It was a classic bait and switch. On Thursday, in the hours before the Oval Office was set to host President Donald Trump’s ceremonial signing of a farm bill — one which had been lauded by anti-hunger advocates for sparing the food stamps program of deep funding cuts — the Trump administration quietly announced its plan to dump hundreds of thousands of people off of the food assistance program.
It was a quick end to a much ballyhooed example of bipartisan compromis...
politics
Anti-Obamacare lawyer tries to defend his court victory, winds up undercutting his own case
Late last week, Judge Reed O’Connor, a former Republican Senate staffer with a history of poorly reasoned opinions striking down Democratic policies, struck down the entire Affordable Care Act. On Wednesday, one of the lawyers behind this suit attempted to defend O’Connor’s opinion. It did not go well.
The political-operative-turned-judge’s opinion is widely viewed as indefensible, even by many of O’Connor’s fellow Obamacare haters. The Wall Stree...
Everyone’s talking about Ocasio-Cortez’s Green New Deal, but no one knows what it is
The Green New Deal championed by Representative-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) is one of the hottest progressive policy ideas around.
But virtually no one knows what it is.
In fact, many in the media and elsewhere who think they know what it means, likely have it wrong. Or aren’t explaining the full picture.
Since the midterms, dozens of U.S. representatives and at least four Democratic senators have pledged support to create a Select Committee to create l...
There’s no GOP backup plan for the anti-Obamacare lawsuit
Now that a federal judge in Texas has handed down an order striking down the Affordable Care Act (ACA)’s individual mandate — and, with it, all 900-plus pages of the health law — what happens next?
That’s the question facing Republican lawmakers whose colleagues are party to the lawsuit, which was filed by 20 GOP-led states.
The lawsuit aims to strike down very popular provisions of the ACA, including but not limited to protections for pre-existing con...
Even the Cato Institute thinks that Republican judge who struck down Obamacare was wrong
A Republican judge’s opinion claiming that the entire Affordable Care Act must be struck down is so poorly reasoned that even the Cato Institute denounced it on Wednesday.
Cato, which was originally known as the Charles Koch Foundation, tried and failed to convince the Supreme Court to strike down the key provisions of Obamacare in 2012. The conservative think tank’s health policy director, Michael Cannon, was one of the architects of King v. Burwell, the last p...
In self-congratulatory tweetstorm, Paul Ryan celebrates his lone victory: tax cuts for the rich
Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) is in his final days as Speaker of the House, a job that he only reluctantly took in 2015 and will depart with a dearth of accomplishments. While he will leave office unable to realize his college dream of taking Medicaid away from poor people, he launched a tweet-storm on Tuesday morning celebrating the first anniversary of his sole major legislation: the Trump tax cuts that mostly benefited the rich and big corporations.
He began his tweet-storm by noting he&...
Tucker Carlson defends anti-immigrant rhetoric as more advertisers drop his show
Instead of apologizing for his recent remarks claiming immigrants make America “dirtier” — which have led six advertisers to drop his show — Tucker Carlson doubled down on his rhetoric on Monday night.
The Fox News host bizarrely claimed that the “relatively tiny number of people” who benefit from immigration policies are trying to silence him.
Minted and NerdWallet became the latest companies to confirm on Monday evening they would no long...
Judge’s Obamacare ruling: Advantage Democrats: COLUMN
This does not bode well for the GOP if health care is a major issue in 2020.
After judge’s ruling against Obamacare, what happens now?
Questions and answers on federal judge's ruling that would erase Obamacare
House Democrats won’t let Zinke escape investigation, even after he leaves office
After less than two years on the job, outgoing Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke will be leaving a legacy of pro-fossil fuel management of public lands and a long trail of alleged cases of personal misconduct.
Zinke announced his resignation over the weekend. His departure, though, will test the political will of investigators and congressional Democrats who must decide whether to continue pursuing inquiries into the allegations or focus on oversight of the actions of the new leadership...