It came to the attention of the Rwandan authorities that many investors who were granted mining concessions left them unexploited, thus wasting potential exploitations. The reasons behind this behaviour reside in the current legislation, which ...

AFL greats Dermott Brereton and David King have debated the merits of a severe penalty for the Adelaide Crows, following a “training malfunction” on Thursday.

Watch A Week With Warnie, part of a week-long pop-up channel on Foxtel and Foxtel Now, from Monday 8pm (EST)!

Today, anything with network access connected to a screen can serve as a television. A new OECD report looks into the impact these new devices and services have on telecommunications networks.

This edition of Migration Policy Debates presents updated information on international migration in the Americas up to 2014 as well as on labour market outcomes of emigrants originating from the hemisphere. It also summarises available evidence on the emigration of doctors and nurses from the region.

This edition presents an overview of some “alternative pathways” that could help take the pressure off the main traditional pathways for refugees in general and assesses their potential application for Syrians in particular. Overall, these alternatives can help provide safe channels and good integration prospects to refugees who might otherwise be tempted to risk their fate with smugglers and illegal border crossing.

Who bears the cost of integrating refugees? New edition of the Migration Policy Debates

To circumcise or not to circumcise? This has been a touchy subject in the medical community for years, with those in favor of circumcision arguing that it is necessary to prevent disease, and those who are against the procedure insisting...

In a global economy, the benchmark for educational success is no longer improvement by national standards alone, but the best performing school systems internationally.

Roger Federer, who will be 39 in August, leads the race with 20 Grand Slam singles titles. Rafa Nadal is hot on his heels with 19 titles, while Novak Djokovic is closing in quickly with 17.

After leaving the Nou Camp two years ago, Neymar was keen to return to Barcelona - but despite murmurs Neymar remained in Paris and now Barca are considering Mbappe.

For decades, there have been concerns that India's universities were being bogged down by the number of institutes they had to manage. Recently, the University Grants Commission accepted in principle that autonomy must be green-lighted. But debates on the freedom of institutions remain inconclusive, reports Deepa A.

The role of guns in U.S. society is a subject of intense policy debate and disagreement.

A new report by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine proposes a framework for evaluating proposals to provide authorized government agencies with access to unencrypted versions of encrypted communications and other data.

I know these Presidential debates aren’t debates in the historical sense.  Regardless, I’m looking forward to seeing how both men do on a topic of immense complexity.  Is Mitt Romney going to be more forthcoming about what tax deductions he’d want cut to keep his tax reform plan from ballooning the deficit?  Will President Obama  give more detail about how he would improve the economy, short of a government stimulus that could never get through a GOP Congress?

I’ll be live tweeting during the debate.  Join me @AirTalk #debates.

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

I thoroughly enjoyed the VP debate and its fast paced back-and-forth.  Democrats had to love Joe Biden's energy and willingness to challenge Paul Ryan on almost every point.  Republicans had to love Ryan's poise and discipline in how he handled himself, even as Biden was dismissing him throughout the 90-minutes.

Both of our "AirTalk" political strategists, Democrat Darry Sragow and Republican Jonathan Wilcox, agreed that Biden's performance fired up the Democratic base and provided tremendous relief after the President's flat performance the week before.  However, they also agreed that it wasn't likely to have much effect on the small number of undecided voters still out there.

The passionate performances of the VP candidates certainly sets a higher bar for the next Presidential candidates debate.  Will Obama and Romney up their games on Tuesday?  I suspect most of us will be tuning in to see.

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

I’ll be live tweeting @AirTalk tonight during the debate.  Of greatest interest to me about President Obama is whether he’ll be able to crisply make his arguments and maintain a high level of energy for the full 90-minutes.  With Mitt Romney I’ll be looking to see whether he can loosen up in the town hall format and make a good connection with the questioners.

What was most striking for me about the first debate was how strongly Romney played with women.  That had been a huge problem for him throughout the campaign.  In fact, a couple of months ago I joked about the “ten single women in the country who were voting for Romney.”  He found a way to connect with women two weeks ago and he’ll attempt to build on that tonight.  The President, obviously, hopes to reverse his loss.

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

US President Barack Obama and Republican Presidential nominee Mitt Romney debate on October 16, 2012 at Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York. Undecided voters asked questions during a town hall format.; Credit: STAN HONDA/AFP/Getty Images

There continue to be questions about how moderators approach Presidential debates and about whether the extra time President Obama has received in the first two debates indicates moderator bias in his favor. 

I had chalked up the concerns to Republican hyper-partisanship, such as we saw with many Democrats criticizing Jim Lehrer for his moderating — as though Obama would’ve won the first debate if only Lehrer had asserted himself more.   However, even CNN has been doing significant follow-up on its own Candy Crowley’s performance in debate number two. 

