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By Nomi Prins
$10.36
By Michael Dirda
$11.16
$23
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Gage Skidmore (CC BY-SA 2.0)
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Rep. Paul Ryan has figured out a way to balance the budget: Give corporations and wealthy people tax breaks they don’t need while aggressively cutting health and social programs that middle and lower-income Americans do.
Posted on Mar 12, 2013
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A look at the day’s political happenings, including a major reversal by Florida Gov. Rick Scott on Obamacare and the NRA is already working to influence the 2014 election.
Posted on Feb 20, 2013
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Truthdig Editor-in-Chief Robert Scheer and the other “Left, Right & Center” panelists consider the fiscal cliff deal and the issues it left untouched: the debt ceiling and the threat of “reform” to social services. They also dissect the re-election of John Boehner as speaker of the House as well as the FTC’s decision on Google and antitrust and anti-competition laws.
Posted on Jan 4, 2013
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flickr/13lucie
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A policy set to be enacted by the nation’s largest private employer would deny health insurance to new employees who work fewer than 30 hours a week, effectively shifting costs from the company to you.
Posted on Dec 2, 2012
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senate.gov
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By Sen. Bernie Sanders —
Now is the time to hold Democrats accountable and ensure that we do deficit reduction in a way that is fair, while also protecting Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.
Posted on Nov 28, 2012
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Flickr/Fortune Live Media
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A group of corporate CEOs that contributed to the burgeoning deficit crisis want the poor and elderly to largely pay for the mess the greedy Wall Street fat cats helped create.
Posted on Nov 26, 2012
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kevin dooley (CC BY 2.0)
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A group of CEOs led by Macy’s Terry Lundgren calling itself the Fix the Debt coalition is hoping for a deficit-busting austerity budget this holiday season—not a program to create American jobs.
Posted on Nov 22, 2012
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The president and Congress reaching a “grand bargain” would mean significant cuts to Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid; some Republican senators believe Obama is using a Cold War-era mind-control technique on American citizens; meanwhile, millions showed up to the largest coordinated strike Europe has ever seen. These discoveries and more after the jump.
Posted on Nov 18, 2012
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At a mid-November meeting of the Defending Social Security Caucus, the Vermont independent issued a fiery warning against cutting Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid to President Obama, congressional Republicans and Blue Dog Democrats.
Posted on Nov 17, 2012
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Flickr/TexasGOPVote.com
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Ralph Nader —
Congress is still talking about a “Grand Bargain” that “balances” far more spending cuts than tax increases. That is another way of saying that you – the consumer of Medicare and Medicaid services, the recipient of Social Security, and the average taxpayer — will take the brunt of the spending cuts.
Posted on Nov 14, 2012
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Pete Souza/The White House
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By Robert Reich — Assuming the goal is $4 trillion of deficit reduction over the next decade (that’s the consensus of the Simpson-Bowles commission, the Congressional Budget Office, and most independent analysts), here’s what the President should propose.
Posted on Nov 12, 2012
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DonkeyHotey
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By Robert Reich — Unemployment is still above 8 percent, job gains aren’t even keeping up with population growth, the economy is barely moving forward. And yet, according to most polls, the Romney-Ryan ticket is falling further and further behind.
Posted on Sep 17, 2012
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Flickr/Gage Skidmore
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By Robert Reich — You want real entitlement reform? President Obama has begun it. Rational people would make sure he gets a second term.
Posted on Aug 21, 2012
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DanBackman (CC BY 2.0)
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Internal inquiries have revealed that cardiologists at several hospitals operated by HCA, the United States’ largest for-profit hospital chain, performed unnecessary and potentially dangerous heart procedures, and made misleading statements in medical reports to make it appear the measures were needed.
Posted on Aug 7, 2012
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A look at the day’s political happenings, including Mitt’s impressive June fundraising haul and Florida GOP Rep. Allen West’s latest controversial comment.
Posted on Jul 9, 2012
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Images_of_Money (CC BY 2.0)
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Obamacare did nothing to stop the cost of employer-based health insurance from growing at twice the rate of inflation during the Great Recession, and for that and other reasons, progressives want to get rid of it. AlterNet editor Joshua Holland has a cheaper and arguably more practical idea: Open the Medicare system to anyone who wants to buy into it.
Posted on May 29, 2012
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Flickr / Gage Skidmore
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It’s been quite the eventful week in Washington, no? In case the health care hullabaloo at the Supreme Court didn’t bring enough action to our nation’s capital, over in the halls of Congress there was an equally heated debate about Rep. Paul Ryan’s Republican-backed budget plan, which the GOP-heavy House passed Thursday.
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Flickr / Mark Fischer (CC-BY-SA)
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By Bill Boyarsky — “There is an important connection, a profound connection, between that problem and liberty. And I do think it’s important that we not lose sight of that,” Solicitor General Donald Verrilli told the Supreme Court.
