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Sen. Bernie Sanders challenges Pentagon official over defense contractor CEO pay

Nobody spends money on defense like the United States, and Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., wants to know why so much of taxpayer dollars are going to the CEOs of defense companies.

“I think the elephant in the room here is the relationship of the DoD to defense contractors. I think that’s the area that needs the most research,” Sanders said during a Senate Budget Committee hearing Wednesday on the Department of Defense’s business operations.

The Pentagon requested one of the largest budgets in history with its recent proposal of $686 billion and an additional $30 billion for non-defense agencies including the Department of Energy, which maintains the country’s nuclear weapons.

For perspective, the U.S. allocates more money to the military than the next 10 highest spending countries combined.

Sanders hit on two points during the session:

*Roughly half of the Pentagon’s budget goes directly to defense contractors.
*The CEOs of the top five defense contractors in the U.S. earned a cumulative of $96 million in compensation last year.

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Essentially, Sanders said, “Lockheed Martin is a government agency, a private one, but a government agency virtually fully funded by U.S. government.”

Sanders, Leahy back party’s infrastructure plan

Both Vermont senators joined a slew of Democrats pitching a proposal that would invest $1 trillion in infrastructure initiatives.

Senate Democrats offered the proposal as a response to an infrastructure plan President Donald Trump released last month.

Trump’s plan would use about $200 billion in federal funds with the intention of leveraging a total of $1.5 trillion from private companies and state and local governments.

The proposal Democrats rolled out Wednesday would undo some key parts of the tax overhaul package Republicans passed last year and use the funds to pay for infrastructure initiatives.

They would restore the top income tax rate, the estate tax and the alternative minimum tax — all of which were cut in the new law. They propose to invest $1 trillion in projects including improving roads, bridges, train service, and water and sewage systems.

The plan also would appropriate $40 billion to build out universal access to high-speed internet connections.

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Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., ranking member of the Budget Committee, said there’s a major need for improving infrastructure in the country.

“We are the wealthiest nation in the history of the world,” Sanders said. “And yet from Vermont to California, people look around them and what they’re finding is their roads and their bridges and their water systems and their wastewater plants are falling apart.”

Bernie Sanders tells Democrats to back off primary attacks

Bernie Sanders is warning the Democratic Party not to attack its own candidates in primary battles, as happened in a Houston-area congressional race.

The Vermont senator said it’s “appalling” that the party’s congressional campaign arm targeted Laura Moser ahead of Tuesday’s primary election. Moser, an activist, is endorsed by Sanders’ Our Revolution group.

Sanders told The Associated Press on Wednesday that such attacks are “not acceptable.”

Moser advanced to a runoff with Democratic front-runner Lizzie Pannill Fletcher, despite the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee publishing an opposition research memo calling her “a Washington insider who begrudgingly moved to Texas” to run for Congress.

A Houston native who attended high school there, Moser was also targeted by the campaign arm for joking that she’d “rather have my teeth pulled out without anesthesia” than live in small-town Texas.

“What these organizations should not be doing is doing negative attacks on Democratic candidates,” said Sanders. “That just continues the process of debasing the Democratic system in this country and is why so many people are disgusted with politics.”

What issue do you think got more coverage on CNN today, the effort to deregulate the major banks or Donald Trump and a porn star? Think hard! pic.twitter.com/zVHuZk2kjB

— Bernie Sanders (@SenSanders) March 8, 2018

Keith Ellison takes over the Democrats’ universal health-care bill

Rep. Keith Ellison, the deputy chairman of the Democratic National Committee, has replaced former congressman John Conyers Jr. as the sponsor of the Expanded & Improved Medicare For All Act. Early Wednesday afternoon, Ellison asked for and received unanimous consent to take over H.R. 676, the single-payer health bill that has become a focus of left-wing energy and is supported by most of the Democratic caucus.

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His pitch: He could and would lead a campaign for the legislation, separate from his DNC role but building on the success he’d had as a far-traveled advocate for the party.

“Until the platform committee of the DNC adopts this, it’s really more of a congressional effort and a community effort, so we respect the difference,” Ellison said. “But I am going to talk about it as a member of Congress. We’re going to be working on this thing as a team. One of the consistent applause lines we’re all hearing is: We need Medicare for all. There’s a lot of folks who feel that it’s time for us to organize around that. It’s a better policy, at a better price. People in labor, people all over the country, they’re going to be driving the public conversation, raising the dialogue about this.”

