In February, conversations reignited about American exception- alism, as the state of Oklahoma and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani made headlines for separate incidents. In Oklahoma, legislators reviewed and later pushed for a cut in funding for AP United States History courses because, in the words of Oklahoma State Representative Dan Fisher, the… Read more »
Over the last eight months, police forces across the United States have undergone increasingly vociferous criticism for what many believe to be racially motivated uses of force. Most recently, the deaths of Michael Brown and Eric Garner have galvanized the American public into questioning the accountability, institutions, and practices of American law enforcement agencies. Unfortunately,… Read more »
Journalists and human rights organizations have closely documented the correlation between poverty and prison time. The United States, largely as a result of its mass incarceration policies, boasts the largest prison population in the world, and a disproportionate segment of this population has lived beneath the poverty line. Moreover, researchers have demonstrated that convicted felons… Read more »
A story of the megarich run wild, and those who paid the price.
“If you’re wealthy enough in Detroit, you can have water. If you’re not wealthy enough, you can’t have water.” This is how Dr. Peter Hammer, the director of the Center for Civil Rights at Wayne State University, characterizes the latest developments in Detroit’s financial crisis. In what the United Nations has declared a violation of… Read more »
The fossil fuel divestment movement emerged at Swarthmore College in 2012. In three short years, divestment has evolved from a small campaign among student activists into a mainstream movement with commitments from universities to churches to the $860 million Rockefeller Brothers Fund. Currently, over $50 billion has been divested from fossil fuels. The movement urges… Read more »
Following police officer Darren Wilson’s murder of unarmed black teenager Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri in August of this year, national media attention has been directed toward racial profiling in a supposedly post-racial America, as well as the excessively forceful response of law enforcement to demonstrations following Michael Brown’s killing. The unrest in Ferguson has… Read more »
It’s relatively clear that Bobby Fischer, the famously infuriating, enigmatic and opinionated American chess demi-god, recognized the importance of his 1972 World Championship match series against Boris Spassky. Cold War hyper-drama, a life in pursuit of literally one thing—world number one—and a realignment of the entire chess world, it was all there. Yet Fischer, hours… Read more »
In a motion that has incensed free speech advocates across the country, Boston’s Northeastern University has suspended its chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) until 2015, after the organization engaged in a leaflet campaign around school dormitories. The university has also pursued disciplinary action, including expulsion proceedings, against two group members. The leaflets… Read more »
Two tendencies define the Obama Administration’s approach to armed conflict: retrenchment from inherited wars and minimal military involvement in new crises. Since taking office, President Obama has tried to readjust American foreign policy to reflect new political and fiscal constraints. Seven years of war under the Bush administration wore down the electorate’s patience for foreign… Read more »