Maybe it’s not just hardcore GOP loyalists who are questioning Crowley’s decision-making on when to cut in and when to allow the candidates to take more time. I thought she did pretty well, but there are plenty of critics.

As someone who has moderated hundreds of debates, I thought I’d share my thoughts on what we’ve seen so far in this election. Though I’ve never moderated a Presidential debate, with its incredible level of attention, concern about rules, and demands by campaigns, there are certain fundamentals regardless of the office or issue at stake.

Time Doesn't Matter...Too Much
First, as strange as this may sound, the time taken by each candidate has little to do with who has an advantage.   Yes, it’s always possible for a candidate to use another minute to fire off the defining line of the night. However, the well-practiced zingers or essential policy explainers are not left to the end of a candidate’s statement, as the clock is running out. 

I’m sure Mitt Romney wasn’t thinking after the last debate, “If only I would’ve had that extra 90-seconds, and Obama hadn’t gotten 90 more than he deserved.”  Both men front-loaded their major talking points and were going to get them in. Neither man could legitimately say he didn’t have a chance to make his strongest points. At some point, a time advantage could make a difference in who wins or loses, but an extra 90-seconds in a debate longer than 90-minutes isn’t going to do it.

Serving The Audience
As a moderator, you also have to think about what best serves your audience. I never guarantee candidates equal time, as it’s my job to serve the listeners, not their campaigns. I strive to get close to equal time, but can’t make any guarantee. Some speakers get to the point succinctly and have their points well put together. Others are messier in their arguments and eat up time just building up any head of steam. 

If the moderator holds to a strict time limit, you run the risk of frustrating listeners by cutting off the rambler just as the candidate is getting to the point. There are methods a moderator can use to help guide the speaker toward being more succinct, but there’s no guarantee the person will be able to comply.

Isn’t this inherently unfair to the succinct speaker? No. The purpose of the debate is to allow the ideas to compete.  It’s not a boxing match that’s about landing punches in a given time. The succinct debater has a big advantage, regardless of how much time the candidate has. That’s why Mitt Romney’s victory in the first debate was so lopsided — he won on the conciseness and clarity of his answers, coupled with Obama’s inability to get to his central points.  Obviously, there are those who thought Obama’s arguments were still more compelling than Romney’s, and that Romney lacked essential details.  However, for most viewers of the first debate, it was stylistically no contest.

Equal Time Is Not A Guarantee
When candidates are allowed to talk to each other directly, it’s very difficult to assure equal time. Even CNN’s clock that registers elapsed time for each candidate is subject to squishiness. Unless a debate is extremely formal, with carefully controlled time limits and a ban on candidates following-up with each other, you’re only going to have an approximation of time balance. I thought Crowley did pretty well to land the second debate with the balance she did. I’m not sure I could get it that close for a debate of that length. She had the added challenge of trying to determine when to cut in on President Obama’s lengthier answers. Also, Romney’s speaking rhythm allows more space for interruption. It’s tougher to break in on Obama.

Moderating Is A Balancing Act
Moderators are always trying to balance a need to move on to the next topic with allowing a candidate to answer an opponent’s charge. Sometimes, you open that door for a candidate, only to regret it later when the politician starts into a monologue, instead of confining the response to the previous challenge. Sometimes moderators, having gotten burned, will become less tolerant of such expansive rebuttals, as the debate goes on. Moderators are always juggling competing goals, and it’s a difficult job (at least for me).

Unfortunately, there are those who think debate moderators attempt to influence the outcome of the debate and the performances of the candidates. Maybe I’m naïve, but I can’t imagine any journalist who’s worked hard enough to get to the position of Presidential debate moderator subordinating his or her career in an effort to getting someone elected. Mainstream political journalism is like national sports reporting. You really don’t care who wins the Super Bowl, you want great story lines to explore with your audience. Yes, sports reporters have affinities for the hometown teams of their youth, but that can’t compete with the professional goal of covering great stories. 

Yes, most journalists in mainstream media probably have a stronger cultural and political affinity for Obama, as he’s more like them. However, it doesn’t mean a journalist is going to sacrifice the better story to intentionally provide a benefit to the President.

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

There is a need to broaden the debate on sustainable food security from a straight comparison between organic and conventional farming to a consideration of a variety of farming techniques. This is the conclusion of a new review of research that indicates, for some crop types, organic yields can nearly match conventional yields under good management practices and growing conditions.

There is an ongoing debate over exploitation of the Dutch Wadden Sea, over issues including gas extraction and cockle fishing. According to a review analysing interactions between scientists and policymakers during these debates, the productivity of such discussions is substantially influenced by the policy setting, i.e. the level of government involved and the key decision-makers.