On Tuesday night, as Texans voted in the first round of primaries, supporters of the Medicare-for-all approach made gains. In the 23rd and 32nd districts, both of which saw crowded Democratic races, the candidates who made it to May 22’s runoff were all supporter. Ellison wasn’t surprised.

“Here’s the problem: We’re at a point in American history with more income inequality than at any point since the Gilded Age,” Ellison said. “So you’re seeing more support for Medicare for all. Of course you are. If you run to the center, you’re not meeting the needs of the average voter. Millennials are the most screwed voters out there, and the last thing they want is a giant debt load from health care coming on top of their debt load from college. What some people think is a really progressive position is just what the rest of the industrialized world does.”

Pretty sure Fararakhan is mentioned in this article more than single payer… but its the WAPO so wouldn’t expect much different.

How to see Sen. Bernie Sanders this weekend at his downtown Phoenix rally

Bernie Sanders, the left-leaning independent U.S. senator from Vermont who gave Hillary Clinton a spirited challenge for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination, is set to rev-up his fellow progressives Sunday in downtown Phoenix.

Sanders will be joined at the noon rally at the Orpheum Theatre, 203 W. Adams St., by Democratic U.S. Reps. Ruben Gallego and Raúl Grijalva of Arizona and former Democratic Ohio state Sen. Nina Turner, who is now president of the Sanders-aligned organization Our Revolution.

Per Sanders’ website, Sanders intends to address various topics, including “the need to move forward and pass comprehensive immigration reform that will allow people to come out of the shadows and will unite families — not divide them — and the urgent need to ensure health care as a human right.”

Doors open at 10:30 a.m. Admission is first-come, first-served, and the Sanders team encourages RSVPing online at BernieSanders.com.

Here is why I am opposing the bill being voted on in the Senate now to deregulate some of the largest banks in America. pic.twitter.com/bF85IPDPrN

— Bernie Sanders (@SenSanders) March 6, 2018

Bernie Sanders: Trump Diagnosed the Problem on Trade. But His Solution Doesn’t Work.

Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) believes Donald Trump may be on to something.

The Independent Democratic-Socialist from Vermont, known as one of the Senate’s immoveable progressives, says he has found a patch of ideological common ground with a man who progressives bemoan on a daily—no, hourly—basis. But as the president prepares to announce on Thursday new tariffs on steel and aluminum imported from overseas, Sanders isn’t sure that he is going about addressing their mutually-agreed-upon problem in the right manner.

“We need to fundamentally rethink our trade policies and move to fair trade rather than just unfettered free trade,” Sanders told The Daily Beast in an interview on Wednesday afternoon. “So Trump is identifying a problem. Certainly China’s role in dumping an enormous amount of steel, not only in the United States, but all over the world, is very very clear. It has to be dealt with.”

“In my view though, what you need is a comprehensive, a more comprehensive approach than Trump is laying out,” Sanders continued. “So what I would like to see is Congress begin to rethink our trade policies and hopefully we will have a president supportive of that. So he is identifying the problem correctly but I’m not sure that his particular solution at this moment is exactly the right one.”

This 28-Year-Old Progressive Helped Bernie Sanders Win Rhode Island. Now He Is Running for Lt. Gov.

Two-term Rhode Island State Representative Aaron Regunberg is still in his 20s, but already has a long pedigree of organizing for social change.

At 20, Regunberg co-founded the Providence Student Union, a group dedicated to empowering high-school students to “win a fair say in the education system.” At 24, Regunberg was elected to the Rhode Island State House after running on a strong progressive platform. At 26, he helped organize Bernie Sanders’ come-from-behind victory in the state’s Democratic primary. At 27, he sponsored a successful effort to pass paid sick leave legislation. Now, at 28, he’s running for lieutenant governor, backed by organized labor and the Ocean State’s growing activist community.

Regunberg, a Brown University graduate, is challenging one-term incumbent Dan McKee in the September Democratic primary. McKee is widely considered a conservative-leaning Democrat and has close ties to the state’s charter school lobby. Unlike in other states, lieutenant governor candidates in Rhode Island do not campaign as running mates but rather are popularly elected every four years.

The race fits into a broader nationwide pattern of progressive candidates challenging moderate and conservative Democrats in party primaries, with many of these challengers inspired by Bernie Sanders’ historic 2016 presidential campaign.

