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100% happiness guarantee, free paper examples by words:, last added essay samples, bullying should be a crime.

Bullying, an entrenched quandary that impacts individuals across diverse age cohorts, settings, and nations, has perpetually aroused apprehension among educators, guardians, and policymakers. The inquiry into whether bullying merits classification as a crime is intricate, necessitating a nuanced exploration of legal delineations, societal ramifications, and the myriad manifestations bullying can assume. This discourse delves into the intricacies encompassing the criminalization of bullying, extant legal frameworks, and the impediments encountered in confronting this multifaceted quandary. At its essence, bullying embodies unwelcome, […]

What are the Five Elements of a Crime?

Comprehending the foundational constituents of a transgression holds paramount importance for legal practitioners and the populace at large. These constituents function as the rudimentary units for ascertaining whether an individual's deeds warrant criminal censure under statutory regulations. At its essence, a transgression is an act or the omission thereof that contravenes public law and incurs punitive measures by the state. Nevertheless, the intricacies surrounding the delineation of transgressions can be considerably convoluted, contingent upon specific criteria that demand fulfillment. This […]

Noah’s ‘Born a Crime’: the Outsider on the Inside

Trevor Noah's memoir, "Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood," offers a profound narrative about growing up in South Africa during the twilight of apartheid and the tumultuous days of freedom that followed. Born to a black South African mother and a white Swiss father in 1984, Noah’s very existence was a breach of the apartheid laws that segregated the population based on race. His memoir is not only a story of survival and resilience but also an […]

Cody Metzker Madsen’s Crime

Delving into the intricate nexus between mental well-being and the legal realm, the tale of Cody Metzker-Madsen presents a poignant and somber narrative. This youthful individual's existence and deeds have sparked deliberations on several pivotal matters, encompassing the treatment of mental health within legal confines, the duty of guardianship, and the broader societal obligation to safeguard susceptible juveniles. This discourse endeavors to unravel the strata of the Cody Metzker-Madsen saga, contemplating the legal, psychological, and societal dimensions it encapsulates. Cody […]

The Genre of Crime and Gangster Movies

The 1990s were a defining era for the gangster genre in cinema, with a slew of films that not only revitalized interest in mob narratives but also pushed the boundaries of storytelling, character development, and moral complexity. These movies, rich in narrative depth and stylistic innovation, offered more than just tales of crime and retribution; they provided keen insights into the human condition, power dynamics, and the American Dream gone awry. This essay explores the standout gangster movies of the […]

Crime: the Causes of Public Order Crime

Transgressions against public order, often denoted as "victimless" infractions, are behaviors deemed by societal norms to transgress its codes of respectable conduct, notwithstanding their lack of direct harm to any particular individual. These transgressions pose intricate dilemmas to both legal and moral paradigms within communities, prompting profound inquiries into freedom, ethics, and the governmental role in behavioral governance. This discourse delves into the essence of public order violations, their ramifications on society, and the contentious dialogues encompassing their governance. The […]

OJ Simpson Crime Binder: Criminal Activities and Applied Criminal Theories

In the diverse of American cultural and sports history, certain figures stand out not just for their professional achievements but also for their complex personal stories. Jimmy Lee Simpson, while not an immediately recognizable name to the casual observer, represents a fascinating intersection of talent, tragedy, and controversy. This essay seeks to explore the multifaceted life of Simpson, delving into his contributions, the adversities he faced, and the legacy he leaves behind. Jimmy Lee Simpson emerged from humble beginnings to […]

Rise of Crime in the 1920’ss

The 1920s, often idealized as the "Roaring Twenties," constituted a decade characterized by profound social and economic transformations in the United States. Amidst the ambiance of prosperity, jazz, and the flapper phenomenon, the nation also confronted a darker facet: a notable uptick in criminal activities. This discourse delves into the intricate tapestry of crime during the 1920s, scrutinizing its origins, the predominant categories of crime, and the societal reaction to the burgeoning criminal landscape of the epoch. A substantial impetus […]

Literacy Analysis of Trevor Noahs Born a Crime

Trevor Noah, the South African comedian and former host of "The Daily Show," has often shared stories about his upbringing under apartheid, using humor to shed light on the systemic injustices of the time. Central to his narrative is the figure of his mother, Patricia Nombuyiselo Noah, whose life story embodies resilience, defiance, and profound courage. This essay delves into the extraordinary life of Trevor Noah's mom, illustrating how her experiences and actions not only shaped her son's worldview but […]

The Crime Rate of Detroit

Detroit, a city with a storied history, vibrant culture, and significant economic challenges, has long been under the microscope for its crime rate. While the narrative around the city often leans heavily on its struggles with crime, a closer examination reveals a complex picture that encompasses efforts towards improvement, persistent challenges, and the resilience of its communities. This essay aims to explore the crime rate in Detroit, shedding light on the nuances of its criminal landscape, the factors contributing to […]

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Earth Day: What is it, when is it and why is it important?

