Category: English

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Chris Lamb, Professor of Journalism, Indiana University

President Barack Obama famously chided Donald Trump in April 2011 during the annual White House correspondents’ dinner. The reality show star had repeatedly and falsely claimed that Obama had not been born in the United States and was therefore ineligible to be president.

Trump’s demands that Obama release his birth certificate had, in part, made Trump a front-runner among Republican hopefuls for their party’s nomination in the following year’s presidential election.

Obama referred to Trump’s presidential ambitions by joking that, if elected, Trump would bring some changes to the White House.

Obama then called attention to a satirical photo the guests could see of a remodeled White House with the words “Trump” and “The White House” in large purple letters followed by the words “hotel,” “casino” and “golf course.”

Obama’s ridicule of Trump that evening has been credited with inspiring Trump to run for president in 2016.

My book, “The Art of the Political Putdown,” includes Obama’s chiding of Trump at the correspondents’ dinner to demonstrate how politicians use humor to establish superiority over a rival.

Obama’s ridicule humiliated Trump, who temporarily dropped the birther conspiracy before reviving it. But Trump may have gotten the last laugh by using the humiliation of that night, as some think, as motivation in his run for the president in 2016.

There is a further twist to Obama joking about Trump’s renovations to the White House if Trump became president. Trump has fulfilled Obama’s prediction, kind of.

The Trump administration has razed the East Wing, which sits adjacent to the White House, and will replace it with a 90,000-square-foot, gold-encrusted ballroom that appears to reflect the ostentatious tastes of the president.

The US$300 million ballroom will be twice the size of the White House.

It’s expected to be big enough to accommodate nearly a thousand people. Design renderings suggest that the ballroom will resemble the ballroom at Mar-a-Lago, the president’s private estate in Palm Beach, Florida.

“I don’t have any plan to call it after myself,” Trump said recently. “That was fake news. Probably going to call it the presidential ballroom or something like that. We haven’t really thought about a name yet.”

But senior administration officials told ABC News that they were already referring to the structure as “The President Donald J. Trump Ballroom.”

The renovation will have neither a hotel, casino nor golf course, as Obama mentioned in his light-hearted speech at the 2011 correspondents’ dinner.

Obama pokes fun at Trump

In the months before the 2011 correspondents’ dinner, Trump had repeatedly claimed that Obama had not been born in Hawaii but had instead been born outside the United States, perhaps in his father’s home country of Kenya.

The baseless conspiracy theory became such a distraction that Obama released his long-form birth certificate in April 2011.

Three days later, Obama delivered his speech at the correspondents’ dinner with Trump in the audience, where he said that Trump, having put the birther conspiracy behind him, could move to other conspiracy theories like claims the moon landing was staged, aliens landed in Roswell, New Mexico, or the unsolved murders of rappers Biggie Smalls and Tupac Shakur.

“Did we fake the moon landing?” Obama said. “What really happened at Roswell? And where are Biggie and Tupac?”

Obama then poked fun at Trump’s reality show, “The Apprentice,” and referred to how Trump, who owned hotels, casinos and golf courses, might renovate the White House.

When Obama was finished, Seth Meyers, the host of the dinner, made additional jokes at Trump’s expense.

“Donald Trump has been saying that he will run for president as a Republican – which is surprising, since I just assumed that he was running as a joke,” Meyers said.

Trump gets the last laugh

The New Yorker magazine writer Adam Gopnik remembered watching Trump as the jokes kept coming at his expense.

“Trump’s humiliation was as absolute, and as visible, as any I have ever seen: his head set in place, like a man on a pillory, he barely moved or altered his expression as wave after wave of laughter struck him,” Gopnik wrote. “There was not a trace of feigning good humor about him.”

Roger Stone, one of Trump’s top advisers, said Trump decided to run for president after he felt he had been publicly humiliated.

“I think that is the night he resolves to run for president,” Stone said in an interview with the PBS program “Frontline.” “I think that he is kind of motivated by it. ‘Maybe I’ll just run. Maybe I’ll show them all.‘”

Trump, if Stone and other political observers are correct, sought the presidency to avenge that humiliation.

“I thought, ‘Oh, Barack Obama is starting something that I don’t know if he’ll be able to finish,’” said Omarosa Manigault, a former “Apprentice” contestant who became Trump’s director of African American outreach during his first term.

“Every critic, every detractor, will have to bow down to President Trump,” she said. “It is everyone who’s ever doubted Donald, whoever disagreed, whoever challenged him – it is the ultimate revenge to become the most powerful man in the universe.”

The notoriously thin-skinned Trump did not attend the White House correspondents’ dinner during his first presidency. He also did not attend the dinner during the first year of his second presidency.

Although Trump has never publicly acknowledged the importance of that event in 2011, a number of people have noted how pivotal it was, demonstrating how the putdown can be a powerful weapon in politics – even, perhaps, extending to tearing down the White House’s East Wing.

Chris Lamb does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Trump’s White House renovations fulfill Obama’s prediction, kind of – https://theconversation.com/trumps-white-house-renovations-fulfill-obamas-prediction-kind-of-268458

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Gibbs Knotts, Professor of Political Science, Coastal Carolina University

Routine congressional oversight hearings usually don’t make headlines. Historically, these often low-key events have been the sorts of things you catch only on C-SPAN – procedural, polite and largely ignored outside the Beltway.

