On July 10, 1985, among hundreds of newsworthy events around the world, were the following: Bishop Desmond Tutu, Nobel laureate, charged into an angry mob to save a suspected police informer from being burned to death. An Israeli court convicted 15 Jewish terrorists of murder and other acts of violence against Arabs. A Turkish supertanker was struck by an Iraqi...

At the height of all the Watergate scandal coverage in the ‘70s, TIME magazine ran an interesting story about Jeb Stuart Magruder. Don’t remember Magruder? He’s the man frequently mentioned in the first hour of the movie All the President’s Men. Based on the 1974 book by Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, the two investigated the initial break-in at...

In 1954 journalist Edward R. Murrow stepped away from his role as news reporter to speak out against the blatant demagoguery of Senator Joseph R. McCarthy. According to an article by Carl Hausman published in The Institute for Global Ethics, “Murrow protégé Walter Cronkite noted that Murrow was troubled about taking an editorial position, but felt he had to break the rules...

At the age of sixteen, George Washington copied, by hand, 110 Rules of Civility & Decent Behavior in Company and Conversation. Based on rules composed by French Jesuits in 1595, the conventions outline how we demonstrate respect for others. In a time of widespread self-interest, the rules focus on others. In his biography of Washington, historian Richard Brookhiser writes, “all modern...

Tributes to Ronald Reagan occupied much of this past weekend on what would have been the 100th birthday of the 40th President. It’s always interesting to observe that the longer a 20th century president has been out of office, the more glowing the tributes.  While many such tributes seem forced, such is not the case with Reagan. Ronald Reagan was...

January 20, 1961, I sat in my seventh grade homeroom class while the teacher rolled in a big, black & white television and announced that we would all be watching history today. What I was unprepared for was how quiet and engaged everyone in class would be in watching John Fitzgerald Kennedy take the oath of office as the 35th...

The following, written by David Krieger, gives us a closer examination of President Eisenhower’s final thoughts before leaving office, regarding the growth of military budgets. It’s interesting to look at in light of today’s continuing build-up of nuclear weapons in particular. Yesterday, January 17, 2011 was the 50th anniversary of President Eisenhower’s Farewell Address to the nation in which he...

Dr. Alvin F. Poussaint is the Director of the Media Center at the Judge Baker Children’s Center in Boston and one of the nation’s leading psychiatrists. He is also a Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. A highly regarded specialist on race relations in America, Dr. Poussaint has served as a consultant to many corporations and government agencies. He...

On November 22, 1963, John F. Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States, was assassinated. Nearly every American who is old enough can remember where he was when he heard the news of Kennedy’s death. In my case, I was on a train platform in Japan when I was told of the assassination. A Japanese man came up to...

Today is Veteran’s Day, but it also marks the 90th Anniversary of the original name for this holiday, Armistice Day. The day was created to celebrate the war to end all wars, World War I.The Armistice took effect on November 11, 1918 at 11:00 A.M. or at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month. That date quickly became a...