‘The consequences spread outward from there’
Opinion, comment and editorials of the day
‘Tens of millions of Americans will never own a home — consequences will be severe’
John Mac Ghlionn at The Hill
Real estate “has been crushed for a second consecutive year — this time by a war in Iran that has sent mortgage rates soaring,” says John Mac Ghlionn. The market has “become a staring contest where nobody blinks, nobody moves, and the country suffers.” Homeownership has “long been the primary vehicle through which middle class Americans build wealth.” Take it “away, and you remove the single largest source of generational stability for tens of millions of households.”
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‘We lend military our loved ones. Least they can do is feed them.’
Rebekah Gleaves Sanderlin at USA Today
There’s an “unspoken contract the U.S. military makes with military families: Lend us your loved ones, and we’ll meet their basic needs,” says Rebekah Gleaves Sanderlin. But upon seeing photos of “meager and unappetizing meals purportedly being served to sailors deployed to the Middle East, people took notice.” The “mere fact that military family members suspect their loved ones’ basic needs aren’t being met is an indicator.” It “tells us they don’t trust leadership to care for their people.”
‘The dark side of Gaza’s new fancy cafes and restaurants’
Eman Abu Zayed at Al Jazeera
Social media is “full of posts showing off photos and videos of fancy-looking cafes and restaurants in Gaza” but “these new establishments do not prove that normality is coming back to Gaza,” says Eman Abu Zayed. They are a “testament to its continuing genocidal abnormality.” The war “made some people in Gaza rich, especially those who engaged in illicit activities,” and “this wealth is now coming out in various forms, including luxury cafes and restaurants.”
‘Trump’s ridiculous ballroom is no place for journalists’
Ana Marie Cox at The Nation
Trump has “been pushing for future White House Correspondents’ Association dinners to be held on his turf, at the still-mythical ballroom that the president tore down part of the White House to build,” says Ana Marie Cox. But “this is a solution to a problem that does not exist.” The “metaphor of watchful hospitality should be on everyone’s mind every time Trump or his cronies bleat about moving the correspondents’ dinner to his metastasizing monstrosity.”
