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For-Profit US Healthcare System—Once Again—Ranks Dead Last Among Its Peers
A report out Thursday shows that the United States' for-profit healthcare system still ranks dead last among peer nations on key metrics, including access to care and health outcomes such as life expectancy at birth. The new analysis from the Commonwealth Fund is the latest indictment of a corporate-dominated system that leaves tens of millions of people uninsured or underinsured and unable to afford life-saving medications without rationing doses or going into debt. "Despite spending a lot on healthcare, the United States is not meeting one of the principal obligations of a nation: to protect the health and welfare of its residents,"...
Shutdown Looms as House Rejects GOP Attempt to Impose 'Trump's Dangerous Agenda'
The U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday rejected a GOP resolution that would have punted a fight over government funding until after the next president takes office and pushed through a noxious voter suppression measure backed by Republican nominee Donald Trump. The final vote was 202-220, with 14 Republicans joining nearly every member of the House Democratic caucus in voting against the legislation. GOP opponents of the bill included far-right lawmakers who want to slash spending. Reps. Jared Golden (D-Maine), Don Davis (D-N.C.), and Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (D-Wash.) broke with their party and backed the Republican continuing resolution, which would have largely...
Ocasio-Cortez, Smith Push Bill to Create Social Housing Authority
"It's becoming nearly impossible for working-class people to buy and keep a roof over their heads. Congress must respond with a plan that matches the scale of this crisis." That's according to U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Tina Smith (D-Minn.), who on Wednesday introduced the Homes Act in a New York Times opinion piece and an event with supporters of the proposal on Capitol Hill. "Because we believe that housing is a human right, like food or healthcare, we believe that more Americans deserve the option of social housing," the pair wrote in the Times. "That's why we're introducing the...
'The Genocide Gentry': Weapon Execs Sit on Boards of Universities, Institutions
A trio of human rights groups on Wednesday announced a new interactive initiative exposing what the coalition is calling a "Genocide Gentry" of weapons company executives and board members and "54 museums, cultural organizations, universities, and colleges that currently host these individuals on their boards or in other prominent roles." The coalition—which consists of the Adalah Justice Project, LittleSis, and Action Center on Race and the Economy (ACRE)—published a map and database detailing the "educational and cultural ties to board members of six defense corporations" amid Israel's ongoing annihilation of Gaza, for which the U.S.-backed country is on trial for genocide...
Fed 'Waited Too Long' But Finally Cut Interest Rates
Economists and working-class people across the United States on Wednesday welcomed the Federal Reserve's decision to cut its benchmark interest rate by half a percentage point as an incredibly overdue and necessary move. In line with signals from Fed Chair Jerome Powell's speech last month, the Federal Open Market Committee lowered the federal funds rate by half a percentage point to 4.74-5%, the first cut "since March 2020 when Covid-19 was hammering the economy," as The Associated Press noted. Additional cuts are expected over the next two years. "Finally," wrote Kenny Stancil, a senior researcher at the Revolving Door Project and former...
Teamsters Decline to Endorse in 2024 US Presidential Race
For the first time in decades—and in a break with other major unions and many of its own local bargaining units—the International Brotherhood of Teamsters on Wednesday announced it would not endorse a candidate in the U.S. presidential election.The union's decision came two months after its general president, Sean O'Brien was widely criticized by labor proponents for speaking at the Republican National Convention, with advocates noting that GOP candidate Donald Trump had spent his presidential term from 2017-21 appointing anti-union federal judges and key agency leaders, undermining collective bargaining rights, and making it harder for workers to hold their employers...
Saudi Aramco Leads Fossil Fuel Firms in 'Sportswashing' Sponsorships: Analysis
Aramco, the state-owned Saudi firm, has the most sports sponsorships of any fossil fuel company in the world, with $1.3 billion in active deals, followed by Ineos, TotalEnergies, and Shell, according to a Wednesday report that compares the industry's methods to those once used by Big Tobacco. The 23-page report, Dirty Money: How Fossil Fuel Sponsors Are Polluting Sport, details one of the ways in which countries and corporations "sportswash" their reputations: sponsorships of popular athletes, teams, events, or leagues. Other means of sportswashing, such as Saudi Arabia's development of a new golf tour and purchase of major soccer clubs,...
