In many ways, the holiday season is the ultimate embodiment of American consumerism — so naturally, it’s fraught with ethical complications. Amid the festivities, there are serious dilemmas...

Turnout in the 2018 midterm elections was extraordinary. In Texas, 8.3 million people voted in the Senate race between Ted Cruz and Beto O’Rourke, or 53 percent of registered voters — the highest...

When stern-faced pundits warn of a free speech crisis on college campuses, there’s usually good reason to be skeptical. As I’ve written before, students have an unprecedented level of access...

Climate change is going to ruin your life. Yes, you. Not your children or grandchildren, not other people living in a far away time and place — you. If you’re a student who’s planning...

In the aftermath of a demonstration on the West Mall earlier this month, the Young Conservatives of Texas released a statement insisting they “wished to engage in good faith dialogue with our peers...

Last week was supposed to be historic for labor rights in Texas. The first paid sick leave ordinance in the state was scheduled to take effect in Austin on Oct. 1. Instead, protesters gathered outside...

Like plenty of UT students, I moved apartments this summer. While I didn’t move very far — according to Google Earth, my new apartment is less than 1000 feet from my old one — I was surprised...

Evidently fearing the impression UT employs people with common sense, University officials have asked faculty to remove “Gun Free UT” signs from their office windows, as well as any other outward-facing...

In the early history of the universe, things were so hot and dense that three of the four fundamental forces were unified as a single force. This lasted for an inconceivably tiny period of time —...

Last week Quinnipiac University released a poll showing state senator Beto O’Rourke just three percentage points behind in his quest to unseat incumbent Texas senator Ted Cruz this November. Although...

A new study conducted by UT researchers that was published in the Journal of Adolescent Health shows an undeniable link between the mental health of transgender youth and the extent to which those around...

If you happened to be browsing CBS Austin’s website on Tuesday, you might have noticed a banner ad at the top of the page reading “CNN’s hypocritical attack on Sinclair.” The ad...

Where does a man go after wrecking the State Department and getting canned as the nation’s top diplomat? If you’re Rex Tillerson, apparently you go to Texas. Reports last month named him as...

Editor's note: This column appears in a point-counterpoint regarding reactions to the Austin Bomber. Read this column's corresponding counterpoint here. “Recently our community was shaken...

This month, Spotify unveiled two new features aimed at marrying music streaming to social good. The first, a tool called the “Equalizer,” analyzes your listening history and determines how...

I’ll give this much credit to the National Rifle Association: By opposing all sensible gun control policies, they’ve made the American gun debate strikingly simple. Other hot button issues...

Texas is one of 15 states that hold open primaries, which allow voters to cast their ballots in whichever party’s nominating contest they choose — regardless of previous affiliation. Even if...

The perpetrators of the 10 worst mass shootings committed by a single individual on a single day in U.S. history all have one thing in common. It’s not their race, religion, mental health or motive....

According to the pop culture database tvtropes.org, method acting is a practice in which “an actor tries to replicate the life circumstances, mannerisms and emotional feelings of the character he...

“Happy days are here again,” Billboard magazine declared last March. In the last six years, music streaming has rejuvenated the American recording industry, bringing an end to 15 years of declining...

If Neil Portnow didn’t watch the Grammys on Sunday night, he would be far from unique among Americans. The awards ceremony billed as “music’s biggest night” suffered its worst ratings...

There’s never been a dumber time to be a rebel without a cause. There are so many good causes on behalf of which to rebel in 2018, from climate change to income inequality to systemic racism personified...

Earlier this month, singer Lana Del Rey alleged in a tweet that Radiohead was suing her over similarities between her song “Get Free” and their 1993 hit “Creep.” Radiohead’s...

“Guess what?” exclaimed a jubilant President Donald Trump at the Values Voters Summit in October. “We’re saying Merry Christmas again!” And with that, he resumed his annual...

Net neutrality didn’t have to become the partisan issue it is today. There’s nothing fundamentally liberal or conservative about the idea that the companies connecting you to the internet shouldn’t...

Twitter garnered criticism last week after it cracked down on a handful of alt-right figureheads on the site, revoking verification from several and suspending one. For a group that derides its opponents...

I think we can divide the people who still support Judge Roy Moore’s Senate campaign into three categories. First, there are those who don’t believe the allegations against him: inappropriate...

Last week, lawmakers released samples of more than 3,000 Facebook ads purchased by Russian operatives during the 2016 presidential election, shedding new light on the breadth of Moscow’s effort to...

Whatever else can be said about the United States, the natural beauty contained within our borders is perhaps unparalleled in diversity and grandeur. It’s a sometimes underrated part of what makes...

As difficult as it is to imagine a worse president than Donald Trump, try and picture this: Sixteen years from now, such a president is in office. From his presidential library in the basement of Trump...

At first glance, the recent decision by the Boy Scouts of America to begin admitting girls seems like a good-faith attempt on the organization’s part to put its history of regressive politics behind...

The number I keep coming back to isn’t 59, the number of people killed in last week’s mass shooting in Las Vegas. It isn’t more than 500, the number of people who were injured, either. To...

Presumably, there are few things on which Sen. Ted Cruz and Susan Rice, former Obama administration national security advisor, agree. But at the Texas Tribune Festival last month, they struck similar notes...

Back on the campaign trail, then-candidate Donald Trump bemoaned the state of the American space program: “Look what’s happened with our whole history of space and leadership,” he told...

Last week Facebook announced that fake accounts controlled by Russian operatives had purchased more than $100,000 in political ads on the site over the last two years. Just how serious are these revelations?...

