Rights and Democracy
Where Are the Women?
At the exact moment that I'm writing this, the New York Times homepage is displaying stories authored by 35 men — and eight women. And three of those eight articles were coauthored with men. You can find this data at WhoWritesFor, a website that tracks authorship on...
The False Choice between Security and Liberty
Even before Edward Snowden disclosed that the National Security Agency (NSA) was harvesting seemingly every detail of our digital lives, our nation has been wrestling with a Faustian bargain: How do we maintain fundamental American rights of liberty and privacy while...
Wall Street’s Fix for Homelessness
It's so great — truly heartwarming — to see billionaires devoting their deepest thoughts to finding solutions for eradicating poverty. For example, I can't begin to tell you how grateful America's homeless people are going to be once they hear about Andy Kessler, who...
Dud Congress Breaks with a Thud
Twenty-two. That's how many bills have become law since the 113th Congress was sworn in on January 3, 2013. It's one more illustration of the dysfunction that's engulfed the Capitol. One bill that did become law this year was the continuing resolution that funded the...
Get Radio-Active
Are you tired of hearing nothing but the corporate news and mainstream views on commercial, mass-market radio? Well, go get your own station! That's not as preposterous as it might sound, thanks to a freelance, free-range, free-form collective of mostly young...
Solving the Student Debt Crisis
Well, finally! Hard-right congressional leaders and the Obama White House ultimately agreed that interest rates on student loans should not double to nearly 7 percent, as they let happen early in July. Instead, college students will be billed at a rate that will...
A Chance to Start Listening Locally
The world of radio is experiencing a shake-up. The country's second-biggest radio network recently announced it may cancel Rush Limbaugh's show on 40 of its major-market stations. This might not be enough to get Rush off the air altogether, but it's a sign that he may...
Higher Education’s Complicity in the Trayvon Martin Tragedy
The immediate response to the verdict in the George Zimmerman trial on my campus was a mixture of outrage and frustration. A reaction of this kind isn't surprising at a historically black university, especially here at North Carolina A&T State University. I'm a...
Why I Granted Bradley Manning a Presidential Pardon
In another America — where democracy reigns and government respects freedom of the press, protects privacy, and honors whistleblowers — Bradley Manning would receive a presidential pardon. After campaigning for the presidency last year, I was asked by my supporters to...
By George, You Don’t Get It
There I was, sitting at my desk and looking out of the window — you know, writing — when my wife came in and plopped down a newspaper article in front of me. "Read that," she said with a cruel twinkle in her eye. It was an article on Detroit by George Will, one of my...
