16 items found for your search. If no results were found please broaden your search.
(11/19/15 2:47am)
In light of the terrorist attacks in Paris, conservative America chomped at the bit to try and use the tragedy to rationalize why we shouldn’t invite Syrian refugees into our nation. Without waiting for all of the details of the horrific event to come out (including the fact that the attacks were primarily executed by European nationals), conservatives had already made up their minds that opening our country to refugees is to invite the Islamic State to our doorstep.
(10/15/15 2:48am)
Last night at the first Democratic debate, we had an opportunity to see what the potential nominees for the Democratic Party’s presidential candidacy were good for, and what their weak points were. Lincoln Chafee, the former governor of Rhode Island, was immediately outed for his spotty party affiliations and records, and was even grilled by CNN anchor Wolf Blitzer later on when he planned on ending his “futile” presidential bid. Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton each caught flak for their actions, statements and past voting records, but came out without significant damage. Slow-talking Martin O’Malley had the heat turned up on him for his emotional appeals and lack of serious answers regarding the delicate state of Baltimore due to recent civil unrest. However, former Sen. Jim Webb suffered less for his unique stances and speaking style at the hands of debators than he did later at the hands of social media users.
(10/14/15 5:03am)
As far as I know, there’s no class here at UW that teaches students about current events or day-to-day politics in election cycles, and for good reason. The job of a professor is not to indoctrinate specific beliefs or views into their students, but rather give them the tools and skills to form their own opinions. However, when students are left with very little in terms of political socialization outside of what they’ve always grown up with in terms of mainstream media from broadcast channels, newspapers and social media, certain events and political figures are often overlooked in lieu of what is reported on the most.
(09/22/15 3:56am)
In the past week, there has been an influx of headlines shaming and indicting various corporations, business owners and other major or minor players in the world of commerce. To rattle off a couple, a bar was forced to compensate a woman for needing surgery after ingesting a liquid nitrogen shot, and a deposed peanut company owner is being sentenced to 28 years for conspiracy involved in the death of nine people from products tainted with salmonella. It seems like businesses everywhere can’t catch a break for their malfeasances.
(09/15/15 3:48am)
To label Wisconsin as anything other than a party school is considered a slight to most Badgers. A year after taking my nervous first steps onto this campus, I’m still trying to wrap my head around how, in all my hours of research and determination on what university would be my home for the next four years, I skipped over this glaring detail. I got caught up in the trees of fantastic programs such as student research, Badger athletic programs, and the Wisconsin Idea, that I failed to notice the actual forest of student life on campus. Within this year, I continue to struggle reconciling my perceived image of Wisconsin and what it actually wound up being like, as well as reconciling scholastics and the heavy social aspect on here on campus.
(09/10/15 2:32am)
I may be not much of a spiritual person, but one of the most profound experiences of my life was behind the wheel of a 1999 Toyota Highlander on the road from Madison to Florida for spring break. In a 24-hour period, I spent half that time behind the wheel, and the rest talking to my fellow passengers, bickering with other members of our collegiate caravan or attempting to get some uncomfortable sleep. We made the return trip about five days later, with similar distributions of fitful rest and bloodshot-eyed driving.
(09/08/15 2:13am)
As long as fashion trends have existed, there have been movements that took hold of the general public that are looked back upon with embarrassed laughter. Those who never partook in things like bell-bottoms and Ed Hardy smugly affirmed their biases against them when they fell from grace, and everyone moved on with their lives. Today, that stupid fashion trend is Birkenstock sandals, and I will be the one calling them for what they are—ugly, childish and highly overrated, to say the least. Let me take you on a journey where I describe what’s wrong with these overhyped crimes against humanity.
(09/01/15 11:57pm)
Nothing manages to draw as many chuckles as it does frowns as the infamous ‘dad bod.’ Quietly entering the lexicon of college students everywhere last year, it is used to describe a blanket body-type that bridges the gap between the guy with a beer gut who discovered the gym a few months back. The idea of the dad bod is a fun topic of debate at parties, and it seems like I hear a new reason to love it or hate it every time the term comes up. Now that the steam behind a new member of the repertoire of college slang has died down, I felt the time was ripe to finally take a critical look at this phenomenon.
