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The People Organize To Stop Mnuchin

Treasury Secretary nominee Steve Mnuchin is having his hearing today in the U.S. Senate. Will you make a quick call to your senators to oppose his candidacy? When Donald Trump nominated Steve Mnuchin for U.S. Treasury Secretary, a nightmare Debbi Adams thought she had...

Progressive Breakfast

TAKE ACTION Call your senators: Demand they say no to Mnuchin Donald Trump’s Corporate Coup marches on. Steve Mnuchin, Trump’s pick to steer our economy as Treasury Secretary, is a multimillionaire hedge fund banker who profited off the backs of hard-working...

Why This Price Is Wrong

The following was originally published in OtherWords.org For most people, prescription drugs are a lifeline. For Representative Tom Price, Donald Trump’s health secretary nominee, they’re a source of profits. Indeed, hundreds of thousands of dollars in drug and health...

Progressive Breakfast

TAKE ACTION Tell Your Senators: Say No to Corrupt Tom Price Today, Rep. Tom Price, Donald Trump's pick to run Health and Human Services has his first nomination hearing. But ethics experts are already raising red flags. Over the weekend, CNN reported that a week after...

Speak Loudly and Carry a Big Aluminum Bat

During this very month last year, aluminum smelters across the United States were closing, one after another. It was as if they produced something useless, not a commodity crucial to everything from beverage cans to fighter jets. In January of 2016, Alcoa closed its...

Progressive Breakfast

Ethics Cloud Hangs Over Cabinet Noms Education Secretary nominee Betsy DeVos hearing today, The Hill: "[DeVos will be] face-to-face with liberal stalwarts Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.). DeVos’s vocal support of school choice and charter...

A Bold UK Echo of FDR’s Income Cap

In 1942, Franklin Roosevelt advanced what may have been the most politically daring policy proposal of his entire presidency. FDR called for the equivalent of a maximum wage. No individual American after paying taxes, Roosevelt declared, should have an income over...

Resisting the Trumpublican Shock Doctrine Blitzkrieg

The Trumpublicans are intent on manipulating the shock of Donald Trump’s victory  to roll back much of the New Deal and Great Society; ram through unvetted Cabinet appointments intent on undermining the legal mandate of the very Departments they are charged with...

Progressive Breakfast

Resistance Assemblies Sunday President-elect Donald Trump, his agenda, and his toxic cabinet nominees have galvanized unprecedented energy for activism around the country and people are looking for ways to get involved. People’s Action, MoveOn and the Working Families...

Will Betsy DeVos Restart The 'Education Wars'?

Education, which was hardly ever mentioned in the recent presidential election, has suddenly been thrust to the frontline in the increasingly heated conflict over President-Elect Donald Trump's proposed cabinet appointees. The reason for that turn of events is his...

Republicans, Here's Your Way Out Of the Obamacare Vise

The Republicans are in a jam. For the last six years, they've pledged to repeal Obamacare, but haven't figured out a plan for replacing it. They are ideologically opposed to government involvement, but they know that taking away the health insurance of 20 million...

Progressive Breakfast

Obamacare Repeal Advances Senate takes first step toward Obamacare repeal. NYT: "The vote was 51 to 48 ... setting the stage for ... a reconciliation bill ... The budget blueprint instructs House and Senate committees to come up with repeal legislation by Jan. 27....

How Many Won't Watch Trump's Inauguration?

In The New Republic, I counseled people to deny Donald Trump big TV ratings and refuse to watch his inauguration, as well as future State of Union addresses, speeches and interviews. Previously on The Rick Smith Show, I discussed how low TV ratings would rattle Trump,...

Sen. Elizabeth Warren Calls On People To Defend The CFPB

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) protects consumers from financial fraud and scams and was set up as part of the effort to clean up Wall Street following the 2008 financial crash. It's working. Since it was set up five and a half years ago the CFPB has...

Progressive Breakfast

Don't Take Away Our Health CareThis week, Congress will vote on a budget resolution to repeal the Affordable Care Act and take health care away from millions. This is the right wing's first step toward gutting the health care we all count on. On top of eliminating the...

Don’t Watch Donald Trump’s Inauguration

The following is excerpted from The New Republic. Click here to read the full article. ...That inauguration next week? Don’t watch. State of the Union? You’re better off with an early night’s sleep. Oval Office addresses? Speeches? Rallies? Press conferences?...

Progressive Breakfast

Senate: Do not let Trump's picks go unvettedToday, the Senate will begin confirmation hearings for President-elect Donald Trump’s Cabinet nominees. But many of his picks haven’t yet completed the ethics vetting process. According to the Office of Government Ethics,...

Postal Service Drops Staples Privatization Effort

The Postal Service's experimental "pilot program" in privatizing the retail end of the USPS using Staples outlets has failed and ended. The "Grand Alliance to Save Our Postal Service" has forced the USPS to back off from partnering with Staples in their effort to...

Progressive Breakfast

URGENT: Sessions Attorney General confirmation can still be stopped Senate Republicans are trying to rush through one of the most dangerous Presidential appointments of all time. Sen. Jeff Sessions has a history of attacking civil rights organizations, undermining...

How Trump Is Like Reagan ... And How He Is Not

With eleven days until Donald Trump is inaugurated as President, at least half of the country is in disoriented shock. It remains hard to believe this is really happening. And while in many respects what is happening is unprecedented, in other respects, we've been...

Progressive Breakfast

Republicans Reveal Their Priorities GOP to rush cabinet confirmations. Politico: "Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s conference has scheduled six Cabinet-level confirmations hearings for next Wednesday, Jan. 11, the same day the chamber will likely slog through...

Democrats Who Oppose Betsy DeVos Have Nothing To Lose

In "an unprecedented break" from tradition, Democrats in the US Senate are expected to challenge as many as eight of Donald Trump's cabinet nominees, including Betsy DeVos for US Secretary of Education, according to a report by the Washington Post. The opposition to...

An Arrogant Entrance, A Sad Exit

Republican leaders in Congress have never — in any of our lifetimes — entered a new year with higher hopes. They don’t just have a lockgrip on both chambers. They have an incoming president who’s itching to sign pretty much any legislation GOP lawmakers plop on his...

Sorry Donald, Republicans Own Health Care Now

With Republicans making Obamacare repeal their first order of business, queasiness has already set in among congressional leaders and the President-elect. "Even people who voted for [repeal] before are [saying], ‘Wait a minute, wait a minute, we knew that wasn’t going...

Progressive Breakfast

Obamacare Repeal Not So Simple Republicans increasingly queasy about Obamacare repeal. Politico: "There’s definitely fear on the Hill. Congress has only been in for a few days, but the conversation on Obamacare has definitely shifted. It’s no longer a...

Progressive Breakfast

Schumer Lays Out Democratic Strategy Senate Minority Leader articulates oppositional vision. Yahoo! News: "Schumer mentioned infrastructure investments and tax and trade reform as areas of possible cooperation, while vowing to fight 'tooth and nail' on other issues,...

The Carolina Coup and the Fight for Public Education

The nation's eyes are on my home state of North Carolina, where what many are calling a coup has shown the lengths to which Republicans will go to protect and expand their political power. The naked power grab by Republicans has shocked the nation. But few people...

Progressive Breakfast

House Guts Ethics Office "With No Warning, House Republicans Vote to Gut Independent Ethics Office" reports NYT: "House Republicans, overriding their top leaders, voted on Monday to significantly curtail the power of an independent ethics office ... The move to...

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