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Homegrown Terrorist
Snake Oil Won’t Cure Inequality
At last, America's political leaders now feel the pain of the poor and empathize with the millions of working families slipping out of the middle class. For years, politicians paid no attention to the ever-widening chasm between the rich and the rest of us. But it's...
5 Key Things Pope Francis Says about Climate Change
Pope Francis just released an “encyclical,” a fancy word for a sort of intimate letter that is meant to serve as a guide to understanding our personal relationship to some of the most complex issues of the day through religious doctrine. This particular encyclical is...
In OtherWords: June 17, 2015
This week in OtherWords, Jill Richardson skewers feeble efforts by McDonald's to burnish its brand and I point out that world leaders — aside from Pope Francis — aren't as bold as they sound on climate change. Do you want to make sure you don’t miss the latest from...
Paying the Pink Tax
You probably think you know about all the taxes you pay. Income taxes, property taxes, sales taxes — it seems like the list is endless. But there’s one tax I’ve been paying for most of my life that you might not know about. If you’re a woman, chances are you’re paying...
The Year of the Internet Voter
In the 1996 election it was the soccer mom. In 2004 it was the NASCAR dad. Could 2016 be the year of the Internet voter? The Internet has grown from a fad to an essential tool to a platform that’s catalyzed a growing political constituency. Pollsters have identified a...
A Noxious Double Whammy
Here's the good news: President Barack Obama has committed to reducing the nation’s greenhouse gas emissions by at least 17 percent by 2020. The bad news? A rise in fracking for natural gas could make the United States fail to keep this pledge. Unfortunately, a big...
Robin Hood in Reverse
One of the biggest questions of the day is: Why do the rich keep getting richer and the middle class keep getting poorer? This also ranks as the dumbest question of the day, week, month, or year. To anyone who's been paying attention, it's obvious why economic...
Taking Our Sweet Crude Time
After a quarter-century of buzz over global warming, the climate talkers are at it again, doing whatever it is they do. Visitors to the next big climate change summit, in an act of glorious irony, will pack Paris-bound jets flown by Air France — one of the meeting’s...
All Hacked Up
I've gotten a lot of unwelcome mail from the feds these last few years, like a copy of my indictment for blowing the whistle on the CIA’s torture program. But this latest delivery was something altogether new. My jaw dropped as I scanned the form letter from the...