Tag Archives: Hot Topics

Final thoughts on the 2018 midterms Here are six takeaways from last night’s results: 1. It *was* a wave election in the popular vote, but it was blunted by gerrymandering: Here’s a tweet by Sam Wang: Even though Democrats won the popular vote by 9.2%, they only eked out 12 seats over a majority, and came about 4 seats short of Nate Silver’s median projection: By contrast, in 2010, a smaller vote advantage led to a 63 seat gain for the GOP....

A little over a year ago, Robert Watson, former chair of the IPCC, and two co-authors published a report titled “The Economic Case for Climate Action in the United States.” Based on trends over the past few decades, the authors estimated the current total annual cost in the U.S. of losses from weather events intensified by climate change and health damage from fossil fuel pollution to be $240 billion, which they described as “about 40 percent of current...

Michigan 8th District Congressman Mike Bishop’s ad: “Additionally, under the American Health Care Act (AHCA), insurance companies cannot deny coverage based on pre-existing conditions – yet Elissa Slotkin continues to lie about Mike Bishop’s record. Sec. 137 of H.R. 1628 of the AHCA states: “Nothing in this Act shall be construed as permitting health insurance issuers to limit access to health coverage for individuals with preexisting conditions.” Under...

[embedded content] If you have not seen this yet, take a moment and listen. It kind of makes you feel good about being a Democrat. 7th District Virginia’s Elissa Slotkin, Abigail Spanberger. Like Esquire’s Charles Pierce tells us, it kind of reminds you of the Ali-Terrell fight—What’s my name, motherf***er? Abigail took teabagger Dave Brat to the wood shed and just tore him apart. It is a great take down. HT to EMichael...

HuffPost Politics: New York Times columnist Economist Paul Krugman fears that President Donald Trump’s insistent complaints of “voter fraud” are a setup to deny the legitimacy of a Democratic majority in the House should the party win in the midterm elections. Those who don’t believe such a scenario is possible “haven’t been paying attention,” the Nobel laureate warned. Trump has complained, without evidence, that as many as 5 million people voted...

Jargon is a heck of a drug: If names be not correct, language is not in accordance with the truth of things. If language be not in accordance with the truth of things, affairs cannot be carried on to success. The discourse of global warming/climate change is lousy with jargon. This rampant obfuscation gives science deniers rhetorical leverage and induces hallucinations about “Green New Deals” and “Environmental Kuznets Curves.” “Decoupling,” “rebound...

A Federal Court cleared the way for students who have been defrauded by for-profit institutions (I hesitate to call them schools). “This court ruling is a major victory for thousands of students across the country who were defrauded by predatory for-profit colleges taking advantage of our broken student loan system. We commend Attorney General Maura Healey for her leadership fighting for students who were left with thousands of dollars in debt after...

After instituting a $1.5 trillion tax cut and after signing off on a $675 billion Defense budget, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said yesterday, Tuesday, October 16, 2016; “The only way to lower the record-high federal deficit would be to cut entitlement programs like Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.” More McConnell: “It’s disappointing but it’s not a Republican problem.” The deficit, grew 17 percent to $779 billion in fiscal year 2018....

Last March, U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin sponsored a bill (Fair Care Act) to block President Trump’s plan to allow insurers to sell short term or what is frequently called junk plans. Senator Baldwin bill would reverse all of what the Republicans attempted to do with short term plans by reinstating protections for pre-exiting conditions, maintaining the community benefit costing of the plans, blocking life-time cost limits, etc. Senator Tammy...

The Trump administration has proposed changes to limit demonstrations near the White House and National Mall. The limits include closing 80% of the White House sidewalk, placing limits on spontaneous demonstrations, and imposing a “First Amendment fee” for protests (gotta make up for the deficits he created). ✓ The public has until October 15 to comment on the plans. ✓ Under current policy, the National Park Service charges fees for special events (e.g.,...