Politics

KRAVITZ’S KORNER | The GOP’s Perilous Gamble on Trump

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If there was ever a time for the Republican Party to regret nominating Donald Trump, it would be now. The Washington Post’s release of video tapes that include Trump’s abhorrent remarks about women in 2005 underscore not only his immoral character, but also his weakness as a candidate. And following the second presidential debate, there is little sign that Trump is going to change the tone of his campaign. According to Election Betting Odds, a website that uses political betting markets to compute odds, Trump’s current chance at winning the election hovers at an abysmal 16 percent, down from 26 percent from before the video tapes were released, and down from 36 percent from before the first presidential debate. It’s safe to say that Trump would get crushed if the election were held tomorrow.

Politics

THE PERSONAL IS POLITICAL | I’ma Let You Finish, but Stop Interrupting Women

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Remember 2009 when Kanye West interrupted Taylor Swift at the VMAs and we all laughed and it either made you love Kanye or hate Kanye?  It’s probably the most familiar example of a pervasive cultural phenomenon: manterrupting.  If you’re a man, you’ve probably done it; if you’re a woman, you’ve probably experienced it.  It’s an insidious social occurrence that emboldens men to speak over women and silences women from speaking up for fear of being perceived as too outspoken.  It dictates all spheres of discourse, from the workplace to academia, from popular culture to the political arena.

Politics

WELCOME TO THE ZOO | The Gender Wage Gap

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With an open mind and two sides of the story, you’re bound to learn something new. Welcome to the zoo! This is a blog where both the Republican and Democratic viewpoints are represented. The blog is not meant to sway you either way necessarily, just to present both sides of the story. You may not agree with the whole article, but hey, you’re likely to agree with half!

Politics

KRAVITZ’S KORNER | Due Process Matters

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Immediately following the death of Keith Lamont Scott, protesters had come to the incontrovertible conclusion that the police officer who shot the 43-year-old African American man in Charlotte, North Carolina had clear racist motivations. Violent protests and riots erupted in Charlotte, forcing the North Carolina governor to declare a state of emergency. A similar string of events happened in Ferguson, Missouri in 2014 after police officer Darren Wilson fatally shot Michael Brown, an 18-year-old African American man. Following the incident, the media was convinced that race played a key role in the death of Brown. Sensing that the government was granting Wilson impunity, protesters and rioters took to the streets and turned an otherwise ordinary U.S. city into a virtual war zone.

Politics

OUTSIDE THE MAINSTREAM | We Need to Look at Prisons

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There are some places where the eyes of the press rarely go. Maybe it is because they do not care. Maybe it is because they cannot. Yet this lack of a gaze has left a large blind spot in coverage, which may allow some truly terrible things to continue to happen. The United States has more people in prison than any country in the world.

Politics

BETWEEN BARS | Unlock the Vote

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The one-hour car ride back to Cornell from Auburn Prison is a time for tutors to talk about how the night went. On my last trip, a few of the tutors in my car observed a voting poster inside a classroom. They found its presence ironic: after all, felons can’t vote. According to New York state law, no one who is currently incarcerated or on parole can vote. With the election less than two months away, efforts to register voters are ever present on Cornell’s campus.

Politics

MCEVOY MINUTE | To Millennials Considering the Protest Vote

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If you are like many college students, you probably find that you have barely enough time to complete your class work, let alone follow the news everyday. In case you have managed to avoid a newspaper since you came to campus in August, I am here with some potentially bad news: Hillary Clinton has lost the solid lead in the polls that she maintained towards the end of the summer. Nate Silver, the famed statistician of FiveThirtyEight, currently has Clinton’s chance of winning the election at only 55.8%, while a month ago he predicted her chance of winning at 80.9%. Furthermore, Donald Trump seems to be gaining more momentum in key battleground states like Florida and Ohio — both of which Silver predicted would vote for Clinton in August and now predicts will go to Trump. However, Clinton still has time to come back from her bumpy September.

Politics

NOBODY’S OPINIONS | Trump Killed the First Debate

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I have to hand it to Donald J. Trump, he truly is a genius in ways I never thought anyone could ever be. The man was amazing in the first debate! He handed Hillary such a thorough defeat (almost on a platter) that I was for a time left totally speechless by the content of his answers. Where to start? I suppose at the beginning, though Trump’s opener was kind of lacklustre; at the start of the debate Trump abandoned his usual assertive, confident demeanor in favor of a more restrained, presidential look.

Politics

THE PERSONAL IS POLITICAL | Dear Undecided Voter

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Dear Undecided Voter,

Hey, I hope you’re doing well.  I am not going to make this too long, because I get it, we’re all busy people.  I just want to have a little chat. This is for all of you citizens out there who still haven’t made the ultimate choice: Trump or Clinton?  You have your different reasons — some of you view yourselves as “independents” and would rather vote third party, some of you are just postponing what you perceive to be a choice between the “lesser of two evils” and some of you just feel so frustrated with our democracy and the way that this presidential election season has unfolded that you aren’t going to vote at all.

Politics

POLITICS & STUFF | Three Years Later: My Reflection and Frustrations with Public Forum Debate

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My high school years were defined by my participation in public forum debate. PF is a two-on-two debate format that encourages discussion on current controversies such as gun control, education reform and constitutionality. While I am extremely grateful for the critical forums of discourse provided through the activity, PF debate, from my experience, was a shitshow of sexism, classism, ableism and overall privilege that hid behind the feel-good notions of intellectual discourse and academic exploration. It was also an incubator for frustration against the exclusivity and elitism that runs rampant in this activity. Not only did the coaching fees, travel and hotel fees, and even attire actively exclude students not financially well-off, a multitude of damning biases and prejudices run under the radar.