Jan. 6 committee reveals Trump’s Orwellian attempt to win the election

by Naseem Rakha, Oregon Capital ChronicleJuly 26, 2022 Anyone who’s read George Orwell’s “1984,” the dystopian novel about life under an authoritarian regime, knows that to survive, one had to accept whatever Big Brother said no matter how big the lie. Proof you’d come to fully embrace the all-controlling Party… Read More

US Supreme Court is Out of Touch with Majority of Voters

by Naseem Rakha, Oregon Capital ChronicleJuly 13, 2022 I woke up the morning of July 4th feeling cynical about “Independence Day” after the recent slew of  Supreme Court decisions that essentially eviscerated long-standing constitutional rights and protections considered core to our democracy. With Dobbs v. Jackson, the Supreme Court’s newly… Read More

My New Job

I have begun to write commentaries for The Oregon Capital Chronicle, a member of The States Newsroom and one of 28 states providing in-depth and fearless coverage of state and national politics. In the past my commentaries could occasionally be found in The Guardian, The Washington Post, the Oregonian and… Read More

Can America Heal?

Can America Heal?

Never in the four years of the Trump administration did I imagine our sides engaging in a war. Rhetorical sparring, sure. But not physical combat.

Accepting Death

Accepting Death

And so, on this day, I fill that hollow space in my chest with heat from a thousand thousand thousand suns:

Get Out of Portland!

Get Out of Portland!

The lists goes on and on. A long miserable soliloquy that is really only a fraction of the names that it could be. A list that leans back to the first time black people stepped onto this soil and were bought and sold on a block. No thought to their needs. Their pain. Their humanity.

Do They Notice We are Gone?

Do They Notice We are Gone?

Mother and Daughter They live in our woods. Sleep in a nest of grass between large moss covered boulders and ancient gray barked firs. When I walk by the pair they eye me with curiosity and wariness. I avert my gaze then lift my camera and click. I wonder about… Read More

No One Sleeps

No One Sleeps

While we isolate in our homes, our hearts learn to reach out to the world.