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Vaccine mandates have always faced resistance and saved lives
Vaccine hesitancy is not new. It has been around for as long as there have been vaccines. It is born out of the most basic and rational thought one can have about life and health: “Do the benefits outweigh the risks?”
Opinion: How a Supreme Court decision limiting access to abortion could harm economy
Michele Gilman, University of Baltimore For The Conversation The Supreme Court on Dec. 1, 2021, heard oral arguments in a case that may result in a ruling that overturns Roe v. Wade. But reproductive health isn’t just about abortions, despite all the attention the procedures get. It’s also about access to family planning services, contraception, […]
‘Hunker down’ is not enough: 2021 hurricane season showed US isn’t prepared
Marina Lazetic, Tufts University and Karen Jacobsen, Tufts University for The Conversation Hurricane Ida hit New Orleans on Aug. 29, 2021, 16 years to the day after Hurricane Katrina flooded the city. This time the levees held. Billions of dollars invested in reinforcing them had paid off – at least for part of the population. […]
After storms batter Louisiana’s parishes, Black women lead the way in picking up the pieces
By Candice Norwood Originally published by The 19th Ida, Zeta, Laura, Gustav, Rita: Each hurricane that barrels through Louisiana triggers for residents memories of Hurricane Katrina, the most expensive natural disaster in U.S. history. The storm brought national attention to governmental failures leading up to and following the crisis and led to congressional hearings and […]
Flooding could shut down one-quarter of America’s critical infrastructure
By Jena Brooker of Grist Flooding is already the most expensive natural disaster in the United States, costing the country more than $1 trillion in damages since 1980. And it’s only getting worse due to climate change. A quarter of all critical infrastructure in the United States, 36,000 facilities including airports, utilities, and hospitals, is at […]
New Orleans’ jail made him sick. Angola’s medical treatment killed him.
Editor’s note: This commentary contains a graphic description of a person’s suffering and death. By Lois Ratcliff as told to Jamiles Lartey I spent 40 years working in healthcare, mostly as a certified nursing assistant, taking care of elderly and infirmed patients. I watched many people that I had spent years caring for as their health […]
Republicans are just fine with cancel culture when it comes to their own Trump critics | John A. Tures
By John A. Tures Earlier this year, the Conservative Political Action Committee (CPAC) held a conference titled “American Uncanceled.” Organizers attempted to showcase how their political opponents are the intolerant, and that conservatives were the true defenders of the ability to speak their minds. But what would happen when House Republicans would vote on a […]
Going the way of the Whigs: Zachary Taylor and the current political crisis
by Keith Edgerton for the Daily Montanan Lost in the avalanche of images that has bombarded us since this month’s Capitol insurrection, was one of a small, blood-smeared, white marble bust of our 12th president, Zachary Taylor. Perhaps like many Americans you slept through history class when the course breezed through that brief sixteen-month period when […]
Let’s not get fooled again: Fight the lies by learning to recognize the truth
by Kathie Obradovich, Iowa Capital Dispatch January 11, 2021 We have a crisis of credulity in this country. We’ve become a nation of dupes. The inability of far too many Americans to separate fact from fantasy, and the people who are eager to take advantage of that failure, are the root of the rot in […]
We’ve got to talk to our children about Wednesday’s attack on the U.S. Capitol
By Victor Jones My 6-year-old daughter had trouble sleeping Wednesday night, and was unable to say why. Just like me, my daughter is highly sensitive and intuitive to the energies surrounding us. We both can innately tell when something is off. On Thursday, she gave voice to her intuition. “Daddy, something is wrong,” she said. […]
Monument to segregationist E.D. White should be removed, not placed next to Chief Justice Bernette Johnson’s museum
Guest column by Okyeame Haley On Saturday, Jan 2., in true pandemic fashion, admirers of Chief Justice Bernette Joshua Johnson drove around the Louisiana Supreme Court building in New Orleans’ French Quarter to honor her retirement as the first African-American woman on the Louisiana Supreme Court and the first African-American chief justice. I was happy […]
There are good reasons Black people don’t trust health institutions, but I still got the vaccine
By Maurice Sholas, M.D., Ph.D. “To make people trust, you need to become trustworthy…. I think if…communities were engaged in conversation… people would know: ‘You are hearing me, you are respecting my right to ask questions and get a legitimate answer. So now let me make up my own mind’…. If we approach it […]