Deliberations by the Department of Veterans Affairs Commission on Care, the congressionally mandated group planning the future of the Veterans Health Administration, have, as The American Prospect has reported, become increasingly marred by controversy. When the 15-member commission met in Washington in mid-March, another furor erupted. A recently uncovered proposal to privatize the VHA set […]
Blog: TAPPED
Posted inHealth and Social Policy
House Veterans Affairs Chairman Blasts Health-Care Commission Member
The VA Commission on Care, the 15-member bipartisan body created by Congress to make recommendations about the future of the Veterans Health Administration (VHA), has been meeting for months and plans to publish its findings in June. Until this week, Congress had not interfered with the commission’s supposedly independent deliberations. That all changed on March […]
Posted inWorking in America
Legislative Primary May Help Tighten Democrats’ Supermajority in Illinois
Illinois Democrats’ ability to thwart Republican Governor Bruce Rauner’s right-wing, union-busting agenda has just been enhanced by the defeat of a state representative who regularly broke party ranks on key union votes. Incumbent state representative Ken Dunkin, a Democrat whose defections on key votes often thwarted the party’s slim supermajority in the house, lost by […]
Posted inEconomic Policy
Clinton Wins Illinois, but Chicago Feels the Bern
Hillary Clinton carried Illinois, swept through three other states, and kept Bernie Sanders at bay in a too-close-to-call race in Missouri. But Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, who endorsed Clinton, cannot revel in the presumptive Democratic nominee’s home state victory anytime soon. Instead, he will face questions about the blowout defeat of the incumbent Cook County […]
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
Sanders’s Chances in November: A Bloomberg Addendum
An update to “Why Bernie May Have a Better Shot at Winning Than Hillary“ In the past, I’ve written that if Bernie Sanders were the Democratic nominee, Michael Bloomberg would enter the race and thereby win enough electoral votes to throw the election into the House, which, assuming it’s still under Republican control, would elevate […]
Posted inEconomic Policy
Senate Bill Targets Corporations Moving Overseas to Dodge Taxes
Senator Sherrod Brown, a Democrat from Ohio, has introduced a new bill that would force deserting corporations to pay taxes before they head overseas-The Pay What You Owe Before You Go Act of 2016. U.S. multinational corporations have been evading paying U.S. taxes by renouncing their corporate citizenship and formally becoming formal foreign corporations (though […]
Posted inHealth and Social Policy
Oral Arguments Open in Supreme Court Challenge to Texas Law
On Wednesday morning, the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments for Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt, the most significant reproductive rights case to reach the Supreme Court in a generation. The outcome of the case will, to put it plainly, determine whether a woman’s constitutional right to access safe and legal abortion is merely theoretical, […]
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
Is Warren the Inevitable Democratic VP Candidate?
Both Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton have good reason to put Senator Elizabeth Warren on the ticket-whoever wins the presidential nomination. If Sanders wins his underdog campaign, he will have denied the nomination to the most prominent and admired woman in American politics. He will be under intense pressure to name a woman as his […]
Posted inLaw and Justice
McConnell’s Misstep — and Obama’s Backbone
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell made a big mistake when he declared that Republicans would not confirm any Supreme Court nominee appointed by President Obama in this election year. For starters, it makes Republican senators, several of whom are defending closely contested seats in purple states, look purely obstructionist and opportunist. The same goes for […]
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
House Speaker Shows Interest in Congressional Black Caucus Initiative to Fight Rural Poverty
After losing the White House in 2012, the Republican Party set out to do some “soul searching” to figure out how to make inroads with African-American voters who traditionally support Democrats. The following year, the Republican National Committee released a comprehensive “Growth and Opportunity Project” report, which included a detailed plan on how to reach […]
