How corruption became America’s national pastime
What does “SWIMNUT” know that the world’s supposed experts on corruption or the elites who gather each year for skiing...
Category: Politics
Rightwing Groups Try to Stamp Out Local Union Contracts
A rightwing legal group is suing the school district, school board, and teacher’s union in Madison, Wisconsin, for honoring a...
Iowa Senate Candidate Joni Ernst: An ALEC Shill?
The battle between Democratic congressman Bruce Braley and Republican state Sen. Joni Ernst to be Iowa’s next US senator couldn’t...
Income inequality’s sick joke: A rising tide only lifts luxury yachts
For a long time, the right has argued that we shouldn’t worry about inequality because the true concern is the...
The Supreme Court That Made It Easier to Buy Elections Just Made It Harder for People to Vote in Them
In case there was any remaining confusion with regard to the precise political intentions of the US Supreme Court’s activist...
Mitt Romney’s Latest Excuse for His 47 Percent Remarks Is a Doozy
Mitt Romney explains his 47 percent remark, Take 23. During a recent sit-down with the New York Times’ Mark Leibovich,...
Top Billionaire Campaign Donors Favor Republicans In 2014
WASHINGTON — The wealthiest Americans are playing a larger role in politics these days, thanks to campaign finance laws loosened...
Bill aims to stop coal companies from denying benefits to miners with black lung
Two coal-state senators plan to introduce sweeping legislation to reform the federal program meant to provide benefits to miners suffering...
Low-Wage Workers Confront Scott Walker, Accuse Wisconsin Of Breaking The Law
On Wednesday morning, Wisconsin Jobs Now, Wisconsin Working Families, and a group of low-wage workers in the state submitted 100...
A Conservative Disdain for the Unemployed
House Speaker John Boehner says that unemployed Americans are pretty clearly malingerers, bums on welfare who have decided that they...
5 Signs the Dark-Money Apocalypse Is Upon Us
It’s the home stretch of the 2014 election season. No single theme or issue has dominated the midterms, but 2014...
New Republican Bill Would Paralyze National Labor Relations Board
This week, Republican Senators introduced a bill they call the “The National Labor Relations Board Reform Act.” Its chances of...
Casino Mogal Sheldon Adelson Spends $10 Million in an Attempt to Buy the 2014 Elections for Republicans
Las Vegas casino mogul Sheldon Adelson has donated $10 million to a Karl Rove-backed outfit boosting Republican Senate candidates and...
Arizona Is Becoming The Cayman Islands For Dark Money
Dark money groups have already poured more than $5 million into Arizona’s elections this cycle. These organizations, carefully constructed to...
Paid Sick Days for Six Million Californians to Become Law
When Governor Jerry Brown signs Assembly Bill 1522, California will join a growing number of states where temporary or part-time...
McConnell Promises Billionaire Donors He Won’t Waste Time On ‘Gosh Darn’ Minimum Wage Increases
At a Koch Brothers-hosted secret strategy conference of right-wing millionaire and billionaire political activists in June, Senate Minority Leader Mitch...
After 13 Years Of Fighting For Wall Street, Eric Cantor Will Make Millions At An Investment Bank
Former House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA), who resigned last month after losing renomination to an underfunded college professor, spent...
Some ALEC Funders Flee, but Koch, Big Tobacco, and PhRMA Remain Loyalists
At least 72 corporate funders have cut ties with the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) in the wake of the...
A Kentucky Objection to McConnell’s Pandering to Millionaires and Billionaires
When the political mercenaries of American oligarchy jet off to consort with their electoral paymasters, they never imagine that the...
Minimum wage laws aren’t just for workers with lowest wages
An extraordinary shift in wages paid to American workers took place from 2000 to 2012, a change that holds powerful...
Social Security Turns 70 — Still Going Strong Despite Right Wing Attacks
For seven decades, Social Security has been under attack by opponents who consider government-guaranteed pensions for Americans to receive as...
The States With The Highest Uninsurance Rates Are All Led By Republicans
The 10 states with the highest percentage of uninsured adult residents all have one thing in common: They’re led by...
Tax Dodger Running for Governor in Illinois
If you are not in the Chicago media market, you might not know much about Bruce Rauner, the Mitt Romney-like...
ALEC Offshoot Tries to Hijack Local Governments
After forty years of pushing corporate-friendly policy in state legislatures, this week the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is launching...
House Republicans Pass Bill to Lower Taxes on the Rich and Raise Taxes on the Poor
So what are Republicans in the House of Representatives up to these days? According to Danny Vinik, they just passed...
