Editorial page
From Banyan Project
The Banyan Project envisions an editorial page that will comment on issues daily in consonance with an Editorial Platform of intellectual depth. The Platform is grounded in a commitment to the strongest and broadest democracy possible as a counterbalance against the excesses of a market economy. It will be available to all on the Web and will be linked and cross-linked to a deep reservoir of information supporting each of its planks, to every editorial Banyan has published, plank by plank, and to forums about the issues that each plank addresses.
The editorial page and platform will aspire to provide the intellectual grounding for a responsible populism that respects and supports the economic and life interests of working people and is quite distinct from the progressivism of the elites who run the institutions that often ignore or exploit them. This is a populism that may ally itself with progressive forces on many issues, a populism that has no room for the demagoguery associated with politicians who call themselves populists while disrespectfully seeking to manipulate people with appeals to base instincts. On contrary, responsible populism is grounded in respect for its readers that includes a presumption that their intellectual capacity is no less than that of the rural Populists whose movement came so close to transforming the U.S. economy and politics in the late 19th century.
Banyan envisions publishing at least one exclusive commentary daily, drawing from a stable of contract writers who are naturally attuned to the subscribers’ lives and concerns. Some possible standing weekly columns:
-- How Can This Be Legal? Exploring common practices at the intersection of business and government that are clearly corrupt but not illegal and tracing how the law has been shaped to make sure it’s not illegal (e.g., pension abandonment).
-- Economist Watch, singling out weird things economists say and write that expose biases and assumptions that diverge from reality as experienced by regular people.
