On December 1, 2009, a year after America elected its first black president, two candidates, one white and one black, faced off in runoff election to determine who would become Atlanta’s 60th mayor. Mary Norwood, the white candidate, had come 3,000 votes away from avoiding the runoff and becoming the city’s first white mayor since … Read more
Center-left parties in the United Kingdom held an iron grip on power for centuries, but the current political realm is dominated by Labour and the Conservatives. Between the inception of the Whig party in 1721 and the end of the Liberal party in 1988, the center-left produced 30 prime ministers. It seemed to be an … Read more
A quick glance at a map of presidential election results in California over the past 24 years shows a consistently blue state amidst a changing political landscape. Reagan-era conservatism seems to have faded from the Golden State, but the Republican base that propelled Nixon and Reagan into the White House endures in several of California’s … Read more
Panorama from the Mars Pathfinder landing site. Is there life on Mars? This is one of the most salient questions in extraterrestrial exploration, but it could be jeopardized by dirty spacecraft carrying Earth microbes. Part of Dr. Catharine Conley’s job, as NASA’s planetary protection officer since 2006, is to prevent that from happening. In 2011, … Read more
Georgia Tech’s campus in downtown Atlanta. It’s a little after 11 p.m. the evening of September 16 on the campus of the Georgia Institute of Technology. Situated in the heart of Midtown, Georgia Tech is a lively campus composed of rustic red brick buildings that stand alongside modern architecture, with vast green spaces around each … Read more
On September 19th, the Harvard College Open Campus Initiative hosted a panel entitled “Are We Killing Free Speech?” The panelists–– Dave Rubin, Bret Weinstein, and Steve Simpson–– were intelligent, articulate, and thought-provoking. It was an attentive but quiet crowd; no protesters, no walk out. That the event was open only to Harvard ID holders became … Read more
Across the West, anxieties about immigration have begun to play an increasingly central role in popular discourse and politics. During his first few months in office, Donald Trump has twice tried to restrict entry of Muslims into the United States, only to be thwarted by the judiciary both times. The surge of refugees entering Western … Read more
Every week-day since around the time Donald Trump took office, my morning routine has included watching Stephen Colbert and Seth Meyers’s monologues from the night before. I load both clips on YouTube and, as I fill my coffee machine with water, I listen to Colbert conversationally recall Trump’s most recent actions and blunders – a … Read more
Massachusetts has a budget crisis, and Medicaid is the primary suspect. Since 2010, prescription drug costs have increased by 13 percent every year, and the state’s Medicaid program, MassHealth, makes up nearly 40 percent of the state’s budget. In a September letter to the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Marylou Sudders, Massachusetts Secretary of … Read more
When Rep. Cheri Bustos (D – Ill.) comes home from the Capitol for the weekend, you can find her at the supermarket—but she won’t be shopping for pasta or paper towels. Every Saturday, the congresswoman from the 17th District spends time walking the grocery aisles of Western Illinois, talking to constituents about addressing their needs … Read more