June-July 2008

Democrats are challenging Republican incumbents in three "Cuban" congressional districts in South Florida. Could the campaigns foreshadow a shift in presidential politics or Cuba policy?

A new British book, "Flat Earth News," provides a well-researched answer to the age-old question: Why are the news media so dumb?

Authoritative research shows exactly how to fix public schools. What we need are leaders with the guts to put it into practice.

Each year, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services tracks the arrival and initial settlement location of refugees coming to the United States.

When an academic gets to introduce his new book on "The Daily Show," you know he's reaching a wider audience. A Miller-McCune interview of The Earth Institute's Jeffrey Sachs.

A documentary looks at historic injustice in the Texas prison system — and comments on the habeas corpus battles of the war on terror.

In Europe and elsewhere, governments are using ideas from the new science of well-being to try to make citizens more content. Will America follow their lead?

Offline Diary: Where we look beyond some of the stories originally published on Miller-McCune.com.

Notes on early parenthood, cell phone usage, the lack of obesity in France and more.

How and why the threat of bioterrorism has been so greatly exaggerated. A Miller-McCune interview of UCLA's William R. Clark.

Cristi Hegranes and her nonprofit train women around the world so they can help their communities — through journalism.

A look at some current research that merits a raised eyebrow or a painful grin.

By funding its own research, industry has raised unwarranted doubts about a range of scientific issues — from the risks of tobacco to the reality of climate change — delaying response to public dangers for decades. Can scientists and journalists learn to beat the doubt industry before our most serious problems beat us all?

Ken Nedimyer and the Nature Conservancy find coral tough enough to withstand global warming.

Public debate has been dominated by the belief that education builds human capital, causing increased income, health and political participation, among many positive outcomes. But new research suggests that costly expansions of education may not always bring the promised social results. In some cases, those expansions may do little but sort people according to their native ability.

A psychotherapist argues that right-wing political operatives, religious leaders and the media are prospering by screwing with our collective sense of reality.