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Are Millennial Workers and Boomer Managers Destroying the Mafia, Too?

Federal prosecutions in the 1980s and 1990s decimated experienced middle-management ranks in New York's organized crime families. Are they struggling today because their remaining workforce consists of boomers who can't quit and millennials who are on their phones too much? 

Alabama Spends More than a Half Million Annually on a Confederate Memorial; Black Historical Sites Struggle

"It is the only museum in the state that has a dedicated revenue stream codified in the state’s constitution. So while other museums struggle to keep their doors open, search for grants for funding and depend on volunteer staff, the Confederate Memorial Park is flush with cash."

A Timeline of US-Colombia Relations Shows Influence of Cold War, War on Drugs

Over the two centuries since Colombia’s independence, the relationship between Washington and Bogota has evolved into a close economic and security partnership. But it has at times been strained by U.S. intervention, Cold War geopolitics, and the war on drugs.

Is this Lawsuit the Last Hope for Justice for Survivors of the Tulsa Massacre?

The lawsuit by survivors and their descendants argues that the massacre's effects constitute an "ongoing nuisance," a theory used successfully by the state to sue a pharmaceutical company for the damages of the opioid epidemic.

The Beatles vs. the KKK

John Lennon's notorious "bigger than Jesus" comment prior to the group's 1966 American tour brought out right-wing protestors and helped push the band to stop touring permanently. 

Johns Hopkins Prez: Universities Failing Responsibility to Democracy

by Ronald J. Daniels

Today's universities need to break from a historical cycle of attention and indifference to matters of civic education. 

Yale Affirms Celebrated "Vinland" Map is a Forgery

“The Vinland Map is a fake,” Raymond Clemens, the curator of early books and manuscripts at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale, said in a statement this month. “There is no reasonable doubt here."

Army Base Names Are Changing. But to What?

“There is a lesson here,” said Wade Fowler, who was born and raised here and now runs a small barbecue joint. “Don’t name things after people.”

My Father Harry Jaffa and the Birth of Modern Conservatism

by Philip Jaffa

Political scientist Harry Jaffa succeeded in cajoling the disparate elements of the right into a coalition dedicated to the pared-down goals of defeating Soviet communism and domestic socialism; after claiming victory in those battles, the coaltion has faltered. 

Despite Controversy, NASA Won't Rename Space Telescope

Critics argue the James Webb Telescope honors a NASA administrator who sanctioned employment discrimination against gay and lesbian astronomers during the 1950s and 1960s.

Biden NLRB Counsel Says College Athletes are Employees

"Jennifer Abruzzo took issue with the term “student-athletes,” calling it a misclassification of college players, and warned that using it could be construed as an attempt to lead players to believe that they’re not protected by labor laws."

White, Male, and, for Now, Still on Pedestals

Paul Farber, director of Monument Lab, said, “We must see monuments as way stations that reflect our values. This is a generational process.”

Could a College Football Union Be the Biggest Force for Progress in the South?

"There are huge numbers of conservative Southerners who would fight against all important progressive reforms — unless doing so threatened their access to college football. Then, they would at least be willing to negotiate."

What Young People's Embrace of "The Sopranos" Says about a Changing Culture

"The show’s depiction of contemporary America as relentlessly banal and hollow is plainly at the core of the current interest in the show, which coincides with an era of crisis across just about every major institution in American life."

Racist "Replacement" Theory Goes Mainstream

"White replacement theory" posits the existence of a plot to change America's racial composition by methodically enacting policies that reduce white Americans' political power. It's moved from the fringes of the hard right to the mainstream of conservative media and some Republican politicians. 

Colonial-Era Papers Stolen from Mexican National Archives Returned

"Thanks to a group of eagle-eyed scholars, a trove of stolen colonial-era documents has been returned to Mexico City."

Bob Moore, Key Pillar of the "Nashville Sound", dies at 88`

"Over 40 years Mr. Moore elevated the bass in country music from a subordinate timekeeper to an instrument capable of considerable tonal and emotional reach."

You Likely Don't Know of the Tejano Patriots of the American Revolution

The Daughters of the American Revolution has extended recognition to Spanish Texans who fought the British and aided the American rebels in the imperial conflicts that accompanied the war for independence. 

Randall Kennedy on the "Right-Wing Attack on Racial Justice Talk"

"The history of American education at every level is full of examples of textbooks blocked, library books pulled, and instructors fired on account of right-wing objections to teachings about racial injustice."

Why No One in Media Cares About Nicaragua Today

by Eric Alterman

The American foreign policy establishment was once obsessed with undermining Nicaragua's leftist Sandinista government under Daniel Ortega. But today, when Ortega is carrying out a political second act as an authoritarian populist, US policy is limited to unleashing the Border Patrol on Nicaraguans fleeing repression, violence and poverty.