Earth Day takes place on 22 April each year. Image:  UNSPLASH/Markus Spiske

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Hanh nguyen.

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.chakra .wef-1nk5u5d{margin-top:16px;margin-bottom:16px;line-height:1.388;color:#2846F8;font-size:1.25rem;}@media screen and (min-width:56.5rem){.chakra .wef-1nk5u5d{font-size:1.125rem;}} Get involved with our crowdsourced digital platform to deliver impact at scale

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This article was last updated on 11 April 2024. It was originally published on 19 April 2022.

• Earth Day takes place every year on 22 April and is one of the biggest environmental protest movements on the planet.
• The theme of Earth Day this year is 'Planet vs. Plastics' - campaigners are calling for a 60% reduction in the production of plastics by 2040.
• The World Economic Forum's Global Risks Report 2024 finds that environmental risks make up half of the top 10 risks over the next 10 years.

“Good evening, a unique day in American history is ending. A day set aside for a nationwide outpouring of mankind seeking its own survival.”

Those were the words of US TV presenter Walter Cronkite as he described the aftermath of the first Earth Day back in 1970.

Here’s what you need to know about Earth Day in 2024.

What is Earth Day and what is the theme in 2024?

Earth Day is an international day devoted to our planet. It draws attention to the environment and promotes conservation and sustainability. Each year on 22 April, around 1 billion people around the world take action to raise awareness of the climate crisis and bring about behavioural change to protect the environment.

Participation in Earth Day can take many forms, including small home or classroom projects like planting a herb garden or picking up litter. People also volunteer to plant trees, join other ecological initiatives or take part in street protests about climate change and environmental degradation.

Official Earth Day campaigns and projects aim to increase environmental literacy and bring together like-minded people or groups to address issues such as deforestation, biodiversity loss and other challenges .

The global theme for this year's Earth Day is ' Planet vs. Plastics ', which recognizes the threat plastics pose to human health and with campaigners demanding a 60% reduction in the production of plastics by 2040.

From 23 to 29 April 2024, governments and NGOs from around the world will gather in Ottawa to continue negotiating the terms of the United Nations Global Plastic Treaty .

How did Earth Day begin?

Millions of people took to the streets of US cities and towns on 22 April 1970 in mass protests over the damage being done to the planet and its resources. Amid the demonstrations, protesters brought New York City’s usually bustling Fifth Avenue to a halt, while students in Boston held a “die-in” at Logan Airport. The environmental impact of the post-war consumer boom was beginning to be felt at that time. Oil spills, factory pollution and other ecological threats were on the rise, with little if any legislation in place to prevent them.

The protests brought together people from all walks of American life – accounting for about 10% of the US population – to demonstrate and voice their demands for sustainable change. The Earth Day website calls it the birth of the modern environmental movement.

What led to the street protests in 1970?

Concerned about increasing levels of unchecked environmental destruction, Junior Senator Gaylord Nelson of Wisconsin suggested a series of “teach-ins” on university campuses across the US in 1969 to raise awareness of environmental threats. Nelson was joined by Congressman Pete McCloskey and activist Denis Hayes to organize the teach-ins, but the group soon recognized an opportunity to broaden the event’s appeal beyond student populations.

The newly named Earth Day protest events attracted national media attention and support from around 20 million Americans across age and political spectrums, occupations and income groups.

What did the protests achieve?

The Earth Day demonstrations left an indelible mark on US policy. By the end of 1970, the US Environmental Protection Agency came into being and a stream of laws followed to help protect the environment . These included the National Environmental Education Act, the Occupational Safety and Health Act and the Clean Air Act. Further legislation was soon introduced to protect water quality and endangered species, and to control the use of harmful chemicals and pesticides.

When did Earth Day go global?

Earth Day went beyond the US in 1990. Around 200 million people from 141 countries joined efforts to boost recycling around the world that year, paving the way for the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Climate change poses an urgent threat demanding decisive action. Communities around the world are already experiencing increased climate impacts, from droughts to floods to rising seas. The World Economic Forum's Global Risks Report continues to rank these environmental threats at the top of the list.