But their tone has shifted dramatically during the second Trump administration.

When Attorney General Pam Bondi appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Oct. 7, 2025, what took place was a contentious, highly partisan, made-for-TV-and-social-media confrontation.

The hearing occurred on the heels of the indictment of former FBI Director James Comey, which many legal experts view as an example of a president targeting his political enemies. Bondi came ready to fight. She refused to answer many questions from Democrats, instead launching personal attacks against these members of the U.S. Senate.

When Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin, a Democrat, asked about the deployment of National Guard troops in Chicago, Bondi retorted, “I wish you loved Chicago as much as you hate President Trump.” The clip went viral, as Bondi likely intended.

From our perspective as political scientists who study the U.S. Congress, congressional oversight has played an important role in American democracy. Here’s a brief history.

Inquisitory powers

In simple terms, oversight is the ability of Congress to ensure that the laws it passes are faithfully executed. This generally means asking questions, demanding information, convening hearings and holding the executive branch accountable for its actions.

Oversight isn’t specifically mentioned in the Constitution. Article 1, Section 8, which lists the powers of Congress, includes the power “to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper,” without identifying an oversight role. Once laws are enacted, Article 2, Section 3, states that the president “shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.”

However, the framers viewed congressional oversight as a key component of legislative authority. They wanted presidents to take Congress seriously and structured the Constitution to ensure that the executive would be accountable to the legislature. As James Madison urged in Federalist 51, the separate branches of government should have the power to keep each other from becoming too powerful. “Ambition must be made to counteract ambition,” Madison wrote.

The framers drew from the examples of the British Parliament and Colonial legislatures. In 1621, Sir Francis Bacon was charged with corruption and impeached as Lord High Chancellor after an investigation by a committee of the British Parliament. And in 1768, the Massachusetts Assembly conducted an investigation of Gov. Francis Bernard that led to a formal request to the King of England for his removal.

At the Federal Convention in 1787 that produced the Constitution, Delegate George Mason noted that members of Congress possessed “inquisitory powers” and “must meet frequently to inspect the Conduct of public officials.” Even though this idea was never written down, it was a habit of self-government that early Congresses put into practice.

Early oversight hearings

Congressional oversight began almost as soon as the first Congress met. In 1790, Robert Morris, the superintendent of finances during the Continental Congress and a financier of the American Revolution, asked Congress to investigate his handling of the country’s finances and was exonerated of any wrongdoing.

During this period, congressional investigations were often referred to select committees – bodies created to perform special functions. These panels had the power to issue subpoenas and hold individuals in contempt. Since there was no official record of debates and proceedings, the public relied on newspaper accounts to learn about what had happened.

In March 1792, congressional oversight exposed businessman William Duer, who signed contracts with the War Department but failed to furnish the needed military supplies. This shortfall contributed to a stunning U.S. military defeat against a confederation of Native American tribes in the Northwest Territory.

Congress eventually removed the quartermaster general from his role for mismanaging the contracts. Duer was simultaneously involved in perhaps the first American economic bubble, which burst at the same time as Congress’ hearings. He ended up in a debtor’s prison, where he died in 1799.

Throughout the 19th century, Congress continued to quietly exercise this power. The work was often invisible to the public, but the issues were important. Hearings from December 1861 to May 1865 on the conduct of the U.S. Civil War produced a detailed record of the war, exposed military wrongdoing and condemned slavery. In 1871, the Senate created a select committee to investigate Ku Klux Klan violence during Reconstruction.

Investigating corruption and criminal acts

Congress started to use its oversight power more aggressively in the 1920s with the Senate Committee on Public Land and Surveys’ high-profile investigations into the Teapot Dome scandal.

Hearings revealed that Interior Secretary Albert Bacon Fall had secretly leased federal oil reserves in Wyoming to two private corporations and had received personal loans and gifts from the companies in return.

The investigation found clear evidence of corruption. Fall was indicted and became the first U.S. Cabinet member to be convicted of a felony.

The U.S. Supreme Court helped to shape the legal foundation of congressional oversight. In McGrain v. Daugherty, decided in 1927, the court held that congressional committees could issue subpoenas, force witnesses to testify and hold them in contempt if they fail to appear. Two years later, in Sinclair v. United States, the court ruled that witnesses who lied to Congress could be charged with perjury.

These cases granted the judicial branch’s sanction to what had long been an implied legislative power, cementing the constitutionality of congressional oversight.

Oversight highs and lows

The modern era of congressional oversight has produced some very important reforms – and some truly regrettable spectacles.

The most important example of bipartisan congressional oversight came in response to reporting by The Washington Post’s Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward. The two journalists wrote about the 1972 burgling of Democratic National Committee offices in Washington, D.C.’s Watergate Hotel and subsequent cover-up efforts by the Nixon administration.

On Feb. 7, 1973, the U.S. Senate voted 77-0 to establish a Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities, which brought together Democrats and Republicans to investigate what came to be known as the “Watergate scandal.” The committee’s work spurred action in Congress to impeach President Richard Nixon, leading to Nixon’s resignation in 1974 and to the enactment of legal reforms to provide an institutional check on presidential power.

Another high point for congressional oversight came after the 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001. Seeking to learn how the deadliest terrorist strike on American soil had occurred, Democratic Sen. Bob Graham and Republican Rep. Porter Goss, who chaired the Senate and House Intelligence committees, formed a joint committee to investigate intelligence failures before and after the attacks.

