Academic Rants

 Once again America is rocked by a Supreme Court decision, one that isn't really a decision based on legal precedents. The politics of race and class as well as personal agendas encouraged six members of the court to vote against the policies of the University of North Carolina and Harvard University.  Since its introduction Affirmative Action has been problematic. However, if equality had been achieved, it would not have been needed. Sadly, we are rehashing an old story. American history was not on trial. But it should be. Centuries of discrimination, attempts at remedies and then backlashes failed to convince the Court that a better solution was needed. The United States refused to blame itself for crafting weak or faulty judgements since the Regents of the University of California v. Allan Bakke in 1978. In contrast to the previous cases, especially the 2003 University of Michigan cases, when the court attempted to define Affirmative Action, this has been a watershed moment...

New York City is the nation's most populated city. However, it is not regarded as a "car city", but rather the American standard of "working mass transit." Unfortunately working mass transit, or at least the American model, has numerous flaws that have been exposed by COVID-19. Currently, the consumer-based models of mass transit are hemorrhaging as many Americans have not returned to work on a regular or daily basis. Center cities now deserted due to remote plans fail to have the numbers needed to keep transit systems out of the red. And as mass transit fails, other parts of the urban economy will also fail. Occupancy in malls, offices and other retail spaces will continue to decrease unless people are pushed back to center city business districts. While San Francisco represents one extreme of the failure of the center city, Manhattan represents another.  Although the density of New York City, particularly Manhattan, will not turn mid-town into a ghost town, an...