To limit global temperature rise to well below 2°C and as close as possible to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels, it is essential that businesses, policy-makers, and civil society advance comprehensive near- and long-term climate actions in line with the goals of the Paris Agreement on climate change.

The World Economic Forum's Climate Initiative supports the scaling and acceleration of global climate action through public and private-sector collaboration. The Initiative works across several workstreams to develop and implement inclusive and ambitious solutions.

This includes the Alliance of CEO Climate Leaders, a global network of business leaders from various industries developing cost-effective solutions to transitioning to a low-carbon, climate-resilient economy. CEOs use their position and influence with policy-makers and corporate partners to accelerate the transition and realize the economic benefits of delivering a safer climate.

Contact us to get involved.

This “Earth Summit”, as it became known, led to the formation of the UN Convention on Climate Change and the UN Convention on Biological Diversity , along with the Commission on Sustainable Development to monitor and report on the implementation of Earth Summit agreements.

And as citizens were increasingly concerned with corporate impacts on the natural environment, big and small businesses started to feel the pressure to consider sustainability in their practice.

Have you read?

Is climate inaction a human rights violation, how earth observation from space helps advance climate change research, why is earth day important today.

As the millennium loomed, the Earth Day movement turned its attention to the growing reality of the impending climate crisis with a clear message for world leaders and business: urgent action is needed to address global warming.

It’s a message that is even more relevant today. The latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change states that without further immediate action to curb greenhouse gas emissions, the world is on course for temperatures 3.2°C above pre-industrial levels by 2100. This level of warming would be catastrophic for the planet and all life on it, including humans.

The year 2023 was the hottest ever recorded .

The World Economic Forum's Global Risks Report 2024 finds that environmental risks make up half of the top 10 risks over the next 10 years, with extreme weather events, critical change to Earth's systems, biodiversity loss and ecosystem collapse being the top three.

Nature is our biggest ally in fighting the climate crisis and has slowed global warming by absorbing 54% of human-related carbon dioxide emissions over the past 10 years. Yet, we are losing animals, marine species, plants, and insects at an unprecedented rate, not seen in 10 million years . Threats from human activity for food production and ocean use, infrastructure, energy and mining endanger around 80% of all threatened or near-threatened species .

Earth Day has become a leading light in the fight to combat climate change and nature loss. As we celebrate its 54th anniversary, we must make use of this truly global movement to act, as citizens and governments, as consumers and businesses, and as individuals and communities. Our survival could well depend on it.

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World Economic Forum articles may be republished in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International Public License, and in accordance with our Terms of Use.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.

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Democracy Dies Behind Paywalls

The case for making journalism free—at least during the 2024 election

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Produced by ElevenLabs and News Over Audio (NOA) using AI narration.

How many times has it happened? You’re on your computer, searching for a particular article, a hard-to-find fact, or a story you vaguely remember, and just when you seem to have discovered the exact right thing, a paywall descends. “$1 for Six Months.” “Save 40% on Year 1.” “Here’s Your Premium Digital Offer.” “Already a subscriber?” Hmm, no.

Now you’re faced with that old dilemma: to pay or not to pay. (Yes, you may face this very dilemma reading this story in The Atlantic .) And it’s not even that simple. It’s a monthly or yearly subscription—“Cancel at any time.” Is this article or story or fact important enough for you to pay?

Or do you tell yourself—as the overwhelming number of people do—that you’ll just keep searching and see if you can find it somewhere else for free?

According to the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, more than 75 percent of America’s leading newspapers, magazines, and journals are behind online paywalls. And how do American news consumers react to that? Almost 80 percent of Americans steer around those paywalls and seek out a free option.

Paywalls create a two-tiered system: credible, fact-based information for people who are willing to pay for it, and murkier, less-reliable information for everyone else. Simply put, paywalls get in the way of informing the public, which is the mission of journalism. And they get in the way of the public being informed, which is the foundation  of democracy. It is a terrible time for the press to be failing at reaching people, during an election in which democracy is on the line. There’s a simple, temporary solution: Publications should suspend their paywalls for all 2024 election coverage and all information that is beneficial to voters. Democracy does not die in darkness—it dies behind paywalls.