This inquiry produced several important recommendations that were ultimately adopted, including the creation of a director of national intelligence and a Department of Homeland Security, as well as better information sharing among law enforcement agencies.

Congress’ oversight can extend beyond the executive branch when the actions of private actors raise questions about existing laws or spur the need for new ones. As examples, investigations into medical device safety and Enron’s 2001 collapse examined malfeasance in the private sphere that existing regulations failed to prevent.

However, the power to expose corruption can also be used as a tool to score partisan points and generate outrage, rather than holding the executive branch accountable for actual malfeasance. Notably, in the 1950s, Wisconsin Sen. Joseph McCarthy turned oversight into inquisition and used the power of media to amplify his accusations of communist influence within the federal government.

Democracy needs oversight

Congressional oversight has strengthened the democratic system at many points. But hearings like Bondi’s recent session before the Senate Judiciary Committee aren’t the first, and likely won’t be the last, to substitute sound bites for substance.

As we see it, the problem with allowing oversight to become political theater is that it distracts Congress from quieter and more meaningful oversight work. Slow, procedural work isn’t likely to go viral, but it helps keep government accountable. The task of a deliberate legislative body is to reconcile those very different impulses.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. A brief history of congressional oversight, from Revolutionary War financing to Pam Bondi – https://theconversation.com/a-brief-history-of-congressional-oversight-from-revolutionary-war-financing-to-pam-bondi-267623

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Valerie Thomas, Professor of Industrial Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology

Countries around the world have been discussing the need to rein in climate change for three decades, yet global greenhouse gas emissions – and global temperatures with them – keep rising.

When it seems like we’re getting nowhere, it’s useful to step back and examine the progress that has been made.

Let’s take a look at the United States, historically the world’s largest greenhouse gas emitter. Over those three decades, the U.S. population soared by 28% and the economy, as measured by gross domestic product adjusted for inflation, more than doubled.

Yet U.S. emissions from many of the activities that produce greenhouse gases – transportation, industry, agriculture, heating and cooling of buildings – have remained about the same over the past 30 years. Transportation is a bit up; industry a bit down. And electricity, once the nation’s largest source of greenhouse gas emissions, has seen its emissions drop significantly.

Overall, the U.S. is still among the countries with the highest per capita emissions, so there’s room for improvement, and its emissions haven’t fallen enough to put the country on track to meet its pledges under the 10-year-old Paris climate agreement. But U.S. emissions are down about 15% over the past 10 years.

Here’s how that happened:

US electricity emissions have fallen

U.S. electricity use has been rising lately with the shift toward more electrification of cars and heating and cooling and expansion of data centers, yet greenhouse gas emissions from electricity are down by almost 30% since 1995.

One of the main reasons for this big drop is that Americans are using less coal and more natural gas to make electricity.

Both coal and natural gas are fossil fuels. Both release carbon dioxide to the atmosphere when they are burned to make electricity, and that carbon dioxide traps heat, raising global temperatures. But power plants can make electricity more efficiently using natural gas compared with coal, so it produces less emissions per unit of power.

Why did the U.S. start using more natural gas?

Research and technological innovation in fracking and horizontal drilling have allowed companies to extract more oil and gas at lower cost, making it cheaper to produce electricity from natural gas rather than coal.

As a result, utilities have built more natural gas power plants – especially super-efficient combined cycle gas power plants, which produce power from gas turbines and also capture waste heat from those turbines to generate more power. More coal plants have been shutting down or running less.

Because natural gas is a more efficient fuel than coal, it has been a win for climate in comparison, even though it’s a fossil fuel. The U.S. has reduced emissions from electricity as a result.

Significant improvements in energy efficiency, from appliances to lighting, have also played a role. Even though tech gadgets seem to be recharging everywhere all the time today, household electricity use, per person, plateaued over the first two decades of the 2000s after rising continuously since the 1940s.

Costs for renewable electricity, batteries fall

U.S. renewable electricity generation, including wind, solar and hydro power, has nearly tripled since 1995, helping to further reduce emissions from electricity generation.

Costs for solar and wind power have fallen so much that they are now cheaper than coal and competitive with natural gas. Fourteen states, including most of the Great Plains, now get at least 30% of their power from solar, wind and battery storage.

While wind power has been cost competitive with fossil fuels for at least 20 years, solar photovoltaic power has only been competitive with fossil fuels for about 10 years. So expect deployment of solar PV to continue to increase, both in the U.S. and internationally, even as U.S. federal subsidies disappear.

Both wind and solar provide intermittent power: The sun does not always shine, and the wind does not always blow. There are a number of ways utilities are dealing with this. One way is to use demand management, offering lower prices for power during off-peak periods or discounts for companies that can cut their power use during high demand. Virtual power plants aggregate several kinds of distributed energy resources – solar panels on homes, batteries and even smart thermostats – to manage power supply and demand. The U.S. had an estimated 37.5 gigawatts of virtual power plants in 2024, equivalent to about 37.5 nuclear power reactors.

Another energy management method is battery storage, which is just now beginning to take off. Battery costs have come down enough in the past few years to make utility-scale battery storage cost-effective.

What about driving?

