ehm1212

Dana Goldstein on the Obama administration’s approach to education: We liberals like to flatter ourselves by proclaiming our allegiance to fact. In the immortal words of Stephen Colbert, for us, mere “truthiness” will not suffice. We demand evidence, research, science — Truth itself. But on so many of the social issues liberals care about, concrete […]

Paul Waldman says that understanding and compassion are good traits in an ever diversifying country: Back in 2007, Barack Obama said that if he got the chance to make a Supreme Court appointment, one of his criteria for a justice would be a capacity for “empathy.” Conservatives were predictably outraged. But last week, we got […]

Rich Benjamin on his journey into the whitest — and fastest growing — communities in America: Imagine moving to a place where you can leave your front door unlocked as you run errands. Where the community enjoys a winning ratio of playgrounds to potholes. Where you can turn your kids loose at 3 P.M., not […]

Courtney Martin argues that we can’t keep training the public to think in black and white terms about a very gray war: As President Barack Obama and his team deliberate about the best way forward in Afghanistan, they are compelled to incorporate a variety of voices on the subject. Military leaders advocate for an increase […]

Stanley Greenberg argues that candidates running with the economy against them have a tougher go, but that its possible to win by changing the conversation: No future candidates for president and few of their advisers will read Lynn Vavreck’s new book — her statistical methods and academic style guarantee that — but they will miss […]

Jessica Lambertson talks about the difficulties of student organizing with a graduate representative of NYU’s Local 2110: In 2002, New York University graduate student employees made history, becoming the first at any private institution to unionize. But NYU also has a history of administration hostility to grad student organizing. When the contract for the university’s […]

Mark Schmitt on the influence that Who Governs? had on his political development: New Haven, Connecticut, at the tail end of the 1970s was a pretty good place for a precocious kid to get a political education. The city contains all the ethnic and social dynamics of New York City or Philadelphia in microcosm. But […]

Gershom Gorenberg on the threat of violence in Jerusalem’s most holy space: Five cops edged the Street of the Chain carrying riot batons and shields. A few meters away, in the shadows of a covered alleyway, four more cops were doing what police do so often, which is wait. The Street of the Chain is […]

Tim Fernholz argues that aid to states could help the unemployment problem: It’s been the same story for months: Unemployment is increasing, even if the rate at which it rises has been slowing. While 9.8 percent of the labor force is actually unemployed, some 17 percent are suffering — they’re out of a job, or […]

Michelle Goldberg on Obama‘s decision not to meet with the Dalai Lama: Tibet sometimes seems like a case study in the futility of peaceful resistance. It has been occupied by the Chinese since 1949, two years after the creation of Israel led to the dispossession of the Palestinians. Unlike the Palestinians, the Tibetans have rarely […]