Politics

When Troy Davis was executed at a Georgia state prison in September, several hours after the Supreme Court deliberated (and denied) an emergency appeal, people around the world looked on in shock. Activists, convinced that there was too much doubt surrounding his murder conviction, including the fact that seven of nine witnesses later recanted their…

Whether or not President Barack Obama’s first term embodies the idealism of the 2008 campaign is debatable, according to interviews with nine prominent black academics in the run-up to next year’s presidential election. For the second in the series, The Root interviewed Katherine Tate, professor of African-American studies at the University of California, Irvine’s School…

In July 2012, Cornel West will make his much anticipated return to Union Theological Seminary — the site of his first academic job and one of the sacred grounds he calls home — from his current position at the Center for African American Studies at Princeton University. In light of this news and in the…

Just moments after his prominent gaffe while answering a question about Libya, GOP presidential candidate Herman Cain confidently proclaimed that he does not have to know about foreign policy, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports. “I’m not supposed to know anything about foreign policy. Just thought I’d throw that out,” he said to a Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel…

Candidates in the 26-debate GOP marathon seem already to have hit the wall. With the 12th debate last Saturday and the 13th this coming Saturday, alternate front-runners in the Republican primary such as Mitt Romney, Michele Bachmann, Rick Perry and Herman Cain have fallen back, drained and giddy, and now it appears that Newt Gingrich,…

Whether or not President Barack Obama’s first term embodies the idealism of the 2008 campaign is debatable, according to interviews with nine prominent black academics in the run-up to next year’s presidential election. Those participating in these conversations with The Root include Kwame Anthony Appiah at Princeton, Ralph Richard Banks at Stanford Law School, Mark…

Don’t tell anyone, but I’m envious of black conservatives. They can see America through a visor that was clouded for me many years ago. To them, this is a nation of opportunity for anyone who is willing to work hard enough. I believe that, too, but experience has taught me that such a concept must…

For a black man with a slim lead in the race for the Republican nomination for president and embattled by allegations of sexual impropriety, Herman Cain is coasting on easy street. Because of Cain’s high-profile defenders in the Republican Party, at least in part, sexual harassment allegations from four different women are sliding off the…