The president was in Texas last week, and wherever the president goes, protests follow. A crowd of several hundred including protesters, supporters and spectators, lined up along Koenig Lane last Tuesday...

Whenever things get bad in the U.S., I like to remember that America isn’t just a country, or an idea, or a possibly doomed experiment in democracy. It’s also a 3.8 million square mile expanse...

At some point in their higher education experience, almost every college student finds themselves packed in a giant lecture hall with 300 of their peers, listening to a professor—who doesn’t...

With average global surface temperatures exceeding the 1950-1980 average by 0.94 degrees Celsius, 2017 is poised to go down in history as the second warmest year on record — beaten out only by 2016. You...

Can there be any justification for President Donald Trump’s recently announced intention to ban transgender people from serving in the military? In one of the tweets he fired off on Wednesday morning...

It’s a classic sitcom trope — a character makes some ridiculous boast or claim, refuses to back down out of pride, and eventually spends the whole episode going to absurd lengths to support...

“MODERN DAY PRESIDENTIAL” — that’s how President Trump defended his use of social media in a tweet on Saturday. Others have been less flattering: after the president tweeted an...

Occasionally, Sen. Ted Cruz actually stumbles into doing something useful for his state and country. Last year, he became the unlikely hero of Trump opponents on the left and the right when he pointedly...

Democrats have been criticized from within their own ranks for focusing on the issue of Russian interference in the 2016 election when an economic message could be more effective against Republicans,...

Ever the paragon of leadership, the state of Texas became the 47th in the nation to sign into law a ban on texting while driving last week. The law is set to take effect on Sept. 1. In a legislative...

Last Friday, President Donald Trump pulled the United States out of the Paris climate accord, a historic agreement among nearly every nation on Earth to work in tandem for the preservation of the planet....

“It is a dark day for free speech in America,” absurdist right wing commentator Ann Coulter told her 1.49 million Twitter followers last week after her speech to a conservative student organization...

The March for Science, which drew protesters across the country and around the globe into the streets on Saturday, presents a kind of contradiction. Implicitly if not explicitly, the march was a reaction...

There’s been some degree of relief among liberals that the legacy of President Barack Obama is proving more difficult to dismantle than many — including President Donald Trump — had anticipated....

Do facts matter? Can they be objectively determined, or is truth ultimately subjective? In our fragmented society, can there be any such thing as a consensus? These are all questions raised by the most...

The biggest national news story of the past week concerned something President Donald Trump didn’t do: He and his party failed to pass a bill repealing and replacing Obamacare. The health care debacle...

Donald Trump is not just any Republican president. He is an unstable autocrat perpetually torn between his desire to exert control and his desire to say breathtakingly stupid things. But even as the man...

In a speech riddled with confused rhetoric, where leering ethno-nationalism and the flaccid specter of traditional American exceptionalism seemed to wrestle for control of the podium, President Donald...

Two weeks ago, conservatives were up in arms about the treatment of Breitbart tech editor and alt-right online superstar Milo Yiannopoulos, who was, to hear them say it, being rudely deprived of his free...

More than three months later, it’s clear that the post-election panic over fake news has backfired. Instead of shattering the alternate realities Americans constructed for themselves online, the...

How does one make the Environmental Protection Agency great again? Rep. Lamar Smith, who chairs the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology — and represents parts of Austin including West...

It’s been suggested that in opposing President Donald Trump, Democrats should pursue tactics similar to those of the Tea Party movement. This is a strange idea, given the fate many leading voices...

Is President Trump — his title as of today, Jan. 20 — a populist hero elected to root out corruption and rebuke coastal elites? Or is he a dangerously inexperienced demagogue who flaunts the...

The Milky Way is billions of years old and composed of billions of stars. If life is a fairly typical and unremarkable process, and not an aberration in the history of the universe, then by now there should...

The coalition that elected Donald Trump president is comprised of two wings. The deplorable wing is made up of members of the so-called “alt-right,” white nationalists baffled by the notion...

Compared to past backdrops, among them the Great Depression, the onset of World War II, public dissent toward the Vietnam War and the collapse of the American housing market, the context of today’s...

Apparently, everyone is sick of the two-party system. People crave a third party alternative, but as that system’s most fervent critics will tell you, all the forces of the establishment are colluding...

During last week’s presidential debate, Donald Trump made headlines by suggesting that, rather than pledging to accept the results of the election, he would prefer to “keep you in suspense”...

Let’s say you backup your computer to an external hard drive. Your computer works fine — better than fine, actually. Let’s say it’s the best computer in the world. But there’s...

Twenty four hours prior to Sunday’s presidential debate, the Republican Party stood at a fork in the road. They could either disavow their presidential candidate, who was exposed on Friday gleefully...

Last week’s presidential debate was the most watched in history, drawing in some 83 million viewers. Since then, Donald Trump has blamed the perception that he lost the debate on the media, a faulty...

What do the states of Texas, New Hampshire and Montana have in common? Not much, but they all share one distinction: They’re among the last 12 states in the nation that have not taken action to provide...

Almost since the moment Donald Trump announced his presidential campaign last year, pundits have speculated as to what, if not an ounce of their own personal restraint, could halt the flood of free media...

  There’s something tragic about Gary Johnson’s present situation. Late last week, the Libertarian presidential candidate and former New Mexico governor went on MSNBC’s Morning...

This is a weird election year — on that much, everyone seems to agree. But could it get even weirder? A new poll says that most Texans who back Donald Trump for president would support secession...

  With the controversial campus carry law set to take effect in August, Nobel laureate and UT physics professor Steven Weinberg says he will ban guns in his classroom beginning in the fall semester....