by jpitney | Feb 22, 2021 | Civility, Polarization, Uncategorized
J.D. Tuccille at Reason: “Political polarization is having far-reaching impacts on American life, harming consumer welfare and creating challenges for people ranging from elected officials and policymakers to corporate executives and marketers,” according...
by jpitney | Feb 20, 2021 | Civility, Polarization
From Arkansas State Senator Jim Hendren: I’m here to talk to you today about something that has been weighing heavy on my heart and mind for some time now. And the time has come for me to address it publicly. Like so many of you, I look around at our country today and...
by jpitney | Feb 5, 2021 | Civility, Polarization
Aversive partisanship (aka negative partisanship) is a threat to civility and civil society. Maggie Koerth and Amelia Thomson-DeVeaux at FiveThirtyEight: Four years ago, Lilliana Mason learned something she really, really hoped wasn’t true. A political scientist who...
by jpitney | Feb 1, 2021 | Biden, Civic Education, civic virtue, Civility, Deliberation, Democracy, Polarization
A release from the University of Virginia Center for Politics Responding to President Joe Biden’s inaugural request to end the “uncivil war” in America, the University of Virginia Center for Politics is launching a yearlong national Civility Project in an effort to...
by jpitney | Jan 24, 2021 | civic virtue, Civility, Democracy, Polarization, Religion
David French: On January 15, Hunter Baker, the dean of arts and sciences at Union University—a Baptist college not far from me in Jackson, Tennessee—did something exceedingly rare in our highly polarized time. He published an apology. In an essay in Public Discourse,...
by jpitney | Jan 21, 2021 | civic virtue, Congress, Constitution, Democracy, Elections, Electoral College, History, Polarization, US Constitution
The national anthem has seldom resonated as much as it did when Lady Gaga emphasized the words “our flag was still there” and pointed to the flag on the capitol which had been attacked just a fortnight earlier. It was all balm for America’s wounded soul....