March 2016 - Page 17 of 25

Saturday, March 12th, 2016

Louisiana Will Tax Its Poor To Fill Budget Hole Caused By Tax Cuts For The Rich

Alan Pyke, - Think Progress

Stephan: Remember the story SR ran recently about former governor Jindal, the quality of Theocratic Rightist social policies, and their effect on Louisiana. Well here's the story of how they are going to pay for the economic disaster Republicans visited upon the state. And yet I will bet you Louisiana goes Republican in the general election.

Former Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal (R) waves goodbye at the inauguration of Gov. John Bel Edwards (D) in January.
Credit: Patrick Dennis/ Baton Rouge Advocate/AP

Louisianans will pay more and get back less under a compromise struck Wednesday over the state’s enormous budget gap.

The deal raises sales taxes by 25 percent — from four cents on the dollar to five — and applies the higher rate to a number of transactions that had previously been exempt from sales taxes.

It also falls $830 million short of fixing the state’s problems, making further cuts likely to services that have already been gutted.

Because the sales tax applies to consumption rather than income, the hike Louisiana lawmakers agreed to will be regressive: While people in the top 20 percent of the income distribution will pay 41 percent of the total cost of the tax hike according to the Louisiana Budget Project, the sales tax […]

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Friday, March 11th, 2016

Surprise! A third of Congress members are climate change deniers

Katie Herzog, - grist

Stephan: The corruption and willful ignorance of the U.S. Congress has become an international shame and embarrassment. Think I am exaggerating? Read this.

Credit: Dylan Petrohilos/ThinkProgress

An annual tally of climate deniers in Congress just came out, and there’s good news and bad news. The good news: You’re smarter than 34 percent of Congress. The bad news: You’re smarter than 34 percent of Congress.

The Center for American Progress Action Fund found that there are 182 climate deniers in the current Congress: 144 in the House and 38 in the Senate. That means more than six in 10 Americans are represented by people who think that climate change is a big ‘ol liberal hoax — including some leaders at the highest levels of government, like Senate Majority Leader Mitch “I Am Not a Scientist” McConnell and senator and presidential candidate Marco “I Am Not a Scientist” Rubio. (And those are just the members of Congress who are out-and-out deniers, so it doesn’t include the many more who kinda sorta admit that something might be going on with the climate but still don’t want to do anything about it.)

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Friday, March 11th, 2016

For Those Who Had Any Doubts, Kansas Has Officially Gone Insane.

Dartagnan, - Daily Kos

Stephan: Once you realize the states are laboratories to test hypotheses of governance it is fascinating to watch people vote into office individuals who brazenly govern to screw them, and enrich a small group of clients. What studying the laboratories also shows is that Republican governance is notably inferior in terms of social outcomes, while being significantly more costly than wellness oriented policies. Here is the latest on the crash and burn of Kansas.

Kansas Republican Governor Sam Brownback

For those who had any remaining doubts, Kansas has officially gone insane, with its Republican dominated legislature now trying to pass a law effectively nullifying the state’s Judiciary system:

A committee in the GOP-controlled Senate plans to vote Tuesday on a bill that would make “attempting to usurp the power” of the Legislature or the executive branch grounds for impeachment.

Impeachment has “been a little-used tool” to challenge judges who strike down new legislation, said Republican Sen. Dennis Pyle, a sponsor of the measure. “Maybe it needs to be oiled up a little bit or sharpened a little bit.”

Senate Bill 439 is currently set for debate before the state’s GOP-stacked Judiciary Committee. If it is approved and signed by Governor Brownback, it will permit impeachment of any Judge who acts contrary to the wishes of the legislature. In other words, any Judge who strikes down or modifies any law the legislature passes, for any reason– whether the law is blatantly Unconstitutional, violative of existing laws, […]

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Friday, March 11th, 2016

Texas Lowers Childcare Standards To Keep Private Family Detention Centers Open

Brian Sonenstein, - Shadow Proof

Stephan: It's not just that Texas does crazy things with its government; it's that there is such a nasty streak to so much of it. This report describes the latest manifestation, although we mustn't forget the new head of the Texas book commission who is a Creationist who thinks President Obama worked as a homosexual prostitute.

Children in the hands of U.S. Immigration

At the very end of the day on Friday, the Texas Health and Human Services Commission quietly lowered its standards for licensing childcare facilities. The decision paves the way for for-profit immigrant family detention centers in the state to remain open by bringing them in compliance with a federal court order.

According to the terms of a 1997 settlement agreement [PDF], children taken into custody by U.S. immigration officials could not be held in secure, unlicensed facilities. Nonetheless, the Obama administration renewed the mass detention of immigrant families in 2014.

The administration had defended the practice of incarcerating children with their parents by arguing it was better to keep families together. It also crudely argued there was no acceptable state licensing procedure for federal detention centers, so it couldn’t comply with the order that they be licensed.

Federal Judge Dolly Gee disagreed [PDF] with President Obama’s justifications and ordered the administration to cease its detention of children in unlicensed facilities in June 2015. This meant immigrant families like those held in two Texas family prisons, the Karnes County Residential Center and the South Texas Family Residential Center, […]

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Friday, March 11th, 2016

5 people have been killed in a mass shooting near Pittsburgh

Libby Nelson, - Vox

Stephan: Here is this week's first massacre, the 44th mass killing by guns in the U.S. since the first of January. Mass murders have become so commonplace you may not have even heard of this one. Or perhaps it rated a couple of 30 second mentions on the news you watch. Anyway, just business as usual. I have a rather different view, which is why I am pointing this event out. We are having an epidemic; if these deaths were the result of some exotic virus, people would be running around in semi-hysteria. Remember the introduction of AIDs in 1981? I do and I will never forget it.

Gazette A mourner leaves candles at a makeshilft memorial on the steps of the scene of the shooting. Credit: John Heller/Posst-Gazette

A mourner leaves candles at a makeshift memorial on the steps of the scene of the shooting.
Credit: John Heller/Post-Gazette

Five people were killed and three injured in a shooting at a backyard barbecue and house party in Wilkinsburg, a Pittsburgh suburb, late Wednesday night, according to local police.

Local police said there were at least two shooters, and police are still searching for them, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported. Neighbors reported dozens of gunshots — one man said 26; another woman said the shooting continued for at least a minute.

Police haven’t said what the motive for the shooting was, nor have they identified suspects. Wilkinsburg is a relatively high-crime area. It had the second-highest murder rate in Allegheny County in 2012.

This isn’t the first mass shooting in Wilkinsburg, a town with only about 16,000 people. In 2000, a man named Ronald Taylor went on a […]