In the avalanche of analysis and speculation about Chief Justice Roberts’ stunning decision to side with the Supreme Court’s liberal wing to uphold Obama’s healthcare law, one strain paints Roberts […]
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Who could have predicted that Chief Justice John Roberts would break with the conservative block on the Supreme Court and write the majority opinion upholding the individual mandate, one of […]
A review of Matthew Engelke’s How to Think Like an Anthropologist.
What does it take to tackle a multifaceted problem?
There are few more powerful positions than being a Supreme Court justice, yet the female justices are just like other women: talked over by their male colleagues.
A case in which a judge used an undisclosed software algorithm to determine a defendant’s sentence has caught the interest of the U.S. Supreme Court.
While the battle over the next Supreme Court justice will be fought in the realm of bare-knuckle, high-octane politics, the daily business of the justices is often a good deal less partisan.
Free riders choose to reap the rewards of a public good without paying their portion of the cost necessary to produce it.
Test your legal acumen. Pencils ready!
In his dissent in Obergefell v. Hodges, the ruling that made same-sex marriage a constitutional right throughout the United States, Justice Clarence Thomas rejected the majority’s rationale that gays and […]
The final weeks of the 2014-2015 Supreme Court term brought us a bumper crop of quotable lines from the ever-cantankerous Antonin Scalia. Justice Scalia has never been shy on the bench, but as he approaches the end of his third decade on the court, he is letting loose to a degree that is surprising even for him. Some say the Ronald Reagan appointee may even be growing a touch unhinged.
“Daddy, why do all the players have dark skin?” When my eldest daughter posed this question one football Saturday six years ago, she had no concept of race in mind […]
The American Freedom Defense Initiative (AFDI), an odious right-wing organization dedicated to spreading offensive messages about Muslims, won a federal court battle this week against the Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA) […]
President John F. Kennedy famously implored Americans to ask “what you can do for your country” rather than “what your country can do for you.” That’s nice rhetoric, but the […]
Is working from home good for business? A recent study has found that it is: productivity goes up, staff turn-over goes down, and job-satisfaction increases.
On Wednesday, the Supreme Court upended nearly four decades of campaign-finance law, removing “aggregate caps” on how much political donors may contribute to federal campaigns. From now on, millionaires seeking […]
A federal ruling might be a big win for broadband companies who could cut deals with large content providers — Disney or Netflix — to ensure that their web content is delivered faster and more reliably than other sites.
Any theory worth its salt, or any law worthy of the name, should welcome challenge.
The history lesson in Zimmerman’s acquittal in the murder of Trayvon Martin
This week’s Supreme Court decisions have been the main topics streaming into my Facebook and Twitter feeds (along with a few heartfelt thoughts for Nelson Mandela). Escaping a thumbs up […]
The Supreme Court could make history with its rulings on the legality of both California’s Proposition 8 ban on same-sex marriage and the federal Defense of Marriage Act.
Due to Friday’s historic Supreme Court ruling, this installment of Purpose, Inc. will delve into an important relationship lesson that models “the perfect ask” as told through Obama, the Bushes, […]
Today’s breaking news was, of course, that the U.S. Supreme Court has upheld the Affordable Care Act, otherwise known as “Obamacare”. In what will doubtless go down in American history […]
On the basis of having for a time shared a house with a John Roberts clerk who conveyed to me no useful information about the Chief Justice’s cast of mind, […]
Earlier this week I wrote that the Supreme Court was likely to take up a case challenging the Affordable Care Act in the next term. The Obama administration decided Monday […]
Disputes about evidence in social science can drag on for decades. I bet many a researcher has fantasized about the day when a world-famous panel of judges looks at the […]
“For all the money sloshing around in American politics, you still cannot buy the results of elections.” The Economist says the law of diminishing returns applies to campaign money.
Legal scholar Laurence Tribe told Big Think today that he found Elena Kagan’s performance in her Supreme Court confirmation hearings to be “masterful in every respect.” Kagan, who was previously the […]
Solicitor General Elena Kagan, President Obama’s new nominee for the Supreme Court, is by all accounts spectacularly brilliant. She was also, by all accounts, did a fantastic Dean of Harvard […]
“Being first sucks.” That’s what Amanda Simpson, one of the country’s first two openly transgender presidential appointees, told ABC News. “I’d rather not be the first, but someone has to […]