After publishing 32 articles for the opinion section of The Lamron, it’s hard sometimes to remember that I am not simply spouting into a vacuum, and that there are indeed people reading the things I’ve written. That’s something like 19,000 words I’ve typed out for others to read – at least that’s the intent. And the question I come to now is: Why?

On the morning of Monday April 22, the White House announced alleged Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev would not be tried as an enemy combatant, rather as the United States citizen he is.

Under a constant fear of being branded part of the “liberal media” establishment, there is an apparent effort by mainstream media outlets to cover stories as evenly as possible, which usually entails attributing equal blame to both sides of the political fighting and gridlock that plagues Washington, D.C.

On March 10, the online betting and “prediction market” site Intrade announced that it would “immediately cease trading activity.” The site, which allows users to make bets on various world events including United States presidential elections, had always been a target of questions of legality and the ethical implications of its commodification of world political events.

With President Barack Obama calling in his Feb. 12 State of the Union address to raise the minimum wage, a debate over traditional economic theory has, if only briefly, been brought to the forefront of political discussion. While basic economics would suggest that raising the minimum wage, however slight, would have a negative impact on employment, certain recent findings argue otherwise.

A key pillar of President Barack Obama’s fifth State of the Union address delivered on Feb. 12 was Obama’s proposal for a universal early education program. The policy proposal brought with it a welcomed discussion of federal education spending, one that is long overdue. In order to confront the United States’ low education performance, the nation must be prepared to commit its extensive resources to the problem. That the president at least appears to be ready to do so is a promising start.

President Barack Obama opened his fifth State of the Union address delivered on Feb. 12 imploring Congress and voters to seek bipartisan action, calling to put the “nation’s interest before party.” Yet the reality of his address painted a different picture.

At the start of 2013, it appears the United States economy is headed for recovery. That is, as long as an exaggerated fear of government spending doesn’t get in the way.

The new SUNY model for resource allocation, which was unveiled to the SUNY Student Assembly on Nov. 27 and which relies heavily on enrollment-based distribution, is the fairest way to distribute the $787 million in funding. While the majority of SUNY’s four-year liberal arts colleges will indeed see a decrease in funding, there simply is no better way to allocate the funds, and any critics who suggest otherwise are blinded by their own bias.

Put bluntly, the Republican Party had a very disappointing Election Day. Failing in its efforts at the presidency and for a majority in the Senate, the Nov. 6 results have sent the GOP into disarray as its members attempt to explain why exactly the party came up so short.