Monica Potts

Tom Laskawy at Grist ran across this CBS report on school lunches in France. The gourmet, five-course meals that every child eats offer a sharp contrast to our mostly horrible school-lunch system and, as Laskawy notes, it seems impossible for us to institute even modest reforms. The reauthorization of the Childhood Nutrition Act, which the […]

Via Amanda Marcotte, a moving post about the privilege of not having to think about various types of discrimination, but choosing to anyway: Today I don’t have to think about those who hear “terrorist” when I speak my faith. Today I don’t have to think about men who don’t believe no means no. Today I […]

By now, you’ve all seen this video of Delaware senatorial candidate Christine O’Donnell — who, as Daily Intel pointed out, was a Constitutional Government fellow at the Claremont Institute — being ignorant about the Constitution. She asks where in the Constitution it says “separation of church and state,” and the answer, of course, is in […]

The New York Times reports on the resurgence of sociological research looking into the “culture” of poverty. Those in liberal circles, of course, view the premise that cultural mores lead to poverty with skepticism; it bears too much resemblance to Daniel Patrick Moynihan‘s idea of cultural pathology, which he introduced in his infamous report, released […]

Many of you probably saw this ad yesterday, posted by Ben Smith at Politico. I keep watching it and giggling, but I’ve decided I really like it for one simple reason: It’s straightforward. If you think about it, “He kicks children in the face” is the kind of implicit charge lots of politicians would like […]

Every few years, Connecticut legislators toy with the idea of getting rid of the state’s rarely applied death penalty. But then, a horrible case like the Cheshire triple murders comes up. Dr. Willliam Petit was the sole survivor when two former parolees allegedly broke into his home, and raped and killed his wife and their […]

When I moved to D.C., I was surprised at the visceral hatred of Michelle Rhee, the school’s chancellor who is expected to announce her resignation today. I heard Rhee speak at an event in New York when she still ran the New Teacher Project, a Teach for America-like program that recruited career-changers to work in […]

You’ve probably already seen Adam’s Bloggingheads with Amy Wax, a law professor from the University of Pennsylvania, arguing over whether the focus on the struggles African Americans face is misplaced. As Jamelle already pointed out, she conveniently ignores the impact that government programs have had on building a middle class among non-blacks. She also misunderstands […]

It’s October, and the world is awash in pink for breast cancer awareness month. But if decades of walks and fundraisers haven’t muted your ability to hear any news about breast cancer, you noticed that three studies out this month complicate the picture painted by a study from a year ago, which recommended that women […]

Tim Griffin, a former attorney general from Arkansas who is the Republican candidate for Congress for the district that includes my hometown, Clinton, recently made another Clinton resident — a man named Johnny Rhoda — a campaign adviser. Griffin introduces Rhoda as a “doctor,” but it turns out his Ph.D. is from a diploma mill […]