Abuse of power stopped by citizens, that’s a good sign of the health of our democracy, and it happened in New Jersey this past weekend when state legislative leaders were forced off a plan to permanently gerrymander Democratic control. It’s an even better sign that the citizen groups doing the stopping were on the side that would have benefited politically from the power grab.

San Diego, Calif.- Sweetwater High School District officials knowingly covered up the district's financial crisis, so say state officials after a damning audit of the Sweetwater School District's finances.

The state’s Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team (FCMAT) has even suggested some district employees may have committed criminal fraud.

FCMAT’s chief executive officer Michael Fine said the district’s accounting system was doctored to create the impression the district had more money than it really did.

Those of us who inhabit the space in American politics between the 40-yard lines have watched with dismay as the nation’s two major parties retreat to their respective ideological end zones. As election after entrenched election passes, we have to wonder about the potential for a third party that would occupy the ground near midfield that has been abandoned by Democrats and Republicans.

Our electoral system is broken. Just look at the U.S. House of Representatives. Only a tiny fraction of seats are competitive, and the results leave out far too many voters. Case in point: almost two years out, we can project the results in over 80 percent of seats for the 2020 elections.

Many of us now see the connections between severe weather and new disease patterns. More destructive and more frequent floods, fires, droughts, hurricanes and blizzards can no longer be ignored. Also recognized, changing weather brings new patterns of insects and diseases. Mosquitoes moving north, ticks and Lyme disease spreading west, polio-like illnesses, ancient bacteria in defrosting tundra and everywhere the health impacts of poorly stored or unethically distributed chemicals and toxins.