History always serves us a cautionary tale -- avoiding the mistakes of the past is the surest way to avoid immense criticism, even if all we do is create new mistakes in the process.

Inaugural celebrations have been no exception.  The greatest and most memorable inaugural speeches focus on the present issues, the greatness of America, and the peaceful transition of power.

The worst often speak for themselves.

Despite the GOP's initial distaste towards now President Elect Trump (see: Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell, Mitt Romney), party members seem to have come around to the idea of a Trump presidency and are willing to work with him to forwar

Following the Obama administration’s decision to abstain from voting on a U.N. Security Council resolution condemning Israel’s construction of settlements in contested Palestinian territory, supporters of Israel in Congress have called for cutting off U.S. funding to the United Nations.

In our fourth episode of Third Candidates, we follow Gary Johnson and Jill Stein from June to September at various 2016 campaign stops as they try to capitalize on their unique opportunities in a highly unusual election season.

Interviews with Gary Johnson, Jill Stein, their supporters, political leaders, and other activists highlight the goals and emotions that fuel the people who throw themselves against insane odds and a relentless election system.

It’s been said before, what a year! We’ve followed the presidential election, electoral reform, and everything in between.

Below, we've compiled the top articles on IVN from this past year - found using Facebook engagement and article pageviews. Check out the headlines and highlights of each article.

Out of all the winners of the 2016 elections, the biggest might have been the Libertarian Party (LP). While Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson did not reach the coveted 5% in national polls to boost his party in future presidential elections, he did help his party extend its ballot access to 39 states for the 2018 elections.

A free press is the watchdog of the people. The media holds the sacred responsibility of alerting the citizenry of actions by governments, elected politicians, corporations and even private citizens. It is the fourth estate guaranteed by the First Amendment. For democracy, this is the fire alarm.

But now the fourth estate is in crisis. The news media has been reshaped, redefined, and side tracked by commercial interests, biased ownership, the phenomenon of social media, the Internet, and a failure to police itself. As a result, fake news has become a threat to democracy.

On Monday, December 19, electors from across the country gathered to cast the official votes for president. Of the 538 votes that were tallied, seven came from faithless electors – electors who chose not to vote for the nominee who won a plurality of votes in their state. These included four Democratic electors in Washington state, two Republican electors in Texas, and one Democratic elector in Hawaii.

Over a month after the conclusion of the 2016 presidential election, politicians, and unnamed sources quoted in various media outlets continue to raise the spectre of Russian interference in the elections.

As TIME pointed out last week, this is a fear that goes back to the time of America's Founding Fathers, with Alexander Hamilton, for instance, concerned about, "the desire in foreign powers to gain an improper ascendant in our councils."

"Therefore, putting away falsehood, let everyone speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another." - Ephesians 4:25, RSV

In 1949, I was in the eighth grade at Roosevelt Junior High School in San Diego, watching with my classmates, for teaching purposes, a black and white film depicting an automobile crash.

At the end of the film, Mr. Grant, our teacher, asked the class to tell him what we saw, but despite having seen the same film, we saw different things.