2018 summer fire season is on record as being one of California’s most demanding and devastating. In the 9 month fire season from January to September, over 4,800 wildfires burned 617,00 acres across …
Recipe for a Successful Public School System
How properly implemented charter schools could aid students in historically poor areas Charter schools do not represent a desire to force capitalism further into the public school equation or a lack o…
Gassed up: Standoffs, Strikes, and Tension in West Virginia
A couple weeks ago, Lissa Lucas, a Democratic political candidate for the West Virginia House of Delegates, was physically dragged off the House Chambers floor during a Judiciary Committee hearing. Pr…
Dear Mr. Sanders: Tuition-Free Education is a Handout to the Rich
As an eye-catching, sloganeering, vote-winning policy, tuition-free public university is certainly a crowd pleaser. It was for Bernie Sanders, and his left-wing doppelganger in Britain, Jeremy Corbyn,…
Are You #MakingADifference?
Over the past decade, voluntourism has become a dirty word in the world of development. You may have encountered it in updated Facebook profile pictures. Or an advertisement selling idealism through s…
The Missing Part of Haitian Progress: The Forgotten Children
Haiti is home to 10 million people and the first modern revolution predicated on freedom, equality and justice of all. But among all the nations in the Western Hemisphere, none have faced greater chal…
“Leapfrogging”: Can developing countries truly skip over fossil fuel reliance in favor of renewable energies?
There is a popular argument that progress and growth are not possible without reliance on fossil fuel-powered energy. Examples abide to support this claim: almost every industrialized country is (rel…
The Waning Hermit Kingdom (Part I): A Faltering Kim-Regime
When tensions rose along the Korean Peninsula this past August, it was not military provocation, but South Korean speakers blaring anti-North Korean propaganda that spurred Pyongyang to declare a quas…
Lessons from the School of Trumpian Politics along the Venezuelan-Colombian Border
Xenophobic ideology is not new to politics. It is, however, relatively new to Venezuela, which has been one of the more welcoming South American countries to immigrants throughout the second half of t…
America Works Works
In the latest season of House of Cards, Frank Underwood proudly proclaims “America Works works.” And it does. However, the America Works that exists in reality (the subject of the remainder of this ar…
California’s Welfare Benefits: Boom or Bust?
There has been much discussion about immigrants in the United States from everywhere around the world. Yet, why is it that California seems to attract the most immigrants of any state? Indeed, while t…
Popping the Berkeley Bubble
“So…why’d you pick Berkeley?” my new friend asks, looking at me over the rims of his glasses. It’s a frequently asked question during Welcome Week, the favorite of awkward strangers-turned-conversatio…
Community College: Undivided Over an Educational Divide
On January 08, 2015, President Obama unveiled “a bold new plan” to universalize the first two years of community college. His initiative would provide free tuition to all students across the economic …
Do Not Feed the Animals: The Dehumanization of America’s Homeless
A 90-year-old WW2 veteran has been cited four times for feeding the homeless on public property after an ordinance banning the activity went into effect in Fort Lauderdale on October 31st. The city’s…
The Myth of the Model Minority
American culture characterizes the narrative of the Asian American as being highly educated, disciplined, wealthy, successful, and assimilated. Data from the Pew Center reveals that Asian Americans ha…
Food Stamps: The Usual Target
This past month Representative Tim Huelskamp from Kansas said the GOP’s plan to cut social programs including the food stamp program (SNAP) meant, “you can no longer sit on your couch…and expec…