EP 896 Gerrymandering Is on Full Display and Ahead of Schedule in Texas

EP 896 Gerrymandering Is on Full Display and Ahead of Schedule in Texas

While both parties have long histories with gerrymandering Congressional districts for partisan advantage, it’s fair to say Republicans have taken it to a new low by interrupting the every ten -year process, based on the census, and doing it at halftime of this cycle.  In the process, they are encouraging Democrats to do the same.  …

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EP 895 Independent Voters are Little Discussed and Yet the Key to Many of Our Elections

EP 895 Independent Voters are Little Discussed and Yet the Key to Many of Our Elections

 When political discussions take place, they are often focused on how Democrats or Republicans, conservatives versus liberals or red in relation to blue look at an issue.  They leave out a component of the electorate which grows in number and importance year after year–the independent or unaffiliated voter.  In fact, if you really analyze the …

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EP 894 College Sports Governance and Economics Have Become the Wild, Wild West

EP 894 College Sports Governance and Economics Have Become the Wild, Wild West

 Can your star quarterback on a powerhouse Division 1 football program get paid as it stands today?  After the recent $2.8 billion settlement in House v. NCAA, which enables universities to directly pay college athletes for their athletic participation, the answer is yes.  First came the NIL ruling in which college players could get paid …

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EP 893 A Little Discussed Law Still Hard at Work to Expand Home Ownership in America

EP 893 A Little Discussed Law Still Hard at Work to Expand Home Ownership in America

The U.S. Congress passed the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA)in 1977 with the key objective of ending redlining, the decades-old practice of neighborhood discrimination by banks against African Americans and others based on race and income.  The race-based rejection of loans to creditworthy residents of redlined neighborhoods delayed the American dream of homeownership for generations.  Our …

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EP 892 Strongman Presidency Has a Clear Goal

EP 892 Strongman Presidency Has a Clear Goal

  There is irony in a man determined to use the powers of the presidency and the administrative state capacity to disassemble the administrative state, aka ‘the deep state.’  Yet that is what we are seeing with the Trump Administration. The military, Department of Justice, homeland security and ICE are all aspects of the administrative …

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EP 891 A Longtime Washington Insider Provides His Perspective on How D.C. is Functioning

EP 891 A Longtime Washington Insider Provides His Perspective on How D.C. is Functioning

   Attorney Ira Shapiro is a man who has seen it all in Washington. As a long-time U.S. Senate staffer, he has written three books about the upper chamber. The collection has been described by one scholar as an ‘epic trilogy’, capturing sixty years of Senate history.  He was the chief U.S. trade negotiator with …

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EP 890 U.S. Supreme Court Tells Plaintiffs to Take Another Approach to Challenging Trump Policies

EP 890 U.S. Supreme Court Tells Plaintiffs to Take Another Approach to Challenging Trump Policies

 Many lawsuits have been brought against the second Trump Administration on the basis of overreach of its authority in trying to enact policies. President Trump declared victory over ‘radical left wing judges’ when the U.S. Supreme Court declared that the concept of the ‘universal’ injunction, wherein one lower federal court can make a ruling which …

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EP 889 A True Crime Case Which Shows the Hold the Genre Has on Americans

EP 889 A True Crime Case Which Shows the Hold the Genre Has on Americans

In 2019, the quiet suburb of New Canaan, Connecticut was shocked by the disappearance of Jennifer Dulos, a mother of five who vanished one morning after dropping her kids off to school.  In 2020, her husband Fotis Dulos–with whom she was locked in a contentious divorce–and Fotis’s lover, Michelle Troconis, were charged with Jennifer’s murder, …

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EP 888 Brain Gain to US Quickly Becoming a Brain Drain

EP 888 Brain Gain to US Quickly Becoming a Brain Drain

America is a leader in scientific pursuits.  This fact that is underpinned by much evidence.  While the United States represents only 4 percent of the world’s population it accounts for over half of science Nobel Prizes awarded since 2000, hosts seven of the Times Higher Education Top 10 science universities, and has introduced to the …

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EP 887 Evil Regimes Require Many Ordinary People Just Doing Their Jobs

EP 887 Evil Regimes Require Many Ordinary People Just Doing Their Jobs

 The type of extensive evil that went on under Adolf Hitler back in the 1930’s and 40’s requires an apparatus that enlists ‘average’ Germans of the era doing their jobs.  No one man could have done it alone.  Bringing this story forward, in authoritarian regimes around the globe there are people looking away at the …

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