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Martin Di Caro

mdicaro@washingtontimes.com

Martin Di Caro was the host of the History As It Happens podcast at The Washington Times.

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Articles by Martin Di Caro

This April 3, 2013, file photo shows bitcoin tokens in Sandy, Utah. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer, File)

History As It Happens: The Bitcoin bubble

It is no surprise some Americans believe it is just a matter of time before another financial crisis rocks the economy. Recent headlines make clear the financial system is loaded with minefields.

May 31, 2021
FILE - President Donald Trump speaks to crowd before boarding Air Force One at Andrews Air Force Base, Md., in this Wednesday, Jan. 20, 2021, file photo. Former President Donald Trump will find out this week whether he gets to return to Facebook. The social network’s quasi-independent Oversight Board says it will announce its decision Wednesday, May 5 on a case concerning the former president. Trump's account was suspended for inciting violence that led to the deadly Jan. 6 Capitol riots. (AP Photo/Luis M. Alvarez, File)

History As It Happens: Facebook versus free speech

While fear of government censorship still exists, the globe's digital behemoths -- Facebook, Twitter, Google, YouTube -- possess more unchecked power and technological capability to suppress speech than any government.

May 12, 2021
FILE - In this March 23, 2021, file photo, migrants walk on a dirt road after crossing the U.S.-Mexico border in Mission, Texas. Confronted with a stream of unaccompanied children crossing the border from Mexico, the U.S. government has awarded shelter-construction and management contracts to private companies that critics say may not be equipped to adequately care for the minors. (AP Photo/Julio Cortez, File)

History As It Happens: Going deeper on immigration

If you step away from the daily headlines and avert your eyes from the border for a moment, you will see that the underlying problems and historical causes of human migration have not been resolved. Some may even be intractable.

May 5, 2021
In this March 9, 1950 file photo, Sen. Joseph McCarthy, R-Wis., gestures during a Senate subcommittee hearing on McCarthy's charges of communist infiltration of the U.S. State Department. President Donald Trump, tweeting over the weekend, invoked both McCarthyism and the Watergate scandal, two of the most-debated chapters of recent American political history. (AP Photo/Herbert K. White)

History As It Happens: McCarthyism Redux

It may seem a stretch to compare the anti-Communist hysteria of the McCarthy era to the "Stop the Steal" movement. Yet despite their significant differences, both conspiracy theories are based on the same notion: internal enemies, from ordinary people to the powerful, are at work.

April 28, 2021
A U.S. Air Force B-52H Stratofortress from Minot Air Force Base, N.D., is refueled by a KC-135 Stratotanker in the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility Wednesday, Dec. 30, 2020. The United States flew strategic bombers over the Persian Gulf on Wednesday for the second time this month, a show of force meant to deter Iran from attacking American or allied targets in the Middle East. (Senior Airman Roslyn Ward/U.S. Air Force via AP)

History As It Happens: The American way of war

President Biden's decision to withdraw the last U.S. troops from Afghanistan may have overshadowed an equally important development in Congress designed to rein in the executive branch's authority to fight "forever wars."

April 26, 2021
Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, D-D.C., speaks at a news conference on District of Columbia statehood on Capitol Hill, Tuesday, June 16, 2020, in Washington. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik) ** FILE **

History As It Happens: The D.C. statehood movement

In 2021, more than enough Democrats support statehood to pass the legislation in the House, and Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton is confident her party will be able to eliminate the filibuster in the Senate, where a final vote would potentially come down to a tiebreaker cast by Vice President Kamala Harris.

April 14, 2021
FILE - In this Jan. 5, 2021, file photo, voters wait in line to cast their ballots in Georgia's Senate runoff election in Atlanta. The sweeping rewrite of Georgia's election rules that was signed into law by Republican Gov. Brian Kemp Thursday, March 25, 2021, represents the first big set of changes since former President Donald Trump's repeated, baseless claims of fraud following his presidential loss to Joe Biden. Georgia’s new, 98-page law makes numerous changes to how elections will be administered, including a new photo ID requirement for voting absentee by mail. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson, File)

History As It Happens: Jim Crow 2.0?

Republican lawmakers in state legislatures nationwide are proposing more than 250 bills that, critics say, are designed to curb Black voters' access to the ballot and increase the possibility of partisan interference in vote counting.

April 12, 2021
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., leaves the chamber after criticizing Democrats for wanting to change the filibuster rule, at the Capitol in Washington, Tuesday, March 16, 2021. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

History As It Happens: Ending the filibuster

The origins of the word filibuster seem to belie any claims that the tool of partisan warfare is a pillar of senatorial greatness, and therefore must be guarded against efforts to eliminate it.

April 7, 2021
FILE - In this Sept. 4, 2018, file photo, Chinese President Xi Jinping speaks with South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, left, during the 2018 Beijing Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation - Round Table Conference at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing. China's loans to poor countries in Africa and Asia impose unusual secrecy and repayment terms that are hurting their ability to renegotiate debts after the coronavirus pandemic, a group of U.S. and German researchers said in a report Wednesday, March 31, 2021. (Lintao Zhang/Pool photo via AP, File)

History As It Happens: Chasing China

Few Americans in 1971 might have foreseen the dramatic changes China would undergo after Mao's reign, to the point where it is in a position to possibly become the world's most militarily and economically powerful nation within a couple more decades.

March 31, 2021
Migrant families, mostly from Central American countries, wade through shallow waters after being delivered by smugglers on small inflatable rafts on U.S. soil in Roma, Texas, Wednesday, March 24, 2021. As soon as the sun sets, at least 100 migrants crossed through the Rio Grande river by smugglers into the United States. (AP Photo/Dario Lopez-Mills) **FILE**

History As It Happens: The intractable problem of human migration

Facing the biggest migrant surge in 20 years, the Biden administration is not only struggling to cope with the influx. The president is also seeking to deflect responsibility for enticing Central American parents to send their kids on the dangerous trek.

March 29, 2021