Archive
A Big Fat Radioactive Lie
Not long ago, no billionaire worth his cufflinks would be caught dead without hurling bales of money at our nation’s educational system. They bankrolled charter schools, high-stakes testing, and the splintering of big high schools into smaller academies. Their failure...
Buy Today, Kill Tomorrow
Good people can disagree about guns. Though I’ve always leaned left in my political views, I believe that Americans have a constitutional right to keep and bear arms. I owned a gun for many years myself — at least until my conviction for blowing the whistle on the...
The Fishy Science Behind Mutant Salmon
Americans have been eating genetically modified corn, soybeans, and other crops for nearly two decades. But thanks to the Food and Drug Administration, now you might find a salmon with genes spliced from two other fish species on your plate. It’s the first time the...
Big Ag Serves Up Wastewater Salads
Ask anyone who’s lived through California’s drought: Water scarcity is getting scary. And banning long showers isn’t even a drop in the bucket when it comes to finding a solution. The biggest water sponge by far is food production, yet agri-giants continue to douse...
Fear Itself
In OtherWords: We Make It Our Business to Amplify Bold and Independent Voices
On behalf of the OtherWords team and all of our writers and non-profit partners, I’d like to wish you and your loved ones a very happy Thanksgiving. I’d also like to express our gratitude for your choice to support this non-profit editorial service. Whether you opt to...
What Competing Thanksgiving Tales Share
Thanksgiving is here. Let’s eat! America's most food-focused holiday traces its roots back to the abundant feast that Pilgrims and Indians enjoyed together in the fall of 1621. Only half of the Mayflower Pilgrims who’d arrived at Plymouth Rock the previous December...
In OtherWords: November 18, 2015
This week in OtherWords, Donald Kaul, Peter Certo, and I discuss the Paris attacks and how North America is responding to them — accompanied by a Khalil Bendib cartoon. We're also running seasonal fare. Jill Richardson weighs in on the latest war on Christmas...
Military Intervention Is the Problem, Not the Solution
A café. A stadium. A concert hall. One of the most horrifying things about the murderous attacks in Paris was the terrorists' choice of targets. They chose gathering places where people's minds wander furthest from unhappy thoughts like war. And they struck on a...
How to Be a Merry Environmentalist
Here's something to consider this holiday season: Stop sending greeting cards. I know this sounds like a tip from the Grinch, but this well-meaning tradition causes very real environmental consequences. Americans mail over 1.6 billion holiday cards to each other each...