In the U.S., gasoline consumption has remained roughly constant and electric vehicle sales have been slow. Some of this could be due to the success of fracking: U.S. petroleum production has increased, and gasoline and diesel prices have remained relatively low.

People in other countries are switching to electric vehicles more rapidly than in the U.S. as the cost of EVs has fallen. Chinese consumers can buy an entry-level EV for under US$10,000 in China with the help of government subsidies, and the country leads the world in EV sales.

In 2024, people in the U.S. bought 1.6 million EVs, and global sales reached 17 million, which was up 25% from the year before.

The unknowns ahead: What about data centers?

The construction of new data centers, in part to serve the explosive growth of artificial intelligence, is drawing a lot of attention to future energy demand and to the uncertainty ahead.

Data centers are increasing electricity demand in some locations, such as northern Virginia, Dallas, Phoenix, Chicago and Atlanta. The future electricity demand growth from data centers is still unclear, though, meaning the effects of data centers on electric rates and power system emissions are also uncertain.

However, AI is not the only reason to watch for increased electricity demand: The U.S. can expect growing electricity demand for industrial processes and electric vehicles, as well as the overall transition from using oil and gas for heating and appliances to using electricity that continues across the country.

Valerie Thomas receives funding from the US Department of Energy

– ref. How the US cut climate-changing emissions while its economy more than doubled – https://theconversation.com/how-the-us-cut-climate-changing-emissions-while-its-economy-more-than-doubled-268763

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Jianna Jin, Assistant Professor of Marketing at Mendoza College of Business, University of Notre Dame

When it comes to inquiring about – ahem – certain products, shoppers prefer the inhuman touch.

That is what we found in a study of consumer habits when it comes to products that traditionally have come with a degree of embarrassment – think acne cream, diarrhea medication, adult sex toys or personal lubricant.

While brands may assume consumers hate chatbots, our series of studies involving more than 6,000 participants found a clear pattern: When it comes to purchases that make people feel embarrassed, consumers prefer chatbots over human service reps.

In one experiment, we asked participants to imagine shopping for medications for diarrhea and hay fever. They were offered two online pharmacies, one with a human pharmacist and the other with a chatbot pharmacist.

The medications were packaged identically, with the only difference being their labels for “diarrhea” or “hay fever.” More than 80% of consumers looking for diarrhea treatment preferred a store with a clearly nonhuman chatbot. In caparison, just 9% of those shopping for hay fever medication preferred nonhuman chatbots.

This is because, participants told us, they did not think chatbots have “minds” – that is, the ability to judge or feel.

In fact, when it comes to selling embarrassing products, making chatbots look or sound human can actually backfire. In another study, we asked 1,500 people to imagine buying diarrhea pills online. Participants were randomly assigned to one of three conditions: an online drugstore with a human service rep, the same store with a humanlike chatbot with a profile photo and name, or the same store with a chatbot that was clearly botlike in both its name and icon.

We then asked participants how likely they would be to seek help from the service agent. The results were clear: Willingness to interact dropped as the agent seemed more human. Interest peaked with the clearly machinelike chatbot and hit its lowest point with the human service rep.

Why it matters

As a scholar of marketing and consumer behavior, I know Chatbots play an increasingly large part in e-retail. In fact, one report found 80% of retail and e-commerce business use AI chatbots or plan to use them in the near future.

When it comes to chatbots, companies want to answer two questions: When should they deploy chatbots? And how should the chatbots be designed?

Many companies may assume the best strategy is to make bots look and sound more human, intuiting that consumers don’t want to talk to machines.

But our findings show the opposite can be true. In moments when embarrassment looms large, humanlike chatbots can backfire.

The practical takeaway is that brands should not default to humanizing their chatbots. Sometimes the most effective bot is the one that looks and sounds like a machine.

What still isn’t known

So far, we’ve looked at everyday purchases where embarrassment is easy to imagine, such as hemorrhoid cream, anti-wrinkle cream, personal lubricant and adult toys.

However, we believe the insights extend more broadly. For example, women getting a quote for car repair may be more self-conscious, as this is a purchase context where women have been traditionally more stigmatized. Similarly, men shopping for cosmetic products may feel judged in a category that has traditionally been marketed to women.

In contexts like these, companies could deploy chatbots – especially ones that clearly sound machinelike – to reduce discomfort and provide a better service. But more work is needed to test that hypothesis.

The Research Brief is a short take on interesting academic work.

Jianna Jin does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Chatbots don’t judge! Customers prefer robots over humans when it comes to those ’um, you know’ purchases – https://theconversation.com/chatbots-dont-judge-customers-prefer-robots-over-humans-when-it-comes-to-those-um-you-know-purchases-266105

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Daniel Schneider, Professor of Social Policy, Harvard Kennedy School

American households have become dependent on Amazon.

The numbers say it all: In 2024, 83% of U.S. households received deliveries from Amazon, representing over 1 million packages delivered each day and 9 billion individual items delivered same-day or next-day every year. In remarkably short order, the company has transformed from an online bookseller into a juggernaut that has reshaped retailing. But its impact isn’t limited to how we shop.

Behind that endless stream of packages are more than a million people working in Amazon fulfillment centers and delivery vehicles. Through its growing dominance in retail, Amazon has eclipsed its two major competitors in the delivery business, UPS and FedEx, in terms of package volume.

