Ryan Cooper

Ryan Cooper

Ryan Cooper is a national correspondent at TheWeek.com. His work has appeared in the Washington Monthly, The New Republic, and the Washington Post.

Articles by this author

"It's garbage politics, and worse still, it's so lame that nobody even pays attention." (Photo: Senate Democrats/Flickr/cc) Views
Thursday, June 07, 2018
Chuck Schumer Is The Exact Opposite of What Democrats Need
Listen to the leaders of the Democratic Party, and it seems America is in some of its most dire straits in its history. In an interview with NPR regarding President Trump's assertion that he can break any law he wants, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said: "We do not have a dictatorship. The...
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"If Trump can pardon anyone, including himself, and shut down any investigation, then he has a free pass to break any federal law." (Photo: AP Photo/Evan Vucci, Wikimedia Commons, holwichaikawee/iStock) Views
Tuesday, June 05, 2018
America's Rickety Constitution Is Proving No Match for The Mad King Donald
President Trump has officially embraced Richard Nixon's infamous view of presidential authority: "When the president does it, that means that it is not illegal." That is the clear implication of a letter Trump's lawyers sent to Special Counsel Robert Mueller , which made sweeping claims about the...
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Friday, June 01, 2018
The Deafening Message of Trump's Dinesh D'Souza Pardon
President Trump announced Thursday that he would pardon Dinesh D'Souza, the loopy conservative operative who pleaded guilty to violating campaign finance law: Will be giving a Full Pardon to Dinesh D’Souza today. He was treated very unfairly by our government! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump)...
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"On the North Korean side, they can get some relief from devastating sanctions, a partial return to ordinary nation status, and perhaps most importantly, get to appear magnanimous and statesmanlike." (Photo: Richard Engel/Twitter) Views
Friday, May 25, 2018
Peace in Korea Is Still Possible — Just Without America
President Trump has abruptly canceled his much-hyped June 12 summit with North Korea in a baffling letter to Kim Jong Un in which he cited the latter's supposed "tremendous anger and open hostility." Given Trump's record of pervasive dishonesty and addle-brained rambling, it's anybody's guess what...
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Sunday, May 20, 2018
The Mind-Boggling Corruption of Trump Inc.
Another week in the Donald Trump presidency, another handful of days so stuffed full of sordid and highly complicated stories that even journalists have trouble keeping track of what's going on. But the thread tying all the latest news together — from Trump lawyer Michael Cohen's sundry exploits,...
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"The only actually nuclear-armed state in the Middle East is Israel." (Photo: Mark Wilson/Getty Images) Views
Tuesday, May 08, 2018
The Dishonest Case Against the Iran Deal
President Trump will announce today whether or not to he will recertify the Iran nuclear deal. He has been hinting that he will refuse to do so this time, throwing the whole carefully negotiated framework crafted by his predecessor into disarray. A parade of warmongers, cretins, and outright liars...
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"As the GOP has become composed of characterological extremists, they have become all but incapable of negotiation or compromise." (Screengrab from NBC) Views
Thursday, March 29, 2018
The Parkland Kids Have Triggered Conservative Snowflakes
Over the weekend, the March for Our Lives event featured gigantic rallies across the nation, including one in Washington, D.C., that drew several hundred thousand people — depending on estimates, perhaps the largest single rally there in American history. It was an inspiring demonstration of...
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Saturday, March 17, 2018
Can Democrats Think Strategically About Trump Country?
Democrat Conor Lamb seems to have eked out a narrow victory in the special election in Pennsylvania's 18th congressional district — which President Trump won by 20 points in 2016. Far too much time, money, and attention has been lavished on this race — after all, this district is literally going to...
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"The average teacher's salary in West Virginia is just $45,622, one of the lowest in the U.S. And they've had enough." (Photo: American Ethnologist) Views
Tuesday, March 06, 2018
Will Striking Teachers Spark a Labor Revolution?
We're in the midst of a brushfire outbreak of labor militancy not seen in decades. First came a statewide teachers' strike in West Virginia. When the teachers union leadership negotiated a weak compromise (which was tabled by the GOP-held state Senate anyway), the rank-and-file rebelled and started...
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"Of course, Obama's bait-and-switch on telecom immunity was only the first step in his civil liberties record. As the Snowden documents showed, as president he embraced and in some ways expanded the Bush spying machine." (Photo: Getty) Views
Tuesday, January 16, 2018
Democrats' Bewildering Decision to Hand President Trump More Surveillance Powers
Back in 2005, The New York Times reported that President Bush had been lying through his teeth about a warrantless wiretapping program his administration had set up under the NSA. The baldly illegal program required participation from telecom companies, who were thus exposed to millions of lawsuits...
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