Power and Action

When I cornered Richard Leakey to ask him about the elephant that had once chased me but had let me go, he responded, “The elephant wasn’t interested in you.” Though clearly anxious to get away after his talk at the National Geographic Society in Washington, DC, he had heard out my tale of how it…

A receding row of columns with the rear view of a man in a sweater walking toward the columns diminishing in size

Education and Ethics

BY KELLY HAND Two articles in the new January-February 2016 issue of Academe urge faculty to consider their ethical obligations within and beyond their academic communities. In her article, “Liberal Arts in the Modern University,” Lorna Fitzsimmons discusses the liberal arts as an antidote for social change and fragmentation. Offering the example of identity theft…

Guns on Campus, Florida Edition

Writing for the website of Channel 10 News in the Tampa Bay-Sarasota metro area, Sarah Hollenbeck has reported on two bills currently being considered in the Florida state legislature that would legalize guns on the campuses of the state’s colleges and universities. Here are the highlights of the article: “Some college leaders estimate the cost…

Whose Crisis Is It?: Framing the History—the Facts–of the Flint Water Crisis

In his state-of-the-state address, Gov. Rick Snyder referenced a timeline of the Flint water crisis prepared by his office. Here is that timeline: The progressive blog The Daily Kos has provided the following list of significant dates missing from Gov. Snyder’s timeline: April 2011: Reports of partially treated sewage leaking into the Flint River. This is one…

When Polarization Becomes the Snake That Swallows Itself

  The following quotations appeared in different parts of CNN’s daily Politics newsletter:   “Politics: Trump used to back Hillary, who endorsed Gore, who ran with Lieberman, who endorsed McCain, who picked Palin, who endorsed Trump.” –Tweet by the New York Times‘ Nick Confessore, on the circle of American politics.   “It is hard for me to watch…

Government Run like a Business Led to Lead in Flint’s Water

This post was written by Dave Johnson for the daily Progressive Breakfast newsletter of the Campaign for America’s Future [http://ourfuture.org/], which has become a driving force behind the New Populist Movement. The group’s report, Organizing to Take Back America: The New Populist Movement, is available at: http://y.ourfuture.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/New-Populist-Movement-Organizing.pdf. Prepared by Roger Hickey, the co-director of the Campaign for…

Notes for “Devil”

This is a guest post by Howard V. Hendrix, who teaches literature and writing at California State University–Fresno. He is the author of six novels and many short stories, poems, and essays. A year has now elapsed since the events that prompted me to write “Professor, Say Hi To The Devil!” To really understand this…