Bishop Gene Robinson in a CAP repost.
Earth Day 2011 is also Good Friday. In the midst of budget cut proposals, compromises on services to the poor and needy, and a rush to preserve the wealth of America’s top-earning 1 percent, it is not surprising that the environment is all but forgotten.
Ignoring environmental issues will cost us, too, however.
Last month, a New Jersey state judge struck down Gov. Chris Christie’s (R) $820 million cuts in education because they disproportionately affected low-income students in violation of the state constitution. That case is now pending before the New Jersey Supreme Court.
In an interview with radio host Eric Scott today, Christie suggested that if the state’s highest court hands down a decision that he does not like, he may simply defy the court order:
HOST: In all seriousness, governor, what if the ruling comes down, and [the state supreme courts says] you’ve gotta spend $1.7 billion, and you just say “no”?
CHRISTIE: Well, that’s an option too.
HOST: You’ve considered that? You’ve considered actually saying we’re not going to do it? . . .
CHRISTIE: Well, listen, I’m not going to sit here and speculate. Um, have I thought about that? Of course I have. You asked me if I was coming up with a contingency plan. Yeah, there’s a whole bunch of options in the contingency plan and we’ll see what happens.
Watch it:
Sadly, Christie’s apparent belief that the law only applies to him when he feels like it is shared by many of his fellow conservatives. Indeed, the New Jersey governor is only the latest conservative leader to claim that the courts can be ignored — or even punished — when they hand down decisions that the right doesn’t like:
At the end of the day, conservatives don’t want to live under the rule of law — they want a veto power over any attempt to make them follow the parts of the law they don’t like.
At this point, it’s no secret that thousands of U.S. guns have illegally made their way across the U.S. – Mexico border and into the hands of deadly drug cartel operatives. State Department Secretary Hillary Clinton has indicated in the past that she feels “very strongly” that the U.S. and Mexico share co-responsibility in the drug war. Now, the Mexican government may be considering holding U.S. gun companies responsible in court. CBS reports:
CBS News has learned that the Mexican Government has retained an American law firm to explore filing civil charges against U.S. gun manufacturers and distributors over the flood of guns crossing the border into Mexico.
Sources say Mexico’s frustration with U.S. efforts to stop the flow of weapons has pushed them into this novel approach. The law firm is looking at charges that may include civil RICO [Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act]. The contract was signed on November 2, 2010 by a representative of Mexico’s Attorney General, at their Washington embassy.
Mexicans have good reason to be frustrated by the United States’ inability to stem the flow of guns down south. A report by Mayors Against Illegal Guns found that “90% of guns recovered and traced from Mexican crime scenes originated from gun dealers in the United States.” From 2006 to 2009, a total of almost 19,000 guns in Mexico were traced to the United States. An overwhelming majority of these guns came from the stores in Texas, California, and Arizona. News broke earlier this year that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives purposefully permitted 1,800 weapons to “walk” into the hands of drug lords and gun runners in an attempt to trace them back to high-level drug cartel operatives. And while these traced firearms do not represent all of the guns recovered in Mexico, there’s only one gun store in all of Mexico where they could’ve come from. That store is run by the Mexican military. The Brookings Institution estimates that 2,000 U.S. guns are smuggled into Mexico each day.
Meanwhile, the Mexican drug war has claimed the lives of at least 35,000 people — many of them innocent civilians — since 2006.
The Firearms Committee responded to the news that Mexico might sue U.S. gun manufacturers, saying, “it is wrong for anyone to blame America’s firearms industry for the problems Mexico is currently facing.” Richard Feldman, President of the Independent Firearms Association, suggested that “maybe we should be suing the Mexican government for their failure to prevent drugs from coming into our country.” Tea Party Nation also issued its own release which proclaims that “Mexico is our enemy” and that “Mexican President Felipe Calderon is about as useful as Joe Biden sleeping through a Barack Obama speech.”
