What the Green New Deal Says About the Young and Progressive Left

Austin Sacker

When freshman Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Senator Ed Markey’s Green New Deal resolution failed to pass on the Senate floor by a staggering 0-57 vote, her reaction (and those of her supporters) was one of both upset and outrage. Disappointedly absent from this rant was any glimmer of introspection. Ocasio-Cortez is the millennial voice in Congress, and her and Markey’s resolutions are, by its description, the legislative panacea that this generation apparently desires. The lack of presented policy action and the unrealistic cost are well-documented criticisms, but less often considered…

The Electoral College: Preserving our Republic

David Andreas

In the past twenty years, two presidents, George W. Bush and Donald Trump, have won the presidency with much controversy. Bush’s triumph over Al Gore had to be decided in the Supreme Court, where the justices decided that Bush did in fact win. Their decision was based on the deadline that a state had to determine it’s electors six days before the electoral college met. The decision did not sit well with many Americans, even after Gore conceded. Then, in 2016, Donald Trump beat Hillary Clinton with 304 to 227…

Rehab vs. Control

J Elizabeth Mascoli

Over 2.3 million people, adults and juveniles alike, are currently in some sort of correctional facility in the United States. Our country has the highest rate of incarceration per capita in the world, yet over the years, many have come to realize that our prison system does not work. The main source of this error is the prison system’s hyperfocus on punishment and control rather than the rehabilitation of its inmates. Prison itself should be a system of rehabilitation. Most people who go to prison do not go for life…

Biden and 2020

Allyson Ryan

Despite the fact that former Vice President Joe Biden has not yet announced his candidacy for the 2020 election, he has been shown to be leading in many polls for the 2020 Democratic primaries. Despite this, Joe Biden is not what the Democratic party needs for the 2020 election. What the party needs is to focus on the fresher, more progressive faces that are rising through the ranks of the party. The Democratic party needs to be strategic in who becomes the nominee for the 2020 election. The current status…

The Threat of Brexit for the UK’s Welfare State

Samantha Butzen

Since the founding of the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP), a British exit from the European Union has been on the minds of many in the United Kingdom. In order to maintain the support of UKIP, the Conservative government promised  a referendum on the UK’s membership in the EU.  In 2016, many promises were made by the UKIP aligned Leave.EU campaign as well as the 2015 founded Vote Leave campaign regarding a boost to the welfare state should the UK leave the EU yet in the years of negotiations following…

Sexism Kills: Medical Misogyny and Ignorance of Female Bodies

Anastasia Lacina

In the 5th century BCE, followers of Hippocrates—the founder of Western medicine—published “The Hippocratic Corpus.”  The exact writers of this ancient text are lost to history, but their views of the human body prevailed for centuries in the West.  One of the works included in the corpus is called “On the Diseases of Women,” which introduced the “wandering uterus” theory.  2,500 years ago, doctors believed that almost any illness that a woman contracted was caused by her uterus literally floating around her body, putting pressure on other organs and poisoning…

Are the Politics of Today Having a Deterrent Effect?

Austin Sacker

There is no denying that the process by which a citizen strives to attain public office, whether elected or appointed, entails a great degree of public exposure and risk of character damage. Political candidates are regularly subject to a vetting process by which individual Americans, the media, and other members of government evaluate the suitability of a particular individual for a political position. These evaluations can range from more benign measurements of education level, experience, and their intended policy agenda (which I fear is becoming less commonplace a metric), to…

The Electoral College: Extinction or Evolution?

J Elizabeth Mascoli

The biggest news of the 2020 electoral season (so far) is the ever-growing pool of Democratic candidates whose progressive policies are ever more in the mainstream.  Recently, the senator from my lovely home state of Massachusetts, Elizabeth Warren, made a bold statement about abolishing the Electoral College.  Other candidates have also said they were open to the idea.  But what would abolishing the Electoral College actually mean for our country?   The idea is not new.  In 2000, Republican George W. Bush beat out Democrat Al Gore for the presidency…