by Tim Wilkins | Mar 15, 2017 | Blog
Winter gusts could not keep hundreds from converging on the Racine offices of Wisconsin Representative Paul Ryan to deliver a simple message. “I want to live a life of dignity,” said Reggie Griffin, a retiree in his seventies who traveled from Chicago to join the...
by Alan Jenkins | Mar 15, 2017 | Blog
This month marks the 100th birthday of civil rights legend and revered federal judge Robert L. Carter. Best known as a principal architect of Brown v. Board of Education, Carter brilliantly wove together history, social science, constitutional jurisprudence, and our...
by People's Action | Mar 15, 2017 | Breakfast
Republicans Rework Health Care Bill Changes likely to House health care bill. The Hill: "White House spokesman Sean Spicer on Tuesday said the administration is working with House leadership on a manager’s amendment that would make changes to the legislation ... any...
by Richard Eskow | Mar 15, 2017 | Blog
After a presidential campaign filled with racist rhetoric, the Republicans have proposed a healthcare agenda that will harm many black, brown, and poor Americans while helping the white and wealthy. It's the same cynical strategy Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan...
by Dave Johnson | Mar 14, 2017 | Blog
It's starting to look like President Trump's promised $1-trillion plan to rebuild the nation's infrastructure will be as bad for us as his health care plan turned out to be. Infrastructure Report Card The American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) has issued their...
by Jacob Swenson-Lengyel | Mar 14, 2017 | Blog
On February 19, 2009, just 30 days after President Obama was sworn in, Rick Santelli’s rant on the floor of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange launched the Tea Party. The conservative establishment worked together with the grassroots to fan the flames of opposition. The...
by People's Action | Mar 14, 2017 | Breakfast
CBO Torches ACA Repeal CBO exposes Republican health care plan. NYT: "The House Republican plan to replace the Affordable Care Act would increase the number of people without health insurance by 24 million by 2026 ... The budget office estimated that 52 million people...
by Robert Kraig | Mar 14, 2017 | Blog
Hundreds of Wisconsin and Illinois activists will brave snowstorms Tuesday to converge on House Speaker Paul Ryan’s office in Racine, Wisconsin, to challenge the GOP's bid to take health care away from millions of Americans. The two groups leading the event, Fair...
by Dave Johnson | Mar 13, 2017 | Blog
During the campaign Donald Trump pledged that "on day one" as president, he would label China a currency manipulator. Then he didn't. Then China granted Trump's businesses lucrative trademarks he has been seeking. Coincidence? "On Day One" On the campaign trail, Trump...
by People's Action | Mar 13, 2017 | Breakfast
Republicans Skittish Over Health Care GOP Sen . Tom Cotton warns House Republicans against approving health care bill as is, on ABC's This Week: "I would say to my friends in the House of Representatives with whom I serve, 'Do not walk the plank and vote for a bill...
by Miles Mogulescu | Mar 12, 2017 | Blog
How mean-spirited are Republican plans to repeal The Affordable Care Act? Among other things, they will make states choose between kicking millions of old people out of nursing homes or kicking millions of poor and near-poor people off Medicaid health insurance. This...
by Richard Eskow | Mar 12, 2017 | Blog
The American Health Care Act is a rich person's bonanza. Under the plan proposed by House Republicans, each of the nation’s 400 richest families will save $7 million per year, as part of a tax giveaway. The plan offers no benefits at all to those who earn $200,000 or...
by Robert Borosage | Mar 10, 2017 | Blog
Few entities have been more discombobulated by our madcap president than the bipartisan foreign policy establishment, which former Obama foreign-policy adviser Ben Rhodes once dubbed “the blob.” Donald Trump assaulted the blob with his “America First” posture and his...
by People's Action | Mar 10, 2017 | Breakfast
Trump Owns Health Care Trump goes all in on ACA repeal. NYT: "...Mr. Trump is plunging personally into his first major legislative fight, getting behind a bill that has been denounced by many health care providers and scorned by his base on the right. If it fails, Mr....
by Jeff Bryant | Mar 10, 2017 | Blog
In its waning hours, the Obama administration gave conservatives poised to take the reins in Washington, DC a huge gift when it issued a highly negative report on the results of its efforts to rescue the 5,000 lowest performing public schools across the nation. "Obama...
by Robert Borosage | Mar 10, 2017 | Blog
February, the first full month of the Trump presidency, witnessed solid jobs growth of 235,000 with the headline unemployment rate little changed, at 4.7 percent, according to the Bureau of Labor Services monthly report. Trump has already tweeted to claim credit for...
by Dave Johnson | Mar 9, 2017 | Blog
Who could be against rules that try to protect workers from having their pay stolen, having their health and safety put at risk, and being subjected to civil rights and labor law violations? See if you can guess who. Last August, President Obama implemented a ‘Fair...
by People's Action | Mar 9, 2017 | Breakfast
Trump Prepares To Shift Blame Trump prepares to blame Dems for GOP health care fail. Politico: "In a private Oval Office meeting with conservative activists Wednesday, President Donald Trump sold Paul Ryan's health care bill as strong and necessary. But minutes later,...
by Richard Eskow | Mar 9, 2017 | Blog
The Republicans' plan to replace the Affordable Care Act is a disaster for the health of the American people. But that may be nothing more than a byproduct of the bill’s main impact: it will increase inequality, and make the rich even richer than they’ve become in the...
by Leo Gerard | Mar 8, 2017 | Blog
This month is the one-year anniversary of Alcoa closing the largest aluminum smelter in the United States – the Warrick in Indiana. More than 325 workers lost their family-supporting jobs, including Brandon Marshall, who, like most aluminum workers, was a member of my...
