Anything Goes
Timeless stories from our 174-year archive handpicked to add context to the news of the day.
The Onion Buys InfoWars
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Lewis H. Lapham’s brief history of the primordial soup of right-wing media propaganda from which InfoWars eventually spawned.
Read “Tentacles of Rage” by Lewis H. Lapham
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Mark Twain’s standup comedy routine.
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“The public relish for ill-natured remarks is as keen as ever.”
Read “American Satires in Verse” by Brander Matthews
Gaetz-Gate
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How Republicans hacked the Justice Department.
Read “Vote Machine” by Scott Horton
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Adlai Stevenson on the dangers of appointing government officials of ill-repute.
Read “The Reputation of the Government” by Adlai E. Stevenson
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“Referring to the shenanigans of the attorney general, you were quoted as saying: ‘That is the standard for a bank robber and should not be the standard for high public office.’”
Read “Meese: An Insider’s View” by Raymond E. James
Make It Rain
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An account of the severe autumn drought of 1881 and the “water famine” it threatened upon New York City.
Read the Editor’s Easy Chair from the January 1882 issue
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Will drought destroy the Southwest?
Read “Razing Arizona” by Christopher Ketcham
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Can anyone really prevent forest fires?
Read “There Will Always Be Fires” by Scott Sayare
Brain Freeze: Ben & Jerry’s Sues Unilever, Claiming Censorship of Gaza Support
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Albert Camus on freedom of the press, in a 1939 article discovered decades after it had been censored.
Read “Rules of Engagement” by Albert Camus
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The costs of corporate monitoring and censorship.
Read “The Spy Who Fired Me” by Esther Kaplan
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“The betrayal of public trust is a daily story manipulated by the media within the narrative confines of ‘scandal,’ when in fact it’s all a part of the daily routine and everyone knows it. The media makes pornography of the collective guilt of our politicians and business leaders. They make a yummy fetish of betrayed trust.”
Read “The New Censorship” by Curtis White