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1. Rebecca Traister’s profile of Kirsten Gillibrand raised plenty of eyebrows — especially for the junior U.S. senator from New York’s liberal use of the word fuck (“Kirsten Gillibrand Is an Enthusiastic No,” April 3–16). “This Senate is rated ‘M,’ for ‘mature,’ ” tweeted Carl Quintanilla. But Upworthy’s Parker Molloy argued that Gillibrand’s language choice was getting far more attention than another aspect of Traister’s article: Susan Collins’s and Gillibrand’s support for each other. Molloy wrote, “Gillibrand and Collins represent something important in any profession: what it looks like when women have each other’s backs.” Some journalists raised questions about different aspects of the piece, though. The Times’ Maggie Haberman tweeted, “Gillibrand has more in common with Sanders than Clinton? Seriously?” (For the record, Traister wrote that she has much in common with Sanders, not more.) And another political reporter, Dan Friedman, wrote, “Other than a quick reference to Goldman Sachs donations, this is a story on Gillibrand’s career that doesn’t mention her fundraising prowess … She got notice and help from the DCCC by raising eye-opening totals for her House campaign against Sweeney in 2006.” Polly Windels, one of the voters who supported Gillibrand during that first campaign, also chimed in: “When I met Kirsten Gillibrand a year before her first election, I was so glad to see a tireless warrior against all that is wrong with politics. She’s always evolving as she plows through the crap to find compromise.” And despite the senator’s denials, for many readers, the profile raised excitement for a potential 2020 presidential campaign. “She’s the best elected official in America right now,” wrote GraduatedAmbition.
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2. Reeves Wiedeman introduced New York’s readers to Brace Belden, a former florist from the Bay Area who sneaked into Syria to fight ISIS — and who’s become a minor celebrity in some leftist corners for tweeting his exploits under the name @PissPigGranddad (“The Dirtbag Left’s Man in Syria,” April 3–16). Mother Jones’s Ben Dreyfuss summed up the piece by writing: “This story is really good and also insane.” The Atlantic’s Matt Ford added, “The 21st century is strange.” But the Center for Climate and Security’s Neil Bhatiya responded, “I bet the Spanish Civil War was full of people like this. We just have ubiquitous methods for documenting them now.” Peter N. Carroll, author of The Odyssey of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade: Americans in the Spanish Civil War, weighed in on this theory: “Brace Belden’s odyssey from San Francisco to Syria (and back) does indeed show many parallels with the journey of American volunteers in the Spanish Civil War 80 years ago. At 27, his age is nearly the same as the average Abraham Lincoln brigadista; his unmarried status mirrors the 80 percent single status of his role models; his Jewish background targeting isis fanaticism reflects the disproportionate number of Jews from around the world who saw Spain as an opportunity to shoot back at fascists and Nazis; the loss of a parent at an early age also appears frequently among the earlier volunteers. But, most important, there’s the similarity that young people today face in seeking stable lives amid economic uncertainty, unemployment or marginal work, and the absence of hope for self-improvement that also afflicted millions during the Great Depression. Facing bleak prospects, individual volunteers in both eras have discovered a rare sense of camaraderie in the ranks and an ideological purpose that promises a beneficent future. This is no mere adventurism, but a serious alternative to a life of tweets.”
3. Readers agreed with Jonathan Chait that President Trump, while failing to repeal the ACA, has accomplished something major in his first 100 days: “Trump’s biggest accomplishment in two words: White Power. This is exactly what his voters want,” tweeted @Charlesjaco1 (“Donald Trump’s Race War,” April 3–16). But Matthew Guterl, a professor of Africana Studies at Brown University, felt that Chait should have more deeply explored “the link between white supremacism and the federal government as something new and not all that American.” He argues, “As any historian will tell you, the current President’s white nationalism isn’t a ‘redefinition’; it is the original, and still all too strong, foundation of the nation. Trump, the mad fabulist, has repackaged our nation’s enduring commitment to
racism under his own gilt label.”