The New Republic: Encyclopedia II - The New Republic - Politics

The New Republic - Politics

Domestically, the current version of TNR supports policies first associated with the Democratic Leadership Council and "New Democrats" like former President Bill Clinton and Connecticut Senator Joseph Lieberman, who received the magazine's endorsement in the 2004 Democratic primary. These policies, while seeking to achieve the ends of traditional social welfare programs, often use market solutions as their means, and so are often called "business-friendly". Typical of some of the policies supported by both TNR and the DLC during the 1990s were increased funding for the Earned Income Tax Credit program and reform of the Federal welfare system.

Unsigned editorials prior to the 2003 invasion of Iraq expressed strong support for military action, citing the threat of WMD as well as humanitarian concerns. Since the end of major military operations, unsigned editorials, while critical of the handling of the war, have continued to justify the invasion on humanitarian grounds, but no longer maintain that Iraq's WMD facilities posed any threat to the United States.

While The New Republic has traditionally been considered a "liberal" (or at least neo-liberal) publication, some American progressives disagree with this description, and would instead use the term to describe magazines like The Nation, The American Prospect, Mother Jones, Harper's, The New York Review of Books and The Progressive -- or indeed TNR before it was purchased by Peretz. (Even further to the left are the radical leftist publications Z Magazine and Counterpunch, which are generally critical of liberalism.)

Many would describe the modern TNR as centrist in the realms of foreign and (to a lesser degree) economic policy, but relatively progressive on social issues. The magazine diverges most notably from the various left-wing publications on the subject of the Middle East; Peretz and foreign correspondent Yossi Klein Halevi are both particularly ardent supporters of Israel. (As a result, some critics on the far left consider TNR essentially neoconservative; others have jokingly described it as "the Jewish Commentary").

Other moderately or inconsistently left-of-center intellectual publications include The Washington Monthly, The Atlantic Monthly, The New York Times Magazine, The New Yorker, Dissent (whose contributors include liberal hawks as well as social democrats) and the online magazines Slate and Salon.com; comparable conservative magazines -- both neo and paleo -- include National Review, The Weekly Standard, Commentary, The American Conservative, Policy Review, The New Criterion, City Journal, First Things, The American Spectator, The Claremont Review of Books and The Public Interest (recently defunct).

TNR also has its own blog called The Plank, which is written by Michael Crowley, Franklin Foer, Jason Zengerle, and other TNR staff. The Plank is apparently meant to be TNR's sole blog, replacing the magazine's first three blogs, &c., Iraq'd, and Easterblog.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Politics", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki