While teaching a class this past semester in Mississippi Government and Politics I raised the question as to who were Andrew Goodman, Michael Schwerner and James Chaney. Only three of 30 students had ever heard of them. While I will admit to struggling with the process of adapting to my age relative to college students [...] [...]
Here we go again. With jobs and the economy clearly at the forefront of the issues troubling the average American, Congress is determined to descend into the fevered swamp of healthcare reform. What will be the political impact for Republicans? Just last week a CBS News/New York Times poll revealed that 43 percent of those [...] [...]
Many will remember the almost unbelievable story of perhaps the most famous Christmas truce ever. It was during World War I on the battlefields of Flanders. In that winter of 1914 what has been described as one of the most unusual events in human history occurred. Is it possible that we could have a similar [...] [...]
There is yet another thing for which we must give the Tea Party movement credit. It has played a role in making Constitutional scholars out of everyday working folk. Recently I have come across everyone from the auto mechanic to the curb store clerk who have in a heightened state of agitation and in a [...] [...]
The implications of the 2010 mid-term elections are still evolving. What has become clear at this juncture is that there is more at stake in the 2012 Presidential elections than we have witnessed in several generations. For starters, the Democrats were somewhat isolated from a disaster in the United States Senate similar to the firestorm [...] [...]
The time for spirited campaign rhetoric and stinging one-liners is over. The image makers have done their jobs, and with the Republican electoral hurricane as proof the Tea Party can rightfully claim to have made good on its threats to come to Washington in hopes of “taking back the government.” However, it has been an [...] [...]

Hardly a week goes by when I am not approached by someone with the invitation to speculate on what the late great Mississippi Sen. John C. Stennis would think about today’s political environment. It usually starts with a question like, “Wonder what Senator Stennis would do if he were still in Washington and witnessed the [...] [...]
More than a few policy experts have speculated on education-related problems as being one of the prime reasons why there have been delays in corporate investments in additional employees — even as un-obligated surpluses continue to mount in the coffers of these corporations. Former President Bill Clinton, for one, stated recently that companies that lost [...] [...]
The current political season surrounding the 2010 mid-term elections continues to amaze in so many ways. Mid-term congressional elections are, more often than not, sustenance for the appetites of perpetual political junkies. This is true even though they often embody major changes in the direction of Congress based on the frustrations of a restless electorate. [...] [...]
The annual rhetorical outburst that is fast becoming customary during the sweltering month of August has certainly served as the impetus for more than a few moments of reflection. Perhaps the highlight this year was conservative commentator Glenn Beck’s dusting off of the spot where Dr. Martin Luther King made his classic “I Have a [...] [...]