What is life like for those workers? Between Amazon’s rosy public relations on the one hand and reporters’ and advocates’ troubling exposés on the other, it can be hard to tell. Part of the reason is that researchers like us don’t have much reliable data: Workers’ experiences at companies such as Amazon, UPS and FedEx can be a black box. Amazon’s arm’s-length relationship with the drivers it depends on for deliveries makes finding answers even harder.

But that didn’t stop us. Using unique data from the Shift Project, our new study, co-authored with Julie Su and Kevin Bruey, offers the first direct, large-scale comparison of working conditions for drivers and fulfillment employees at Amazon, UPS and FedEx based on survey responses by more than 9,000 workers.

What we found was deeply troubling – not only for Amazon drivers but also for the future of work in the delivery industry as a whole.

2 models, 2 realities

For nearly a century, driving delivery trucks has been a pathway to the middle class, as epitomized by unionized jobs at UPS. UPS drivers, who have been members of the Teamsters union for decades, are employees with legal protections and a collective-bargaining contract.

In contrast, Amazon has embraced a very different model. Most important is that Amazon does not directly employ nearly any of its delivery drivers.

Instead, its transportation division, Amazon Logistics, relies on two methods to deliver most of its shipments: Amazon Flex, a platform-like system that treats drivers like independent contractors, and Amazon DSP, a franchise-like system that uses subcontractors. DSP subcontractors are almost all nonunion, and the company has cut ties with DSP contractors whose drivers have attempted to unionize. These practices place downward pressure on the wages and working conditions of drivers throughout the industry.

The impact on workers is stark.

Delivery workers at Amazon receive significantly lower wages than at UPS and FedEx, we found. Wage gaps are especially large between the delivery workers at Amazon, who earn US$19 an hour on average, and the unionized drivers at UPS, who make $35.

We also found that unionized UPS drivers have a clear pathway to upward mobility, while Amazon drivers don’t. At UPS, wages increase sharply the longer a worker has been on the job. Pay starts at $21 an hour, reaching nearly $40 an hour for drivers who’ve been with the company for at least 10 years – which is more than half of them.

At Amazon, wages start at $17 an hour and don’t increase with tenure. Nearly half of workers have less than a year on the job.

Between lower wages, more unstable schedules, fewer benefits and limited protections from employment laws, Amazon drivers struggle to make ends meet. More than 1 in 4 told us they had gone hungry because they couldn’t afford enough to eat within the past month, and 33% said they couldn’t cover their utility bills. Compared to drivers at UPS and FedEx, Amazon drivers face significant financial instability.

On top of that, Amazon drivers face intense workplace surveillance and speed tracking – as do workers at the company’s fulfillment centers. Sixty percent of both types of Amazon workers received frequent feedback on the speed of their work from a technological device, and more than two-thirds said that Amazon monitors the quality of their work using technology. That degree of technological surveillance and tracking far outpaces what UPS and FedEx workers told us they were exposed to, representing an extreme case of worker monitoring and performance assessment.

Using nonemployee drivers contributed to the exponential growth of Amazon as a package delivery company. In 2023, Amazon for the first time delivered more packages than UPS, making it the second-largest parcel carrier in the country – surpassed only by the U.S. Postal Service.

By building an online retail empire with the capacity to deliver the majority of its own shipments, Amazon’s expansion continues. UPS, by contrast, has seen drops in its revenues, stock value and market capitalization. Amazon’s sheer size and giglike approach are therefore changing industry standards, putting downward pressure on wages, benefits and job stability across the delivery sector.

The contrast between Amazon and UPS drivers isn’t just about two companies using different models for package delivery – it represents two competing futures for work. As the second-largest retail company and now largest private delivery company in the U.S., Amazon exerts market power that impacts the working conditions of workers beyond its own delivery drivers. Recent reporting indicates that UPS has been experimenting with using gig deliveries, much to the consternation of the union that represents three-quarters of its workforce.

In the post-World War II era, increasing unionization led to better wages and conditions across much of the economy, including nonunionized sectors. The continuing expansion of Amazon’s business model could signal the unraveling of wages, benefits and protections for working people more generally.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. The unraveling of workplace protections for delivery drivers: A tale of 2 workplace models – https://theconversation.com/the-unraveling-of-workplace-protections-for-delivery-drivers-a-tale-of-2-workplace-models-268164

Source: The Conversation – USA (3) – By R. Amanda Cooper, Assistant Professor of Communication, University of Connecticut

Every three seconds, someone in the world develops dementia. There are over 6 million people living with dementia in the U.S. and 57 million globally.

These figures will only increase in the coming years, as rates of dementia are predicted to double by 2060. If you don’t know someone affected by dementia, you probably will at some point.

Dementia is incredibly difficult both for the person experiencing it and for their loved ones, not only because of the symptoms of the disease but also because of the social stigma associated with cognitive decline. Experiencing stigma makes it difficult for people with dementia to ask for help, increases anxiety and depression, and ultimately leads to social isolation.

Dementia-related stigma is perpetuated through media messages that portray people with dementia as mindless and incapable, as well as through daily interactions in which others dismiss and dehumanize the person living with dementia.

These forms of invalidation – usually unintentional – accelerate and intensify the loss of self-worth and identity that dementia patients are already experiencing.

Fortunately, educating and spreading awareness can help reduce behaviors that propagate stigma and dehumanizing treatment of people with dementia.

