Presidents and prime ministers aren’t just anyone. They are chosen by a nation’s citizens or their parties to lead. They are often popular, sometimes revered. So judicial proceedings against them are inevitably perceived as political and become divisive.
The Conversation
Trump’s Indictment and the Presidential Race
The Constitution does not require that the president be free from indictment, conviction or prison. But an indictment, conviction or both – let alone a prison sentence – would significantly compromise a president’s ability to function in office. The Constitution doesn’t provide an easy answer to the problem posed by such a compromised chief executive.
Against Baseball’s New Pitch Clock
The Major League Baseball executives who restlessly tinker with the rules in an effort to speed up the game are doing so less as its reliable custodians and more as marketers. Why else would they have adopted the new pitch clock rule?
Body Language Books Get It Wrong
Reading body language can be a useful skill in understanding how someone is feeling or what they might be thinking. But it’s important to remember that it’s not an exact science and there can be cultural or individual variations in how people express themselves through body language.
George W. Bush’s Promise of Democracy in Iraq, 20 Years On
While Iraq today has a constitution, a parliament and holds regular elections, the country struggles both with popular legitimacy and with practical aspects of governance, such as providing basic education for children. In 2023, Freedom House continues to score Iraq as “Not Free” in its measure of democracy.
Woke’s Potential Despite the Culture War’s Mercenaries
Open-ended terms like woke can evolve over time to symbolize more than their creators could have ever imagined. Words used ambiguously and in excess can eventually become meaningless. They can even experience semantic bleaching. This is when words lose their meaning through repeated and varied usage.
‘Salam, Ramadan Mubarak!’: 4 Ways Schools Can Bring Ramadan Into the Classroom
As Muslims begin observing Ramadan, it’s a good time to consider the importance of building a strong sense of belonging at school. Affirming the identities of Muslim students and all minoritized and racialized learners is a way of creating a positive classroom culture.
Why the Bitter Reaction to the Coretta and Martin Luther King Jr. Sculpture?
Despite the intended show of mutual affection between Coretta and Martin Luther King Jr., two of the most revered civil rights leaders in modern American history, many of the tweets shared on national news feeds after the unveiling were crude and misinterpreted arms for other body parts.
Should the U.S. Ban TikTok? Can It?
Banning TikTok on work-provided phones is one thing. A full ban of the app is another matter, which raises a number of questions: What data privacy risk does TikTok pose? What could the Chinese government do with data collected by the app? Is its content recommendation algorithm dangerous? And is it even possible to ban an app?
In Congress, Civility Is Increasingly Out of Order
A growing list of norm-breaking events away from a long tradition of decorum and civility are coloring how the GOP-controlled House, during the 118th Congress, is conducting business.