Susan Estrich
West Central Tribune
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Past articles by Susan:
Susan Estrich commentary: The Politics of Hate
The horrifying weekend of gun violence has moved hate and crime, separately and together, to the top of the political agenda. More people died in automobile accidents this weekend, but the impact of the shootings in Buffalo, New York, and Laguna Woods, California, cast a bigger pall on our national spirit. Hate. For Blacks in Buffalo. For Taiwanese immigrants in Laguna Woods. So many questions.… → Read More
Susan Estrich commentary: Jan. 6 and the Rule of Law in America
Summary: A month ago, with inflation and gas prices skyrocketing to the point that they overtook even a war and a pandemic among public concerns, it seemed the president and the Democrats were doomed to a disastrous midterm. But leave it to the Washington Republicans (including those sitting on the Supreme Court) to find ways to grab defeat from the jaws of victory. → Read More
Susan Estrich commentary: It's time to occupy the center
The right-wing takeover of the Republican Party, symbolized by the end of Roe v. Wade, offers the Democrats the rare opportunity so artfully exploited by President Emmanuel Macron in France: that is, the chance to occupy the middle of the political spectrum. Ideologues may wring their hands, but the general rule in American politics is that the center holds. That is, clearly, how Joe Biden won… → Read More
Susan Estrich commentary: Abortion politics will be fought at the ballot box
Summary: We are no longer one vote away. We have lost. The midterm may well turn on single-issue voters, but this time, the voters with the greatest motivation to vote are those who are pro-choice and must now look to politics and not the court to protect their rights. → Read More
Susan Estrich commentary:
I remember the world before Roe. I was young, but old enough. I saw girls "get in trouble," meaning they got pregnant and had to drop out of high school and give up their dreams. They were sent away, somewhere, and we never saw them again. That was the world without Roe. In college, it was a little better. Abortion was legal in New York, as it no doubt will be, but it was illegal (and so was… → Read More
Susan Estrich commentary: Why are they killing innocent civilians?
Summary: Whether the Russian people know what their army is doing is one of the big unanswered questions; what they can do about it in a repressive society is another. The revolutions brought about by social media elsewhere seem very far away. How can those walls be broken down? → Read More
Susan Estrich commentary: Elon Musk is right about free speech
Summary: In making these decisions, in responding to Congress and the courts, Musk will inevitably be at the center of a new body of law — an evolving international common law for free speech in the metaverse's town square. It is a challenge as great as any leader faces. → Read More
Susan Estrich commentary: In praise of censorship in America
Summary: The reason the First Amendment protects free speech against government restrictions (but not private ones) is that the founders recognized that a democracy depends on a free press and government control of the contents of coverage of itself is a step — or a leap — into dictatorship. See, for instance, Mr. Putin. → Read More
Susan Estrich commentary: The fourth time around
Summary: The fourth time around, there is no line. There is no one in front of me and no one behind me. The Rite Aid is down the street, not an hour across town. It's all very frustrating in an entirely different way. Frustrating because she probably is right: I've just heard of a friend of a… → Read More
Susan Estrich commentary: Fear of crime is real
Summary: In a sense, we are back in the '80s and '90s, back in the days when it came to be recognized that dealing with the "incivilities" — the quality-of-life crimes from vandalism to graffiti that make a neighborhood or a train car feel unsafe — by encouraging a visible police presence working… → Read More
Susan Estrich commentary: Dinner at Madeleine's helped break the glass ceiling
Summary: Madeleine Albright taught this younger woman an important lesson. You do what it takes, and you do it with grace. That's what we learned at Wellesley, our shared alma mater, and what Madeleine taught me. And by the way, she was a great cook. May she rest in peace. I was lucky to have such a wise and wonderful teacher. → Read More
Susan Estrich commentary: The new job numbers: A healthy economy?
Summary: At the end of the day, there are two questions that go to the heart of an incumbent's status. One is whether people think the country is headed on the right or wrong track. The other is whether they think the incumbent understands/cares about the problems of people like them. A healthy… → Read More
Susan Estrich commentary: Judge Jackson and Georgetown Day
Summary: But why should Republican senators be troubled by such a small point of principle when mud is being slung at a busy woman who found time to serve on the board? Hypocrisy is Ted Cruz's middle name. He went on to read a passage from another book on the library catalog at Georgetown Day —… → Read More
Susan Estrich commentary: Anatomy of a tweet
Summary: But in today's hypothetical, which happens to be the situation facing my client Leon Black, what is even more troubling is that the skepticism of the mainstream media wasn't enough to stop the fire from beginning and spreading before the truth had a chance to come out, much less catch up. → Read More
Susan Estrich: Security is the business of government
Summary: Ensuring our personal security, our economic security and our national security is its most basic function. To do that requires trust, and restoring that kind of faith and trust seems, in these times, almost as difficult as dealing with Putin. But we must try. → Read More
Susan Estrich commentary: Tim Cook's payday
Summary: To put it most simply, Tim Cook has earned every penny he is being paid. ... Of course, an argument can be made that no one -- including the president of the United States -- "earns" $99 million for 365 days' work. Certainly, no one needs that kind of money, much less the even greater sums that some of the tech and finance billionaires have managed to accumulate. → Read More
Susan Estrich commentary: Vladimir Putin's posturing
Summary: I understand that even pretend and almost wars are dangerous. Lives will almost certainly be lost, in exercises if not in hostilities, needlessly, in what will hopefully prove to be a bigger crisis averted, a war interrupted, all part of a star turn by a man who covets the world's… → Read More
Susan Estrich column: Real racism: Whoopi Goldberg and the Holocaust
Summary: In modern days, we have seen the way race can be twisted and used as a weapon to divide us. Surely Whoopi Goldberg, a Black woman who adopted a "Jewish name" and even identity, should know this. And if she doesn't — and she clearly did not, at least insofar as it applied to the Holocaust — she is surely not alone. → Read More
Susan Estrich: Swimming in underwear is not blameable
Summary: This is not what should happen. Of course parents should be more responsible. But there is no excuse for raping an unconscious girl ... And, no, not everyone or everything has changed. → Read More
Susan Estrich: The Justice retires
Summary: Now I'm probably going to get in trouble with people who don't believe in bipartisanship, but this is an important story. The ranking Republican on the Judiciary Committee was Strom Thurmond of South Carolina, an opponent of civil rights. Before the election, President Jimmy Carter, in a… → Read More