By Jackie Jones
“The question is whether or not you get your return on that investment in actual financial capital or some sort of human capital or emotional capital or social capital,” Boyce Watkins, a professor of finance at Syracuse University, told National Public Radio (NPR) in a recent interview. “The truth of the matter is that this blanket notion that going to college will guarantee you a better economic future is not always true.”

By Mark Lassiter
The National Football League (NFL) seems to be getting along quite well without recent almost-team-part-owner Rush Limbaugh. That blip came and went pretty quickly, but it’s still worth looking at, both as an example of how politics and race can play out on and off the field, and as an examination of sports as sanctuary.

By Kevin Eason
Kevin Eason is a freelance editorial cartoonist and Illustrator from NJ. His brand of satire covers news events in politics, entertainment, sports and much more. Kevin’s  work features include: TVOne, NABJ, WBLS_107.5FM, EURweb and various newspapers & magazines throughout the country.

By Janet Singleton
As of January 1, 2010, the federal Mental Health Parity and Addiction Act will mandate that insurance coverage for mental health be comparable to that for other medical interventions, for group plans of companies employing 50 or more. What it means, for those who are sheltered beneath its modest umbrella, is that reimbursements, number of visits, annual and lifetime caps, co-payments, and any out-of-pocket costs for psychotherapy and related medications should be in line with, for example, treatment for diabetes.

By Jackie Jones
Without a national agenda on mental health treatment, Torrey predicted, many states would be wrestling with substantial increases in the number of and funding treatment for the mentally ill homeless and mentally ill prison inmates.

By The Editors
On Friday, President Obama  signed a measure once again extending benefits to the long-term unemployed—even as it became likely that  still another extension may be necessary next spring.

By TaRessa Stovall
Another hip-hop artist is headed to jail, seemingly determined to live out the drama of his own lyrics.

Grammy Award-winning superstar Lil Wayne, real name Dwayne Carter, pleaded guilty on October 15 to a felony charge of attempted criminal possession of a weapon in New York City.

By The Editors
“There has never been a year like this past year in America.”

Those were the opening words of the brief speech with which John Payton, President and Director-Counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund (LDF) welcomed the nearly 800 guests at LDF’s 23rd annual National Equal Justice Awards Dinner in New York on November 4; and that straightforward declarative sentence indeed seemed to capture an entire twelve months’ sense of excitement—and determination—that permeated the buoyant gathering.

By The Editors
After nearly a month of wrangling, on Thursday the U.S. Senate shelved an eleventh-hour attempt to add a new question—about citizenship and immigration status—to next year’s Census population survey.

By Olympia Duhart
Keith Bardwell, the Louisiana justice of the peace who refused to marry an interracial couple recently, is using some tired, old arguments to support his biased decision.