While the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act makes it especially hard to win a lawsuit against the gun industry, Mexico may have have a case. Many of the guns that have made their way to Mexico were purchased by U.S. citizen “straw buyers” who were paid by gun runners to buy the firearms for them. Yet, there has been at least one case in which a gun dealers were directly involved in funneling weapons to Mexican drug cartels. If Mexico can prove that at least one individual engaged in a “pattern of racketeering activity,” they might have a case against the gun industry under the RICO statute.
With all that said, even if Mexico does have a case against gun manufacturers, it shouldn’t distract attention away from the responsibility that Mexico shares with the United States. U.S. drug consumption is funding the drug war, U.S. guns may be fueling it, but ultimately, Calderon’s militarization of the drug war has only resulted in more violence and deaths.
On Wednesday, the so-called “Don’t Say Gay” bill advanced out of the Tennessee Senate Education Committee. The measure, which has been introduced multiple times since 2005, would prohibit teachers from discussing homosexuality in grades K through 8, even with students who may be gay or have gay family. The bill’s sponsor, Sen. Stacey Campfield (R), has previously rationalized the measure by arguing that it would allow teachers more time to focus on core subjects like arithmetic, but during a 2009 interview with SiriusXM’s Michelangelo Signorile, Campfield went a step further. He said that homosexuality is a “learned” behavior and compared the Gay Rights Movement to bestiality:
CAMPFIELD: What you’re getting into is the thing, is it a genetic issue or is it none genetic issue? Is it a learned behavior or is it something that cannot be controlled? [...]
SIGNORILE: Most of the science now shows that homosexuality is something biological…
CAMPFIELD: No. You don’t believe that. Who are you kidding? Come’n now. [...]
SIGNORILE: You teach about the Civil Rights Movement. Why not teach about the Gay Rights Movement?
CAMPFIELD: Because they’re different types of movements. If I want to talk about the bestiality movement, do you think we should be teaching that?
Listen:
The bill (SB49) now advances for consideration by the full Senate. A similar bill (HB229) has not advanced out of the House Education General Subcommittee.
Spinning like toys:
— The global recovery on monetary policy.
— David Beckworth on monetary policy.
— This from Will Wilkinson is very intelligent but if it were true in a macro sense we’d see large real wage increases despite high unemployment.
— China’s currency is appreciating.
— Immigrants and the wealth of nations.
St Vincent’s “Jesus Saves, I Spend” combines an excellent Good Friday theme with a clever national income accounting identity pun.
Ex-anti-gay strategist Louis Marinelli, who recently defected from the National Organization for Marriage (NOM), continues to spill details about the inner-workings of the organization. (NOM has apparently threatened legal action.) Today, Marinelli confirmed suspicions that on the “Summer for Marriage Tour,” a series of anti-marriage equality rallies he helped coordinate, NOM was eagerly looking to portray LGBT supporters as “crazy.” NOM would use the pictures Marinelli took on it blog to describe the counter-protesters as “militant” and “intolerant, inconsiderate bullies.”
It turns out the strategy backfired, because it scared away would-be NOM supporters. Here are excerpts from an email sent by Matthew Haas, who orchestrates NOM’s video projects:
I just want to follow-up on the email David [LeJeune] sent. We want to focus on the positive for photos and video. We want happy people, people clapping, families, speakers shaking hands with people coming out. We want to still capture the protestors (especially if they do something exceptionally crazy), but that will not be the main focus.
…
ALSO, for both photos and video, we want the crowds to look as big as possible. We got feedback that people are afraid to come out to the stops actually, which is really a shame because they’re afraid of what the protestors may do.
Whether or not this fear was the primary factor responsible for the low turnout of supporters at most of NOM’s rallies is unclear.
Despite backing away from this strategy, NOM has not held back its self-victimization rhetoric. At last week’s House Judiciary Committee “defending marriage” hearing, NOM’s Maggie Gallagher repeatedly complained that same-sex marriage would lead to opponents like her being labeled as bigots and “hateful.” Watch it:
ThinkProgress filed this report from a town hall meeting in Florence, SC.
On Monday, ThinkProgress spoke to Rep. Mick Mulvaney (R-SC) at one of his constituent town halls in Florence, SC. Mulvaney, a freshman, spent much of his time arguing in favor of the new Republican budget put forth by Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI).