Regunberg’s campaign has won the support of organized labor, and is being powered both by the growing anti-Trump resistance movements as well as Rhode Island’s progressive statewide infrastructure.

Regunberg sees his candidacy as a challenge to corporate control over Rhode Island politics. “I’ve been in the statehouse since 2014, so I’ve been in government long enough to see that the system needs change” Regunberg tells In These Times. “I’ve seen firsthand how lobbyists paid for by Walmart payday lenders are ever present in the capitol, while everyday Rhode Islanders get ignored. I’m running for lieutenant governor to be an independent public advocate. That means that it’s my job to be the voice for people who can’t afford a lobbyist.”

Texas Progressive Laura Moser Is Beating Democratic Insiders by John Nichols

The defining characteristic of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee for too many years now has been its well-honed ability to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Drowning in conventional wisdom, disconnected from realities on the ground, and instinctively inclined to react to Republicans rather than to set its own agenda, the DCCC is such a bumbling enterprise that even the chairman of the Democratic National Committee recently distanced himself from its so-called “strategies.”

When DNC chair Tom Perez was asked his opinion of a ham-handed move by the DCCC to circulate selectively edited and disingenuously framed opposition research against Texas Democrat Laura Moser, a popular progressive running in the party’s crowded primary in the Houston area’s 7th Congressional District, he replied: “I wouldn’t have done it.

That was a wise response, as grassroots Democrats are figuring out that taking advice from the strikingly inept folks in DC might not make as much sense as following their own instincts in districts like the seventh, where Republican incumbents are vulnerable to defeat. After Moser answered the DNC attack by urging primary voters to reject the counsel of “Washington operatives trying to tell Texans what to do,” the voters did just that.

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Decrying the “Republican-lite hacks at the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee,” [DFA’s Jim Dean] said: “The same gutless, corporate playbook that has lost Democrats nearly 1000 elected offices over the last decade isn’t our party’s path to retaking the House in November.”

“Candidates like Laura Moser, who are building smart, grassroots campaigns and mobilizing the New American Majority by fearlessly standing up for inclusive populist priorities like the reproductive rights, gun reform, and Medicare for All, are showing us a way out of the cycle of losses we’ve been stuck in since 2008,” added Dean, who argues that “it’s time that those currently occupying the DCCC’s revolving door to either figure that out, or get the hell out of the way.”

#Teamsters Pres. Jim #Hoffa sat down today with @SenSanders to discuss the top issues facing the #union including the looming pension crisis, trade and the threat that the Supreme Court case of #JanusvAFSCME poses to public employees across the nation. pic.twitter.com/yB5ubkrMN3

— Teamsters (@Teamsters) March 7, 2018

Schumer Denounced for ‘Absolutely Disgusting’ AIPAC Speech

“Bigoted,” “outrageous,” and “disgusting” were just a handful of the many adjectives critics used to denounce Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer’s (D-N.Y.) speech this week before the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), which attributed ongoing Middle East conflict not to Israel’s decades of brutal U.S.-backed occupation of Palestinian territories, but to Palestinians’ failure to “believe in the Torah.”

“The fact of the matter is that too many Palestinians and too many Arabs do not want any Jewish state in the Middle East,” Schumer told the audience gathered for AIPAC’s annual conference in Washington, D.C. “Of course, we say it’s our land, the Torah says it, but they don’t believe in the Torah. So that’s the reason there is not peace. They invent other reasons, but they do not believe in a Jewish state and that is why we, in America, must stand strong with Israel through thick and thin.”

Transcript of the above excerpt of Senator Chuck Schumer's speech at AIPAC.

Tell me how US foreign policy isn't driven by religious beliefs again?! pic.twitter.com/HalUAs0pah

— saeen (@saeen90_) March 7, 2018

Coast Guard Responders ‘Harmed by Chemicals Used to Clean Up BP’s Spill’

DNC to grant S.D. Democrats $50k to improve outreach to Native Americans

The Democratic National Committee on Wednesday announced that it will grant $50,000 to help the South Dakota Democratic Party expand its outreach to Native American voters.

In a statement, DNC representatives said the funds could boost voter registration on Native American reservations and grow voter turnout across the state.

“South Dakota is home to nine tribal nations and we know that if we empower and organize Native American voters, they will be the difference-makers in the 2018 elections,” DNC Chair Tom Perez said in a statement.

