Ross Barkan

1 week ago | nymag.com | Ross Barkan

Have American colleges and universities finally found a wartime leader? On Monday, Harvard president Alan Garber told the Trump administration his university would not comply with calls for draconian crackdowns on student speech and diversity initiatives. Garber was blunt: "No government-regardless of which party is in power-should dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue," he said in a statement.

1 week ago | crainsnewyork.com | Ross Barkan

After witnessing several years of scandals and policy setbacks, New Yorkers appear eager to put someone else in City Hall. Cuomo had many of his own scandals, but voters seem ready to forgive: A decade in the governor’s mansion holds a certain appeal. And most of the other Democrats running against Cuomo have yet to break through, though they still have some time before the June 24 primary.

1 week ago | nymag.com | Ross Barkan

It gets harder every day to track the chaos emanating from Donald Trump's America. The stock market has gyrated wildly, and we are now locked in an unprecedented trade war with China, facing 125 percent tariffs from Beijing that are sparking a whole lot of panic-buying of iPhones. Trump is living his 40-year dream of threatening enormous tariffs on everyone - and Americans can do little more than nervously look on and hope their 401(k)s don't evaporate.

2 weeks ago | open.substack.com | Ross Barkan

Philadelphia! I’ll be coming to the City of Brotherly Love on May 12 to discuss Glass Century with the great Adrian Nathan West. Please reserve your ticket now if you want to come. My novel, as a reminder, is out on May 6, less than one month from now, and I strongly urge you to preorder a book that has been called the long-awaited great Millennial novel and “a marvelous paean to NYC and a spectacularly moving novel,” according to Junot Diaz.

2 weeks ago | nymag.com | Ross Barkan

Much has been made recently of the Democratic Party's systemic problems. Donald Trump won the popular vote, Republicans netted a healthy Senate majority, and almost every demographic group, absent the white and wealthy, gravitated to the GOP. As Trump has laid waste to the government and cowed civil society, few Democrats could settle on a compelling oppositional message.