Perhaps it’s the pandemic that offers a fitting analogy to the condition of our politics as Americans try to recover from the trauma of Jan. 6 – when we came dangerously close to the onset of an anti-democratic Trump-ocracy. The loss of more than 500,000 of our fellow citizens, their lives snuffed out by COVID-19, has been a cataclysmic shock to the nation, an epic of sorrow and suffering.
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Those who had high hopes for a serious minimum wage proposal from the Republican Party will be disappointed: The recent proposal released by Sens. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) and Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) would not even increase the minimum wage to 1960s levels, after adjusting for inflation. It is a meager increase that fails to address the problem of low pay in the U.S. economy.
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When the State places its noose around a white woman’s neck, the world cries foul. On January 13, Lisa Montgomery, a white woman, was led to the death chamber. The federal government used its weapon of choice, lethal injection, to kill her. She was the first woman executed by the federal government in 68 years. Widely condemned, her execution was seen as a tragic killing of a victim of horrific sexual and physical abuse.
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As state legislatures have started their sessions, anti-public school legislators have wasted no time introducing “school choice” bills that would divert public funds to privatization schemes. In the first three weeks of January alone, 34 bills to expand private education options had been introduced in 15 states.
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The cruel reality of solitary confinement ought to shock all caring and thinking people One night in January of 2014, two prison guards at the Colorado State Penitentiary walked a man in handcuffs and an inmate’s uniform down the prison hallway and deposited him in a solitary cell designated "R.F.P. Ad. Seg.: Administrative Segregation, Removed from Population. Solitary confinement."
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Teacher burnout was already a big problem prior to COVID, and without policy changes, it's about to get a lot worse Public school educators in North Carolina continue to manage the immediate needs of students under shifting instructional conditions and an uncertain future as the debate around in-person and remote schooling dominates policy discussions.
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Unless we acknowledge and address the racist history of school choice, we will perpetuate it.
It's National School Choice Week. Following a year of reinvigorated examination of the history and current role of racial oppression in American institutions, like policing and elections, this week provides all parents, educators, administrators and advocates a worthwhile opportunity to likewise reflect upon the historical role of race and racism in the school choice movement.
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COVID taught us a lot about living in crisis mode. The biggest lesson: address crises early enough to avoid complete disruption of our lives. Let’s start with the climate crisis. If we cannot slow climate change before certain tipping points are reached, changes will accelerate of their own accord and disastrous consequences will mount. There will be worse weather extremes, food shortages, mass migrations of people escaping rising seas and extinction of an estimated one-third of all species by 2050.
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As schools begin spring semester classes, local leaders in North Carolina face the weighty decision of whether to offer in-person instruction. Local leaders have been handed no favors from federal and state officials who have abrogated their responsibility to establish objective criteria for in-person instruction that would apply to all schools, public and non-public alike.
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Even for those of us who found a measure of joy during the year whose end we now mark – taking delight from a child’s birth, perhaps, or from a marriage, a graduation, success at work – Americans will remember 2020 chiefly as a showcase of conflict and sorrow. It brought of course the rampage of the coronavirus, costing upwards of 330,000 lives with many more in the balance.
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This month, I watched the federal government execute two Black men in two days, Brandon Bernard and Alfred Bourgeois. In an unprecedented and spiteful move, Trump’s lame-duck administration has undertaken a spree of executions after a 17-year hiatus. If all goes as planned, thirteen people will be killed before Joe Biden, who has pledged to end the federal death penalty, takes office. Six of the last seven will be Black men.
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State lawmaker says NC leaders must prioritize health care, especially reproductive health care, during the pandemic and beyond After enduring an election cycle unlike any other, North Carolina legislators are turning our focus back towards the critical work ahead of us in 2021. During my reelection campaign, I talked to many constituents who were concerned about their healthcare.
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A disability rights advocate reaches out to one of NC's newest members of Congress Maybe I’m strange for my age, or perhaps it’s because I have a background in history, but I always feel excited during election season. No matter who’s running, there always seems to be a surprise. This election, there was a particularly big surprise in the mountain region of North Carolina where Madison Cawthorn was chosen to represent the 11th congressional district.
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I spent much of my adult life proudly serving this country as a United States Marine. The most sacred duty of any leader is keeping their word to their subordinates so they know you will always have their back. Sen. Thom Tillis had been a champion in Congress for legislation to clean up toxic chemical contamination of drinking water in North Carolina and nationwide. But in June, he went back on his word – at least when it comes to protecting members of the military and their families.
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North Carolinians who stood against our soon-to-be ex-president’s rancid politics of grievance, contempt and division, fueled by a gusher of falsehoods, are heartened by the nation’s clear choice of Joseph R. Biden Jr. to be our next chief executive. At the same time, Biden’s happy supporters must reckon with this uncomfortable fact: half of the Tar Heel electorate wanted to see Donald Trump occupy the White House for another four years.
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It was a mob hit, pure and simple. An angry mob boss, Donald Trump, ordered the hit; two of his henchmen, Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue, carried it out. Without warning, without cause and without apparent guilt, the two U.S. senators stabbed Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger in the back this week and left their fellow Republican to bleed, pretty much ending his political career.
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