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JD Vance Tells Republicans Who America’s Real Birthright Citizens Are

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Trump’s obsessions help bury GOP chances

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Consensus Without Power: How Sortition Could Break America's Legislative Gridlock

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New York Is Making Childcare Affordable. Don’t Forget the People Providing It.

New York Is Making Childcare Affordable. Don’t Forget the People Providing It.

Webinar rewind: How to make sure your vote counts

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Webinar: How to make sure your vote counts
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The Fulcrum
By The FulcrumSep 24, 2020
The Fulcrum
The Fulcrum staff.
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With legal fights over the election being waged across the country and disinformation clouding the truth about voting systems, Americans can be forgiven for their confusion about how to cast a ballot this fall. Because each state sets its own rules — for registering, getting and returning vote-by-mail ballots, timetables for balloting in person and so many other things — keeping it all straight can be difficult for both voting rights advocates and individual voters.

The Fulcrum hosted a live discussion in which we discussed the realities of voting during the coronavirus pandemic and resources that you can share with friends and family.

The discussion was moderated by The Fulcrum's editor-in-chief, David Hawkings, and featured:

    • David Levine, elections integrity fellow, Alliance for Securing Democracy
    • Jack Noland, research manager, RepresentUs
    • Eliza Sweren-Becker, Democracy Program counsel, Brennan Center for Justice

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    Humans May Start Wildfires. Climate Change Makes Them Catastrophic.
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    Humans May Start Wildfires. Climate Change Makes Them Catastrophic.

    The summer of 2026 once again saw wildfire smoke from the West Coast and Midwest blanketing East Coast skies. Smoke-filled summer skies now seem to be the norm across America, and wildfire season isn’t even close to over.

    The public response is also becoming normal. When investigators determine that a person started a wildfire, online chatter usually centers on the idea that humans are the cause and that climate change could not have played a role. That argument confuses the ignition source with the complex conditions that contribute to wildfire. A spark may explain where a wildfire began. It cannot, on its own, explain why flames spread so far and devastate entire communities.

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    ​U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth

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    Politicians Can’t Just ’Give the People What They Want’

    For reasons that will baffle my many detractors, I am often asked for advice about being an opinion journalist. One of my standard responses is: You have to be willing to disappoint your biggest fans.

    What I mean is that if you start to see your job as telling fans what they want to hear, you risk becoming an entertainer rather than a thinker, and eventually you become a caricature. I’ve seen it happen numerous times. Patrick Buchanan was a brilliant columnist and a serious person. But over the course of his career, he listened too much to the people who said, “Go Pat, go!” and too little to friends who said, “I think that’s taking it too far.”

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    Congress approval is at a record-low 10%. Moderation and consensus-building, not partisan theatrics, are how Washington gets problems solved.

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    Reclaiming the Politics of the Possible

    Washington is stuck in a cycle of performative conflict. The incentives seem to reward outrage, not outcomes that last; purity tests, not problem‑solving. So it’s no surprise that after three shutdowns in less than a year, public approval of Congress collapsed to just 10 percent this spring. (Gallup, April 2026.) But the country we live in — where many middle-income families report persistent financial strain and businesses are navigating unprecedented technological upheaval — cannot be governed by theatrics. Breaking this cycle requires moderation, consensus‑building, and a cooperative approach to governance.

    This is not a call for centrism as an ideology. Instead, this is a call for transformative leaders to embrace moderation as their governing strategy, recognizing that in a pluralistic country of nearly 350 million people durable solutions require broad and stable alliances. Ultimately, this is a call for the 240 million of us who are eligible to vote in November to elect consensus-builders instead of bomb-throwers, and healers instead of arsonists.

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