'When We Fight, We Win': Amazon Boosts Pay as Workers Launch Bid for $25 an Hour
As Amazon workers across the United States launched a campaign demanding at least $25 an hour, the e-commerce giant announced Wednesday that it is raising hourly pay for its warehouse workers and drivers. In what Amazon vice president of worldwide operations Udit Madan called the company's "biggest-ever investment in pay and benefits," the average starting pay for U.S. fulfillment and transportation workers will rise starting this month. "Members of our front-line team will be getting at least an additional $1.50/hour starting this month, which will bring their average base wage to more than $22/hour and average total compensation to more than...
Big Oil to Benefit From Biden's Carbon Capture Tax Credits: Report
As the U.S. moves to invest in climate solutions, is the money going toward projects that will meaningfully reduce emissions and transition the nation's energy system away from fossil fuels? A report released Wednesday by worker-owned corporate accountability and environmental justice research organization Empower found that just 34 carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects in Texas could receive between $3.2 billion and $33 billion in annual tax subsides. At the same time, most of the carbon dioxide pipelines in the state are managed by the major oil and gas companies like Kinder Morgan, Occidental Petroleum, and ExxonMobil that played a disproportionate role...
Sanders Leads New Senate Effort to Stop Flow of US Arms to Israel
Demanding that the Biden administration follow the lead of several close U.S. allies in recent months, Sen. Bernie Sanders on Wednesday announced his intention to take action on the Senate floor to stop the flow of American weapons to Israel. The Vermont independent said in a statement that he plans to file Joint Resolutions of Disapproval (JRD) regarding the sale of offensive weapons to the Middle Eastern country, which for nearly a year has bombarded civilian infrastructure and blocked humanitarian aid to Gaza, killing more than 41,000 Palestinians and pushing the enclave into famine. The JRD is the only congressional mechanism that...
In Overwhelming Vote, UN General Assembly Demands Swift End to Israeli Occupation
The United Nations General Assembly on Wednesday passed a resolution demanding that the Israeli government end its occupation of Palestinian territories within 12 months, affirming a recent International Court of Justice opinion that deemed the decadeslong occupation unlawful.The Palestine-led resolution, co-sponsored by dozens of nations, calls on Israel to swiftly withdraw "all its military forces" from Gaza and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem. The final vote tally was 124 member states in favor and 14 against, with 43 nations abstaining.Unsurprisingly, Israel and the United States—Israel's top ally and arms supplier—were among the 14 countries that opposed the resolution, which...
After Israeli Attack, More Exploding Devices Kill at Least 20 in Lebanon
Update: The death toll from Wednesday's attacks has risen to at least 20, with more than 450 others injured, according to Lebanon's Health Ministry. Earlier: A day after an Israeli attack caused thousands of pagers to explode across Lebanon, killing a dozen people including children and wounding over 2,800 others, new explosions of battery-powered devices killed at least nine more people and injured upward of 300 others around the Middle Eastern country, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry. Multiple Lebanese and international media outlets reported that targets of Wednesday's attacks included people attending funerals of those killed by the previous day's explosions. "Anyone...
LGBTQ+ Kentuckians Cheer as Beshear Bans 'Conversion Therapy' for Kids
LGBTQ+ rights advocates celebrated on Wednesday after Democratic Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear signed an executive order banning "conversion therapy" for minors across the state, citing medical experts' warnings about the dangerous practice that attempts to change a person's gender identity or sexual orientation. "Kentucky cannot possibly reach its full potential unless it is free from discrimination by or against any citizen—unless all our people feel welcome in our spaces, free from unjust barriers and supported to be themselves," Beshear said in a statement. "Conversion therapy has no basis in medicine or science, and it can cause significant long-term harm to our...