As a social scientist and researcher in interpersonal communication and family caregiving, I explore the social and relational side of dementia. Through my work with these patients and families, I’ve learned that reducing stigma and supporting self-worth for people who have dementia is often done through daily conversations.

How is dementia defined?

Dementia is an umbrella term that refers to a family of cognitive conditions involving memory loss, difficulty thinking or processing information, changes in ability to communicate and challenges with managing daily tasks.

The most common form of dementia is Alzheimer’s disease, but there are several other forms of dementia that can severely affect a person’s quality of life and that of their loved ones.

Most forms of dementia are progressive, meaning that the symptoms of the disease get steadily worse over time. A person with dementia can live with the disease for several years, and their symptoms will shift as the disease progresses.

People in the early stages of dementia, including mild cognitive impairment, continue to engage socially and participate in many of the activities they have always done. In the middle stage of the disease, people often need more help from others to complete daily tasks and may have more difficulty holding conversations. In the late stage, people with dementia are dependent on others and often lose the ability to communicate verbally.

Despite the cognitive declines that come with dementia, people living with dementia can maintain many of their former abilities as the disease progresses. Even in the late stages, research shows that people with dementia can understand tone of voice and nonverbal communication such as body language, facial expressions and gentle touch.

This makes it clear that people with dementia can continue having meaningful social connections and a sense of self-worth even as their disease progresses.

Focusing care around the person

In the 1990s, psychologist Tom Kitwood, who studied dementia patients in long-term care settings, introduced the notion of “personhood.” Personhood is a recognition of a person’s unique experiences and individual worth. He had observed that residents with dementia were sometimes treated as objects rather than people and were dismissed as being “no longer there” mentally. In response, Kitwood advocated for a new model of person-centered care.

In contrast to the medical model of care that was standard at the time, person-centered care aims to provide people with dementia comfort, attachment, inclusion, occupation and identity.

Comfort includes both physical and psychological comfort, ensuring that the person with dementia feels safe and is as pain-free as possible. Attachment and inclusion have to do with supporting a person with dementia’s closest relationships and making sure they feel included in social activities.

Occupation is about giving the person meaningful activities that are suited to their abilities, while identity is about preserving their unique sense of self. According to Kitwood, each of these elements of personhood can be upheld or threatened through a person’s interactions with others.

I find Kitwood’s work particularly important because it suggests that communication is at the heart of personhood.

Communicating to support personhood

So how can family members and friends communicate with their loved one with dementia to help preserve their sense of self?

Researchers have identified several evidence-based communication strategies that support person-centered care both in long-term care settings and within the family.

These include:

• Arranging the environment to support conversation. Have conversations in a quiet place with as few distractions as possible, sit at eye level and close to the person, make eye contact and use gestures to reinforce what you say.

• Acknowledging the person with dementia as a unique individual. Helping your loved one remember who they were before dementia is critical to supporting their sense of self-worth. In long-term care, this is done by greeting them, calling them by name and integrating their past experiences into conversations. In families, it is done by inviting the person to reminisce about their past or reminiscing together and by talking about their accomplishments and admirable qualities.

• Affirming and validating the person’s emotions. Even if you don’t understand what the person is thinking or feeling, avoid correcting them and instead acknowledge their underlying emotion.

• Seeking the person’s input about their care. This includes asking about their preferences for food or activities, usually using simple “yes” or “no” questions, and asking their permission before helping them with physical care such as bathing, moving or changing clothes.

• Using simple prompts to help the person successfully engage in conversation. This can be done through repeating or rephrasing questions, paraphrasing the person’s responses, pausing to give the person time to think, and providing simple prompts to help the person remember.

• Creating and maintaining connection. In families, this is done by giving a hug or kiss or saying “I love you”; doing activities together such as playing simple games, making art or playing music; and joking around and laughing together.

Communication shifts as the disease progresses

Supporting personhood requires adjusting to the communication abilities of the person with dementia. Some communication strategies are helpful in one stage of the disease but not in others.

In a recent study, my team and I found that asking the person with dementia to recall the past was affirming for those who were early in the disease and who could still recall the past. But for people who were in later stages of the disease, asking them “Do you remember?” was received more like a test of memory and led to frustration or confusion. Similarly, we found that suggesting words to prompt recall was helpful later in the disease but demeaning for people who were in earlier stages of the disease who could still find their words without help.

Providing more help in conversation than is needed can lead people with dementia to withdraw, whereas appropriately adjusting to a person’s communication abilities can empower them to continue to engage socially.

Ultimately, supporting a person with dementia’s sense of self and self-worth in conversations is about finding a communication sweet spot – in other words, matching your approach to their current capabilities.

Changing your default approach to conversations can be challenging, but making simple communication changes can make all the difference. Meaningful conversations are the key to helping your loved one live their days to the fullest, with a sense of personal worth and a feeling of meaningful connection with others.

R. Amanda Cooper is affiliated with the Alzheimer’s Association as a Community Educator.

– ref. How to keep dementia from robbing your loved ones of their sense of personhood – tips for caregivers – https://theconversation.com/how-to-keep-dementia-from-robbing-your-loved-ones-of-their-sense-of-personhood-tips-for-caregivers-265477

Source: The Conversation – USA (3) – By Marisha Burden, Professor of Medicine–Hospital Medicine, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus

We’ve all been there: You wait 45 minutes in the exam room when the doctor finally walks in.

