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Essays I find online that I like are located here.


Last updated: May 13, 2008

My favorites are indicated with a filled bullet point •

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Spring 2008

• Grain of Salt column for the Daily Targum
  • Super Extreme Mega Tuesday Premium With Extra Fiber Published February 4
  • The New McCarthyism Published February 18
  • Applying to Law School Published March 3
  • Real Primary Reform Published March 24
  • Five Challenges Facing Rutgers Published April 7
  • Credits Published April 21

Fall 2007

• Grain of Salt column for the Daily Targum
  • A Guide to Students, for Students Published September 10
  • Correcting the Targum Published September 20
  • Universal Grade Change Form Published September 24
  • Facebook Rating System Published October 8
  • Unofficial Handbook of Majors Published November 5
  • Scarlet Shame Published November 19
  • Our Two Presidents Published December 12

Summer 2007

• Cut and rewritten version of spring 2007 column on merit scholarships "Scholar-ships Quietly Sinking" Final Revision

Spring 2007

• Daily Targum satirical commentary on Athletic Director Robert Mulcahy (response to Blaming the Wrong Man)
• Grain of Salt column for the Daily Targum
  • Back-to-School Sale Published February 12
  • A Tale of Two Universities Published February 26 (Reprinted in the Times of Trenton, March 4)
  • How Come No One's Fixing Stuff? (original title: Somebody Should Do Something About All Those Problems) - Published March 19
  • Scholar-ships Quietly Sinking (original title: Putting the Scholar back in Scholarships) - Published April 2
  • Racism 2.0 Published April 16
  • Lesson Learned (end-of-semester Perspective) Published April 30

Fall 2006

• Daily Targum commentary on the insanity defense (edited version of summer essay) Published September 29
• Daily Targum commentary on Athletic Director Robert Mulcahy Published October 18
• Daily Targum satirical response to Dire Straights Published November 28
• Daily Targum editorials
  • The proposed merger of UMDNJ, NJIT, and Rutgers (co-authored) Final Published September 6
  • The Rutgers student governing associations Final Published September 13
  • The Brower vegetarian line (co-authored with Sean Li) Final Published September 13
  • Draft of a satire on how somebody should solve all those problems Original Published October 24
  • The Supreme Court and punitive damages Final Published November 1
  • The Hubble Space Telescope being repaired (co-authored) Final Published November 1
• Newark Targum editorials
  • The Facebook News Feed Final Published September 13
  • Fundraising and our endowment Final Published September 20
  • The proposed merger of UMDNJ, NJIT, and Rutgers (expanded and revised version of above) Final Published September 20
  • Lowering recruitment standards for the Army Final Published September 27
  • Student organizations at Rutgers-Newark Final Published September 27
  • New Jersey high school students going out-of-state for college Final Published October 4
  • Cancelling the Rutgers subscription to online plagiarism detectors Final Published October 4
  • Our inaction towards North Korea Final Published October 11
  • Allowing high school teachers to carry concealed weapons Final Published October 11
  • Banning trans fats from New Jersey restaurants Final Published October 18
  • The Newark Truancy Task Force Final Published October 25
  • Electronic voting in New Jersey Final Published October 25
  • The Newark Targum endorsement for New Jersey Senator Original Published November 1
  • The New Jersey Supreme Court ruling in favor of gay partnerships Original Published November 1
  • Employers using Facebook to screen potential employees Original Published November 8
  • UMDNJ's latest scandal, involving cardiology "professors" Original Published November 8
  • The attention Rutgers has gotten due to its football team Original Published November 15
  • Creationist museums Original Published November 15
  • Atlantic City banning smoking in casinos Final Published November 29
  • Using technology to fight drunk driving Final Published November 29
  • New Jersey potentially unsealing adoption records Final Published December 6
  • Newark's mayor living in a slum Final Published December 6
• Grain of Salt column for the Daily Targum
  • A Failure to Communicate Published September 12
  • Forsaking the Final Frontier Published September 26
  • The Quality of Mercy Published October 10
  • Voting is Irrational Published November 7
  • Major Malfunction Published November 21
  • No More Excuses Published December 5

Summer 2006

• The heat of Phoenix Original (incomplete)
• Gas prices Original
• The insanity defense Original
• A brief history of time Original
• Textbook prices Original (incomplete)

Spring 2006

• Daily Targum commentary on Google entering the Chinese market under self-censorship Published February 3
• Daily Targum commentary on the Solomon Amendment Published February 7
• Point/Counterpoint column for the Daily Targum with Sean Li writing the other side:
  • Should the United States reinstate conscription? || Opposing viewpoint Published February 22
  • Should drugs be legalized? || Opposing viewpoint Published March 8
  • Should parents be allowed to genetically engineer their children? || Opposing viewpoint Published March 29
  • Is tenure good for a university? || Opposing viewpoint Published April 12
  • Jedi or Sith: Choose your destiny. || Opposing viewpoint Published April 26
  • Choose the gray area Published May 1

Fall 2005

• Essay for 355:201, Research in the Disciplines, and one of 14 published in Dialogues@RU as "One Nation, Under God: Rethinking the Pledge". Won one of 4 Distinguished Essay awards Final

High School

• 2004 essay which won first place for New Jersey in the 2004 National Peace Essay Contest and sent me to the 2004 D.C. awards week Final

Videogame-related

• Professional StarCraft Shinhan Proleague Previews for TeamLiquid June 4, June 6 Published June 2 & June 5, 2007
• Top 10 List for GameFAQs - Top Ten Strategy Games of All Time Final Published January 12, 2006
• Guide for GameFAQs on dual-wielding in Halo 2 multiplayer Final Published February 19, 2005
• Review for GameFAQs of Serious Sam: The Second Encounter Final Published October 11, 2004

My personal favorites:

• Scarlet Shame, a fall 2007 column criticizing the stadium expansion.
• Our Two Presidents, a fall 2007 column comparing Rutgers President McCormick to President Bush.
• The New McCarthyism, a spring 2008 column on Dateline NBC's show "To Catch a Predator".
• Major Malfunction, a fall 2006 column analyzing the differences in difficulty across undergraduate majors. I enjoy every one of my fall 2006 columns, but this one is my favorite

Also see:

• Anti-Tenure, my untitled half of a spring 2006 point/counterpoint column titled "Is tenure good for a university?".
• Dark Side, my untitled half of a spring 2006 point/counterpoint column titled "Jedi or Sith: Choose your destiny."
• O Brave New World, a fall 2006 response to another letter that appeared in the Opinions section (Dire Straights).
• A Tale of Two Universities, a spring 2007 column sharply criticizing Rutgers football. Sparked by far the biggest response to anything I've ever written.

The vast majority of my essays come from my work at Rutgers newspapers - I was the Opinions Editor of the Newark Targum (before it folded in December 2006) and also wrote a biweekly column (and occasionally editorials and commentaries) for the Daily Targum.