FLINT, MICHIGAN — The north side of Flint is largely a food desert, the result of a steady decline in jobs and economic security compounded by the city’s enduring water crisis. But Mark Baldwin wants to change that.
“Especially for young folks, there’s an amazing amount of opportunity in Flint,” he says on a crisp Thursday afternoon, gesturing around his greenhouse, which he hopes can be translated into a wider-scale effort to provide the neighborhood w...
health
Republican Senate hopeful Martha McSally lies about her pre-existing condition record
Rep. Martha McSally (R), her party’s nominee for the open U.S. Senate seat in Arizona, was a staunch supporter of the Trumpcare legislation to repeal Obamacare, literally telling her Republican House colleagues that they needed to get the “fucking thing” done. Now that she is under fire for her vote for the wildly unpopular legislation, she is simply lying to her constituents and pretending that the bill would not have eliminated insurance protections for the more than 10...
Lies don’t get more brazen than the one Rohrabacher is telling his constituents about health care
On Wednesday afternoon, Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) shared a touching campaign video detailing how his daughter Annika’s leukemia diagnosis made the need to protect people with pre-existing conditions personal for him.
“Politicians argue a lot about health care, but for me, it’s personal,” Rohrabacher says, while standing next to his daughter. “When my daughter Annika was 8 years old, she was afflicted with leukemia. It was devastating to my family, bu...
GOP Iowa congressman’s ad pretends he ‘stood up’ to his own party on preexisting conditions
Rep. David Young (R-IA) has voted with Donald Trump about than 99 percent of the time, including backing the Obamacare repeal legislation known as Trumpcare. That legislation would have destroyed insurance protections for the more than 100 million Americans with pre-existing medical conditions. That vote was hugely unpopular.
Facing a very tough re-election in Iowa’s 3rd Congressional District, Young launched a new ad this week simply lying to the voters — a tactic sever...
Melania Trump is taking ‘Be Best’ to Africa, because of course she is
First Lady Melania Trump is officially taking her “Be Best” campaign to Africa, because of course she is.
Melania will be heading for her first major solo international trip on Monday. Over the next week, she will travel to Ghana, Malawai, Kenya, and Egypt to discuss the campaign, which she says has many concepts that can be applied globally.
Melania first introduced her “Be Best” campaign in May. At the time, she said it would be focused on addressing...
Former UN chief Ban Ki-moon: US health care system is ‘politically wrong, morally wrong’
Failing to provide health care to 29.3 million people is “unethical” and “politically wrong, morally wrong,” said former United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in an interview with the Guardian.
The U.S. is the only wealthy country without universal coverage — and Ban faults “powerful” interest groups within the pharmaceutical, hospitals, and doctors sector.
“Here, the political interest groups are so, so powerful,” Ban said. “Even president, Congress,...
Trump’s dramatic new plan to label immigrants a ‘public charge,’ explained
Immigrants who utilize virtually all public benefits risk jeopardizing their ability to stay in the country under new rules announced by the Trump administration.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) will require immigration caseworkers to take into account a number of additional factors in considering applications for immigration visas (like work visas or family-based visas) or green cards (permanent residency).
Immigrants who opt to use such benefits — even for U...
Dementia rates are set to double by 2060, and minorities will get hit hardest
This week, researchers from the US Centers of Disease Control (CDC) published a paper looking at predicted dementia rates across the country. Currently 1.6% of the population, or about 5 million people, have Alzheime...
Republicans who voted to repeal pre-existing conditions protections run ads pretending they didn’t
The Affordable Care Act of 2010 banned the long-standing practice of health insurers discriminating against customers on the basis of their pre-existing conditions. The Trumpcare legislation that narrowly passed the House of Representatives last May would have repealed these protections and replaced them with a system in which insurers could charge much higher premiums to those patients. Now, vulnerable House Republicans who voted for the wildly unpopular bill have to defend their votes th...
Absurd GOP attack ads claim candidates who back Medicare for All want to take away your health care
Faced with tough November races, several Republicans who supported GOP-led proposals to roll back Americans’ health coverage are now attacking their Democratic opponents for supposedly threatening Americans’ health care access by supporting a “Medicare for all” system — which would extend the existing Medicare program’s protections to cover everyone.
Republican Reps. Andy Barr (KY-6), Dave Brat (VA-7), and Kevin Yoder (KS-3) all voted for the Trum...