'Criminally Insane': Subsidies That Harm the Environment Reach $2.6 Trillion Per Year
Governments across the world now spend a total of $2.6 trillion per year on subsidies that harm the environment, jeopardizing global climate and biodiversity targets, according to an analysis released Tuesday. The analysis came in an updated report from the research group Earth Track, which found that harmful fossil fuel subsidies top $1 trillion annually and harmful agricultural subsidies top $600 billion. Governments also fund pollution and destruction in sectors such as water, construction, transport, forestry, and fisheries. The $2.6 trillion total, which the report authors said was likely an underestimate, marked an $800 billion increase—or about $500 billion in...
EU Crisis Official Warns of 'Climate Breakdown' Amid Deadly Wildfires and Flooding
With the Portuguese government declaring a "state of calamity" over wildfires that have killed at least seven people, and the daily lives of hundreds of thousands of people in Central and Eastern Europe upended by deadly flooding, the European Union's top crisis official said the bloc must face the reality made evident by the disasters: "This is fast becoming the norm for our shared future."A year after Europe was found to be the world's fastest-warming continent in an analysis by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the E.U.'s Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S), crisis management commissioner Janez Lenarčič told...
Georgia Drops Money Laundering Charges Against 'Stop Cop City' Activists
Members of the "Stop Cop City" movement on Tuesday celebrated that Georgia prosecutors are dropping money laundering charges as a "major victory in the ongoing fight against the political repression of forest defenders and activists," but reiterated criticism of the broader case."The state has previously claimed that the Atlanta Solidarity Fund is at the center of the alleged criminal enterprise, using the money laundering charges to do so," explained Keyanna Jones, a Stop Cop City activist and co-pastor at Park Avenue Baptist Church, in a statement. "Now, it is admitting that it doesn't have the evidence to prove its allegations,...
Report Reveals How US Taxpayers Are Unwittingly Subsidizing Climate Lies
A report published Wednesday identifies nearly 140 "climate disinformation organizations" in the United States financed by wealthy donors who receive massive subsidies from the nation's taxpayers. The analysis by the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) and the Climate Accountability Research Project (CARP) explains that wealthy donors are "pouring billions of dollars" into nonprofit organizations to "advance misleading, self-serving agendas that do irreparable harm to our planet"—all while reaping the benefits of charitable contribution deductions in the U.S. tax code. "Funds directed to fossil fuel industry-friendly think tanks and policy groups help turn disinformation into accepted truth and sow doubt about science," the...
'An Act of Terror': Israel Behind Pager Explosions That Killed 11, Wounded Thousands
Several news outlets confirmed late Tuesday what was widely suspected: Israel's military and intelligence services were behind the explosions of pagers recently purchased by the Lebanese political party and militant group Hezbollah. The explosions, reportedly set off earlier Tuesday by a message that appeared as if it was from Hezbollah's leadership, killed at least 11 people—including an 8-year-old girl—and wounded thousands more. Citing both an unnamed former Israeli official with knowledge of the operation and an anonymous U.S. official, Axios reported that "Israeli intelligence services planned to use the booby-trapped pagers it managed to 'plant' in Hezbollah's ranks as a surprise opening...
New Report Lays Out How US Can Address Its 'Fair Share' of the Climate Crisis
A coalition of climate campaigners on Tuesday published a proposal "for how the U.S. can play a bigger role in tackling the global climate emergency." Described as "a civil society model document for the U.S. climate action pledge submission to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change" under the landmark Paris agreement, the Fair Share Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) is a "comprehensive plan for the United States to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions and enhance climate action in an equitable way both domestically and internationally." Russell Armstrong, international policy liaison at the U.S. Climate Action Network, a member of the coalition,...
Senate Dems Call Out 'Republican Bullsh*t' With IVF Vote
In another effort to call out Republicans in Congress for pushing deadly policies that restrict reproductive freedom, Senate Democrats on Tuesday held a vote to open debate on legislation that is intended "to protect and expand nationwide access to fertility treatment, including in vitro fertilization."The tally was 51-44, short of the 60 votes needed to start debate on the Right to IVF Act (S. 4555). Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) voted with every Democrat and Independent present to advance the bill, while Sens. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Joe Manchin (I-W.Va.), Mike Rounds (R-S.D.), Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), and...
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