Politics

(The Root) — With so many pundits declaring that President Barack Obama’s second-term agenda is dead on arrival, you could be forgiven if you mistook the last few days for the first week of May … 2009. Back then, there was already angst that in Obama’s first first 100 days, unemployment briefly spiked to 10…

President Obama kicked off his annual commencement-speech tour on Sunday with a visit to Ohio State University. In front of a crowd numbering close to 60,000, according to the New York Times, the president steered clear of stumping or any partisan politics. Instead he chose a message of uplift and hope for the graduating Buckeyes…

First lady Michelle Obama said that students at a high school near her family’s Chicago home told her recently that “every day they wake up and wonder whether they’re going to make it out of school alive,” according to The Hill. She told CBS Sunday Morning that she learned the disturbing detail last month during…

(The Root) — The FBI’s recent addition to its Most Wanted Terrorists list has reopened long-dormant wounds from America’s racial past. Assata Shakur’s (formerly Joanne Chesimard) distinction of being the first woman on that list evokes the triumphant and tragic legacy of the black power movement. It was during an era whose high point, between…

Ever since she became first lady, Michelle Obama has been a beacon of fashion and style for many women, with her dresses and gowns becoming must-have items. Her bangs are such a success, at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner Barack Obama jokingly said that he was going to adopt the look himself to boost his…

On Sunday’s Meet the Press, Sen. John McCain took on Syria and encouraged President Barack Obama to take action in the troubled country, reports NBC News.  Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., a senior member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, urged the president to begin identifying a strategy to secure Syria’s stockpiles of chemical weapons should the…

In a victory for voters’ rights, felon-disenfranchisement laws are being overturned in Deleware, and NAACP President and CEO Benjamin Todd Jealous writes on the Huffington Post that it’s high time for the rest of the country to follow suit. The amendment, passed at the urging of the Delaware NAACP, allows people with nonviolent felony convictions…