by Sam Pizzigati | Mar 8, 2017 | Blog
Americans, on average, believe that over a quarter of the federal budget - 26 percent - goes for foreign aid, pollsters report. But actual outlays for foreign aid make up just 1 percent of what the federal government annually spends. Don’t expect this startling gap...
by People's Action | Mar 8, 2017 | Breakfast
Women Strike Day Without a Woman launches. AP: "'A Day Without a Woman' is the first national action by organizers since the nationwide marches held the day after President Donald Trump's inauguration ... School districts including Alexandria City Public Schools in...
by Jacob Swenson-Lengyel | Mar 8, 2017 | Democracy
Exclusive access to President Trump might sound good to a CEO, but it comes at a cost to your business. Just ask Uber chief Travis Kalanick. In early February, Kalanick was compelled to step down from Trump's closed-door economic advisory council after People’s Action...
by Harvey J Kaye | Mar 7, 2017 | Blog
Donald Trump’s candidacy, and now, presidency, have resurrected a public conversation not heard in the United States since the Great Depression – about the possible triumph of a fascist-tinged authoritarian regime over liberal democracy. It’s a fear Sinclair Lewis...
by Dave Johnson | Mar 7, 2017 | Blog
The Census Bureau reports the U.S. deficit on trade with other countries rose in January to $48.5 billion, the highest level in five years. It is up 9.6 percent from December's $44.3 billion, and 11.8 percent from January of 2016. January exports rose $1.1 billion to...
by People's Action | Mar 7, 2017 | Breakfast
Rocky Rollout of ACA Repeal House GOP reveals ACA repeal bill. AP: " The plan would repeal the statute's unpopular fines on people who don't carry health insurance. It would replace income-based subsidies the law provides to help millions of Americans pay premiums...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Mar 7, 2017 | Health
As medicine for our health care system, it's worse than a placebo. It will do active harm to millions of people, particularly low-income people and seniors. It cuts taxes for the wealthy and corporations and dangles paltry tax credits to working people. It leaves...
by Bill Moyers | Mar 6, 2017 | Blog
President Trump let fly a stunning poisoned-tip tweet this weekend: Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my "wires tapped" in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism! He offered no evidence, not an iota of proof to back up the...
by Dave Johnson | Mar 6, 2017 | Blog
Time and again, Candidate Donald Trump promised to "drain the swamp in Washington." He swore to curb lobbying of government by special interest groups to procure favors for their clients. But instead, President Trump has cut out the middleman - he's gone directly into...
by People's Action | Mar 6, 2017 | Breakfast
Trump Tries Again To Restrict Refugees, Muslim Immigration New travel ban expected today. ABC: "The new order has been crafted to withstand legal challenges, exempting permanent legal residents and applying only to future visa applicants, not those who already hold...
by Sarah Warner, Cynthia Ward Wikstrom | Mar 5, 2017 | Blog
Citizens have refused to take no – or no-shows – as answers when elected officials sidestep questions at town hall meetings about Republican plans to cut health care and the Affordable Care Act (ACA). “They have a right to hear what policy proposals are on the table,...
by Dave Johnson | Mar 3, 2017 | Blog
Making people "Look over there!" is a classic magician's trick. The magician misdirects the audience's attention, while palming a coin or putting a dove in a pocket. Misdirection is also used by con men far and wide. The Trump Spectacle The public is being misdirected...
by Jeff Bryant | Mar 3, 2017 | Blog
“We've not done enough to help kids at the lower end of the socio-economic rungs,” says labor economist and Stanford University professor Martin Carnoy. It's not an accident these families, particularly in the African American community, are demanding vouchers,...
by People's Action | Mar 3, 2017 | Breakfast
Cruel Arrests Of Immigrants Continue Another DREAMer detained. The Nation: "On Tuesday, Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in Jackson, Mississippi, pulled over and detained 22-year-old Daniela Vargas, who had just finished participating in a press conference...
by Richard Eskow | Mar 2, 2017 | Blog
Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III is a man out of time, a holdover from an age when some people believed that certain groups were exempt from the rule of law. He may be out of time in another way, too: His days as Attorney General might be numbered. Even in the...
by Robert Borosage | Mar 2, 2017 | Blog
Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign sensibly concluded that Donald Trump was so obviously unfit for office that he could not be elected. He was shockingly unprepared, corrupted, juvenile, poisonous, and often simply repugnant. Clinton chose to make...
by Jeff Bryant | Mar 2, 2017 | Blog
President Donald Trump is being praised for a change in tone in his recent address to Congress, but his belligerent attitude toward public education hasn't changed a bit. While it's true he stopped short of repeating his claims that public schools are "broken" and a...
by Mark Trahant | Mar 2, 2017 | Blog
President Donald J. Trump is set to deliver a financial blow to Indian Country. His first budget will propose cuts of at least $54 billion and an amount that he will add to Defense Spending. The president will check off his promises from the campaign (even those that...
by People's Action | Mar 2, 2017 | Breakfast
No Money For Wall Trump can't find money for the wall. Reuters: "...so far, the DHS has identified only $20 million that can be re-directed to the multi-billion-dollar project, according to a document prepared by the agency and distributed to congressional budget...
by Dave Johnson | Mar 2, 2017 | Blog
President Trump is said to be preparing to privatize key public services, including the Veterans Administration (VA), public schools, and public broadcasting, expanding private prisons and launching a privatized infrastructure program. Republicans in Congress want to...
