Roundup

GOP: A Neo-Fascist White-Identity Party?

by Michael Tomasky

It started 20 years ago, with pandering to racist and xenophobic movements. But today, in Trump’s GOP, it’s not so fringe anymore.

Story off the Week: The Revolution's Longest Love Story

by Gil Troy

The longest living American Revolutionary War veteran also had the longest marriage.

Trump’s anti-Muslim rhetoric will live in infamy in American history

by David Ignatius

Historians will look harshly on those who, for reasons of cowardice or opportunism, kept silent when Trump’s tirades put our constitutional values and the safety of Americans at risk — not to mention the political future of the GOP.

Lincoln's Struggle With The Thirteenth Amendment

by Christian Samito

Amending the Constitution broke with Lincoln’s long-held belief that it should not be altered because the work of its Framers could not be improved.

The Return of History

by Aatish Taseer

The Islamic State’s treatment of history is particularly extreme, but a similar return of history is occurring with varying degrees of intensity all across the old world.

The Words That Killed Medieval Jews

by Sara Lipton

Do harsh words lead to violent acts? At a moment when hate speech seems to be proliferating, it’s a question worth asking.

Trump: You Should Ban Islamists, Not Muslims

by Daniel Pipes

Trump's statement less an exercise in practical policy making than a gadfly provocation.

On the Way to Self-Destruction - Historian Mária Schmidt on Europe's Real Troubles - Part I

by Mária Schmidt

Nobody can have any doubt anymore about the painful fact that the European Union is desperately lacking in any defense capability of practical use.

History Draws a Line on 'One Man, One Vote'

by Noah Feldman

If historical facts are going to be used, they need to be interpreted strictly, not loosely.

Roundup Top 10!

This week's broad sampling of opinion pieces found on the Internet, as selected by the editors of HNN.

Hitler Analogies in the 2016 Election

“Trump not bothered by comparisons to Hitler” — Politico headline

Social Media News: What Historians Are Talking About

This week ... Simon Schama on Trump, Tom Sugrue complaint about David Kennedy's NYT book review, and more. 

Pop Culture Roundup: This Week

This week ... Sarah Vowell, American Experience documentary, and the cost of history books. 

Trump: A Modern Day Joe McCarthy

by Max Boot

Most reporters abhor Trump and everything he stands for. Yet they remain the instrument by which he is able to elevate himself to the top of the Republican race and to the center of the national conversation.

GOP’s hell-bent on tearing us apart: A decades-long strategy to win by divisiveness now leads to President Donald Trump

by Heather Cox Richardson

GOP's Southern strategy has won elections for 50 years. It's also fragmented America and destroyed our politics

The South won the Civil War: White men, racial resentment, and how the Bitter Minority came to rule us all

by Paul Rosenberg

Nixon's Silent Majority, neither silent nor a majority, runs Congress and propels Trump. How did this happen?

Trump vs. the Founding Fathers on Muslims Coming to US

by Juan Cole

Forbidding people from entering the United States on the basis of their religion is inconsistent with the ideals of the Founding Generation of the United States of America.

How Can We Fight Home-Grown Terrorism?

by Jonathan Zimmerman

Try Civics Class.

America's Reckless War Against Evil

by Ira Chernus

Why It’s Self-Defeating and Has No End

Whether to kill baby Hitler might be a political firecracker, but can counterfactuals say anything deeper about the past?

by Rebecca Onion

The counterfactual is a friend to science-fiction writers and chatting partygoers alike. Yet ‘What if?’ is not a mode of discussion you’ll commonly hear in a university history seminar.