As a proud Christian man hailing from Bardstown, Kentucky, I felt compelled to come to the defense of the Christian Right in light of the Kim Davis situation. Although the circumstance of the Rowan County clerk is the first of its kind in the post-Obergefell v. Hodges world, wherein gay marriage is now the law … Read more
I recently attended an event at the John F. Kennedy Jr. Forum that featured neuroscientist and atheist intellectual Sam Harris and Quilliam founder Maajid Nawaz, a former Islamic extremist who now works to combat radical Islam. I sat listening to these two share their experiences about working together on their new book Islam and the … Read more
Some onlookers have drawn parallels between Britain’s new Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn and Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders. Both are left wing (albeit to varying degrees), and both have white hair. Both look a bit scruffy, and both grace the iPhone screens of Buzzfeed and Huffington Post readers regularly. But the similarities end there. The rise … Read more
On the morning of April 15, 2013, I packed a bag of bagels, a Gatorade, a water bottle, five bananas, a few GU gels, my running watch, and my race bib, and I boarded a bus to Hopkinton, Mass. The drive took about an hour, and every minute on the bus carried with it the … Read more
“Welcome to Groundhog Day,” began Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, setting the tone for his refutation of Justice Stephen Breyer’s multi-tiered dissent in this year’s Glossip v. Gross ruling. Scalia, joined by Clarence Thomas, fiercely defended of the constitutionality of capital punishment and the use of a specific drug in lethal injections. The two justices … Read more
As I type this I’m streaking down the highway in a Megabus-turned-Boltbus with the jagged skyline of my city, Philadelphia, in sights. Read any of the recent headlines from Philadelphia’s media outlets and you will almost prevailingly find them to be about some aspect of the Pope Francis’ recent sojourn in Philly. Now that the … Read more
At the third Republican Presidential Debate, the host, CNBC, pr,omised a debate about “Your Money, Your Vote”. Yet, at the night’s end, it seemed the ten candidates spoke less about “Your Money, Your Vote” and instead used the opportunity to attack the media. This strategy involved ignoring questions, fighting back at combative moderators and using … Read more
Last Wednesday night, 14 million viewers tuned in to watch the Republican debate. However, that was not the most compelling political event of the evening. While the ten Republican candidates discussed tax reforms, immigration policies, and Social Security, Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders hosted a National Student Town Hall at George Mason University. More than … Read more
Republicans understand American frustration with taxes, as was more than evident in the last GOP debate: every GOP candidate believes in some combination of reforms and cuts to the tax code. However, the specificities of each candidate’s tax plan and the rhetoric they used to present their plans during the GOP debate highlight just how each … Read more
In one of his more famous essays, Politics and the English Language, George Orwell argues that politicians and political parties often employ different generalities and don different clichés, “but [parties and politicians] are all alike in that one almost never finds in them a fresh, vivid, homemade turn of speech.” Here, Orwell claims that regardless … Read more