The problem is not just that professionally produced news is behind a wall; the problem is that paywalls increase the proportion of free and easily available stories that are actually filled with misinformation and disinformation. Way back in 1995 (think America Online), the UCLA professor Eugene Volokh predicted that the rise of “cheap speech”—free internet content—would not only democratize mass media by allowing new voices, but also increase the proliferation of misinformation and conspiracy theories, which would then destabilize mass media.

Paul Barrett, the deputy director of the NYU Stern Center for Business and Human Rights and one of the premier scholars on mis- and disinformation, told me he knows of no research on the relationship between paywalls and misinformation. “But it stands to reason,” he said, “that if people seeking news are blocked by the paywalls that are increasingly common on serious professional journalism websites, many of those people are going to turn to less reliable sites where they’re more likely to encounter mis- and disinformation.”

In the pre-internet days, information wasn’t free—it just felt that way. Newsstands were everywhere, and you could buy a paper for a quarter. But that paper wasn’t just for you: After you read it at the coffee shop or on the train, you left it there for the next guy. The same was true for magazines. When I was the editor of Time , the publisher estimated that the “pass-along rate” of every issue was 10 to 15—that is, each magazine we sent out was read not only by the subscriber, but by 10 to 15 other people. In 1992, daily newspapers claimed a combined circulation of some 60 million; by 2022, while the nation had grown, that figure had fallen to 21 million. People want information to be free—and instantly available on their phone.

Barrett is aware that news organizations need revenue, and that almost a third of all U.S. newspapers have stopped publishing over the previous two decades. “It’s understandable that traditional news-gathering businesses are desperate for subscription revenue,” he told me, “but they may be inadvertently boosting the fortunes of fake news operations motivated by an appetite for clicks or an ideological agenda—or a combination of the two.”

Digital-news consumers can be divided into three categories: a small, elite group that pays hundreds to thousands of dollars a year for high-end subscriptions; a slightly larger group of people with one to three news subscriptions; and the roughly 80 percent of Americans who will not or cannot pay for information. Some significant percentage of this latter category are what scholars call “passive” news consumers—people who do not seek out information, but wait for it to come to them, whether from their social feeds, from friends, or from a TV in an airport. Putting reliable information behind paywalls increases the likelihood that passive news consumers will receive bad information.

In the short history of social media, the paywall was an early hurdle to getting good information; now there are newer and more perilous problems. The Wall Street Journal instituted a “hard paywall” in 1996. The Financial Times formally launched one in 2002. Other publications experimented with them, including The New York Times , which established its subscription plan and paywall in 2011. In 2000, I was the editor of Time.com, Time magazine’s website, when these experiments were going on. The axiom then was that “must have” publications like The Wall Street Journal could get away with charging for content, while “nice to have” publications like Time could not. Journalists were told that “information wants to be free.” But the truth was simpler: People wanted free information, and we gave it to them. And they got used to it.

Of course, publications need to cover their costs, and journalists need to be paid. Traditionally, publications had three lines of revenue: subscriptions, advertising, and newsstand sales. Newsstand sales have mostly disappeared. The internet should have been a virtual newsstand, but buying individual issues or articles is almost impossible. The failure to institute a frictionless mechanism for micropayments to purchase news was one of the greatest missteps in the early days of the web. Some publications would still be smart to try it.

I’d argue that paywalls are part of the reason Americans’ trust in media is at an all-time low. Less than a third of Americans in a recent Gallup poll say they have “a fair amount” or a “a great deal” of trust that the news is fair and accurate. A large percentage of these Americans see media as being biased. Well, part of the reason they think media are biased is that most fair, accurate, and unbiased news sits behind a wall. The free stuff needn’t be fair or accurate or unbiased. Disinformationists, conspiracy theorists, and Russian and Chinese troll farms don’t employ fact-checkers and libel lawyers and copy editors.

Part of the problem with the current, free news environment is that the platform companies, which are the largest distributors of free news, have deprioritized news. Meta has long had an uncomfortable relationship with news on Facebook. In the past year, according to CNN, Meta has changed its algorithm in a way that has cost some news outlets 30 to 40 percent of their traffic (and others more). Threads, Meta’s answer to X, is “not going to do anything to encourage” news and politics on the platform, says Adam Mosseri, the executive who oversees it. “My take is, from a platforms’ perspective, any incremental engagement or revenue [news] might drive is not at all worth the scrutiny, negativity (let’s be honest), or integrity risks that come along with them.” The platform companies are not in the news business; they are in the engagement business. News is less engaging than, say, dance shorts or chocolate-chip-cookie recipes—or eye-catching conspiracy theories.