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AP / Jacquelyn Martin
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By Bill Boyarsky — What’s a pittance for a super PAC can buy a state senator, beginning with financing a campaign and continuing support into the statehouse. These campaigns to take over state governments will grow as business sees the possibilities.
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AP / Manuel Balce Ceneta
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By Bill Boyarsky — Observing the liberal Democratic critics of President Barack Obama set me wondering whether they ever listen to the Republican candidates. Haven’t they noticed that the Republicans want to dismantle Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and the rest of the economic protections for the poor and the middle class?
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jamiehladky (CC-BY)
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Something interesting happens when hardworking, fiscally minded Americans find themselves on the public dole: They resent the government that lends a hand and feel guilty for accepting help. A major article from The New York Times documents the anxiety, frustration and confusion of a growing class of dependent Americans.
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Flickr / e-MagineArt.com (CC-BY)
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The Obama administration is laying the legal groundwork to strongly encourage (read: enforce) more transparency between pharmaceutical companies and doctors by requiring drugmakers to divulge the details of their monetary exchanges with M.D.s for various services and perks.
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Flickr / Borya
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On Sunday, President Obama and members of the U.S. Congress agreed to cut at least $2.4 trillion from federal spending over the next 10 years, some of which will come from programs that benefit retired Americans. (more)
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Flickr / mikoosij
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Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., on Friday gave voice to the frustration of millions of American liberals who feel betrayed by President Obama’s eagerness to abandon key social welfare programs established and preserved by his Democratic predecessors. (more)
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AP / Pablo Martinez Monsivais
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By Robert Scheer — These threatened programs are not government handouts to a privileged class, like defense contractors and bailed-out bankers, who do feel eminently entitled to pig out at the federal trough.
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By Joe Conason — Still spinning in the vortex of the May 24 tornado in New York’s 26th Congressional District, Republican leaders insist that Democrat Kathy Hochul’s upset victory on their party’s turf was meaningless.
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Flickr / Gage Skidmore
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Republican lawmakers who planned to ride Rep. Paul Ryan’s proposed Medicaid overhaul to glory can think again, as polling confirms the voter opposition demonstrated in New York’s 26th Congressional District on Tuesday.
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Yes, Wednesday night’s “Daily Show” skewering of the Trump vs. Obama birtherversy was funny. You can watch it here. We’d rather focus on a more substantial segment from that show, featuring straight-shooting Sen. Bernie Sanders.
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Flickr / Gage Skidmore
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Citing budgetary constraints, Florida’s Republican-led Legislature is prepared to push the state’s Medicaid payment system off the public dole and into private pockets.
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By Joe Conason — Among the mysteries of modern politics in America is why so many of our leading pundits and politicians persistently seek to undermine Social Security, that enduring and successful emblem of active government.
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AP / Charles Dharapak
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By Bill Boyarsky — The selfish negativity expressed by Republicans in the House health care debate last week showed why we should fight hard for President Barack Obama’s re-election in 2012.
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AP / Lauren Victoria Burke
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By Bill Boyarsky — Now that President Barack Obama has signed health reform into law, insurance industry lobbyists will turn their attention to trying to cripple it. This will be done under the pretense of improving the reform proposal—or, as they say in the lobbying business, loving the law to death.
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AP / Haraz N. Ghanbari
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By Robert Scheer — Boy, the Republicans know how to make Barack Obama look good. What are they going to do now, threaten to repeal a law that forces insurance companies to cover the sick? Or block the provision that allows you to keep your out-of-work kids on your policy until they are 26?
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White House / Lawrence Jackson
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It doesn’t seem possible, but it could maybe perhaps be the case that some kind of resolution in the health care reform saga might be achievable soon. At least that’s the tone President Barack Obama struck in a letter he sent Tuesday to prominent members of Congress that included conciliatory language on the subject of four ideas advanced by Republicans at last week’s health care summit.
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AP / Ted S. Warren
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By Bill Boyarsky — A major reason for enacting health reform is the fate of elderly and disabled patients—especially the indigent—in nursing homes and assisted-care facilities. Nobody is affected more by the confluence of the health care stalemate and the recession than these patients.
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AP / Alex Brandon
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After months of squabbling and tussling with each other as well as their Republican opposition, House Democrats finally produced the latest comprehensive result of their efforts in health care reform in the form of a whopping 1,990-page measure—and then proceeded to congratulate themselves in a public rally outside at the Capitol.
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AP Photo / Toby Talbot
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By Marie Cocco — Overlooked in the health care debate is the recently reconfirmed fact that Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security are working better than ever.
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ekgpulse.com
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Let’s see if this one takes. After critics blasted an earlier, more expensive version, the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee took another crack at a plan to provide coverage for tens of millions of Americans without health insurance. The latest plan, released Thursday, comes at the lower cost of $611.4 billion, as opposed to the $1 trillion proposal that didn’t go over so well last month.
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Truthdigger of the Week: Sen. Angus King
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