An Uprising Is Still Possible, Even if We Can’t Meet in the Streets
Jeff Roberson/AP For indispensable reporting on the coronavirus crisis and more, subscribe to Mother Jones’ newsletters.How do you have a mass revolt without a mob? Prof. Frances Fox Piven is the 87-year-old “intellectual guru of activist progressives”—so sayeth the New York Times. Her work, she explained to me, is about “uprisings that sometimes occur when there’s…
If We Want to Beat Coronavirus, We Need Housing for Everyone
Apu Gomes/Getty As infection rates of the new coronavirus in the United States mount, the pandemic has upended daily life around the world, causing soaring unemployment, school and business closures, and forcing the governors of New York and California to order everyone but essential workers indoors. The Trump administration has been criticized for its response, which included…
Bloomberg Once Promoted a Plan to House Homeless Families on Cruise Ships
Michael Bloomberg delivering a press briefing in 2002. Nancy Kaszerman/Zuma It was the fall of 2002, early in Michael Bloomberg’s first term as mayor of New York. The billionaire-turned-politician had been struggling all year to address a growing crisis: The Big Apple’s homeless population was skyrocketing to record levels, and the city had run out…
In the UC Santa Cruz Wildcat Strike, Class War Meets the California Housing Crisis
Mairav Zonszein “This is a marathon, not a sprint,” Sarah Mason, a graduate student in sociology at the University of California Santa Cruz, tells a crowd of several hundred students, wrapping up the fourth day of an unprecedented wildcat strike that has drawn threats of mass dismissal and captured the attention of UC campuses across…
Trump Isn’t Waging a War on Poverty. He’s Waging a War on Poor People.
Mother Jones illustration; Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP Mr. Smith, a 45-year-old man living in Washington, DC, scrapes together what passes for a living selling a local newspaper as a street vendor, for which he earns $20 a day—on a good day. Each month, he receives $194 from the the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, commonly known as SNAP…
California’s Controversial Housing Bill Just Died. It Wasn’t Just Because of NIMBYs.
Jae C. Hong/AP The controversial housing bill, SB 50, that’s been roiling California’s state legislature—which would have revolutionized land use and housing in the state—failed yet again in dramatic fashion Thursday afternoon. It was three votes shy from passing out of the state Senate, following an attempt to pass it on Wednesday that also came…