As the platforms have diminished news, they have also weakened their integrity and content-moderation teams, which enforce community standards or terms of service. No major platform permits false advertising, child pornography, hate speech, or speech that leads to violence; the integrity and moderation teams take down such content. A recent paper from Barrett’s team at the NYU Stern Center for Business and Human Rights argues that the greatest tech-related threat in 2024 is not artificial intelligence or foreign election interference, but something more mundane: the retreat from content moderation and the hollowing-out of trust-and-safety units and election-integrity teams. The increase in bad information on the free web puts an even greater burden on fact-based news reporting.

Now AI-created clickbait is also a growing threat. Generative AI’s ability to model, scrape, and even plagiarize real news—and then tailor it to users—is extraordinary. AI clickbait mills, posing as legitimate journalistic organizations, are churning out content that rips off real news and reporting. These plagiarism mills are receiving funding because, well, they’re cheap and profitable. For now, Google’s rankings don’t appear to make a distinction between a news article written by a human being and one written by an AI chatbot. They can, and they should.

The best way to address these challenges is for newsrooms to remove or suspend their paywalls for stories related to the 2024 election. I am mindful of the irony of putting this plea behind The Atlantic ’s own paywall, but that’s exactly where the argument should be made. If you’re reading this, you’ve probably paid to support journalism that you think matters in the world. Don’t you want it to be available to others, too, especially those who would not otherwise get to see it?

Emergencies and natural disasters have long prompted papers to suspend their paywalls. When Hurricane Irene hit the New York metropolitan area in 2011, The New York Times made all storm-related coverage freely available. “We are aware of our obligations to our audience and to the public at large when there is a big story that directly impacts such a large portion of people,” a New York Times editor said at the time. In some ways, this creates a philosophical inconsistency. The paywall says, This content is valuable and you have to pay for it . Suspending the paywall in a crisis says, This content is so valuable that you don’t have to pay for it . Similarly, when the coronavirus hit, The Atlantic made its COVID coverage—and its COVID Tracking Project—freely available to all.

During the pandemic, some publications found that suspending their paywall had an effect they had not anticipated: It increased subscriptions. The Seattle Times , the paper of record in a city that was an early epicenter of coronavirus, put all of its COVID-related content outside the paywall and then saw, according to its senior vice president of marketing, Kati Erwert, “a very significant increase in digital subscriptions”—two to three times its previous daily averages. The Philadelphia Inquirer put its COVID content outside its paywall in the spring of 2020 as a public service. And then, according to the paper’s director of special projects, Evan Benn, it saw a “higher than usual number of digital subscription sign-ups.”

The Tampa Bay Times , The Denver Post , and The St. Paul Pioneer Press , in Minnesota, all experienced similar increases, as did papers operated by the Tribune Publishing Company, including the Chicago Tribune and the Hartford Courant . The new subscribers were readers who appreciated the content and the reporting and wanted to support the paper’s efforts, and to make the coverage free for others to read, too.

Good journalism isn’t cheap, but outlets can find creative ways to pay for their reporting on the election. They can enlist foundations or other sponsors to underwrite their work. They can turn to readers who are willing to subscribe, renew their subscriptions, or make added donations to subsidize important coverage during a crucial election. And they can take advantage of the broader audience that unpaywalled stories can reach, using it to generate more advertising revenue—and even more civic-minded subscribers.

The reason papers suspend their paywall in times of crisis is because they understand that the basic and primary mission of the press is to inform and educate the public. This idea goes back to the country’s Founders. The press was protected by the First Amendment so it could provide the information that voters need in a democracy. “Our liberty depends on the freedom of the press,” Thomas Jefferson wrote, “and that cannot be limited without being lost.” Every journalist understands this. There is no story with a larger impact than an election in which the survival of democracy is on the ballot.

I believe it was a mistake to give away journalism for free in the 1990s. Information is not and never has been free. I devoutly believe that news organizations need to survive and figure out a revenue model that allows them to do so. But the most important mission of a news organization is to provide the public with information that allows citizens to make the best decisions in a constitutional democracy. Our government derives its legitimacy from the consent of the governed, and that consent is arrived at through the free flow of information—reliable, fact-based information. To that end, news organizations should put their election content in front of their paywall. The Constitution protects the press so that the press can protect constitutional democracy. Now the press must fulfill its end of the bargain.