There is a need to broaden the debate on sustainable food security from a straight comparison between organic and conventional farming to a consideration of a variety of farming techniques. This is the conclusion of a new review of research that indicates, for some crop types, organic yields can nearly match conventional yields under good management practices and growing conditions.

Thanks in part to shows like 'Modern Family,' a majority of Americans are now in favor of same-sex marriage.

The pontiff's sweeping new encyclical is meant not just for Earth's 1.2 billion Catholics, but for 'every person living on this planet.'

Here are some arguments to consider if we plant to get more oil from our neighbors to the North.

He may not have won an Oscar, but the director of "Gasland" isn’t backing off the natural gas industry.

Colorado's debate over uranium mines isn't that different from other energy debates around the nation.

Even if you take the energy and water it takes to build a dishwasher into account, it still beats washing by hand.

The Fair Trade Federation Conference in May will tackle tough questions in the activist and business communities about what 'fair' really means.

Spending cuts are the talk of Washington these days. Some are looking to make big political gains with cuts that won't create measurable savings.

For the first time in two decades, a U.S. presidential debate season has passed without any candidate or moderator mentioning climate change.

A note-perfect 'clean coal' parody site has become the talk of the Internet. With its Coal Cares campaign, the heretofore unknown activist group Coal is Killing

One side says the EPA is overstepping its bounds, while some say it didn't go far enough.

The latest tag team effort from the EPA and Department of Transportation is an ambitious one: the 60 mile per gallon car.

The former governor is stuck with a history of being on all sides of the climate issue.

The U.S. is set to label carbon as a pollutant, the first step in regulating CO2 emissions.

While research on the lab-altered H5N1 virus that can be transmitted between mammals in laboratories is put on hold, scientists are debating how to balance bios

The government released a framework to determine to fund research that could create a version of the bird flu virus that could infect by airborne droplets.

Al Gore's 24-hour Climate Reality broadcast has attracted millions of online viewers. A competing broadcast by climate doubters had just thousands.

A commentary on last week's remarks by British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, criticising anti-biotechnology activists for not engaging in a rational debate about genetically modified food.

For Earth Day, observers weigh in on the Evangelical Climate Initiative, a program that began as a frustrated response to the National Association of Evangelicals' reluctance to adopt a position on global warming. The initiative hopes to motivate evangelicals to be more Earth-friendly and use their political clout to influence environmental policy.

"It's imperative that the national winter sport stops glorifying the act of "hurting a guy to get the puck." In thestar.com "Sports" section Saturday June 1st, 2013

THERE’S no doubt that the Prime Minister spoke from the heart when he addressed the Tory conference in Birmingham this week, speaking of the NHS.

Copyright 2018 KERA. To see more, visit KERA . SCOTT SIMON, HOST: In Texas, a race that no one expected to be this competitive. The candidates for Texas Senate battled in a debate last night. KERA's Christopher Connelly reports from Dallas. CHRISTOPHER CONNELLY, BYLINE: It was a scene that feels kind of rare in American politics these days. Two guys with diametrically opposed opinions lobbing barbed policy prescriptions back-and-forth without any name calling. Senator Ted Cruz and Congressman Beto O'Rourke were forceful and civil - mostly. (SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING) BETO O'ROURKE: You just said something that I did not say... TED CRUZ: What did you not say? O'ROURKE: ...And attributed it to me. CRUZ: What did you not say? O'ROURKE: I'm not going to repeat the slander and the mischaracterization. CRUZ: So what did you say? What did you say? O'ROURKE: I'm not going to repeat the slander and mischaracterization. CRUZ: You're not going to say what you did say? CONNELLY: Ted Cruz is

Top BBC presenter Michael Buerk is to return to his old school to chair Solihull’s inaugural Big Debate.

Leaders from some of Europe’s largest companies will be gathering in Birmingham to discuss the role that open innovation and collaboration can play in boosting the economy

Question Time Style Debate on Changing Politics chaired by Adrian Goldberg

On Saturday 2nd April some of the region’s top authorities on voting reform will gather in Kings Heath, Birmingham, to present their perspectives

On Wednesday at 9 AM, the full House of Representatives will debate and vote on the two articles of impeachment that have now been passed out of committee. Listen to NPR's live special coverage on PRE News & Ideas at 89.3 across Eastern North Carolina and 88.1 in Greenville. You can also watch the full house floor debate and vote on impeachment on the video stream below.

Twelve candidates take the stage for October's Democratic primary debate, which begins at 8 p.m. ET. NPR reporters are posting context and analysis in real time. Loading...