(07/16/15 6:00am)
Think back to the last time somebody said or did something that got under your skin. Whether they did it intentionally or unintentionally, it happened, and it got your blood boiling. Now, I want you to imagine that, no matter how scathing or hurtful whatever that person said or did to you, it’s no longer okay for you to be upset by it. You can have a straw to suck it up. This is the reality people who don’t goose-step to the beat of the conservative drum must face, and it needs to change.
(04/30/15 3:40am)
I sometimes wonder at night just what America could accomplish if we diverted all of the manpower spent viciously and unflinchingly defending the actions of police, or jumping at the chance to criticize the protests of black lives that make the evening news. I have not seen a more dedicated, faithful and active group of people on social media (less so in person) than people who seek to justify the actions of law enforcement officers. At best, and at worst, they seek to denigrate the position of anyone protesting or questioning the case. I don’t see people willing to have a dialogue about the frustration between blacks and the American justice system, I see people demanding the cessation of the one thing that an oppressed minority have to get the attention of the disinterested majority.
(04/28/15 5:08am)
A fire’s burning in Oregon, but this runaway blaze was far from somebody failing to dump water on a campsite’s smoldering coals. There’s an armed standoff between the Bureau of Land Management and the owners of the Sugar Pine Mine over who owns the rights to the land it is on. However, instead of being content with the legal system or taking to news outlets to share their story, the owners of Sugar Pine have called in organizations such as The Three Percenters Club, Oath Keepers and the Arizona State Militia to have a standoff with law enforcement officials.
(04/16/15 3:56am)
As college students, we came to Madison to further our education and take that critical step to join the workforce. The benefits of a college degree are irrefutable, and going to college is about as culturally ingrained as apple pie and baseball here in America.
(03/26/15 6:00am)
It seems I can’t go a week without hearing something about “living naturally.” While it isn’t as common in Wisconsin, this health craze of looking toward our ancestors and their lifestyle habits and choices is all but unavoidable on the West Coast. However, I do see the slow creep of this movement in UW-Madison’s student population, and it must be stopped. I see toe shoes, ketogenic Paleo diets, functional strength training a la CrossFit and all affiliated acts as a faddish response for middle-aged men tired of the weekly spin class their significant others force them to attend. This group of ideals would almost be tolerable, and even respectable, if its proponents were not some of the most annoying people you’ll meet on planet Earth, but since they are, I feel its my job to pick apart what’s driving these fads forward.
(03/24/15 6:21am)
With NCAA March Madness at a lull until Sweet 16 play begins Thursday, now is as good a time as ever to discuss the state of NCAA athletics. Setting aside the human factor of student-athletes and coaches engaging in acts of misconduct, we can look toward the root of the problem lying in the broken structure of collegiate athletics today. The problem runs the entire gamut of college athletics, whether it is from the bottom in the arbitrary rules and regulations that student-athletes are subject to, all the way up to how the NCAA works as a cartel, but I see most of the controversy bubbling to the surface in student-athletes.
(03/05/15 5:09am)
It is a well-known fact that heart disease is the leading cause of death in the U.S. and much of the developed world. Our bodies have not yet evolved to accommodate our new sugar, salt and cholesterol-rich diets, seeing as these things were all but delicacies in the Paleolithic Age. Now, rates of obesity-related illness are through the roof in both adults and children. It seems no matter how much Americans are told by the government they should go and live healthier lives, obesity won’t go away.
(02/25/15 10:45pm)
The Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) is a group of butchers. There is no question to the atrocities they are guilty of, from inhumane executions of prisoners, to organ trafficking and child prostitution, these disgusting religious extremists deserve nothing less than swift retribution. However, this white-knuckled rage against a stateless, seemingly faceless enemy, is a dangerous one that led us to the quagmire that was the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. Looking at US military policy from the conflicts in the Middle East over the past decade, I believe there are things that could have been done differently, both on the battlefield and off of it. High civilian casualties, an absence of reliable government, and lack of dedicated humanitarian aid/infrastructure development after the siege of Baghdad led to a failure that even the most hard-nosed conservative would be pressed to support entirely. Despite this idea of temperance and looking toward history, my anger rose again when I wondered how many more headlines I would have to read of civilians executed by ISIL. Countries such as Jordan, with far fewer resources than the United States, have responded in kind to ISIL, showing they will not be cowed. My fears were put to rest a few weeks ago when it was announced President Obama was holding an address to the nation regarding action against ISIL.