We’ve all heard the stories. Young person goes to college, graduates with thousands of dollars in debt, can’t get her or his desired job, gets stuck working at a fast-food joint, and moves back in...

Last week, Gov. Terry Branstad sent a letter urging congressional leaders in Washington to act quickly to pass a new farm bill — legislation that has traditionally set funding for both agricultural programs...

My sophomore year of high school, I played on the JV football team, and I got a concussion. A lot has been done in the last few years since I banged my head in practice. Medical studies have been performed,...

The great thing about moving in this town is that you meet so many interesting people. Well, OK, maybe not so much. That’s probably roughly as true as saying Republicans love minority, female, young...

The Institute of Medicine released a new report last week on the geographic variation in health-care spending. Over the last three decades, researchers have documented significant disparities in how Medicare...

I have, for a number of reasons, been thinking a lot lately — too much, even — about Galesburg, Ill. I drive through there every week or two, I’ve had a song about Galesburg stuck in my head...

When I was an ignorant little freshman, I learned an important lesson about the effect a person’s actions can have in the realm of social media. One of my friends had passed away, and another friend...

“For everyone who’s a valedictorian,” Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, said last week about the nation’s undocumented high-school students in an interview with the conservative website...

BEIJING — I heard the familiar beeping sound and rushed onto the train only to be shoved into the person in front of me. We were all sardines in a can on Line 10 of the Beijing Subway. But that was...

My brother can recite Robert De Niro’s entire filmography by memory. More impressively, he recalls and reels off monologues from such movies as Raging Bull and Taxi Driver with ease. I believe...

A new report by a Johnson County task force titled “Racial Equity in Iowa City and Johnson County” had some very disappointing findings. While Johnson County may rightly boast of being a vibrant...

Last month, I felt myself slipping into a spiral of addiction. Thirty or 40 times a day, my brain would project a picture of a glistening pile of French fries onto the front wall of my skull and whisper,...