Happiness & Success
Achieving Happiness Through Acceptance of Life
The quest for happiness often leads to frustration, as many fail to realize that the...
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- Written by: Ben Pryor, Researcher, Oklahoma State University
A line snakes down the sidewalk at Western High School in Las Vegas during the Nevada Republican presidential caucus.During President Obama’s final State of the Union address, he called for reforms to the voting process, saying, “We’ve got to make it easier to vote, not harder. We need to modernize it for the way we live now.”
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- Written by: Thomas Bateman, Professor of Management, University of Virginia
When any American enters the voting booth, he (or she) is free to cast his private ballot for any candidate he favors. On the surface, this seems rather obvious, and easy. We each privately vote for the candidate we wish to support. We choose based on our preferences, so we vote correctly, right?
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- Written by: Bryan Cranston, PhD Candidate in Politics and History, Swinburne University of Technology
On Super Tuesday, voters from more than a dozen U.S. states vote in presidential primaries with important consequences for the candidates. We asked three scholars in different parts of the world to comment on the results and what they mean for the presidential race going forward.
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- Written by: Robert Reich
Step back from the campaign fray for just a moment and consider the enormity of what’s already occurred.
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- Written by: Caren Morrison, Associate Professor of Law, Georgia State University
With the unexpected death of United States Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia this weekend, the political battle lines have been drawn. President Obama has made clear that he plans to nominate a successor. His opposition is equally adamant that he should not do
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- Written by: George Lakey, Waging NonViolence
Bill Moyer was a street-wise, working class white boy from rowhouse Philadelphia, who — in the turbulence of the 1960s — went to Chicago to work for an anti-racist housing campaign.
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- Written by: Robert Reich
“I wish that we could elect a Democratic president who could wave a magic wand and say, ‘We shall do this, and we shall do that,’” Clinton said recently in response to Bernie Sanders’s proposals. "That ain’t the real world we’re living in.“
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- Written by: Graham Kendall, Professor of Operations Research and Vice-Provost, University of Nottingham
The great Victorian polymath, Sir Francis Galton was at a country fair in 1906, so the story goes, and came across a competition where you had to guess the weight of an ox. Once the competition was over Galton, an ...
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- Written by: Ralph Nader
Far too many people think not, and thus they sell themselves far too short. A wave of pessimism leads capable people to underestimate the power of their voice and the strength of their ideals. The truth is this: it is the initiatives of deeply caring people that provide the firmament for our democracy.
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- Written by: Jay Walljasper, On The Commons
We need green visions for less carbon and poverty---but also for more fun and joy. At a time when ecological destruction is more dire than ever, the work of protecting the planet depends on dreamers just as much as of scientists, activists, public officials and business leaders.
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- Written by: Lauren Leatherby , The Journalists Resource
As the 2016 presidential election approaches, both Republicans and Democrats are courting minority voters – a group that is growing in numbers and electoral clout.
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- Written by: Clifton B. Parker-Stanford University
In today’s American politics, it might seem impossible to craft effective political messages that reach across the aisle on hot-button issues like same-sex marriage, national health insurance, and military spending.
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- Written by: Randall Stephens, Northumbria University, Newcastle
The latest Republican presidential primary debate had it all: denunciations of President Obama, angry rants about America’s future, and all manner of bile. It seems like a new low – but in reality, Republican candidates have been singing this tune for years.
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- Written by: Benjamin Radcliff, University of Notre Dame and Michael Krassa, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
What’s better at creating happiness – the government or the market? Conservatives say market forces should reign in all aspects of political and personal life. They say that only completely unregulated markets can create a flourishing economy.
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- Written by: Tim Wheeler, People's World
In a record-breaking turnout, 28,000 supporters crowded into the Moda Center sports arena in Portland, Oregon on Aug. 9 to hear Bernie Sanders speak.
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- Written by: David Morris, On The Commons
What if a trade agreement were designed to protect and nurture labor rather than capital? On May 8th at Nike’s headquarters, President Obama denounced opponents of the hotly contested Trans-Pacific Partnership as ill informed. “(C)ritics warn that parts of this deal would undermine American regulation….They’re making this stuff up. This is just not true. No trade agreement is going to force us to change our laws.”
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- Written by: Cat Johnson, Shareable
Everyone wants to be happy, and increasingly, countries around the world are looking at happiness as an indicator of national well-being and considering happiness in policy making. As this year’s World Happiness Report states, “Happiness is increasingly considered a proper measure of social progress and a goal of public policy.” But what makes people happy, and which countries have the highest levels of happiness?
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- Written by: Ralph Nader
As a high school student, I came across an observation by Abraham Lincoln who said that “With public sentiment, nothing can fail; without it nothing can succeed.” Today “public sentiment” would be called “public opinion.”
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- Written by: Ralph Nader
Suddenly, the mass media is writing about or televising the conditions in West Baltimore. Conditions that Washington Post columnist, Eugene Robinson, summarized as decades long “suffocating poverty, dysfunction and despair.”
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- Written by: Ellen Brown, Public Banking Institute
According to a new study from Princeton University, American democracy no longer exists. Using data from over 1,800 policy initiatives from 1981 to 2002, researchers Martin Gilens and Benjamin Page concluded that rich, well-connected individuals on the political scene now steer the direction of the country, regardless of – or even against – the will of the majority of voters.
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- Written by: David Korten, YES! Magazine
Secret negotiations on the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a trade and investment agreement involving 12 nations of the Pacific Rim, are coming to a close, and President Barack Obama will soon submit the final agreement to the U.S. Congress for approval.