The financial boost comes as the Democratic Party looks to increase voter registration that lags South Dakota Republicans by more than 87,000 voters.

I guess its a start but… 50k? Pretty sure that about pays the salary of one outreach coordinator and buys some printer ink.

Warren donates to DNC and state Democratic parties, then slams banking bill

One day after the Senate voted to begin debate on scaling back the bank reforms passed after the 2008 financial crisis, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) used a speech at a Democratic National Committee gala to chide colleagues who went along with it.

“Let’s build a party that stands against Republicans trying to roll back financial reforms – every one of us – rather than help the Republicans deliver even more goodies for big banks,” Warren said at the DNC’s “I Will Vote” dinner, the kickoff of a digital-driven voter-turnout campaign.

Seventeen members of the Senate Democratic caucus had voted to advance the legislation, with moderates like Sen. Mark R. Warner (D-Va.) and Sen. Christopher A. Coons (D-Del.) arguing that rules meant to rein in the biggest financial institutions were being used to choke out small banks. Warren had fought them at every step, warning in speeches and across the media that the party was doing the bidding of the people who had crashed the world economy.

On Wednesday night, Warren pointedly cited that vote in a rundown of issues Democrats needed to “pick a fight on” to win back voters who began to see them as Republicans-lite. Democrats, she said, could win back “any American whose credit information gets stolen or who gets cheated by their cable company” and simultaneously “stand up for ‘dreamers,’ ” undocumented immigrants brought to the country as children, and against money in politics.

She also noted that she had donated to all 50 state Democratic parties — and $15,000 to the DNC.

“It’s not enough to be better than the other guys,” said Warren. “If people don’t believe we understand what’s gone wrong, and if they don’t believe that we’re ready and willing to fight for them – really fight, they’re going to turn their backs on us, too.”

DNC gives CT Dems cash to organize and unify for 2018

A week after Connecticut Democrats picked up a seat in the state House of Representatives, the Democratic National Committee has added the state party to its list of recipients of competitive $50,000 grants to help organize for the 2018 election.

The money is hardly a game changer for a state party that could afford to spend more than $1.4 million last year and reported $424,371 in available cash in its most recent state and federal campaign finance filings.

But Nick Balletto, the state Democratic chairman, said the grant rewards and reinforces the progress Democrats have made unifying the party since the divisive presidential nomination fight between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders and the election of Donald J. Trump in 2016.

“I think Donald Trump showed us we don’t have the luxury of being all over the place,” Balletto said. “If we’re all over the place, then we get Donald Trump.”

We’re Told the Dow Jones Average… by Jim Hightower

Language matters. For example, the way our society’s leaders choose to comment on the health of America’s economy can either make clear to us commoners what’s going on — or obfuscate, hide and even lie about the reality we face.

Consider that the most common measurement that the media, politicians and corporations use to tell us whether our economy is zooming or sputtering is Wall Street’s index of stock prices. The media literally spews out some number every hour indicating that the Dow Jones Average of stock prices is up, down or sluggish — as though everyone is waiting breathlessly for that news.

But wait — nearly all stock is owned by the richest 10 percent of Americans, so the Dow Jones Average says nothing about the economic condition of the 90 percent majority of Americans. For us — and for the true economic health of America as a whole — we need to know the Doug Jones Average. In plain language, the question leaders should ask every day is: How’re Doug and Delores Jones doing?

As we’ve seen for years now, stock prices keep rising to record highs, while wages and living standards of the middle class and poor majority have been held down by the same corporate and political “leaders” telling us to keep our eye on the Dow. Indeed, they also play a dirty language trick on us when they issue the monthly report on the health of America’s job market. Currently, they say, with the unemployment rate down to four percent, the job market is booming!

But wait again — that only reflects the number of jobs, not their dollar value in terms of wages and benefits. Having lots of people doing poorly paid work is not a healthy job economy. Notice that they don’t measure the stock market by the number of stocks out there, but by their value. And they should measure your job market the same way in order to get an honest picture of how Doug and Delores are doing.

Of course, they’d only do that if they gave a damn about Doug and Delores. And their actions more than prove they don’t.

Trump meeting with video game bosses revives tenuous link to gun violence

Donald Trump will host executives from the video game industry at the White House on Thursday, resurrecting a debate over the link between violent video games and gun-related deaths in the aftermath of the Parkland high school shooting.

