John Feffer

1 week ago | fpif.org | Frazer Merritt |John Feffer

American democracy faces an unprecedented crisis. Trump’s second victory represents more than a mere political setback or symptom of political polarization—it constitutes a systemic assault on shared reality and a gradual erasure of objective truth. America is experiencing what scholars call “hypernormalization”—a quiet coup against reality, replacing it with an artificially engineered alternative, leaving citizens disoriented within an increasingly surreal existence.

1 week ago | fpif.org | Sveta Yefimenko |John Feffer

Russia’s cross-border attack on Sumy in northeast Ukraine this Palm Sunday killed at least 34 people and injured 117 others. The missile barrage seems particularly egregious considering that Moscow blocked Ukraine’s efforts last month to negotiate a full and unconditional U.S.-brokered ceasefire. Putin’s delaying tactics are costing lives as he stalls in an opportunistic attempt to gain leverage. Does it mean that Russia doesn’t want peace? Not necessarily.

1 week ago | counterpunch.org | John Feffer

Dictators defend their rule with guns. Democrats defend their rule with paper. Of course, the constitution that upholds democracy is not just any piece of paper. It is a document backed up by political institutions, by courts, and by the public will. In a normal situation, this paper is stronger than military force or police actions because the product of the pen is indeed mightier than the sword. But we don’t live in normal times.

1 week ago | fpif.org | John Feffer

Originally published in TomDispatch. What put the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), with an annual budget hovering at just about 1% of federal spending, at the top of Elon Musk’s budget-cutting target list? Was it just a political calculation that foreign aid is a safe target because it’s unpopular with so many Americans and cutting those funds will only hurt foreigners, not U.S. voters?

1 week ago | fpif.org | Imran Khalid |John Feffer

In another characteristically brash maneuver, Donald Trump has intensified his economic confrontation with Beijing, announcing an unprecedented 125 percent tariff on Chinese imports while granting a 90-day tariff reprieve to every other major trading nation. Far from being a calculated economic strategy, the move appears tailor-made for campaign optics, an attempt to project toughness against China while mollifying allies and partners he had antagonized on April 2.