Media

Writing recently in The New York Times, Thomas Edsall linked race, genes and political ideology. Edsall, a journalism professor at Columbia University who writes a weekly online opinion piece for the Times, has been one of the leading voices covering race and politics in the United States for the last quarter century — and his latest piece strongly suggests that he fundamentally misunderstands race, missing that race reflects social dynamics rather than genetics.

At Netroots Nation, Demos Senior Fellow Wallace Turbeville speaks on Detroit's recent politically motivated water shutoffs.

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As Michigan Governor Rick Snyder and his appointed “emergency manager” were steering Detroit into bankruptcy last fall, the public-policy think tank Demos released a groundbreaking report on the city’s financial circumstance—and how to address it.

The state-appointed Detroit Emergency Manager has commenced a program of shutting off the water of a large portion of the 138,000 delinquent accounts, up to 90,000 of which are poor households and largely African-American.

EMPLOYEES IN NYC CAN USE SICK LEAVE STARTING JULY 30. That’s the simple message New York’s Department of Consumer Affairs was spreading on street corners and subway stops this morning in English, Spanish, Chinese, Russian and four other languages common to the city.

President Barack Obama recently defied Republican threats to file suit against him for his use of executive orders. "If House Republicans are really concerned about me taking too many executive actions, the best solution to that is passing bills," the president said. "Pass a bill, solve a problem."

Citibank settled the Justice Department’s mortgage market investigation yesterday, agreeing to pay $4 billion in civil penalties, $500 million in penalties to various states and $2.5 billion in “soft dollars” to aid consumers damaged by their pre-financial crisis shenanigans. To reach agreement, the bank was also absolved of any liability for credit default obligations, derivatives that fueled the crisis. Attorney General Holder offered up a verbal slap to the face, writing, “the bank’s conduct was egregious.”

So why did Citigroup share prices close 3.1% higher on the market?

In pledging $50-million to strengthen America’s "flailing democracy," the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation has stirred criticism among liberal groups that in doing so it has jettisoned some of its core values.

In its three-year "Madison Initiative," named after James Madison, an American founder who warned against the "mischiefs of faction," the foundation says it will support groups looking to make adjustments to the legislative process so Congress can perform its basic tasks like passing annual spending bills, says Daniel Stid, who will lead the effort for Hewlett.

Nathan Kelly is an associate professor of political science at the University of Tennessee. His book, The Politics of Inequality in the United States, examines how politics affects the market distribution of income, as well as government redistribution. Kelly and I discuss the implications of his work at the intersection of economic and political inequality.