Politics

Talking Points Memo is reporting that President Obama expressed his frustration with congressional Republicans on their failure so far to reach a budget compromise that would avert a government shutdown by the end of the week, instructing them to start acting like “grown-ups” and to stop playing political games. “We don’t have time for games,”…

It’s well documented that African Americans and other ethnic minorities have disproportionately higher rates of poor health, including infant mortality and most chronic conditions — heart disease, stroke, cancer, HIV/AIDS, asthma and diabetes, among others. Racial differences in health have persisted for so long that they’re largely seen as a standard fact of life, even…

There are those who think that I am naive about racism or that I downplay it. The kinds of people who think so are often themselves accused, from other quarters, of being “stuck in the past,” unable to admit that things truly change. Interestingly, I often feel that it’s actually I who am stuck in…

If you don’t like Newt Gingrich’s carefully considered and passionately argued position on the U.S. intervention in Libya, just wait. Recent history suggests that within days he’ll be saying the opposite of whatever he’s saying now. My best guess is that for the moment, at least, Gingrich kind of supports President Obama’s decision to use…

Emi Kolowale of the Washington Post is reporting that President Barack Obama has launched his re-election bid via a YouTube video posted on BarackObama.com. The video features individuals professing their desire to be involved in the Obama 2012 campaign effort. “The last couple of elections we’ve had have almost been turning-point campaigns,” said one participant…

Seventeen years ago, I was an organizer in Mississippi. And I was scared. We were planning a march to stop the governor from turning a public, historically black university, Mississippi Valley State University in Itta Bena, into a prison. Byron De La Beckwith had just been put in prison for killing Medgar Evers — the…

I woke up Friday, read the news and prayed that it was some sort of macabre April Fools Day joke. Unfortunately, that was not the case. This is one of the worst times in the history of Côte d’Ivoire, a beautiful West African nation that was once a model of economic success. Yet I can’t…

In what is being hailed as a national Day of Solidarity, hundred of thousands of teachers, nurses, students, clergy, firefighters and other workers from across the nation will hold “We Are One” demonstrations to show support for Wisconsin union employees to demand a stop to overreaching policies by Republican lawmakers trying to balance budgets on…

It was a bad sign at oral argument in Connick v. Thompson last October that the plight of John Thompson was never mentioned. In his opening remarks, his attorney tried to refer to his client. But the justices weren’t having any of it. Not one of the nine made a specific reference to Thompson, who…