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Just the Facts: Are FAA Staff Cuts Causing Current Airport Delays?

Chinese Investments in Cuba Demonstrate a Waning U.S. Influence in the Region

Chinese Investments in Cuba Demonstrate a Waning U.S. Influence in the Region

Just the Facts: Canadian Tariffs

Just the Facts: Canadian Tariffs

Redistricting

Redistricting

Tracy Chapman and Luke Combs on stage

Luke Combs, politics and healing our nation's divide

VA Secretary Doug Collins Faces Bipartisan Criticism at Senate VA Committee Hearing

VA Secretary Doug Collins Faces Bipartisan Criticism at Senate VA Committee Hearing

Podcast: Separating news from noise

Podcast: Separating news from noise
The Fulcrum
By The FulcrumJan 30, 2023
The Fulcrum
The Fulcrum staff.
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How much news is too much? Or not enough? News Over Noise, the new podcast from Penn State's News Literacy Initiative explores that question and offers guidance on how to consume news that enhances your participation in our democracy without becoming overwhelmed by all the noise on social media and the 24/7 news cycle.

News Over Noise co-hosts Matt Jordan and Leah Dajches join Democracy Works to discuss how the news impacts our mental health, the future of media literacy education, and more. Jordan is a professor of media studies and Dajches is a post-doctoral researcher, both in the Bellisario College of Communications at Penn State.

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Just the Facts: What Is a National Emergency?
Governance & Legislation

Just the Facts: What Is a National Emergency?

Child Victims of Crime Are Not Heard
Rule of Law

Child Victims of Crime Are Not Heard

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Following Jefferson: Promoting Intergenerational Understanding Through Constitution-Making

An illustration depicting the U.S. Constitution and Government.

Getty Images, Douglas Rissing

Following Jefferson: Promoting Intergenerational Understanding Through Constitution-Making

Towards the end of his life, Thomas Jefferson became fatalistic. The prince and poet of the American Revolution brooded—about the future of the country he birthed, to be sure; but also about his health, his finances, his farm, his family, and, perhaps most poignantly, his legacy. “[W]hen all our faculties have left…” he wrote to John Adams in 1822, “[when] every avenue of pleasing sensation is closed, and athumy, debility, and malaise [is] left in their places, when the friends of our youth are all gone, and a generation is risen around us whom we know not, is death an evil?”

The question was rhetorical, of course. But it revealed something about his character. Jefferson was aware that Adams and he—the “North and South poles of the Revolution”—were practically the only survivors of the Revolutionary era, and that a new generation was now in charge of America’s destiny.

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The Hidden Moral Cost of America’s Tariff Crisis

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Getty Images, Kannika Paison

The Hidden Moral Cost of America’s Tariff Crisis

In the spring of 2025, as American families struggle with unprecedented consumer costs, we find ourselves at a point of "moral reckoning." The latest data from the Yale Budget Lab reveals that tariff policies have driven consumer prices up by 2.9% in the short term. In comparison, the Penn Wharton Budget Model projects a staggering 6% reduction in long-term GDP and a 5% decline in wages. But these numbers, stark as they are, tell only part of the story.

The actual narrative is one of moral choice and democratic values. Eddie Glaude describes this way in his book “Democracy in Black”: Our economic policies must be viewed through the lens of ethical significance—not just market efficiency. When we examine the tariff regime's impact on American communities, we see economic data points and a fundamental challenge to our democratic principles of equity and justice.

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Balance – The Golden Mean

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Getty Images, OsakaWayne Studios

Balance – The Golden Mean

“Next to love, balance is the most important thing.” ~ John Wooden

Would John Wooden, UCLA’s winningest basketball coach, who took his team to ten national championships in 12 years and was named the “Coach of the Century” by ESPN, speak so of “love” and “balance” if they were not absolutely critical to a winning formula?

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Understanding The Freedom Of Information Act (FOIA)

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Getty Images/Stock

Understanding The Freedom Of Information Act (FOIA)

Background

In November 2024, Elon Musk posted on social media, “There should be no need for [Freedom of Information Act] requests. All government data should be default public for maximum transparency.” His statement reignited discussions on the Freedom of Information Act, or FOIA, a federal law enacted in 1966 that requires federal executive branch agencies to disclose information in specific ways. Since its original passage in 1966, FOIA has been updated three times to tighten agency compliance, account for digital records, and allow citizens to request records online. Under FOIA, government agencies must disclose information by:

FOIA includes nine exemptions to protect against harms that might result from divulging certain records; these exemptions include cases like invasion of personal privacy, information related to national security, and information that would interfere with law enforcement proceedings.

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