TomCADem
TomCADem's Journal
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Member since: Thu May 7, 2009, 11:59 PM
Number of posts: 16,342
Number of posts: 16,342
Journal Archives
It's Time to End Legal Immunity for the Gun Industry - Where Do Progressives Stand?
We need to know where our electeds stand. Do they stand with gun manufacturers? Or, will they end the immunity for gun manufacturers?
http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/42522-it-s-time-to-end-legal-immunity-for-the-gun-industry In November 1998, the largest tobacco manufacturers in the country entered into a "master settlement agreement" with the attorneys general of 46 states in order to settle public health lawsuits that threatened to beggar the industry. The attorneys general had sued on the grounds that they had incurred immense Medicaid costs as the result of the tobacco industry's negligent marketing practices, causing millions of people to get hooked on cigarettes and suffering health effects that burdened the state health systems. |
Posted by TomCADem | Mon Feb 19, 2018, 07:01 PM (114 replies)
Last February, Trump signed a bill making it easier for people with mental illness to buy guns
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/2/15/17016036/trump-guns-mental-illness It did not attract a ton of attention at the time (nothing does these days) but about a year ago on February 28, 2017, Congress passed and Donald Trump signed a law revoking an Obama-era regulatory initiative that made it harder for people with mental illness to buy a gun. |
Posted by TomCADem | Thu Feb 15, 2018, 11:47 AM (2 replies)
NY Times - A Little-Noticed Target in the House Health Bill: Special Education
Not only are Republicans fighting against gun control, but they are also cutting funding to special education programs that could assist teens with mental illness and autism.
A perfect recipe for more gun shootings. Easy access to guns plus rollbacks in services to youth with special needs. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/03/us/politics/health-bill-medicaid-special-education-affordable-care-act.html WASHINGTON — While House Republicans lined up votes Wednesday for a Thursday showdown over their bill to repeal the Affordable Care Act, Vickie Glenn sat in her Murphysboro, Ill., office and prayed for it to fail. |
Posted by TomCADem | Thu Feb 15, 2018, 12:12 AM (0 replies)
Fox Pulls Column Calling the U.S. Olympic Team 'Darker, Gayer, Different'
As Korean American Chloe Kim prepared to dominate the women's half-pipe, Fox's Executive Vice President wrote a column complaining about having gay or non-white athletes on the Olympic team.
http://time.com/5143227/john-moody-fox-news-olympics/ Fox News has deleted a column in which executive editor and executive vice president John Moody wrote that the U.S. Olympic Committee (USOC) apparently wants to change the Olympic motto from “swifter, higher, stronger” to “darker, gayer, different.” |
Posted by TomCADem | Tue Feb 13, 2018, 12:48 AM (9 replies)
Republican candidates across the country are trying to replicate Trumps formula
The genie is out of the bottle as Republicans embrace previously unspoken racism, sexism, xenophobia and hate that bound the Republican party. Populism is just a euphemism for hate these days.
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/02/republican-candidates-are-running-like-trump.html Is Donald Trump the chicken or the egg in the devolution of the Republican Party? Trump isn’t the first Republican to win over GOP voters with shameless bigotry and relentless demagoguery, and his administration is almost typical in its disdain for the commons and its commitment to enriching the rich. At the same time, his success has unleashed something in the GOP, opening the gate to a crop of candidates who have jettisoned respectability to channel the conservative id in all of its anger and resentment. |
Posted by TomCADem | Mon Feb 5, 2018, 09:50 PM (2 replies)
Vox - The campaign to oust Rod Rosenstein is heating up after the Nunes memos release
It does not matter that Nunes little list of talking points is bullshit. You do not matter. The point of the memo is to give Fox News and other RW media outlets a plausible story line to justify Trump firing Rosenstein and Mueller.
Looking ahead, once Trump has his cronies in the DOJ and FBI, he can use them to attack his political adversaries Putin style. If you were curious about how a Democratic country can slip into dictatorship, this is how it goes. https://www.vox.com/2018/2/2/16966208/nunes-memo-rod-rosenstein-tea-party-patriots-ad The Nunes memo has been released — and the conservative drumbeat demanding the firing of Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein is getting louder. |
Posted by TomCADem | Sat Feb 3, 2018, 06:05 PM (5 replies)
Vox - The truth about the Trump economy, explained
Excellent article that points out that the real change in the Trump economy, which largely continues if not lags the rate of growth under President Obama, is that conservative media is now celebrating the same fundamentals as signs of a great economy when just a few years ago the RW media was saying that the economy was failing under President Obama.
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/1/30/16945146/trump-economic-record Hillary Clinton struggled to articulate a boosterish case for the American economy during the 2016 campaign in part because of lingering patches of labor market weakness but largely because progressives have a more fundamental critique of the US economic situation. |
Posted by TomCADem | Tue Jan 30, 2018, 09:11 PM (3 replies)
Politico - Trump cuts to CDC worry health experts in NY - Smallest Budget in 20 Years
As the U.S. confronts the worst flu season in a decade, remember that Trump proposed a 17 percent cut to the CDC that would leave it its smallest budget in more than 20 years. But hey, we have to give the rich their tax cuts.
https://www.politico.com/states/new-york/albany/story/2017/05/23/trump-cuts-to-cdc-worry-health-experts-in-ny-112282 It's this kind of coordination that often goes unnoticed by the public even as it likely saves lives. The CDC is typically in the news during major outbreaks but it’s the day-to-day warnings, the data gathering and information sharing that have public and private health officials so concerned about Trump’s budget, which proposes to cut $1.2 billion from the CDC. The 17 percent cut would leave the CDC with its smallest budget in more than 20 years. |
Posted by TomCADem | Sun Jan 28, 2018, 07:59 PM (2 replies)
Vox - This is the first real government shutdown under one-party government, ever
Trump and Republicans are making history again. While the media tries to paint a false equivalency between Republicans and Democrats, the fact of the matter is that Republicans control all three branches of government and Trump himself blew up the latest effort at bipartisanship.
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/1/19/16911148/government-shutdown-unified-control The government shutdown this weekend is the first time a true, honest-to-God shutdown has happened with a single party controlling the White House and Congress. |
Posted by TomCADem | Sat Jan 20, 2018, 08:44 PM (3 replies)
Slate - Oprahs Real Message: It wasnt about her. It was about us. (Even Dems)
The amazing thing is how Oprah's speech has not only drawn criticism for the right, but also among some members of the "left" concerned that the speech was too good and might create momentum for Oprah to run for President. The speech recognized the need for individual citizens to become engaged. Nonetheless, rather than listen to the substance of the speech regarding an empowered citizenry, people continued to either look for a messiah or protect the political messiahs who they felt were threatened by the great speech that Oprah gave.
The folks who seek to annoint Oprah a messiah or seek to bring her down to defend their chosen political messiahs missed the entire point of her speech as noted by Dahlia Lithwik. https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/01/people-are-completely-missing-the-point-of-oprahs-amazing-golden-globes-speech.html I loved Oprah’s Golden Globes speech on Sunday. It was mesmerizing, pitch perfect, and gave voice to many lifetimes of frustration and vindication with eloquence and a full authority she has earned. But I found the strange Facebook response of “Oprah 2020” weirdly discordant and disorienting. Oprah’s speech—in my hearing—wasn’t about why she needs to run for office. It was about why the rest of us need to do so, immediately. |
Posted by TomCADem | Tue Jan 9, 2018, 01:10 AM (3 replies)