Nelson's Rum
Guns, Migrations, and Jails
The usual culprits are present: the laxity of federal, state and local gun laws and the need for more enforcement of existing laws. In the case of Boston, a recent policy brief from the Harvard Kennedy School’s Rappaport Institute for Greater Boston gives some idea of the scope of the problem. According to the report, of 3,202 handguns recovered by the Boston Police between 2007 and 2013, the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms was able to trace 1,813. Of those, almost a quarter came from five southern states along I-95 with weaker gun laws than the Commonwealth’s—yet another clear signal of the need for federal action. In addition, about 18 percent of the traced guns came from New Hampshire and Maine, also states with weaker gun laws, and 22.3 percent came from states other than those. Gun violence, the statistics make clear, is a national problem that demands a national solution.
Tricky Dick and HRC
As the Clinton campaign has rightly pointed out, the whole debate about the former Secretary of State’s handling of classified material ignores the confused and ridiculous way in which the United States government decides whether a document should become classified in the first place. Given the poor protocols in place, making political hay out of the issue is inappropriate and a distraction from graver issues of policy.
Thinking Productively About History
A recent editorial in the New York Times entitled “How Racism Doomed Baltimore” perfectly encapsulates this sense. When the Times’ editorial board writes “racism,” it is referring not only to an attitude, but also to a decades-long historical process by which cities like Baltimore became as segregated as they are today, with all the implications for educational and economic opportunity that segregation entails. The current conflicts tearing apart the Islamic world have far older antecedents, in bitter divisions from periods of religious ferment over a millennium ago.
Sit-Ins, Then and Now
Harvard has a long history of activism and civil disobedience, stretching back at least to Henry David Thoreau, class of 1837. In particular, Divest Harvard’s sit-in at Massachusetts Hall was reminiscent of two earlier episodes in the University’s history: the 1969 occupation of University Hall by students protesting the Vietnam War, and the 2001 occupation of Mass. Hall by students seeking a living wage for Harvard’s workers.
When Will Girls Run the World?
Next up was the Kentucky Senator himself, whose announcement drew merciless criticism from Jon Stewart for the large numbers of warm-up speakers that preceded it. Here, the funniest moment was undoubtedly when one such speaker exhorted to the crowd “to elect Rand Paul as the next United States of America.”
