Buddhist Coalition for Democracy Blog
The Theater of Cruelty
On a sweltering July afternoon in the Florida Everglades, Donald Trump, Ron DeSantis, and Kristi Noem stood before a newly constructed immigration detention center newly built with cages and tents in a remote Everglades location where the heat and mosquitos kill as...
Justice by Geography: How Chaos Now Reigns Supreme
Over the course of his presidency and beyond, Donald Trump has tested the limits of federal power through executive orders, agency maneuvers, and constitutional brinkmanship. In the district and appellate courts, the legal response has been swift and withering:...
What’s Buddhist About Engaged Buddhism?
Previous versions of this article were published in Turning Wheel (2004) and The Existential Buddhist (2016). It still seems relevant today. What is it that is specifically Buddhist about engaged Buddhism? Are we simply conducting our old politics under a new banner,...
When Democracies Choose to Die
In 1814, John Adams issued a warning that sounds today like the tolling of a distant but familiar bell: “Democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.” It was not...
What it Means to be a Citizen of the United States of America
In the United States, the word “citizen” carries a weight that goes beyond legal status. It evokes the right to vote, the expectation of justice, the duty to serve, and the sense of belonging to a political community. But beneath that single term lies a...