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Sept. 11, Mormon candidate challenge U.S. ideal of acceptance By Susan Campbell The Hartford Courant Friday, August 24, 2007 For a country that prides itself on being a religious refuge, Americans like their public figures pious – but not overly so. And they like their religions straight, or at the very least, familiar. So what [...]

     In a come-from-behind, but dubious victory for the Fourth Amendment, Justices Stevens and Scalia teamed up to deliver a surprise concurrence in the recent case of Arizona v. Gant, 129 S. Ct. 1710, 2009 U.S. LEXIS 3120 (2009).  After thoroughly reviewing the Court’s previous holdings in N.Y. v. Belton, 453 U.S. 454 (1981); Thornton [...]

Since 9/11, anti-religious extremists on the internet have worked overtime to fill the breach of accurate information about minority religions with disinformation and hate speech. As demonstrated by the article below, the spread of such lies creates unfounded concerns and prejudices in communities. Pittsburgh’s extremists include David S. Touretzky, a researcher at Carnegie [...] Religious [...]

Want to join a small brigade of public servants working on the cutting edge of science and public policy? Looking to take part in giving away billion? Here’s your chance. California’s top fiscal officer, Controller John Chiang, is seeking nominations for five openings on the 29-member board of directors for the billion California stem cell, [...]

Today’s Mount Vernon (OH) News reports that on Thursday, Ohio middle school science teacher John Freshwater and his wife filed a stipulation along with the Mount Vernon (OH) school board asking an Ohio federal court to dismiss Freshwater’s religious discrimination and other claims. Freshwater was fired for posting copies of the Ten Commandments in his [...]

     Today a 13 year-old student from Arizona won an important victory for the privacy of minors in a school setting. Middle-schooler Savana Redding was accused by a fellow student of distributing prescription-strength drugs to other students. She was forced to endure a humiliating strip search by Helen Romero, the school administrator, in addition to [...]

June 12 1963 (Jackson, Miss.) Mississippi’s NAACP field secretary, 37-year-old Medgar Evers, is murdered outside his home. Byron De La Beckwith is tried twice in 1964, both trials resulting in hung juries. Thirty years later he is convicted for murdering Evers. By Thomas Jackson editor@coastguardreport.org Civil Rights Report

June 21 2005 The ringleader of the Mississippi civil rights murders (see Aug. 4, 1964), Edgar Ray Killen, is convicted of manslaughter on the 41st anniversary of the crimes. By Thomas Jackson editor@coastguardreport.org Civil Rights Report

June 23 2003 In the most important affirmative action decision since the 1978 Bakke case, the Supreme Court (5–4) upholds the University of Michigan Law School’s policy, ruling that race can be one of many factors considered by colleges when selecting their students because it furthers “a compelling interest in obtaining the educational benefits that [...]

There’s a lot of things I like about science. The search for truth and reason, the struggle to avoid personal bias, and the attention to detail in methodology. And the mind-bogglingly awesome things that are figured out through science. I mean, I really love science. Of course, science is really hard to do well, because [...]