Many of you may not spend your time listening to your local Congressman or -woman or Senator repeating talking points while they’re on their August recess, but I can tell you that Democrats are selling health care reform, and any government plan it may involve, as another “choice” for Americans. What can be more American Read More
It seemed so long ago when Allen Iverson came from the South to save my racially polarized hometown from basketball ruin. But how could this barely six foot, barely 165-pound phenom be entrusted with such responsibility? He was racial polarization incarnate. At 17, he was involved in a brawl in a bowling alley that allegedly Read More
We have a rough (if slightly problematic) idea of what is generally used to define poverty for statistical purposes. Sociologists tend to define the middle class largely in terms of rough lifestyle — access to credit, property ownership, higher education (or the realistic expectation of it), savings accounts, etc. But, off the top of your Read More
I was at work when a friend told me that Brett Favre was retiring. My first instinct when someone drops a sports-related bombshell on me is to dart over to ESPN. Not this time. “Great,” I responded. “Now I have to stay away from ESPN for a day or so.” But a day was hardly Read More
As the subprime mortgage crash and the housing market’s downward spiral pull the rest of the economy with them, there is a lot of talk about “personal responsibility.” President Bush and other “reformers” used the same kind of rhetoric when he modified bankruptcy law in 2005. The subprime mortgage crash occurred after an unprecedented decade Read More
A few times over the course of its run, The Wire has briefly shone its light on “A-rabs”, street peddlers who sell fruits and vegetables on carts pulled by horses and a fixture in Baltimore life. Bubbles, during one of his many short-lived forays into sobriety and legality, is one of those peddlers. “You A-rabbing Read More
YouNotSneaky was nice enough to let us re-run a blog entry of his that he posted last year on way ‘The Wire’ deals with economics. Possible spoilers from the first three seasons. I’m really surprised that no one’s has mentioned the economics of the HBO show “The Wire” (though there have been discussions as to Read More
Legendary comedian and classist bourgie Negro icon Bill Cosby once infamously criticized poor black folks for spending all their money on $500 sneakers instead of educational toys and claimed they had mixed-up priorities. A backlash ensued. According to Slate‘s Ray Fisman, who points to a new study about race and consumer tendencies, Dr. Huxtable is Read More