Emotion’s Fourth Wall: Rhetorical Ecologies and “Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint” by Amelia Backes

COURSE: English 245: Writing Feeling

MEDIUM: Website, Graphic Essay

DESCRIPTION: “Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint” is a Korean webnovel by SingShong that places the responsibility of imagining a happy ending on the readers. Fans have flocked to the anonymous community website The Fourth Wall to interact with each other, leave messages, and talk about how that ending has made them feel. This essay examines how the themes of the novel, the open ending, and the mode of the Fourth Wall allow a unique rhetorical ecology of hope to flourish. By being left on the Fourth Wall, the essay takes advantage of the anonymous text form and perpetuates the circulation of emotion.

ARTIST’S STATEMENT: The popular consensus among fans is that finishing “”Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint”” is life changing, and sometimes life saving. With this project, I wanted to investigate why the ending is so impactful by looking at how fans write about their reaction, and how that ending influences the way they interact with each other.

When I first stumbled upon the Fourth Wall website, I was overwhelmed by the passion, vulnerability, comradery, and sheer quantity of the messages. Users could leave anything for someone else to read, and there is a fair amount of jokes and ASCII art, but many messages are confessions of depression, declarations of love to whoever might see it, and telling each other to keep holding on. In the novel, the Fourth Wall is a character and an obstacle to be overcome. The website named for it is a community and a labor of love.

I wrote this essay to understand the feelings of others as much as my own. I left it on the Fourth Wall so others can read it and hopefully understand their feelings as well.

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NPR Editor Who Accused Broadcaster of Liberal Bias Resigns

Uri Berliner, who has worked at NPR for 25 years, said in an essay last week that the nonprofit had allowed progressive bias to taint its coverage.

By Benjamin Mullin

Uri Berliner, the NPR editor who accused the broadcaster of liberal bias in an online essay last week, prompting criticism from conservatives and recrimination from many of his co-workers, has resigned from the nonprofit.

Mr. Berliner said in a social media post on Wednesday that he was resigning because of criticism from the network’s chief executive, Katherine Maher.

“I cannot work in a newsroom where I am disparaged by a new C.E.O. whose divisive views confirm the very problems at NPR I cite in my Free Press essay,” Mr. Berliner wrote.

In his brief resignation letter, addressed to Ms. Maher, Mr. Berliner said he loved NPR, calling it a “great American institution” and adding that he respects “the integrity of my colleagues and wish for NPR to thrive and do important journalism.”

An NPR spokeswoman, Isabel Lara, said the nonprofit does not comment on personnel matters.

In an interview, Mr. Berliner said his decision to resign from NPR coalesced early this week after an email exchange with Ms. Maher. He said in the interview that he could infer from one of her emails that a memo she had sent to employees last week about workplace integrity was referring to him even though he had not been mentioned by name. In the email, which was sent to Mr. Berliner on Monday, Ms. Maher said her memo “stands for itself in reflecting my perspective on our organization.”

“Everything completely changed for me on Monday afternoon,” Mr. Berliner said.

Mr. Berliner’s essay stirred up a hornet’s nest of criticism of NPR and made Mr. Berliner something of a pariah within the network. Several employees told The New York Times that they no longer wished to work with him, and his essay was denounced by Edith Chapin, the network’s top editor.

Many journalists at NPR pushed back against the essay, including the “Morning Edition” host Steve Inskeep, who said on the newsletter platform Substack that Mr. Berliner failed to “engage anyone who had a different point of view.”

“This article needed a better editor,” Mr. Inskeep wrote. “I don’t know who, if anyone, edited Uri’s story, but they let him publish an article that discredited itself.”

Mr. Berliner’s essay found some defenders among the ranks of former NPR employees. Jeffrey A. Dvorkin, a former ombudsman, said on social media that Mr. Berliner was “not wrong.” Chuck Holmes, a former managing editor at NPR, called Mr. Berliner’s essay “brave” on Facebook.

Critics of NPR, including conservative activists, used Mr. Berliner’s essay in The Free Press to impugn the network’s journalism and its leadership. One of them, Christopher Rufo, began resurfacing social media posts from Ms. Maher that were critical of President Donald J. Trump and embraced progressive causes. Mr. Rufo has a history of pressuring media organizations to cover critical stories of well-known figures, including the plagiarism allegations against Claudine Gay, the former Harvard president.

NPR said in a statement earlier this week that Ms. Maher’s social media posts predated her term as chief executive, adding that she was not working in news at the time.

