Steven Jaffe
Recent articles
Penn Relays | Professionals prepare for London 2012
On Saturday, the final day of Penn Relays, the pros will take to the track as they build up to the Olympic Trials in June.
Quakers W. Tennis split final weekend
On Friday, the Red and the Blue played their final home match and picked up a 5-2 win. On Sunday, the Red and the Blue would fall to No. 73 Columbia, 6-1, in the Big Apple.
Highly touted recruit to join Geatz’s men's tennis squad
The Quakers, they’ll be adding to next year’s roster with the arrival of a particularly noteworthy recruit: Vimuktha “Vim” De Alwis.
Penn gymnastics finishes third in last meet of year
They came into the meet as the third seed, and lived up to expectations, finishing behind the University of Bridgeport and Texas Women’s University (TWU), while beating out five other squads.
Penn seniors look to finish on top at USAGs
This should be considered one of Penn gymnastics’ best-ever seasons, but if the last word is the most memorable, the Quakers need a strong final performance to cement their successful year.
Bonincontri and Strasbaugh fail to advance at NCAA Regionals
On Saturday afternoon, gymnasts Dana Bonincontri and Kirsten Strausbaugh competed in NCAA Regionals at North Carolina State and although they turned in career-best performances, neither will advance to the NCAA Championships.
Quakers swept at home by Yale and Brown
The Penn women’s tennis team moved to 0-3 in the Ivy League for the fourth consecutive season, losing to No. 27 Yale and No. 53 Brown.
Penn professors weigh in on constitutionality of healthcare reform's individual mandate
While the Supreme Court deliberates the constitutionality of the Patient Protection Affordable Care Act, Penn professors are also debating the issue.
Men's tennis at its turning point
First-year men’s tennis coach David Geatz came in with mild expectations. He saw a team that had talent, but not a team that was on par with the one he had coached at Cornell a few years back.
Princeton misses near sweep
The Quakers lost 6-1 to the Tigers in their Ivy opener. The lone point came at No. 1 singles from freshman Sol Eskenazi.
Penn gymnastics floors Towson for title
Penn gymnastics won its first ECAC title since 2004 at the Palestra Saturday, beating Towson in the teams’ third meeting of the season.
Penn gymnastics to host ECAC Championships on Saturday
While the Red and Blue would like to bring home their first win at the meet since 2004, they’ll have to go through a Towson squad that has outperformed them on two separate occasions this year.
Penn women's tennis to take on Temple
This afternoon, the Quakers will host the Owls at the new Hamlin Tennis Center in Penn Park at 4 p.m. In recent seasons, the two squads have been fairly evenly matched — the two programs have split the last four head-to-head matchups.
Recruit Jullian Harrell speaks with The DP
Harrell is a 6-foot-5 shooting guard out of Loyola High School in Los Angeles and a former teammate of Penn’s sophomore guard Miles Cartwright
Vogel, Odinak and Greenberg finish year on high note at CSA Individual Championships
For Penn squash teams, the best players didn’t necessarily have the best individual championships.
Q&A with basketball recruit Jamal Lewis
Zack Rosen and the Quakers reminded fans that their season is far from over by pulling off an upset in Boston.
Gymnastics repeats as Ivy champs
Gymnastics team repeated as Ivy Champs to win Penn’s first Ivy title of the 2011-2012 school year.
For the Mattssons, it’s all in the family
Squash runs in the Mattsson family. Thomas and Oscar’s mother, Deborah Lippincott, played squash for the Quakers in the mid-1970s. Their brother, Nils, played at Navy.
DP speaks with recruit Darien Nelson-Henry
The DP sits down with Quakers’ recruit Darien Nelson-Henry and discusses his “big” impact on the program.
Penn tops 192 but finishes second
On Saturday afternoon at the Shelli Calloway Memorial Towson Invitational in Maryland, the Quakers finished second at a four-team meet, scoring a 192.1, their second highest score of the season.
Recent posts
Analysis | A Tale of Two Cases
Despite the fact that both laws were are controversial and hotly contested, there isn’t much public attention currently focusing on Wednesday’s oral arguments. Sure, some will protest on 1st Street, on the Court’s steps Wednesday, and yes, media outlets will report on the case. But the case isn’t in the same spotlight the bill once occupied. In contrast, oral arguments regarding Obamacare received a plethora of coverage to the point the case was deemed the single most important case in recent history.
Economics professor Luca Bossi discusses employment report
The Bureau of Labor Statistics released its monthly employment report earlier this month. Today, I talked with Penn Economics professor Luca Bossi to get his take on the numbers.
Q&A with Political Science professor Rogers Smith on healthcare reform
Political Science professor Rogers Smith, an expert on constitutional law, spoke with us extensively about the constitutional aspects of healthcare reform.
Economics professor Rebecca Stein on healthcare reform
Economics professor Rebecca Stein was kind enough to take the time to share her opinions on the economics aspects on the healthcare case.
