A momentous clash between North Carolina’s General Assembly and the state’s judicial system looks to be coming to a head. At stake is the ability of the state’s public schools to meet the needs of all students – specifically, those students who live in communities where the proper financing of schools can be an overwhelming challenge.
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Other Voices
It’s been just over a week since the last U.S. troops flew out of the Kabul airport in Afghanistan, ending our 20-year war with the Taliban. It was the longest war in U.S. history — some called it “America’s forgotten war” — but the 24-hour news cycle has already turned its attention to other stories...
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Americans like to say we don’t leave Americans behind. We don’t abandon people to be oppressed and victimized by a bunch of gun-toting yahoo zealots who hate freedom and hate science and think they have a direct line to God. So, when do we start evacuating women and girls from Texas?
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Good policy choices drive down poverty. We have to keep moving forward on that So what can the plight of a little cafe tell you about the state of the American economy and the changing face of work? A lot, as it turns out. The other week, the bistro where my family and I have been grabbing brunch every Sunday since the start of the pandemic announced that....
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Behind the headlines of COVID-19 deaths, the story of North Carolina’s drastic increase in fatal drug overdoses has gone largely untold During the COVID-19 pandemic, our country has been on a terrifying roller coaster ride of experiencing COVID deaths and hospitalizations with dizzying falls, drops and catastrophic rises.
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National Memorial for Peace and Justice documents our nation's troubled racial history MONTGOMERY, AL. — You walk out of the fierce summer sun into a shadowy forest of rectangular steel columns, row upon row of them, six or seven feet tall, covered in rust the color of dried blood. It takes a minute to adjust to the dim light.
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The coronavirus – now rekindled in a “pandemic of the unvaccinated” – is forcing us yet again to adjust our daily routines and recalibrate our expectations of normalcy. Even people who got their shots early and thought they were in the clear are finding they need to keep their masks handy.
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I am angry. You are angry. Hell, the entire nation is angry. But what makes this such a challenging time is that we are not all angry about the same things. I am angry that we have developed vaccines that dramatically prevent the spread of COVID, but that in much of the country, the vaccine itself is treated as if it were the plague.
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Though we are only halfway through 2021, this has already been the most catastrophic year for reproductive freedom in the United States since 1973 when Roe v. Wade established the constitutional right to an abortion. Eight states have passed unconstitutional abortion bans, and two, Oklahoma and Arkansas, have passed laws that seek to prohibit abortion in nearly all circumstances.
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While state leaders idle, thousands remain stuck on waiting list for decades A few weeks ago, I felt devastated when I read about the death of Ruby Loftin. Ruby was a beloved community member, sister, and daughter who died at age 64 after waiting in line (unsuccessfully) for more than 19 years to receive services...
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On a sunny Wednesday a little over a month ago, my 7-year-old daughter bravely held my hand as we walked into Children’s Mercy Hospital in Kansas City to participate in a pediatric vaccine trial. After a numbing agent, a blood draw and a nasal swab, she was finally injected with either a placebo or the first dose of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine.
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Experts from four different national nonprofits (the Brennan Center for for Justice, Protect Democracy, Fair Fight Action and States United Action) came together last week at an online panel discussion to examine the latest worrisome trend in undermining democracy: illegitimate election recounts.
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Limitations of government record keeping, journalism conventions likely helping to obscure the true impact of COVID-19 on migrant communities It’s long been established that agricultural workplaces are among the nation’s most dangerous. The latest census on fatal occupational injuries by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that...
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University boards of trustees hold considerable power over the institutions they govern, but get attention only when they’re hiring a new president or if there is a crisis. Yet, increasingly boards aren’t navigating or mediating crises – they are creating them. On June 30, after deliberating in a closed session, the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill Board of Trustees voted 9-4 to grant journalist, MacArthur Fellowship recipient and Pulitzer Prize winner Nikole Hannah-Jones tenure.
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Veteran civil rights attorney explains why the General Assembly must comply with a court order to adequately fund public education Recently, state Superior Court Judge David Lee issued the latest order in the Leandro v. State lawsuit. The judge directed the state to remedy the longstanding violation of the constitutional right of North Carolina public school children to a “sound basic education” ...
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