Since its creation in 1935, every American worker has paid, and continues to pay, into the unemployment insurance system. This insurance was designed to keep Americans afloat in the event of a job loss, so they can feed their families and pay the mortgage or rent while job searching. It’s […]

Many of us believe that life on this planet is in a lot of trouble. The climate is becoming unstable; there are too many people; oceans are dying, sea levels are rising; and water, food, clean air, and minerals are coming into short supply. For many, the economy refuses to […]

Miley Cyrus and her foam finger made “twerk” a commonly used phrase. Christina Aguilera lost a lot of weight, and Kim Kardashian was compared to Shamu. Bombs went off in Boston and Volgograd. A train derailed in Spain. A tsunami hit the Philippines. Gay rights were fought for and won […]

Last year, we had many people who were deeply concerned about an anti-gay Chick-fil-A “backlash.” The actual result? The LGBT community won groundbreaking marriage victories in Washington, Maryland, Maine, and Minnesota. Since then, we have more than doubled the number of states supporting marriage equality and polls in support of […]

By all accounts, 2013 has been an eventful year, a good one for those who look at events not day-to-day, but from the standpoint of what Dr. Martin Luther King called that “moral arc of the universe that bends toward justice.” Dr. King added such bending is conditional upon the […]

Today, many Americans are celebrating what was once unthinkable: LGBT couples marrying in the conservative bastion of Utah, making it the 18th state where same-sex couples can wed. This victory comes on the heels of marriage equality in New Mexico, highlighting incredible momentum towards fair and equitable legal treatment of […]

Just over a year ago, the General Services Administration (GSA) asked for ideas on where to relocate the FBI headquarters, currently housed in downtown D.C. in the outdated Hoover Building. This presented a major opportunity for Virginia. For the past year, our congressional delegation, local and state officials, the McDonnell […]

Many, many passionate, abundantly Biblically-cited sermons, teachings and theological treatises permeated the American south for hundreds of years arguing that slavery and racial discrimination represented God’s order of creation. There were many Biblical passages about “slaves being obedient to their masters,” and similar things, cited to strengthen such cases. No […]

We can thank Saddam Hussein for contributing the saying “mother of” to the English language when he declared that any attack on Iraq would result in the “mother of all battles.” When applied to the peak oil story, “mother of all bubbles” fits nicely into the times in which we […]

Some years ago, I was fascinated by a story that branched between the United States and Russia, the story of 10 spies leading relatively inconspicuous lives in New York and New Jersey who worked for the Russian government. Like much of the country, I was glued to any news I […]