Championing Life And Liberty For Animals
Before Sam, a white-throated capuchin monkey, threw out the first pitch at a minor league baseball game in Frederick, Md., on a midsummer Friday night, and before Sam and other monkeys — dressed as...
View ArticleRecognizing The Right Of Plants To Evolve
If proposals calling for rights for animals are on the table, why not rights for other living things? Plants, for instance.After all, plants can sometimes exhibit humanlike behavior. And we're not just...
View ArticleWhen A Robot Comes Knocking On The Door
Peter Remine says he will know it's time to get serious about rights for robots "when a robot knocks on my door asking for some help."Remine, founder of the Seattle-based American Society for the...
View ArticlePumps And Polls: Why Americans Wait In Lines
Please line up for this multiple choice quiz: Days before the deluge descended and the chaos commenced, Americans along the Eastern Seaboard waited patiently in single-file lines to try to influence...
View ArticleWhy The White House Glass Ceiling Remains Solid
Will the United States ever elect a woman president?When President Obama — or Mitt Romney — leaves the Oval Office, there will be a handful of highly touted female candidates for consideration as...
View ArticleNonvoters: The Other Abstinence Movement
To many Americans, the right to vote in a presidential election is a sacred and precious opportunity. To others, the right to not vote is just as meaningful. And they exercise it.In just-released data,...
View Article5 Truisms About the 2012 Election...That Weren't True
The balloons have fallen, the bunting's down, and President Obama has been re-elected.That means Mitt Romney has been defeated — and with him, many election aspects that we presumed to be true. (You...
View Article5 Foul-Ups In The Romney Campaign
File this under the Strange Case of the 2012 Presidential Campaign. It was a long, tortuous trip that ended up at a very familiar destination: the re-election of President Obama.But along the way,...
View ArticleDo We Really Need A Second Inauguration?
For the sake of argument, let's agree that when we use the word "inauguration" in this particular post, we are talking about the multiday, ball-bestrewn, soiree-soaked, tuxedo-dappled extravaganza that...
View ArticleTable For One, Please. A Solo Thanksgiving
This is America, where Thanksgiving is portrayed in popular culture as a time for gatherings of loving families and friends, holding hands while saying grace over a roast turkey, passing casseroles and...
View ArticleWhen Someone You Know Loses A Child
Amid the aftershocks of the senseless shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., our ever-more-complex society goes on to publicly discuss what happened and how to avoid such tragedy...
View ArticleA Lull Until New Year's? Not So These Days
Time was, the stretch following Christmas Day until New Year's Day was a quiet, sleepy spot on the American calendar. The six-day span hung like a lazy hammock between the holidays.Not...
View ArticleThe 2nd Amendment: 27 Words, Endless Interpretations
The Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is like:an Etch A Sketch. You can make it into pretty much whatever you want.an optical-illusory M.C. Escher staircase that climbs back into itself.How can...
View ArticleThe Great American Signature Fades Away
Much has been made recently of the loopy signature of Jack Lew, the Treasury secretary nominee whose name — if he is confirmed — will appear on new U.S. currency.Lots of other people have screwy and...
View ArticleSaying No To The Inauguration
As supporters of President Obama prepare for his toned-down but glammed-up second inauguration over the long weekend of Jan. 19-21, the president's detractors are making other plans.Across the country,...
View Article12 Half-Truths We Live With
Say it isn't so. Various newsorganizations have recently reported that on occasion the Subway sandwich chain's $5 footlong measures 11 inches instead of 12 — as advertised. Sure enough, the bacon,...
View ArticleForget 2016. The Pivotal Year In Politics May Be 2020
Now that President Obama is ensconced in his second term, speculation about the future of American politics is wildfire-ish.In a post-inaugural story, the Associated Press reports that the name of...
View ArticleAre Shooting Ranges The New Bowling Alleys?
The traditional American shooting range is extending its range.In Summerville, S.C., for example, the ATP Gunshop & Range stages community-minded blood drives and Toys-for-Tots collections. Twice a...
View ArticleEerie Echoes From The First State Of The Union
Guns, immigration, support for diplomats abroad, and the nation's financial situation.These are key issues facing President Obama as he delivers the first State of the Union address of his second term...
View ArticleHow To Pick A Pope (With Latin Subtitles)
For lovers of the lapsed language Latin, the selection of a new pope is an ecstasyfest.The Roman Catholic Church is so steeped in centuries-old traditions, Pope Benedict XVI announced his surprise...
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