NYTimes: Essay: No Face, but Plants Like Life Too

Is it more "right" to kill and eat plants than it is to kill and eat animals? Essay: No Face, but Plants Like Life Too: "Vegetable behavior, and other ruminations on what we kill so we can eat. "

Ferlazzo: “Equality, a True Soul Food”

Equality, a True Soul Food is a piece by New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof. It’s on income equality.

I’m adding it to The Best Resources About Wealth & Income Inequality — Help Me Create A Simple Lesson Plan Using Them.

NYTimes - Bob Herbert on Problems in America

Hiding From Reality

The nation is in denial about the true extent of its problems, from the economy to the deficits to the wars overseas.

NOVEMBER 19, 2010

NYTimes - Charles M. Blow Op Ed on Race

Let’s Rescue the Race Debate

A new poll suggests that most white conservatives believe that discrimination against whites has become as big a problem as discrimination against blacks. Where’s the proof?

NOVEMBER 19, 2010

NYTimes - America's History of Fear

I really like this column from Nicholas Kristof describing the bias / persecution against various groups of Americans over time.

America’s History of Fear

By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF

Hysteria about Islam is but a modern echo of past American worries about Catholics, Jews and others.

September 4, 2010

NYTimes - "Moonshine or the Kids?"

Nicholas Kristof Op-Ed:

Moonshine or the Kids?

On the annual win-a-trip journey, finding families without enough money to pay school fees, but with plenty for booze and cigarettes.

May 23, 2010

NYTimes - Kristof on Modern Slavery

Links to several op-eds from Nicholas Kristof starting with a series from early 2004 and then some...

Girls For Sale

One thinks of slavery as an evil confined to musty sepia photographs. But there are 21st-century versions of slaves as well, girls like Srey Neth, here in northwestern Cambodia.

January 17, 2004OPINIONOP-ED

Bargaining For Freedom

Srey Neth and Srey Mom were stunned when I proposed buying their freedom from their brothel owners.

January 21, 2004OPINIONOP-ED

Going Home, With Hope

As we bounced along rural Cambodian roads, the two teenage prostitutes I had just purchased told me how they had come to be 21st-century slaves.

January 24, 2004OPINIONOP-ED

Loss of Innocence

Four years of sexual servitude had shattered Srey Mom's spirit and left her with no real family, other than the brothel owner she called ''Mother.''

January 28, 2004OPINIONOP-ED

Stopping The Traffickers

Buying sex slaves and freeing them is not a long-term solution. It helps individuals but risks creating incentives for other girls to be kidnapped into servitude.

January 31, 2004OPINIONOP-ED

Seduction, Slavery and Sex

A trio of best-selling Swedish novels, along with legislation, are shining a light on human trafficking and prostitution.

July 15, 2010

NYT Upfront - "Should cell phones be banned in school?"

Should cell phones be banned in school?

As schools across the country grapple with cell-phone policies, New York City's strict ban has everyone talking 

YES
As a former New York City public-school teacher, I can tell you that cell phones don't belong in the classroom. A student with a cell phone is an uninterested student, one with a short attention span who cares more about socializing than education.

When I was teaching, all too often I turned around from writing something on the blackboard to find students text-messaging or otherwise playing with their phones...

—Jesse Scaccia

Former English teacher, Franklin D. Roosevelt High School, Brooklyn, N.Y.

NO
Schools make rules to facilitate a quality education in a respectful and safe environment. Cell phones are a distraction in classrooms and have no place there. I support rules banning their use—by students and staff—in the classroom.

But cell phones should not be banned from students' possession entirely, because that is, in effect, not allowing students to have cell phones while traveling to and from school...

.

—Elizabeth Lorris Ritter
Parent, Bronx High School of Science, New York 

NYT Upfront - "Should public schools offer single-sex education?"

The number of single-sex classrooms in public schools is growing; there are now more than 400

YES
For more than 100 years, some of the nation's finest private schools have experienced the benefits of single-sex education. It's time to make this choice broadly available in our public schools...

—Kathy Piechura-Couture 

Prof. of Education, Stetson University, Deland, Fla.

NO
Single-sex education is not the answer to the challenges facing public schools.

First and foremost, we believe that creating separate classes for girls and boys violates the Constitution as well as federal and state laws designed to guarantee that all public-school students are offered equal opportunities...

—Kim Gandy
President, National Organization for Women

NYT Upfront - "Should Candy and Soda Be Banned from Schools?"

President Obama has proposed removing high-calorie drinks and snacks from school vending machines

YES
Removing unhealthy high-calorie snacks and drinks from schools is an important step toward tackling the nation's childhood obesity epidemic.

About a third of American children are overweight or obese. Addressing that problem requires changing what kids eat in school, where many kids consume half of their daily calories.

Reforming our school meals program will ensure that all foods served in schools are healthy and nutritious. By setting standards for the food that is served and sold in cafeterias, we can make sure our children have the opportunity for a healthy start in life...

Tom Vilsack
U.S. Secretary of Agriculture

NO
It's not the government's job to make decisions about what we eat and where we eat it. That's why it's a bad idea to ban soda and candy from schools...

J. Justin Wilson
Center for Consumer Freedom

(The New York Times Upfront, Vol. 142, May 10, 2010)

Op-Ed Contributor - Unsafe at Any Meal - NYTimes.com

Op-Ed Contributor - Unsafe at Any Meal - NYTimes.com

By ERIC SCHLOSSER

Will the Senate act to protect Americans from food-borne illnesses?

July 24, 2010

Op-Ed Contributor - Shirley Sherrod and Me - NYTimes.com

Op-Ed Contributor - Shirley Sherrod and Me - NYTimes.com

Living through information-age maelstroms.

July 24, 2010

Op-Ed Columnist - Tweet Less, Kiss More - NYTimes.com

Op-Ed Columnist - Tweet Less, Kiss More - NYTimes.com

Bob Herbert encourages us to listen to the sounds of silence and reconnect with our humanity in a classic technology vs. soul argument.

Op-Ed Columnist - Miami’s Hoops Cartel - NYTimes.com

Op-Ed Columnist - Miami’s Hoops Cartel - NYTimes.com
Maureen Dowd on Lebronathon