As President Obama and Congress dig in their heels during the heated negotiations over the fiscal cliff, the public hears about the middle class collectively wringing their hands over potential caps on tax deductions and changes in Medicare eligibility rules. Likewise, the wealthy are well represented, as is...

For more than two years the NAACP Climate Justice Initiative has been working to address climate change and help people understand how climate change will impact minorities and low-income communities. Funded at first by grant money, the initiative has developed from one person going around the country teaching...

According to a new report by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, states are using welfare law loopholes to divert money from spending on the needy in order to fill budget gaps. In some cases, they avoid increasing spending on the poor by claiming expenditures (sometimes by...

Technically, culture is always "in the news," and not just in the arts and entertainment section of our newspapers. It is like unacknowledged water to a fish, or the oxygen we breathe. Yet recently culture has been an explicit topic of debate. After Mitt Romney took flak for...

Recently the national media have been far too eager to throw those with disabilities under the bus. In a column for The New York Times, Frank Bruni decries the growth in the number of Americans receiving Social Security disability insurance (SSDI). He sees it as an outgrowth of...

Former British diplomat Carne Ross doesn't know why we're spending so much time following the presidential campaigns. "We have been led to believe that one little vote every few years is meaningful when I think intuitively, secretly we know it's meaningless," he says. "But in fact, in taking on your...

Now that the dust has settled after the Affordable Care Act (ACA) was approved late last month, it has become increasingly clear that the Medicaid expansion part of the law the Supreme Court softened is not going to be able to cover as many people as needed. The Supreme Court...

Sitting down with Year Up Chicago's executive director Alan Anderson, one can immediately understand how his program is on track to graduate its 70th student. Year Up, which teaches disadvantaged high school graduates ages 18 to 24 technological skills and matches them with potential employers, has been in Chicago since...

When my friend Kurt, who was 26, died in April after colliding with another car, he left a cloud of confusion in his wake. Kurt had struggled with schizoaffective disorder, a subtype of schizophrenia, since he was a teenager and many of us wondered whether Kurt's tragic death was a...

While one would be hard-pressed to say the Republican Party is in decline while they run the House of Representatives, can prevent vital votes by using the filibuster in the Senate and have a candidate running neck-and-neck with President Obama, the death knell may be sounding soon. Climate change could...

Since the Dodd-Frank financial reform act was passed, there have been more than a few flashy headlines hinting that all might not be well in the regulatory world. Subprime mortgage bonds are gaining popularity again. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is shying away from

David Kennedy, author of the popular book Don't Shoot and professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, has been working with the Chicago Police Department (CPD) since the summer of 2010 to reduce homicides in Chicago, employing a violence reduction strategy in District 11, District 7...

As the 20th anniversary of the Earth Summit, known as Rio+20, is producing mild expectations and there is still no promise of a global agreement on reducing the greenhouse gasses that cause climate change, many grassroots activists and green-minded business leaders are taking efforts into their own hands....

I was recently hanging out with some pretty smart liberals and heard one of them say, "There are a lot of people putting crazy ideas out there." And then, not missing a beat, someone else from the group quipped, "They're called libertarians." The room shook with laughter except for me...

If anyone is in the position to get people off their duffs and back to work, it's Germany. But Germany refuses to do so, and thus the whole continent of Europe is sitting at home instead of working -- all to watch this powerhouse play in Group B of the...

In the great debate at the end of Illinois' legislative session over Medicaid and pension reform, editorials raged against "runaway" spending from profligate programs. Yet the familiar story of how these programs and obligations are ostensibly creating a huge budget gap, which is serious at nearly...

Scientific American writer Fred Guterl's new book The Fate of the Species should come with some warnings on the cover: "Not for those with even a modicum of anxiety. Not for reading on bad days. Consume pleasant media after use." He speculates on deadly new viruses and malware that can...

Energy consumers from Chicago to New Jersey were shocked after headlines proclaimed that the recent PJM energy capacity auction would result in electric bills about $130 a year more than this year's prices. The auction procured 164,561 megawatts of capacity, or $136 per megawatt, three years...

While President Obama (who has yet to give an in-depth interview to Chicago media since moving into the White House) was a few blocks away on Michigan Avenue on Friday at a fundraiser at the Cultural Center, the venerable Carol Marin wasn't lying in wait to hound him for some...

When I volunteer at my local animal shelter, which accepts thousands of dogs and cats per year, the worst sight is another animal control truck lumbering through the parking lot, bringing new lost, neglected or abused creatures to the shelter. After I had been at it for a while, I...