The meeting comes as the president and lawmakers in Washington face continued pressure to act in the wake of the 14 February massacre at Marjory Stoneman High School, which left 17 people dead.

Although the White House has provided few details on the meeting, Trump’s focus on the role of violence in entertainment signaled the president may be embracing a more conservative response to the Parkland shooting, even as the push for stricter gun laws reaches a fever pitch.

Each time there’s a school shooting in America, someone inevitably points the finger at video games.

Trump similarly targeted video games and movies for influencing children and young adults when discussing the Parkland tragedy at the White House last month.

“I’m hearing more and more people say the level of violence on video games is really shaping young people’s thoughts,” Trump said.

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But despite the moral panic, the evidence doesn’t stack up.

There have been many studies and meta-analyses examining the issue, and none has shown a causal link between violent video games and violent behavior. The few studies that find a weak correlation between aggressive behavior and video games lack context, failing to highlight how other competitive activities such as team sports have the same impact.

US cancer network recommending expensive drugs based on weak evidence, study finds

Guidelines for American oncologists often recommend expensive and harmful cancer drugs for patients based on “weak evidence”, according to a new study in the British Medical Journal.

The BMJ research looked at drugs recommended for conditions not approved by the US Food and Drug Administration, a practice called “off-label” prescribing.

Off-label prescribing, or using a drug for purposes that may be well known but not approved by a regulatory agency, is common, especially in oncology. But recently approved cancer drugs can cost and have severe side-effects.

“They’re not your grandpa’s old cytoplasmic drugs,” said Vinay Prasad, an oncologist at the Oregon Health and Sciences University, referring to early cancer drugs. “They are $100,000 drugs. They bring $1bn per year to the drugmakers.”

Prasad, the study’s lead author, said: “It would be one thing if we were talking about drugs that were cheap and have no side-effects.” He added that many recently approved cancer drugs “have risk-benefit analyses that are just tilted toward benefit. [But] you can get to a net harm condition.”

Ben Carson’s housing agency drops pledge to end housing discrimination

The US housing department, helmed by the former neurosurgeon Ben Carson, has proposed a new mission statement in which the pledge to build “inclusive” communities “free from discrimination” is removed.

The proposal comes just two weeks after the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services changed its mission statement to eliminate a passage that described the US as “a nation of immigrants”.

A 5 March internal memo, obtained by the Huffington Post, contained a draft of the US Department of Housing and Urban Development’s (Hud) new, shortened mission statement, which emphasizes self-sufficiency. The author described it as “an effort to align Hud’s mission with the secretary’s priorities and that of the administration”.

The Next Standing Rock? A Pipeline Battle Looms in Oregon

Each spring and fall in the old days, Chinook salmon swam up the Klamath River, crossing the Cascade Mountains, to Upper Klamath Lake, 4,000 feet above sea level. For millenniums, the Klamath, Modoc and Yahooskin Band of Snake Indians fished salmon from the lake and the river. The Klamath had agreements with the downriver tribes — the Karuk, Hoopa and Yurok among them — to let fish pass so that some could swim all the way back to their spawning grounds.

After dams were built on the river starting in 1912, the salmon were blocked. Today the only “c’iyaals hoches” (salmon runs) are enacted by the Klamath Tribes, whose members carry carved cedar salmon on a 300-mile symbolic journey from the ocean to the traditional spawning grounds to bring home the spirit of the fish.

The Klamath River’s dams are scheduled to be demolished by 2020, in what will be one of the largest river restorations in American history. But there’s a threat to the dream of a revitalized river — a project that would put a newly unobstructed Klamath at risk of contamination while simultaneously contributing to climate change, desecrating grave sites and trampling the traditional territory of the Klamath people. If you’ve read anything at all about the protests near the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation in North Dakota, you might be able to guess what that threat is.

It’s a pipeline.

The Pacific Connector Gas Pipeline would run 229 miles from Malin to Coos Bay, Ore., crossing underneath the Klamath River near the city of Klamath Falls. It would extend, via interconnections, the Ruby Pipeline, carrying natural gas from Wyoming to a huge planned storage and export terminal for sales to countries in the Pacific Rim.

‘Guilty of being poor’: does California couple’s poverty amount to child abuse?

