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Author / Peter Birke

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  • Romney’s Gamble

    Mitt Romney’s selection of Paul Ryan as his Vice-Presidential candidate continues the trend of peculiar GOP VP selections in recent history. In 2000, George W. Bush tapped Dick Cheney to head up his Vice-Presidential Search Committee. After all signs were pointing to Missouri U.S. Senator John Danforth as the pick, Cheney proceeded to throw his…

    Featured

  • A Wisconsinite Expat’s Take on Walker’s Victory

    I spent the past three weeks visiting my family in Madison, Wisconsin. The Democratic Party’s effort to recall Governor Scott Walker has caused my home state to shed the Upper-Midwestern niceties I had come to know. You could cut the tension in the state’s supper clubs with a knife.  I stepped into ground-zero of our…

    Miscellaneous, National

  • Wash U’s Sore Thumb

    I have always been drawn towards Eliot Hall and I frequently study there. The building’s lack of Wi-Fi prevents me from engaging in any of the innumerable cyber amusements that impede productivity. Its drafty rooms keep me from dozing off. Perhaps my draw to the building is similar to Guy de Maupassant’s attraction to the…

    Miscellaneous

  • Our 9/11 Narrative

    For current college students, September 11th, 2001 was a beginning of sorts. It was a beginning of consciousness. It was a beginning of memory. Only in elementary school at the time, we can recall with great clarity where we were and what we were doing when the World Trade Center’s Twin Towers fell. Most of…

    Miscellaneous

  • A Tale of Two Bubbles: Student Engagement in Madison and St. Louis

    Recently, I’ve forced more than a few friends to listen to me complain about the fact that people only began to care about Wisconsin after I left. Justin Vernon of Bon Iver has become an indie idol, the Green Bay Packers won the Super Bowl, and Brett Favre gave his reputation as a gunslinger a…