Before he resigned from NPR, Mr. Berliner was on a five-day suspension from the network for violating company policy against working for outside organizations without securing permission.

Mr. Berliner said he did not have any immediate plans after leaving NPR, adding that he was looking forward to getting more sleep and spending time with his family.

Benjamin Mullin reports on the major companies behind news and entertainment. Contact Ben securely on Signal at +1 530-961-3223 or email at [email protected] . More about Benjamin Mullin

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'Lessons for Survival' reflects on motherhood, racial justice and climate change

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Host Celeste Headlee speaks with author, photographer and CUNY professor Emily Raboteau about her new essay collection " Lessons for Survival: Mothering Against 'The Apocalypse .'"

The book explores the intersection of climate change with racial justice and economic inequality.

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This segment aired on April 19, 2024.

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Hundreds of Jan. 6 Prosecutions—Including Donald Trump’s—Are Suddenly in Peril at the Supreme Court

Will the Supreme Court jeopardize the prosecution of more than 350 defendants involved with Jan. 6, including Donald Trump, by gutting the federal statute that prohibits their unlawful conduct? Maybe so. Tuesday’s oral arguments in Fischer v. United States were rough sledding for the government, as the conservative justices lined up to thwap Joe Biden’s Department of Justice for allegedly overreaching in its pursuit of Jan. 6 convictions. Six members of the court took turns wringing their hands over the application of a criminal obstruction law to the rioters, fretting that they faced overly harsh penalties for participating in the violent attack. Unmentioned but lurking in the background was Trump himself, who can wriggle out of two major charges against him with a favorable decision in this case.

There are, no doubt, too many criminal laws whose vague wording gives prosecutors near-limitless leeway to threaten citizens with decades in prison. But this isn’t one of them. Congress wrote a perfectly legible law and the overwhelming majority of judges have had no trouble applying it. It would be all too telling if the Supreme Court decides to pretend the statute is somehow too sweeping or jumbled to use as a tool of accountability for Jan. 6.

Start with the obstruction law itself, known as Section 1552(c), which Congress enacted to close loopholes that Enron exploited to impede probes into its misconduct . The provision is remarkably straightforward—a far cry from the ambiguous, sloppy, or muddled laws that typically flummox the judiciary. It’s a mainstay of the Department of Justice’s “Capitol siege” prosecutions, deployed in about a quarter of all cases. Overall, 350 people face charges under this statute, Trump among them , and the DOJ has used it to secure the convictions of about 150 rioters . It targets anyone who “corruptly … obstructs, influences, or impedes any official proceeding, or attempts to do so.” And it clarifies that an official proceeding includes “a proceeding before the Congress.”

The government argues that some rioters attempted to “obstruct” an “official proceeding” by halting the count of electoral votes through “corrupt” means. That includes Joseph Fischer, the defendant in the current case. Fischer, who served as a police officer before Jan. 6, allegedly texted that the protest “might get violent”; that “they should storm the capital and drag all the democrates [sic] into the street and have a mob trial”; and that protesters should “take democratic congress to the gallows,” because they “can’t vote if they can’t breathe..lol.” Video evidence shows Fischer assaulting multiple police officers on the afternoon of Jan. 6 after breaching the Capitol.

Would anyone seriously argue that this person did not attempt to corruptly obstruct an official proceeding? For a time, it seemed not: 14 of the 15 federal judges—all but Judge Carl Nichols in this case—considering the charge in various Jan. 6 cases agreed that it applied to violent rioters bent on stopping the electoral count. So did every judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit except one, Judge Gregory Katsas. Both Nichols and Katsas were appointed by Trump. Their crusade to kneecap the law caught SCOTUS’ attention, and the court decided to intervene despite overwhelming consensus among lower court judges. The Supreme Court’s decision will have major implications for Trump: Two of the four charges brought by special counsel Jack Smith in the former president’s Jan. 6 prosecution revolve around this offense. A ruling that eviscerates the obstruction law would arguably cut out the heart of the indictment.

At least three justices seem ready to do just that. Justice Clarence Thomas—back on the bench after yesterday’s unexplained absence —grilled Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar over the law’s application to Jan. 6. “There have been many violent protests that have interfered with proceedings. Has the government applied this provision to other protests in the past?” Thomas asked, as if to nail the Justice Department for inconsistency and reveal some improper motive for wielding the law against violent insurrectionists. Justice Neil Gorsuch trolled Prelogar by alluding to Democratic Rep. Jamaal Bowman’s infamous fire alarm incident . “Would pulling a fire alarm before a vote qualify for 20 years in federal prison?” he asked. Justice Samuel Alito joined in to ask about “protests in the courtroom” when an audience member interrupts the justices and “delays the proceeding for five minutes.”

