Column

Agriculture is the real culprit in California’s water worries After I graduated from high school, my family and I spent a month in a cabin on the west shore of Lake Tahoe, California. It was the August of 2014, one of the driest months for the state, so for the Sierras to be dusty at […]

By playing on our fears, the media has inflated the threat of Islamist terrorism From 1995 to 2014, 3,264 people died in the U.S. from acts of terrorism. From 1999 to 2015, 533,879 people died in the U.S. from gun violence. More Americans have been killed by guns since 1968 than in all U.S. wars […]

The recent inundation of fake news in emphasizes the need to be distrustful of targeted ads and certain news sources 2018 has been one of the most pivotal years for the American electorate due to revelations over issues including voter privacy, targeting by advertisements and social media safety. As Facebook has acknowledged its role in […]

Why tuning out and avoiding the stress of following the news is one of the most lazy, offensive and irresponsible things one can do It’s a privilege to live in a country with a free press. Unfortunately, many people take this for granted and instead award themselves the unearned privilege of tuning out. There’s a […]

The vegan lifestyle is both inaccessible and not as green as you’re led to believe In the wake of increased public awareness about the consequences of climate change, spring — rather than winter — appears to be the first casualty. Here we reside, in the middle of May in Davis, California, with temperatures swinging erratically […]

The removal of “climate change” from the EPA website mirrors the struggle between Google and Bing Americans love withholding information in lieu of explicit opposition to a problem. Take the Civil War as an example: Some in the South refer to the Civil War as the “War of Northern Aggression” — lending fault to the […]

How Russia’s northern capital tops the bucket list If you’ve ever read Fyodor Dostoevsky’s “Crime and Punishment,” you’ll be familiar with its rather famous opening line, which goes something like this: “On an exceptionally hot evening early in July a young man came out of the garret in which he lodged in S. Place and […]

The Iraq War casts a shadow over future U.S. intervention in the Middle East After 9/11, the U.S. was more unpopular in the Middle East than in any other part of the world. While this is largely no longer true today, it doesn’t necessarily imply that U.S.-Middle Eastern relations have developed smoothly, as with Iran […]

Private data harvesting unlikely to stop after Cambridge Analytica scandal In the wake of Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s congressional testimony, many people have come to the conclusion that political campaigns will never be quite the same. The scandal of Cambridge Analytica and the ensuing revelations about privacy breaches among unsuspecting social media users has raised […]

A case study in society’s worsening ability to make distinctions Some might insist that I shouldn’t discuss toxic masculinity because I’m a cisgender white male. However, a recent article in The New Yorker titled “Why ‘Phantom Thread’ is Propaganda for Toxic Masculinity,” was also written by a cisgender white male, and as a proud movie […]

Leaving the deal could result in yet another war in the Middle East Iran-U.S. relations have been characterized by overt hostility for decades, with both countries affirming rather antagonistic positions with one another. In Iran’s eyes, the U.S. is a powerful and aggressive force in the Middle East. In 1955, the U.S. assisted the U.K. […]

Boycotting is a perfectly valid form of speech, but the left must consider its implications Recently, on “Real Time with Bill Maher,” the political-comedy program’s outspoken host angered his fellow liberal panelists by defending Laura Ingraham. Ingraham is in the midst of an advertiser boycott following her controversial mocking of Parkland shooting survivor (excuse me, […]