President Barack Obama’s proposal to make community college free for all students sounded like a great way to extend free public education beyond high school, giving low-income students a path to college. Critics say the plan could further ghettoize lower income and black high school graduates and spends public money on students who can afford their tuition. …
Published in Al Jazeera – click here to read full article.
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Children’s Defense Fund Twitter photo
For generations, the Children’s Defense Fund has been a national voice for children. Growing out of the civil rights movement, CDF has been led by Marian Wright Edelman, a civil rights activist and the first Black woman licensed to practice law in Mississippi. CDF’s just-released report, Ending Child Poverty Now, denounces the “national moral disgrace that there are 14.7 million poor children and 6.5 million extremely poor children in the United States of America – the world’s largest economy,” and describes a blueprint for reducing child poverty by 60 percent. Continue reading
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Photo by Barnaby Wasson, published under Creative Commons license – https://www.flickr.com/photos/barnabywasson/279911701/in/set-72157594345855838
As Minnesotans congratulate ourselves on paying more attention to preschool, we need to face painful facts. We know a lot about what works to get children a fair start in school, and we are still far from providing or funding that fair start for poor children. Continue reading
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Want to shut down a news site? Facebook will help. A new Facebook “hoax button” lets anyone flag any news article posted on Facebook as false. The mechanism is the same as flagging a post as “annoying or distasteful” or pornography. Just click, and you’re done. Continue reading
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Growing up on the Leech Lake Indian Reservation, Michelle Goose listened to aunts and uncles and her father, who spoke Ojibwe “enough to spark my interest in it.” Today, she has a degree in American Indian Studies with an emphasis on Ojibwe language from the University of Minnesota, and she is a passionate advocate for the revitalization of language. Continue reading
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UPDATED 1/30 – St. Paul will elect four out of seven school board members this fall, and the election season promises to be lively. Three of the incumbents are running, and at least nine other people have talked about challenging them. The first step comes at February 3 precinct caucuses. Issues include: Continue reading
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What lessons does Dr. King’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail have for the city attorney in Bloomington? Take a look at my recent article in Al Jazeera:
Today’s civil disobedience continues MLK’s legacy
When protest targets injustice, public officials, police and prosecutors make choices about where they stand. Prosecutors can exercise their discretion to charge or not to charge, to seek a token sentence of community service or to try to hammer protesters with the full weight of available penalties.
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© alexskopje – Fotolia.com
If the first casualty of war is truth, the second is freedom to speak. Since the massacre at Charlie Hebdo, government repression of political speech has accelerated, and so have attacks on Muslims.
France arrested at least 54 people for “glorifying” or “defending” terrorism in the week after Charlie Hebdo — none of whom were even alleged to be connected to the attacks. Continue reading
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Screen shot from Selma Movie Glory lyrics video, showing marchers on Edmund Pettus Bridge – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HEFRPLM0nEA
Selma, the movie, makes a powerful and inspiring call to action. Without glossing over divisions in the civil rights movement in the 1960s, Selma focuses on courage and commitment, and connects the movement then to the movement now. Continue reading
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During the first week of January, two more ships were abandoned by their crews, leaving hundreds of migrants stranded at sea, reports NPR. The ships carry anywhere from 400 to 800 people. Continue reading
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Bombing schools and hospitals is a war crime. Deliberately targeting civilians and civilian infrastructure is a war crime. Yesterday’s fulminations from the Führer in the White House go beyond war crimes to announce that he intends genocide: the wiping out of an entire people and civilization.
ICE is only one of the federal agencies surveilling people. Federal surveillance reaches far beyond immigrants. Federal agents use massive databases, facial recognition, cell phone photos, and license plate records. Beyond surveillance, they target and threaten people involved in protests, bringing the full weight of federal power to bear on individuals. Their actions often remain […]
Five years after the violent attack on the Capitol by Trump supporters, the attacks on democracy and on elected officials continue. Yesterday, two politicians currently under attack by the Trump administration spoke out with anger and eloquence.
The New York Times today has plenty of coverage of who, how, when, and where the United States illegally attacked Venezuela and abducted its president and first lady. But that’s far from the whole story. A few easily overlooked but essential facts: For informed insights on the consequences of Trump’s attack on Venezuela, see:
50 USC Ch. 33: WAR POWERS RESOLUTION §1541. Purpose and policy (a) Congressional declaration It is the purpose of this chapter to fulfill the intent of the framers of the Constitution of the United States and insure that the collective judgment of both the Congress and the President will apply to the introduction of United […]
Mary Turck