Three children were found living in a plywood box, but friends defend their parents as good people who fell on hard times

This situation is not all too different from parts of my own childhood, though in the mountains of California not the desert. Living ‘off grid’ the state tried to remove my sisters and I from custody but failed after it was shown we were well taken care of and quite educated. I’ll write about it in my book someday :D. Despite being hard times they are still some of my fondest memories and I have a very deep desire to return back to the area.

PUC shuts down Mariner East 1 pipeline, citing public safety concerns raised by sinkholes

Pennsylvania’s Public Utility Commission on Wednesday ordered a temporary shutdown of the Mariner East 1 natural gas liquids pipeline, saying it could have a “catastrophic” effect on public safety if it leaks.

PUC Chairman Gladys Brown approved a request by the commission’s Bureau of Investigation and Enforcement for an emergency order that would halt operation of the line until inspectors are satisfied that it meets safety standards.

The panel, in a petition issued earlier Wednesday, argued that the pipeline had been exposed by the appearance of sinkholes near the construction of two other pipelines – Mariner East 2 and 2X – at several places in Chester County’s West Whiteland Township in recent days.

The panel said that the construction of the two new pipelines and the sinkholes that resulted from drilling for the pipelines – all of it near ME1 – “compromise the safety of the public.”

In a four-page order, Brown agreed with the panel, saying that risks to the public outweigh risks to the shippers of natural gas liquids.

“I agree with BIE that permitting the continued flow of hazardous liquids through the ME1 pipeline without the proper steps to ensure the integrity of the pipeline could have catastrophic results impacting the public,” Brown wrote.

Pipeline chiefs criticise ‘extreme’ tactics of campaigners

Campaigns to keep fossil fuels underground have sparked concern from leading North American pipeline executives, who said tactics to stop their projects had become extreme.

The comments by the chiefs of Energy Transfer Partners, Kinder Morgan and TransCanada underscored how a tactic of addressing climate change by blocking new infrastructure has rattled a midstream energy industry still recovering from the oil price collapse.

Opposition from local residents and environmental campaigners delayed pipelines including ETP’s Dakota Access, which opened last June, and Kinder Morgan’s Trans Mountain Expansion and TransCanada’s Keystone XL, which remain incomplete despite years on the drawing board.

Some campaigners have moved beyond conventional letter-writing, demonstrations and lawsuits. In 2016, a group of activists broke into pipeline flow stations in four states and shut off valves.

Russ Girling, TransCanada chief executive, told the conference that some environmental groups had hired lawyers with the expertise to challenge pipeline applications on technical grounds, forcing his company to be more meticulous with paperwork.

Activists charged with trespassing have said in court that “this is totally defensible behaviour because there’s a greater good of trying to save the world,” an argument that has gained traction with some judges, said Mr Girling.

Silly protestors causing meticulous paperwork when the environment and lives are at stake! How dare they?

Appeals court to review halt in Louisiana pipeline work

A federal appeals court has scheduled a hearing next week to review a judge’s order that halted construction of a crude oil pipeline in a Louisiana swamp.

Bayou Bridge Pipeline LLC asked the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for an “emergency stay” that would lift the suspension of construction work while it appeals the judge’s ruling.

A three-judge panel from the court is scheduled to hear to arguments on that request next Tuesday.

On Feb. 23, U.S. District Judge Shelly Dick sided with environmental groups and issued a preliminary injunction stopping all Bayou Bridge pipeline construction work in the Atchafalaya Basin until the groups’ lawsuit is resolved.

In a court filing last Friday, company attorneys claimed Dick’s ruling “fails the basic requirements” for issuing such an order.

Dick concluded the project’s irreversible environmental damage outweighs the economic harm that a delay brings to the company. Her order only applies to the basin and doesn’t prevent the company from working elsewhere along the pipeline’s 162-mile-long (261-kilometer) path from Lake Charles to St. James Parish.

Climate change tightens grip on US west coast despite progressive aspirations

California’s exposure to climate change has been laid bare with warnings that San Francisco faces a far worse threat from rising seas than previously thought, while the agricultural heart of the state will increasingly struggle to support crops such as peaches, walnuts and apricots as temperatures climb.

The findings, from two new scientific studies, come as California’s neighboring west coast states Oregon and Washington have both faltered in their legislative attempts to address climate change and deliver a rebuke to Donald Trump’s dismissal of the issue.