They seem rushed. A few questions, a quick exam, a glance at the clock and then a rapid-fire plan with little time for discussion – and you leave feeling unheard, hurried and frustrated.

And what if you’re hospitalized? You may face a similar experience.

More than half of U.S. adults say their doctors have ignored or dismissed their concerns, or not taken their symptoms seriously, according to a December 2022 national poll.

It’s easy to blame the doctor. But the reality is, most doctors would like to sit down and have an in-depth conversation with patients and their families. Instead, your unpleasant visit may be the result of productivity pressures and administrative burdens, often shaped by health care systems, payment models and policy decisions that influence how care is delivered.

Patients are increasingly experiencing what’s known as administrative harm – those unintended but very real consequences arising from administrative decisions, made far upstream, that directly influence how doctors practice. Ultimately, these types of interactions affect the care patients receive and their outcomes.

As a doctor and researcher who specializes in business and health care delivery, I’ve studied how organizational decisions have ripple effects, shaping patients’ relationships with their doctor and the quality of care they receive. Patients may be unaware of these upstream administrative decisions, but they affect everything from time allotted for an appointment to the number of patients the doctor has to see and whether a visit is covered by insurance.

A look behind the scenes

Increasingly, health care organizations and physician groups face intense financial pressures. Many doctors can no longer sustain their private practice due to declining reimbursements, rising costs and increasing administrative burdens; instead, they’ve become employees of larger health care systems. In some cases, their practices have been acquired by private equity groups.

With this shift, doctors have less control over their workloads and the time they get with their patients. More and more, payment models fail to cover the true cost of care. The default solution is often for doctors to see more patients with less time for each, and to squeeze in additional work after hours.

But that approach comes with costs, among them the time needed to build meaningful connections with patients. That negative, impolite tone you may have experienced might be because the doctor has many patients waiting and a full evening ahead just to catch up on writing visit notes, reviewing medical records and completing other required documentation. During the work day, they’re often fielding over 100 messages and alerts daily, including referrals and coordinating care, all while trying to focus on the patient in front of them.

But the consequences go beyond their bedside manner. Research makes clear that doctors’ performance and the quality of care patients receive are affected by their workload. A similar pattern is true with nurses: Their higher workloads are associated with higher death rates among hospitalized patients.

Suppose you’re hospitalized for pneumonia, but because your doctor is caring for too many patients, your hospital stay is longer, which increases your risks of infection, muscle loss and other adverse outcomes. In the doctor’s office, a rushed visit can mean delayed or missed diagnoses and even prescription errors.

About half of U.S. doctors report feelings of burnout, and about one-third are considering leaving their current job, with 60% of those likely to leave clinical practice entirely.

Long work hours also brings higher risks of heart disease, stroke and other health problems for health care professionals. In the U.S., 40% of doctors work 55 hours per week or more, compared with less than 10% of workers in other fields.

A better way

The administrative harms stemming from upstream decisions are not inevitable. In large part, they are preventable. Overhauling the health care system may seem daunting, but patients and doctors are not powerless.

Patients and their families must advocate for themselves. Ask questions and be direct. This phrase: “I am still really worried about … ” will quickly get your doctor’s attention. If your visit seems rushed, share it with patient representatives or through patient surveys. These insights help administrative leaders recognize when systems are falling short.

Doctors and care teams should not normalize unsustainable work conditions. Health systems need structured, transparent mechanisms that make it easy and safe for doctors and care team members to report when workloads, staffing or administrative decisions may be harming patients.

Even more powerful is when patients and their doctors speak up together. Collective voices can drive meaningful change – such as lobbying for adequate time, staffing or policies to support high-quality, patient-centered care. It is also important for administrative leaders and policymakers to take responsibility for how decisions affect both patients and the care team.

More research is needed to define what safe, realistic work standards look like and how care teams should be structured. For example, when does it make sense for a doctor to provide care, or a physician assistant or nurse practitioner? At the same time, health systems have the opportunity to think creatively about new care models that address clinician shortages.

But research shows that the medical profession can’t afford to wait for perfect data to act on what’s already clear. Overworked and understaffed teams hurt both patients and their doctors.

Yet when doctors do have enough time, the interactions feel different – warmer, more patient and more attentive. And as research shows, patient outcomes improve as well.

Dr. Marisha Burden reports funding from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, the National Institute for Occupational Health and Safety, University of Colorado Innovations digiSPARK award, Med-IQ and the American Medical Association not related to this work. Dr. Burden contributed to the development of GrittyWork, a digital workforce application, and a registered trademark of the University of Colorado not related to this work. The author utilized the ChatGPT language model developed by OpenAI and Microsoft Co-pilot for editing of original author content to improve readability.

– ref. Why does your doctor seem so rushed and dismissive? That bedside manner may be the result of the health care system – https://theconversation.com/why-does-your-doctor-seem-so-rushed-and-dismissive-that-bedside-manner-may-be-the-result-of-the-health-care-system-261335

Source: The Conversation – USA (3) – By Charles J. Russo, Joseph Panzer Chair in Education and Research Professor of Law, University of Dayton

In recent years, litigation on certain types of religious freedom lawsuits have been practically run of the mill: prayer on school premises, for example, and government funding for students at faith-based schools.

