News Sources: Talking about Nuclear Weapons

Democrat Hillary Clinton recently chastised presidential rival Barack Obama for ruling out the use of nuclear weapons in the war on terror. Reporters subsequently found that Clinton had declared that nuclear weapons were "off the table" in an interview about Iran a year earlier. Should the use of nuclear weapons ever be put "off the table?" Reporters looking for experts to interview on this topic can find them online at the collegenews.org database of news sources and subject matter experts from America's leading liberal arts colleges, including the following (click on names for contact information):

Andrew A. Latham - Associate Professor of Political Science, Macalester College - Latham specializes in international conflict and security issues and is an expert on arms production and the proliferation of arms, including weapons of mass destruction. He has researched nuclear weapons in India and recently completed a report for the Canadian government on India's nuclear policy. Latham is knowledgeable about the changing nature of war, Iraq and the Persian Gulf War as well as the conflict in Northern Ireland.

Michael T. Klare - Professor of Peace and World Security Studies, Hampshire College - Klare is the author of Rogue States and Nuclear Outlaws and American Arms Supermarket. He is the Director of the Five College (Hampshire, Amherst, Smith, Mount Holyoke Colleges and the University of Massachusetts) Program in Peace and World Security Studies. An expert on world security, Klare testifies regularly on arms issues before international organizations, including the United Nations. He is on the Committee on International Security Studies at the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Scott Plous - Professor of Psychology, Wesleyan University - Plous is the author of The Psychology of Judgment and Decision Making, and has conducted research on the psychology of the nuclear arms race.

Historic Pollution Research Papers Released

Pollution in Maine's Androscoggin River prompted the enactment of the federal Clean Water Act of 1972. The papers of a Bates College professor whose decades of reseach were crucial to that effort have been opened to researchers - coincidentally, just as the state Board of Environmental Protection prepares to revisit a controversial 2005 pollution plan involving an Androscoggin paper company.

Don't Leave Middle East to the Experts

“The Middle East is so alien that only an expert can understand it.” Geoffrey D. Schad, assistant professor in history at Albright College, says this common bit of conventional wisdom is not only incorrect, it's dangerous. Why? Because, he says, many of the experts prominent in the mass media are partisans of one side or another in Middle Eastern disputes.

News Sources: Russia Plants Flag at North Pole

The United States and Canada have scoffed at a Russian submarine expedition that planted a Russian flag on the seabed under the North Pole. The recent dive by two small submarines was partly a scientific expedition. But it could mark the start of a fierce legal scramble for control of the seabed and what could be vast energy reserves beneath among nations that border the Arctic, including Russia, the U.S., Canada, Norway and Denmark, through its territory Greenland. Reporters looking for sources to interview on this topic can find them online at the collegenews.org database of news sources and subject matter experts from America's leading lberal arts colleges, including the following (click on names for contact information):

Nick Hayes - Professor of History, Saint John's University - Hayes, who holds a doctorate in Russian and European history, won an Emmy in 1991 for his work on Russia. He has published widely in the academic press and appeared in popular press, including ABC "Nightline" and CBS "Sunday Morning."

Larry Caldwell - Gamble Professor of Political Science, Occidental College - A former visiting professor at the National War College, scholar-in-residence in the CIA's Office of Soviet Analysis, and RAND consultant, Caldwell is an expert on Russian-American relations, Russian politics and military, and arms control who has testified before Senate and House committees.

Michael T. Klare - Professor of Peace and World Security Studies, Hampshire College - Hayes is the author of Resource Wars and Blood and Oil: The Dangers and Consequences of America's Growing Dependency on Imported Petroleum. He is director of the Five College (Hampshire, Amherst, Smith, Mount Holyoke Colleges and the University of Massachusetts) Program in Peace and World Security Studies. Hayes testifies regularly on arms issues before international organizations, including the United Nations, and is on the Committee on International Security Studies, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Home State Unfazed by Talk of Thompson White House Bid

So far, Tennesseeans are mostly yawning over the prospects of native son Fred Thompson's yet-to-be-officially-declared candidacy for president, says DePauw University's Ken Bode. Perhaps it's because they've been down this road many times before. "There is something in the water of this long, horizontal, two-time-zone state that causes its politicians to think they should be president, beginning, probably, with Andrew Jackson, who actually held the job," Bode says.

Cheney Doesn't Waste Words, Says Author

Stephen Hayes' new book on Dick Cheney was based in part on 30 hours of interviews with the vice president. "Most politicians, you ask them a question, they'll keep talking until you ask another one," the DePauw University alum says. "But Cheney doesn't. He'll answer a question with one word and then sit there and look at you, which is sort of disarming."

News Sources: Market Crunch Claims American Home Mortgage

American Home Mortgage Investment Corp. has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection after a tumultuous week in the debt markets brought a once-thriving business to its knees. The move shows how worries about loan defaults fueled by slumping housing prices have spread beyond subprime lenders to companies widely considered to make higher-quality loans. Reporters looking for sources to interview on this situation can find them online at the collegenews.org database for news sources and subject matter experts from America's leading liberal arts colleges, including the following (click on names for contact information):

Karl "Chip" Case - Professor of Economics, Wellesley College - Case is a nationally recognized expert on real estate markets and prices. He has authored several studies that attempt to isolate the causes and consequences of boom and bust cycles and their relationship to regional economic performance.

Charles R. Geisst - Professor of Economics and Finance, Manhattan College - Geisst has 10 years investment banking experience and is the author of 10 books, including Wall Street: A History. His trade articles and interviews have appeared in the International Herald, Wall Street Journal, and Investors Chronicle.

Paul Cleveland - Associate Professor of Economics, Birmingham-Southern College - Cleveland can comment on free enterprise, morality and the free market, the role of government in society, and financial economics.

Getting Students Engaged

How can colleges get students more engaged with their learning? In doing so, does it improve their health and civic engagement? These are questions St. Lawrence University will address through a $250,000 grant from the Bringing Theory to Practice Project (BTtoP), in partnership with the Association of American Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) and funded by the Charles Engelhard Foundation of New York.

Women Have Their Hour at Swarthmore Library

Leading up to the Spanish-American War in 1898, Susan B. Anthony complained that the Civil War had resulted in the emancipation of the slave, that the coming war was to supposed to liberate the Spanish colonies, and asked, "When will there be a women's hour? We must be patient again." Such comments from Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Carrie Chapman Catt and other leaders of the women's suffrage movement are contained in dozens of heretofore unreleased letters that have been donated to the Friends Historical Library at Swarthmore College.