Joke Issue: Romney buys manufacturer of Etch A Sketch
Mitt Romney literally shook things up on Sunday. The presidential candidate bought out the Ohio Art Company, known for producing the Etch A Sketch, using his own, out-of-pocket wealth.
Analysis | A handful of votes
When I get an email from a political campaign, I usually quickly delete it. If I didn’t, I would have contributed $5 to a campaign multiple times a day for the past few months. I think I’ll eat instead. But a recent email I received struck me.
Analysis | A surprise pick for the World Bank
President Barack Obama took some by surprise Friday, when he announced his nominee for the president of the World Bank. On the last day of the nominating period, Obama said he was nominating current Dartmouth president Jim Yong Kim to replace Robert Zoellick as World Bank president.
Analysis | Obama's political bracket
Who said President Barack Obama was taking a break when he filled out his NCAA bracket? There seem to be a lot of strategic picks in Obama’s bracket: politically strategic picks.
Analysis | The outdoor distribution of food
Many of us have given money to some homeless person on the street at some point. Some of us have even spared the leftovers we were carrying home. But in less than a month, we won’t be able to do the latter in parks — at least not without getting a warning and, eventually, fined.
Analysis | Super PACs aren’t as influential as expected
In the wake of the Citizens United case, the infamous Supreme Court ruling that allowed political expenditures by corporations and unions, many feared the outcome of future elections would be determined by large corporations — that the decision put American democracy in jeopardy.
Analysis | Who are the winners come Wednesday?
Super Tuesday. If there’s not a clear nominee by March, it’s supposed to determine who will represent the party in November. With 11 primaries, it has six more races than any other day. Those states represent every United States time zone and include two swing states — it’s not a bad sample.
Analysis | Obama's mandate on contraceptive coverage
According to a CBS News/New York Times poll, over 60 percent of Americans support “federally-mandated contraception coverage for religiously affiliated employers”; only 31 percent oppose it. Other polls have found that about the same percentage of Americans believe the government should require employer healthcare plans to include contraception coverage but that fewer believe the same requirement should be placed on religious entities.
Nutter unveils the local branch of Obama's Truth Team
Democrats aren’t waiting until the GOP ultimately selects its nominee to start getting their campaign into full gear. On Thursday — right in City Hall — Mayor Michael Nutter, along with other Philadelphia government officials, unveiled the local branch of Obama’s Truth Team for the 2012 campaign.
Analysis | Santorum benefits from Obama's birth control mistake
President Barack Obama made a mistake.
And yet, he may be able to benefit from it.
Obama should not have mandated that religious employers must cover the cost of birth control for their employees.
Analysis | Biden's visit with Gutmann
Last month, Vice President Joe Biden visited Penn President Amy Gutmann.. A plethora of black Escalades and men in suits with headpieces didn’t exactly help conceal the unannounced visit.
While no one is sure what the two discussed at Gutmann’s residence off 38th and Walnut streets there are some clues as to what the topic of conversation may have been.
Analysis | Obama, Iran and the Strait of Hormuz
I wouldn’t be surprised if President Barack Obama were secretly daring Iran to close the Strait of Hormuz.
No, I’m not one of those extremists who think Obama’s an American-hating Muslim. But Obama has so much to gain in 2012 from an Iranian misstep.
Continued confusion between Bain Capital and Bain & Co.
Recently, this blog noted that the media has been mixing up Bain Capital and Bain & Company. The former, with its connection to cofounder Mitt Romney, is under fire for its practice of leveraged buyouts. The latter also has connections to the presidential candidate, but is a management consulting firm that has not been implicated in the scandal.
However, due to haphazard reporting, both companies are referred to as “Bain” in the media, and Bain & Co. sometimes takes the blame for Bain Capital’s dealings.
The Supreme Court's ruling on GPS devices
On Monday, the Supreme Court handed down a much anticipated ruling, and the result was unanimous.
The Court’s ruling in United States v. Antoine Jones holds that the police may not place a GPS device on a car without the owner’s consent to track his movements.
While the decision was 9-0, there were some rifts between justices on how to best arrive at their decision. Two concurrences were filed in the case.
Analysis | Don't blame Romney for his tax rate
In the very early morning hours of Tuesday, Mitt Romney finally released his tax records.
People had wanted to see Romney’s tax records in large part because he had tried to duck the question of whether he would release them — an action that has become traditional, though (as Romney has mentioned) is not legally required). For months, Romney said he might release them. If it’s tradition, he said, he’d consider it. But his noncommittal answer to a relatively simple question made him seem like he was hiding something.
Analysis | Newt Gingrich's unusual Flight
Have you ever played the game Flight on Armor Games? It’s pretty good.
Newt Gingrich’s decisive win in South Carolina — by nearly 13 percentage points — reminded me of the game.
Gingrich’s campaign has crashed multiple times since he announced his decision to run for President.
First, there was the debacle in the spring.
