Recently, the Supreme Court has issued major rulings on immigration enforcement, abortion, elections and freedom of religion and freedom of speech protections for artists. So of course, I want to talk to you about Idaho house construction and the definition of the word “water.” In 2007, Michael ...
When Frenchman Alexis de Tocqueville visited the United States, he was blown away by how active American citizens were in their community. What might surprise us today, however, is what he thought made a good citizen. Instead of focusing on voting turnout rates, he marveled at Americans’ “associations ...
In 2018 California passed Proposition 12, which prohibits the sale of pork within the state that was raised in a “cruel manner.” Among other things, this means that bacon sold in California has to come from a pig that had at least 24 square feet of living space.So far, so simple. California voters ...
We’re all familiar with the idea of learning styles –- some of us are visual learners, while others learn best when reading or writing. It’s a common idea — one review of the literature found over thirty different systems of classifying learners, each with their own lists of categories — and ...
In one notable study, researchers played clips from a football game to fans. To no one’s surprise, calls by the referee for their team were seen as right and fair. Calls against their team? The referee was blind — or bribed. That dishonesty is harmless in sports, but we’re about to have a more ...
Recently, Gawker — a news source that you could be forgiven or perhaps applauded for not being familiar with — announced they had Senator Kyrsten Sinema's Social Security number. The benefit this might offer to our nation's civil discourse, aside from showing others how to obtain the same information, ...
I think most academics require little persuasion to talk about the importance of their discipline. Most of us can easily wax on for quite some time about how fundamental our area of study is. So it feels odd to tell people that one of my favorite descriptions of politics compares my scholarly passion ...
Most of us have heard of “First Amendment rights” and “free speech.” The actual ideas wrapped up in those terms, however, are far more intricate than most people credit.
The first presidential debate was relatively widely panned. Large stretches of time were completely unintelligible as the two candidates talked over one another and threw personal attacks. Partisans on both sides announced their candidate’s victory while commentators bemoaned the lack of civility ...
Jakob Miller | Contributor One in six Americans has stopped talking to a friend or family member because of disagreements over politics. That scares me. The next election is almost upon us (campaign ads are already running!) and political rhetoric has barely cooled since 2016. Republicans and Democrats ...
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