Women older than 50 are the most likely group to vote in the midterm elections and make up a large and growing share of the electorate; in fact, nearly 1 in 3 votes cast in 2020 were from women in this age group. Despite women’s electoral heft, Republican Senate candidates like Blake Masters of Arizona, Adam Laxalt of Nevada and Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin have called for cuts to two key programs on which 50+ women disproportionately rely on and strongly support: Social Security and Med...
Opinion
If you think the deficit is bad now, it will soon get worse
America’s finances are in trouble. Despite relatively optimistic predictions by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), the current deficit of $1.4 trillion is only going to get worse.
In July, CBO projected that the federal government budget deficit would be 3.7 percent of GDP in 2023, down from recent record highs of 12.4 percent of GDP in 2021. While still above the pre-pandemic average (since 2000) of 3.5 percent, this would be the lowest percentage sinc...
The real threat to democracy: Declining trust in the courts
A key ingredient for a healthy democracy is an independent and (to the extent possible) an apolitical judiciary. Yet recent polls show public trust in the judicial branch of the federal government reaching its lowest point in decades, primarily among Democrats. That is entirely because the judicial branch, and especially the U.S. Supreme Court, isn’t ruling the way Democrats want. And their proposed efforts to “fix” the Court would destroy its credibility.
According to a recen...
Press: Donald Trump, ‘Confidence Man,’ then and now
Billed by Axios as “the book Donald Trump fears most,” Maggie Haberman’s “Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America” debuted last week as No. 1 best-seller on Amazon and the New York Times. At 508 pages, it’s a challenge. But it’s worth the slog: the best book yet on the mystery man who still remains, two years after being rejected for a second term, the most dominant force in American politics.
The most striking...
Press: Donald Trump, ‘Confidence Man,’ then and now
Billed by Axios as “the book Donald Trump fears most,” Maggie Haberman’s “Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America” debuted last week as No. 1 best-seller on Amazon and the New York Times. At 508 pages, it’s a challenge. But it’s worth the slog: the best book yet on the mystery man who still remains, two years after being rejected for a second term, the most dominant force in American politics.
The most striking...
Americans are drowning in medical debt. Here’s how our leaders can help
Today, more than 100 million Americans are living with medical debt totaling nearly $200 billion. A recent study found this debt leads to increased rates of eviction, food insecurity and bad health outcomes, regardless of health insurance status or income. While the debt is widespread, it is also unevenly distributed; patients of color disproportionately bear its burden. This is a story we’ve heard too many times before, and it’s time for our nation’s leaders to take action.
T...
Quietly, the Biden presidency has been hugely consequential
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Kevin McCarthy’s 2022 campaign agenda is all hat and no cattle
In September, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) issued “Commitment to America,” his 2022 campaign agenda. Predictably, the document blasts Democrats for having “no plan to fix all the problems they created.” McCarthy’s “Commitment to America,” however, fails to present its own plans to address those problems, relying instead on the Republican playbook of omission, distortion, and distraction.
On foreign policy, McCarthy cites “mistakes” by the Biden administratio...
The government is not only spending trillions — it’s losing trillions
Lately, no matter if the federal government is spending taxpayer dollars or losing them, it doesn’t mess around with small change.
The government allocated $4.6 trillion just in COVID relief spending, tens of billions of which have been siphoned off by fraud. And when it comes to losing taxpayers’ hard-earned dollars, we’ve calculated that losses tallied at the Federal Reserve and Department of Education together will top $2 trillion. No telling how much it will co...
Biden’s future plans for higher education will be even more radical
President Biden’s student loan forgiveness announcement resulted in uproar across the political spectrum, but there’s good reason to expect even more radical higher education moves from the administration. In recent months, Biden’s Department of Education has proposed rules that make it far easier for borrowers to claim that their college harmed them and have their loans completely forgiven, a move with unpredictable consequences. Even more significant, however, will be Biden’s independ...