During our brief interview, Mulvaney acknowledged that large corporations are not paying their fair share of taxes — an issue driving the progressive Mainstreet Movement and even some Tea Party activists. Mulvaney called for clearing out taxpayer giveaways to corporations, including Boeing, which recently set up new facilities in South Carolina and has avoided paying corporate income taxes. Rebuking much of his party, which has stood in solidarity with the oil and gas industry, Mulvaney also called for placing billions in oil subsidies “on the table” for cuts:
FANG: One group of people that came out for the first time — I’ve been going to Tea Parties for the last two years and this is something new — they were asking corporations like ExxonMobil, GE, Boeing, Arch Coal, companies that have made billions in profits but have not paid a dime in corporate income taxes, they should pay their fair share. Do you have any opinion on that?
MULVANEY: Yeah. I agree with it generally. One of the things I talked about, remember I talked about changing the tax code, lowering the rate. One of the things that is part of the proposal is take the corporate tax rate down to 25% but make sure it gets paid and get rid of a lot of the loopholes, get rid of a lot of the subsidies. The reason that GE any taxes last year is the first thing, they had some carry forward losses from previous years but they also received a tremendous number of tax credits. And you hear on the floor last week about all the subsidies we give to big oil and big gas. We actually give seven times as many incentives in the tax code to alternative energy than we do big oil.
FANG: But are big oil subsidies, the $40 billion, are they on the table?
MULVANEY: Everything’s on the table, absolutely. If everything’s not on the table, can’t be taken seriously.
Watch it:
While Mulvaney struck a consistent tone against corporate giveaways and oil subsidies, his voting record reveals a different course. On two separate occasions in the last few months, Mulvaney voted to extend over $50 billion in taxpayer subsidies to oil companies like Koch, Exxon, BP, and others. Perhaps Mulvaney will change direction if given another opportunity to vote on oil subsidies.
(cc photo by SuperFantastic)
With Paul Krugman reviving Kenneth Arrow’s 1963 classic on the special economics of health care (PDF) I was interested to read this bit of throat-clearing near the beginning of the piece that I’d overlooked the previous time I read Arrow’s piece:
It should be noted that the subject is the medical-care industry, not health. The causal factors in health are many, and the provision of medical care is only one. Particularly at low levels of income, other commodities such as nutrition, shelter, clothing, and sanitation may be much more significant. It is the complex of services that center about the physician, private and group practice, hospitals, and public health, which I propose to discuss.
What’s interesting about this is that in context Arrow is basically offering a hypothesis. Historically “other commodities such as nutrition, shelter, clothing, and sanitation may be much more significant” determinants of public health outcomes. But perhaps things will be different in the affluent society and health care considerations will start to dominate. But looking back 47 years later, we can see that’s not really the case. To be sure, the balance has shifted somewhat from the days when basic sanitation could prevent cholera outbreaks. But fundamentally lifestyle factors are still dominant.
If we ate less sugar and smoked fewer cigarettes while eating more vegetables and exercising regularly, health outcomes would get way way better. In that sense, the biggest problem of the economics of public health has relatively little to do with the economics of the health care industry and a great deal to do with the economics of self-control or inter-temporal trade. If 26 year-old Matt could have offered 16 year-old Matt money in exchange for a credible commitment to not take up smoking, a massively health-improving positive sum exchange would have happened.
Our guest blogger is Theodora Chang, Education Policy Analyst at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.
The arrival of Easter marks the end of the Senate’s window of opportunity to meet its first Elementary and Secondary Education Act (known as No Child Left Behind) reauthorization deadline. Despite early enthusiastic statements on reauthorization as a top priority of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee, the Committee’s actions to meet this first deadline have fallen short.
Senate HELP Committee Chairman Tom Harkin (D-IA) also set an ambitious target for completing a reauthorization that is more than three years behind schedule:
My goal is to have a bill ready for the president’s signature by late summer. Of course we have no control over the House, but I am hopeful that they will move expeditiously also in that regard.