“For all the protests that have occurred in this court,” Alito noted pointedly, “the Justice Department has not charged any serious offenses, and I don’t think any one of those protestors has been sentenced to even one day in prison.” Why, he wondered, weren’t they charged under the obstruction statute?

Alito, audibly angry, continued: “Yesterday protestors blocked the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco and disrupted traffic in San Francisco,” he told Prelogar. “What if something similar to that happened all around the Capitol so … all the bridges from Virginia were blocked, and members from Virginia who needed to appear at a hearing couldn’t get there or were delayed in getting there? Would that be a violation of this provision?”

To be clear, this is trolling: There is simply no comparison between a violent attack on the Capitol and protests that take the form of civil disobedience. And these justices expressed no similar concern about an ongoing red-state effort to persecute peaceful protesters who participate in Black Lives Matter demonstrations. Gorsuch and Alito’s hypotheticals ignore the reality that there are two layers of protection between minor protests and this rather major law. First, the Constitution affords prosecutorial discretion to the executive branch, allowing the Department of Justice to decide when an illegal “protest” is dangerous enough to warrant the use of a criminal law like the obstruction statute. Second, prosecutors must always prove the alleged offense to a jury, beyond a reasonable doubt, creating a democratic check on the abusive use of a stringent law to punish a silly crime.

Prelogar highlighted this latter point, explaining that juries have indeed acquitted Jan. 6 defendants of obstruction. If prosecutors ever apply this (or any other) criminal statute to a questionable set of facts, they may always be thwarted by a jury. That is how the system is meant to work.

This kind of behavior from Thomas, Gorsuch, and Alito is no surprise at this point. And the liberal justices countered them as best they could. What’s troubling is that the other conservative justices jumped in to join the pile-on. Chief Justice John Roberts insistently pressed Prelogar to prove that the Justice Department has interpreted and enforced the obstruction law consistently in the past. This question ignored the fact that, as Prelogar reminded the court, there has never been any crime like the assault on the Capitol , so the agency had no prior opportunity to apply the law in any similar way.

Justice Brett Kavanaugh suggested that the Justice Department didn’t really need this statute because it has other laws at its disposal. “There are six other counts in the indictment here,” he told Prelogar. Why “aren’t those six counts good enough just from the Justice Department’s perspective given that they don’t have any of the hurdles?” Of course, the DOJ brought the obstruction charge specifically because it was more serious than the others; prosecutors felt an obligation to enforce Congress’ strong protections against intrusions on official proceedings, including those in the Capitol. Kavanaugh appears to think the DOJ should have settled for a smattering of lesser charges. Justice Amy Coney Barrett was not so obtuse; she earnestly worried that the statute was too broad and fished around for narrowing constructions. Yet she seemed unsatisfied with the many options Prelogar provided to keep the law limited to the most egregious interruptions of government business.

What all six justices seemed tempted to do was rip up Section 1552(c) because it happens to include another sentence that applies to the destruction of evidence and other official documents. Jan. 6 rioters didn’t destroy evidence, this argument goes, so they can’t be culpable under a law. That reading is untenable , something Prelogar impressively reinforced at every turn on Tuesday, but it may be attractive if a majority wants to defuse this statute before it’s used against Trump in a court of law.

Smith’s indictment of the former president for his participation in Jan. 6 doesn’t entirely hinge on obstruction. It does, however, weave obstruction into both the facts and the legal theory of the case, placing it at the center of a broader criminal conspiracy to overturn the 2020 election. If SCOTUS defuses the law now, Smith would have to scrap two of four charges and restructure the entire indictment, making it that much easier for Trump to demand further delay and, eventually, evade a conviction.

The justices know this. They should have been on their best behavior on Tuesday to avoid any glimmer of impropriety. It was already profoundly disturbing that Thomas sat on the case given his wife’s involvement with the attempt to overturn the election. The other justices’ faux concern about overcriminalization of protesters only added to the foul smell emanating from arguments. There’s no telling how Fischer will turn out; maybe the liberal justices will help their colleagues rediscover their better angels behind the scenes. From Tuesday’s vantage point, though, the argument was a bleak reminder of how easy it is for cloistered jurists to wish away the massive stakes of a case like this.