by jpitney | Dec 13, 2019 | Deliberation, Internet, Polarization, Social Media, Viewpoint Diversity
Samuel J. Abrams at AEI: Despite statements by Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg that he was changing the mission of his company to “bring the world closer together,” data from the recent AEI survey on Community and Society make it abundantly clear that social...
by jpitney | Dec 12, 2019 | Civility, Congress, Deliberation, Technology
Recommendations of the Select Committee on the Modernization of Congress: Making Congress More Effective, Efficient and Transparent Streamline the bill-writing process to save time and reduce mistakes. Finalize a new system that allows the American people to...
by jpitney | Dec 11, 2019 | Civility
Columnist Mary Sanchez: The point of civility is not to keep the boat steady. In his “Letter From a Birmingham Jail,” Martin Luther King Jr. warned of the pitfalls of decorum, pointedly cautioning against “the white moderate, who is more devoted to ‘order’ than to...
by jpitney | Dec 10, 2019 | Congress, Technology, Uncategorized
Samantha McDonald and Melissa Mazmanian at LegBranch.org: Currently, uses of technology in Congress are preventing citizens from meaningfully engaging with their policymakers. Technologies such as constituent databases provide helpful tools for collecting, storing,...
by jpitney | Dec 9, 2019 | Journalism, Uncategorized
Barbara Cochran, president of the Fallen Journalists Memorial Foundation, at The Lansing State Journal: Journalists relentlessly pursue the truth in order to provide citizens with the information they need to be self-governing. And yet, for journalists, doing that...
by jpitney | Dec 8, 2019 | Congress, Dreier, Freedom of Press, Journalism, Uncategorized
Nelson Oliveira at The New York Daily News: Washington, D.C., is home to numerous memorials and monuments honoring Americans who have sacrificed their lives for the country. But the U.S. capital lacks a permanent memorial dedicated to those who were killed while...
by jpitney | Dec 7, 2019 | Civility, Education, Uncategorized
Thomas Gift and Andrew Miner at the Wall Street Journal: After the 2016 election, students from two high schools—one in Chicago and the other in rural Wisconsin—took turns visiting each other. The field trips were designed to help students understand each other’s...
by jpitney | Dec 6, 2019 | Congress, Science, Uncategorized
From the House Science Committee: EXPERTS NEEDED: OPTIONS FOR IMPROVED SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY ADVICE FOR CONGRESS DATE: THURSDAY, DECEMBER 5, 2019 OPENING STATMENT Chairwoman Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX) WITNESSES The Honorable Michael McCord, Director, Civil-Military...
by jpitney | Dec 4, 2019 | Civility, Public Opinion, Uncategorized
A June report from Weber Shandwick: The latest installment of Civility in America, an annual poll conducted by Weber Shandwick and Powell Tate, in partnership with KRC Research, once again finds that the majority of Americans perceive incivility to be a problem in our...
by jpitney | Dec 3, 2019 | Civility, Congress, Reagan, Social Security
At LegBranch,com, Philip A. Wallach recalls the “Gang of Nine” negotiations that led to the rescue of Social Security in the early 1980s. Nine was a small enough number to allow absolute secrecy in negotiations, as well as an intimate setting, in the home...
