Shielding Democracy from Putin’s S/Words
During the Cold War, Soviet Russia employed self-glorifying rhetoric to create a master narrative that was used to justify expanding Soviet hegemony and communism. Having previously forced the Soviet geo-political and ideological totality on 14 republics (Ukraine among them), after WWII the USSR started liberating Eastern Europe by occupying countries…
Contextualizing China’s Threats against Taiwan
The United States, China, and Taiwan are locked in a communication impasse that feels destined for disaster. If we hope to avoid a catastrophe, then coming to a better understanding of the nuances of U.S.-China-Taiwan communication stands among the most pressing issues in the age of globalization and as one…
Incitement and the President: Defining the Law
On February 13, 2021, 57 Senators, including seven Republicans, voted to convict ex-President Donald Trump. That number was ten shy of the number needed for a conviction on the one charge in the impeachment article: incitement to insurrection. However, the impeachment trial left us with several questions: What led the…
Did President Trump Incite Insurrection? The Causal Connection Between Words and Deeds
On January 6, 2021, then President Donald Trump spoke to a group of his supporters who had come to Washington, DC, to “protest” the outcome of the 2020 election. In his speech, Trump implored his supporters to march down Pennsylvania Avenue toward the Capitol in order to express their outrage…
America’s Horror Story: Trump and the Invisible Enemy
The Trump administration’s response to COVID-19 can be characterized as disjointed, to put it mildly, or as chaotic, to be less charitable. President Trump has routinely contradicted the advice from the officials of the Centers for Disease Control, explained away the high number of cases as only the result of…