A case scheduled for U.S. Supreme Court oral arguments on Nov. 10, 2025, however, is very different from most other high-profile cases at the moment. Landor v. Louisiana Department of Corrections involves whether an inmate of a minority religious group, the Rastafarians, can sue for monetary damages after the warden violated his religious rights – specifically, the right to not cut his hair.

Landor v. Louisiana stands out because it underscores the complexity and far-reaching nature of religious freedom laws in the United States and the increasingly diverse faith traditions to which they apply. Christians now represent 62% of the American population, while 29% have no religious affiliation and 7% belong to other faith traditions.

Religious vow

Damon Landor, the petitioner, wore long dreadlocks for almost 20 years as an expression of his beliefs as a Rastafarian – part of a biblical practice known as the “Nazarite vow.” Many members of the movement, which first developed in Jamaica in the 1930s, do not cut their hair.

Landor was incarcerated in 2020 after being convicted for possessing methamphetamine, cocaine, amphetamine and marijuana. At first, officials respected his religious practice. Just three years before, in a case about another inmate in Louisiana, a federal appeals court had affirmed that Rastafarians must be allowed to keep their dreadlocks under the federal Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act.

Toward the end of his sentence, Landor was transferred to a different correctional facility. There – with three weeks left for Landor to serve – the warden ignored the judicial order, directing guards to shackle Landor and forcibly shave his head.

Not surprisingly, on finishing his sentence, Landor filed suit for money damages under the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act. The act forbids the government and its officials from imposing “substantial burden(s)” on incarcerated people’s religious free exercise rights.

Key question

In 2022, a federal trial court in Louisiana condemned Landor’s treatment but rejected his claim, concluding that money damages were not an appropriate remedy. The following year, the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously affirmed that decision, denying Landor’s claim.

His legal team then filed a petition for the case to be reheard “en banc.” In this uncommon procedure, parties seek further review from all of the judges in a circuit, or federal appellate court. The court denied his request, but 15 of the 17 active judges wrote that this was a question for the Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court agreed to hear an appeal after more than 20 organizations submitted amicus curiae, or “friend of the court,” briefs in favor of Landor. The Trump administration also filed an amicus brief encouraging the Supreme Court to take the case.

The briefs include groups that often have diverging opinions. Americans United for Separation of Church and State, for example, typically supports those wishing to keep religion out of public life. Conversely, the Becket Fund usually defends the rights of those seeking to increase faith’s role in public life.

They are of one mind in Landor because the case involves his right to express his beliefs freely by how he lives, in a very personal way: grooming and hair length.

Lower courts agree that Landor’s religious rights were violated. The key question is whether he can sue an individual official – here, the warden – for monetary damages.

Sister statutes

Weighing heavily in Landor’s favor is a previous Supreme Court order in Tanzin v. Tanvir. That 2020 case was brought by two Muslim men who sued FBI agents after their names were put on a “no-fly list.” The plaintiffs alleged that their names were added to the list in retaliation for refusing to spy on fellow Muslims.

The Supreme Court unanimously affirmed that the men could sue the agents as individuals, not just in their official capacity. Being sued as an individual means defendants must pay damages on their own, without the government helping to foot the bill – a potentially very expensive outcome.

There’s a key difference here in Landor’s case, though. In Tanzin, the plaintiffs sued for violations of their rights under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, a federal law enacted in 1993. Landor brought his case under the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, enacted in 2000. The laws are similar; in fact, the key language in both statutes is identical. But the Religious Land Use Act has not yet been interpreted as providing money damages against government officials.

The earlier statute, the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, became law in response to a pivotal Supreme Court case about religious freedom: Employment Division Department of Human Resources of Oregon v. Smith. The justices upheld the dismissal of two drug counselors under state law for ingesting peyote, a natural hallucinogenic substance, during a Native American Church ceremony – even though most states and the federal government had decriminalized peyote’s use for religious purposes.

The act was essentially a rebuttal of 1990’s Smith ruling. It requires laws that restrict religious freedom to pass strict scrutiny, the highest form of constitutional analysis. If the government seeks to limit someone’s religious exercise, laws must be based on a “compelling governmental interest” and carried out by the “least restrictive means” possible. Under that standard, laws usually cannot withstand judicial review. In 1997, the Supreme Court narrowed the act’s reach in City of Boerne v. Flores, restricting its application to the federal government rather than states.

The Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, which Congress adopted by unanimous consent in 2000, is often referred to as a sister statute because of its similarities. Notably for Landor, it forbids governments, or their agents, from imposing unnecessary “substantial burden[s]” on the “religious exercise” rights of those who are incarcerated. The act also protects religious land uses from discrimination through zoning restrictions.

Bigger picture

At first glance, Landor appears to be little more than a procedural disagreement over whether parties can recover damages under two similar statutes protecting religious freedom. However, at a time when there are nearly 2 million people in prisons, jails and detention and correctional facilities, the inability to seek damages under the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act limits accountability for violations of their rights to religious freedom.

What’s more, Landor’s case illustrates that minority religions have as much protection under the First Amendment as larger faiths. How the Supreme Court resolves it will say a great deal about the future of religious freedom on issues that the authors of the Constitution could not have anticipated.

Charles J. Russo does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Supreme Court soon to hear a religious freedom case that’s united both sides of the church-state divide – https://theconversation.com/supreme-court-soon-to-hear-a-religious-freedom-case-thats-united-both-sides-of-the-church-state-divide-268817