Bernie Sanders

DAVIES | Hillary Clinton’s Ideology Gap

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I would rather have Bernie Sanders as president, but Hillary Clinton as the Democratic nominee. Such is Sanders’ electability problem, distilled. His policies and ideology may be more in line with mine but his chances in the general election are slim. Despite polls’ projections of Sanders’ electoral strength against the top flight of GOP contenders, Americans’ ideological attitudes towards what they consider socialism will prevail in denying him victory. Why else would the Republican Party support and defend Bernie “Hammer and Sickle” Sanders?

Columns

DAVIES | Car and Driver

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Compared to the smooth wine of Formula 1, rallying is harsh and jagged. Taking place on closed public roads over a number of ‘stages’, it is far from the pristine tarmac of its more refined brethren. On surfaces ranging from sand to snow, drivers thread their cars along forest tracks and through village alleys at bowel-loosening speeds. Tight corners and loose surfaces at high speeds made accidents inevitable. Long stages and remote locations made crash recovery difficult. Despite these factors, small engines and production requirements kept accidents un­common and manageable.

Columns

DAVIES | Removing ISIS

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Recent attacks in Paris, Beirut and Baghdad and the downing of Metrojet Flight 9268 over the Sinai Peninsula have, in typically horrifying fashion, proven that ISIS has metastasised beyond its “J.V. team” origins. International outrage erupted, triggered by the attacks’ sophistication and the heightened threat they represent. Wary rivals like the United States and Russia should use their hardened resolve to seek deeper cooperation and assemble a coordinated front against the group. While impressive in the short term, these attacks may well have set the bell tolling for ISIS. The United States and Russia, the strongest powers involved in the Middle Eastern quagmire, are the international lynchpins of two loosely opposing groups whose members are also, at least nominally, fighting ISIS.

Ben carson

DAVIES | This Week in Lies and Idiocy

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Last week, I heard a couple of news items that caught my ears. First was the announcement by Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter that the United States would not “hold back from supporting capable partners in opportunistic attacks against ISIL.” Besides sending the pitch of Lindsay Graham’s voice above the human aural register, Secretary Carter’s statement was interesting for its word choice. Specifically, ‘opportunistic’ struck me as a rather poor selection. Defined as “exploiting chances offered by immediate circumstances without reference to a general plan or moral principle,” ‘opportunistic’ embodies precisely the opposite of what most would argue a military intervention requires. Considering Secretary Carter uttered it in the same breath as he promised American boots on the ground, one has to question how such disastrous diction came to pass.

Columns

DAVIES | The Case Against the Death Penalty

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Richard Glossip was scheduled to die at 3 p.m. on Sept. 30, 2015. After that hour passed without event, Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallin issued a stay of execution, delaying Glossip’s execution until the Nov. 6. For the fourth time since October 2014, the state of Oklahoma stayed Richard Glossip’s execution.

Columns

DAVIES | The Bitter Harvest of Political Decay

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Donald Trump’s success represents the fulfillment of ancient Republican prophecy. The Party’s Department for Agitation and Propa­ganda, commonly known as Fox News, has long strived to paint a picture for its disciples in Middle America of the great American — the true American. In this image, individual success is the measure of a man’s worth and the dollar is its currency. The Republican Übermensch is wealthy, white and unabashedly arrogant. Donald Trump is the pinnacle of this idolatry, and as such is the prime specimen among the pugnacious crop of 2016’s Republican harvest.