Paul Ryan’s New Poverty Proposal Would Have Government Micromanage Poor People’s Lives
On Thursday, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) released his much-anticipated proposal for reforming the way the federal government tries to alleviate...
Koch Political Universe Vaster Than Previously Known
Newly-obtained documents show that the billionaire Koch brothers’ political giving is much more expansive than has previously been known. In...
Rand Paul Flubs the Facts on the Minimum Wage
Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) says the minimum wage, like Trix, is for kids. Speaking in San Francisco over the weekend,...
California Voters to Weigh-In on “Corporate Personhood”
California’s Democratic Governor Jerry Brown has permitted SB 1272, an advisory measure entitled the Overturn Citizens United Act, to appear...
States That Raised Minimum Wage Saw Faster Job Growth So Far In 2014
States with higher minimum wages saw faster job growth in the first six months of 2014 than states that have...
Paul Ryan’s Faux Populism Isn’t Going to End Poverty or Reduce Inequality
Paul Ryan’s fellow Republicans are quick to dismiss Elizabeth Warren as too radical, too progressive, too populist. But Ryan is...
Koch-Funded Texas Gubernatorial Candidate Limits Public Chemical Disclosure After Deadly Explosion
Shortly after the anniversary of the 2013 fertilizer plant explosion that killed 15 people, wounded 226, and upended a large...
Meet the Banking Caucus, Wall Street’s secret weapon in Washington
Every business sector has its friends in Washington. Financial companies — from the biggest megabanks to small payday lenders —...
Senate Democrats Dare GOPers to Block Their Dark-Money Disclosure Bill
The 2014 elections are awash in dark money—and it’s only getting worse. The Koch-backed Americans for Prosperity alone plans to...
State and Local Efforts to Rein in CEO Pay
Fed up with the do-nothing Congress, people around the country are no longer waiting for Washington to lead on some...
Alan Grayson To Force Republicans On The Record On Minimum Wage
Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) proposed an amendment to a House spending bill Tuesday that would raise the minimum wage for...
Dick Cheney: Give More Money to the Pentagon, Not to Infrastructure
WASHINGTON — Former Vice President Dick Cheney said Monday that President Barack Obama is “devastating” the U.S. military and needs...
Corporate Tax Cheats Still Get Billions In Government Business
Despite supposed bans on companies that move offshore to avoid paying U.S. taxes getting federal contracts, more than a dozen...
Who Are The Protectors of Privilege? – A Congressional Report Card
Do you wonder which members of Congress routinely side with the richest 1 percent and Wall Street? Which lawmakers consistently...
Ronald Reagan stuck it to millennials: A college debt history lesson no one tells
During my first semester of college, John Lennon was assassinated 40 blocks south of my freshman dorm, and Ronald Reagan,...
The South is America’s poverty belt, and Republicans want to make all of America more like the South
The South has never been America’s bright spot when it comes to things like poverty and health outcomes, but recent...
Exclusive: Inside the Koch Brothers’ Secret Billionaire Summit
This is what happens when Marco Rubio, Mitch McConnell, Tom Cotton, Cory Gardner and a gang of the world’s richest...
Gov. Paul LePage on Social Security: “It is welfare, pure and simple”
Responding to a Bureau of Economic Analysis study that found the state’s personal-income growth during the first three months of...
Serial School Privatizer “Chainsaw Paul” Vallas Gets Ready For His Next Job
After savaging public education in Chicago, Philly, New Orleans and Bridgeport, Vallas has been summoned home to Illinois by the...
Rep. Issa: Shielding $300 Billion in Tax Evasion
Many Americans dislike the IRS and will paint you a vivid picture of the tax man knocking down your door...
Iraq and Detroit: Both Plundered by the Same Bandits
The ugly face of empire and disaster capitalism is visible all over the world. Detroit, Michigan, was once a thriving...
Massachusetts Passes The Highest State Minimum Wage In The Country
The Massachusetts House passed a bill that will raise the state’s minimum wage to $11 an hour by 2017. The...
Koch-Funded Group Won’t Back Kansas Republicans Who Support Clean Energy
A Republican state legislator in Kansas is being targeted by a new Koch-funded effort to oust those who want to...
Koch Brothers Plan $300 Million Spending Spree In 2014
The billionaire Koch brothers and their political network are planning to spend almost $300 million during the 2014 election cycle,...
Arizona GOPer Compares Poor To ‘Lazy Pigs’
A Republican official in Arizona on Wednesday confirmed something that’s long been suspected. State schools superintendent John Huppenthal has been...
