Costs and benefits | Crunching the numbers on criminal justice
ASK THIS
A new report finds that subjecting criminal justice policy proposals to cost-benefit analysis would show that many "get tough" policies take an outsized toll on taxpayers and society.

Some have drones, too | Local police forces are now little armies. Why?
ASK THIS
More and more, in dealing with nonviolent political protesters police across America show up in battlefield dress with intimidating military gear supplied by the Pentagon and Homeland Security. Writer John Hanrahan says reporters, instead of ignoring this ominous development, should ask local, regional and national leaders: Do we need this crap?

Time to get serious | How about getting some substance in those GOP presidential debates?
ASK THIS
Bob Giles says debate moderators until now have been letting the candidates get away with scripted answers. He urges Bloomberg and the Washington Post, partial sponsors of the next debate, to do better on issues, ideas, solutions, and follow-up, and he offers ten solid questions of his own for them to consider.

More like reparations | Class warfare?
ASK THIS
Taxing the rich doesn't create class division, it responds to the rise of a winner-take-all economy, write two Yale law professors who figure there's an easy $70 billion a year to be made there.

Growing inequality | Why the new poverty numbers are bad news for tomorrow's America
ASK THIS
Before long people of color will be the majority in America but right now the outlook for many of them is grim. Poverty expert Judith Bell poses questions reporters should ask of elected officials and, on the local level, of demographers and other researchers.

Little bang per buck | Is there a desirable jobs benefit from defense spending?
ASK THIS
'Overhead' -- not labor -- can take up the lion's share of spending on big-ticket military hardware, writes Winslow Wheeler. That makes spending money on defense a terribly inefficient way to create jobs.

India: 914 girls for every 1,000 boys | Sex-selection abortions continue, and are spreading
ASK THIS
One estimate from 2005 was that, in part because of sex selection, there are 163 million women and girls missing from the population in Asia. In addition, writes Mara Hvistendahl, skewed sex ratios are cropping up in places with no history of the problem, including the United States.

Book tour | 11 questions reporters should be asking Dick Cheney
ASK THIS
As the former vice president uses media interviews to sell books, reporters have an unprecedented opportunity to confront him about his highly controversial legacy and push him to divulge more about how he pursued his agenda.

Politics and Economics | China’s open-door-then-close-door approach to foreign investment
ASK THIS
The author of a new book on the Chinese regulatory state asks and answers questions about how market liberalization followed by government re-regulation serves the central government's plans.

Who's in charge? | Is Obama's Nuclear Posture Review in safe hands?
ASK THIS
The general outline of the U.S.'s new nuclear war plan has been set by President Obama, who says we should be working our way to a world without nuclear weapons. But the details are being written by a national security bureaucracy that has a big stake in the nuclear status quo. And it's all happening in the dark. Can reporters bring the process into public view?

< Previous page

Page: 5 of 54

Next page >