miles down the road from where I grew up fronted the New York Times today. The story is about a “local pillar” who is now in custody because he arrived in the country illegally more than 20 years ago. That town went about 70–30 Trump in the election.

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Bill Bell in In Interesting Times

Feb 26, 2017

The moral consequence of ineffective policy

For all the bluster, it’s been a rough few weeks for the new administration. Donald Trump’s immigrant and refugee ban? Struck down by the courts and at odds with the Department of Homeland Security’s analysis. His opening move to weaken the Affordable…

Bill Bell in In Interesting Times

Feb 13, 2017

In praise of noisy campus liberals, upon their being labeled Nazis

Conservatives have lamented the state of college campuses for decades, terrified that students are being brainwashed. Ronald Reagan made his bones promising to “clean up the mess at Berkeley” in the ’60s, and the LA…

Bill Bell in In Interesting Times

Feb 1, 2017

The ‘chaotic landscape’ that DeVos built

My great-grandpa started working at a coal mine before he turned 10. Only one of my grandparents finished high school. My dad worked in a coal mine; my mom taught second grade. They both went to public schools and a state college. My brother and I did the…