Earlier this month, journalist Scott Pelley delivered what should have been a fairly standard commencement address at Wake Forest University. The 60 Minutes correspondent spoke about seeking truth, defending democracy, and the importance of courage in difficult times—the kind of boilerplate inspiration you’d expect from a veteran journalist addressing graduates.
The New Republic and Parker Malloy

In a democracy, the balance of power is essential—but what happens when the scales begin to tip? In this PBS special, How Much Executive Power Is Too Much?, we explore one of the most pressing questions in American government today: how much authority should be concentrated in the hands of a single individual?
Public Broadcasting System

Ezra Klein delves into the profound implications of former President Donald Trump’s proposed domestic policy package. Klein characterizes the bill as “the cruelest and most irresponsible piece of domestic legislation to be seriously proposed in my lifetime,” emphasizing its potential to exacerbate fiscal instability and undermine the social safety net.
Ezra Klein Show

Standing beneath towering shelves of kegs in the back of Vancouver’s Loowit Brewing, U.S. Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez has just given a thank-you talk to her supporters after squeaking through another tight election. As she wraps up her remarks in that December gathering and pauses for questions, a man in the crowd speaks up: “I’d like to see you expand the Blue Dog Coalition … I think that’s exactly what we need at the broader level.”
Joseph O’Sullivan, Cascade PBS

Patty Murray is pleading her case. Except she’s pleading it to better angels that have long since left the building.

Multiple times per day now, when the U.S. Senate is in session, Murray, the senior senator from Washington, troops to a microphone at the Capitol to say that something the Donald Trump administration has done is abnormal, unethical, indefensible or downright illegal.
Danny Westneat, Seattle Times

Legal residents of the United States sent to foreign prisons without due process. Students detained after voicing their opinions. Federal judges threatened with impeachment for ruling against the administration’s priorities.

In the Opinion video above, Marci Shore, Timothy Snyder and Jason Stanley, all professors at Yale and experts in authoritarianism, explain why America is especially vulnerable to a democratic backsliding — and why they are leaving the United States to take up positions at the University of Toronto.

The "Concrete Mama" podcast that originated inside the walls of the Washington State Penitentiary serves as a looking glass through which the free world can see inside the prison and into the humanity of those who reside there. 
Editorial Board, Walla Walla Union-Bulletin

You likely know that House Republicans passed their dreadful bill out of an important committee last night. There’s a Rules Committee vote next, late on Wednesday night, and then it’ll go to the floor for a full vote immediately after that. Republican leadership is itching to pass it quickly but—and notably—Johnson still doesn’t have the votes sewn up. House Republicans are still, in fact, hammering out provisions as they go.
Jessica Craven; Chop Wood, Carry Water