There is still time for Congress to roll up its sleeves to meet President Obama’s goal of reauthorizing the nation’s main education law before school starts in the fall, but the clock is ticking. The federal government has a very important role to play on key issues like fiscal equity, accountability, teacher and principal quality, and school turnarounds, especially for students in states that are not taking aggressive measures to close the achievement gap.
Meanwhile, energetic reform efforts are underway in several states. Illinois, for example, just moved legislation through its State Senate that addresses the most contentious issues in education — seniority, tenure, dismissal, strikes, and longer school days. If passed in the House, the new law would streamline the current 27-step dismissal process and end the “last in, first out” policy of firing newest teachers first. Tenure would be based on performance, and teachers who earn excellent ratings during their first three years can actually earn tenure faster than they can now.
Congressional lethargy is taking a toll on states, schools, and students. New information released today shows that Secretary of Education Arne Duncan granted 315 waivers to ESEA requirements in 2009 — more than a nine-fold increase over the number of waivers issued by his predecessors. The waivers signal states’ need for flexibility under the current system, which Congress has been slow to reform. Even New Jersey Governor Chris Christie (R) is showing more enthusiasm for reform than our Senators are — which is all the more reason for the Senate HELP Committee to pick up its game and get reauthorization moving again.
As members of Congress return to their districts and conduct town hall meetings with constituents, lawmakers who voted for the Republican budget are facing a backlash from their constituents. The budget, written by Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), effectively ends Medicare, severely cuts Medicaid, cuts taxes on the rich, and lowers corporate tax rates. As ThinkProgress has reported, everyone from Ryan, to Rep. Pat Meehan (R-PA), to Rep. Lou Barletta (R-PA), to Rep. Charlie Bass (R-NH), and others have faced heated questions about the GOP plan.
Slate’s Dave Weigel reports that American Action Network, a relatively new conservative front group founded by a group of Wall Street bankers, is loading up conservative activists with softball questions and talking points to bolster Republican lawmakers on the Ryan plan:
Meanwhile, the American Action Network, the think tank and campaign shop run by former Republican Sen. Norm Coleman, is making Ryan budget talking points and questions available for conservatives who want to buck up their members.
American Action Network did not return ThinkProgress’ request for more information on the budget talking points. As we reported last year, the group was founded by investment banker Ken Langone, former Goldman Sachs executive Robert Steel, and investor and former Nixon official Fred Malek.
As the Wonk Room’s Pat Garofalo has explained, the Republican budget also contains provisions to unwind new regulations imposed on major financial services corporations. The Ryan plan repeals provisions in the Dodd-Frank Wall Street reform law that allow “the Financial Stability Oversight Council (FSOC) to designate some firms as systemically significant and subject them to stiffer regulation” — a major reform Wall Street has lobbied aggressively to stop. The American Action Network board features a number of executives and lobbyists with a potential interest in rolling back financial regulations:
– American Action Network board member Fred Malek is chairman of the investment firm Thayer Capital Partners.
– American Action Network board member Isaac Applbaum the founding General Partner of Opus Capital.
– American Action Network board member Dylan Glenn is the Senior Vice President of Guggenheim Advisors.
– American Action Network board member C. Boyden Gray is a director of FreedomWorks and founder of a lobbying firm called Gray and Schmitz. Gray recently penned an article calling financial reform unconstitutional.
– American Action Network board member B. Wayne Hughes Jr. is the founder of American Commercial Equities Inc.
– American Action Network board member Ken Langone is the chairman of investment banking firm Invemed Associates LLC.
– American Action Network board member former Sen. Mel Martinez (R-FL) is an executive at JPMorgan Chase.
– American Action Network board member Vin Weber is a lobbyist for a number of banks and insurance companies.
During the debate over health reform legislation, health insurance companies contracted a number of lobbying firms to bring people to congressional town halls and ask industry-friendly questions. Similarly, banks like JP Morgan and Bank of America worked through fronts like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to battle financial reform during the legislative debate last year.
Here is a copy of one of the Paul Ryan budget talking point lists distributed to conservative activists by the American Action Network.
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