The problems faced by the progressive coastal bastions have been sobering on two fronts: not only is the western flank of the US experiencing the escalating consequences of climate change, but widespread Democratic dominance at state level has failed to enact ambitious policies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

“The states are struggling to fill the gap for the federal government on climate change,” said Nives Dolsak, of the school of marine and environmental affairs at the University of Washington.

“In Washington, we are holding a very good policy hostage because it’s not perfect. Inclusion and equity concerns means we are losing momentum and public support on climate change.”

Canada watchdog to review police’s handling of indigenous man’s killing

A police watchdog will review how Royal Canadian Mounted Police handled the shooting of a young Cree man by a white farmer, enlisting an independent investigator to delve into a case that has ignited racial tensions in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan.

The Civilian Review and Complaints Commission – a federal government agency tasked with examining complaints about the RCMP – announced on Tuesday that it would investigate the 2016 death of Colten Boushie and the events that followed.

The 22-year-old was shot in the head after he and four friends from Red Pheasant First Nation drove on to a rural property in Saskatchewan. A lawyer for Gerald Stanley, the farmer who was holding the semi-automatic pistol that killed Boushie, described the shooting as a “freak accident”.

Last month Stanley, 56, was acquitted of second-degree murder by a seemingly all-white jury in a verdict that sparked rallies across the country and prompted calls for justice reform.

On Wednesday, Saskatchewan’s public prosecutions office said the Crown would not appeal the verdict, after coming to the conclusion that there was no legal basis to do so.

The 2016 shooting set the province on edge, laying bare the deep fissures that persist between some indigenous and non-indigenous communities.

Standing Rock tribe asks judge for “meaningful role” in study of DAPL’s impact on their water

Native American tribe is accusing officials of being uncooperative as they conduct a court-ordered study of the Dakota Access oil pipeline’s impact on tribal water supply.

The Standing Rock Sioux is asking a federal judge to order that they be allowed “a meaningful role” in the process. The Cheyenne River Sioux last month made a similar request. If U.S. District Judge James Boasberg grants the requests, it could delay the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ anticipated April 2 completion of the work.

The Corps has been working since last summer to meet Boasberg’s order to further study the pipeline’s impact on tribal interests, including how an oil spill under Lake Oahe in the Dakotas might impact the tribes’ water supply. Late last year, he also ordered the Corps and Texas-based pipeline developer Energy Transfer Partners to work with the tribes on completing a spill response plan and selecting an independent engineering company to review whether the project complies with federal laws and regulations.

Tribal attorney Jan Hasselman in court documents filed March 2 accuses the Corps of “consistently ignoring the requests of the tribe for information and meaningful consultation” and calls the tribe’s participation “correspondingly handicapped.”

“Government-to-government consultation has not even begun,” he said. “The tribe furthermore remains in the dark about the exchange of information that is occurring between (ETP) and the Corps.”

One of Texas’ Most Notorious Prosecutors Was Just Voted Out of Office. Expect More of That. – How progressive activists are boosting reformer DAs.

Nico LaHood is the kind of district attorney who drives criminal justice reformers nuts. In his first term running the prosecutor’s office in Bexar County, Texas, which includes San Antonio, LaHood used his office to promote his anti-vaccination views, float Islamophobic conspiracy theories, and threaten to ruin his critics’ livelihoods. He personally prosecuted death penalty cases—an unusual move for a district attorney—and offered support for SB4, the new state law that imposes criminal penalties on local law enforcement agencies that limit cooperation with federal immigration authorities.

And as of today, he’s a lame duck. On Tuesday, LaHood was swept out of office in the Texas Democratic primary by San Antonio defense attorney Joe Gonzales, whose law firm LaHood once threatened to “shut down” after the firm’s attorneys accused LaHood’s office of having a conflict of interest in a murder case.

Tuesday’s outcome could have sweeping ramifications for criminal justice reform in one of the nation’s most populous counties. Among other things, Gonzales has promised to end cash bail for certain crimes, a practice that often puts low-income residents who have yet to be convicted of a crime behind bars indefinitely or forces them to pay exorbitant rates to bail-bond companies.

But Gonzales’s victory also has important national implications. Bexar was the latest front in an effort to focus national progressive organizing energy on oft-overlooked district attorney races.

My statement on today's fundraiser hosted by the corporate insurance lobby in Michigan against #MedicareForAll.

"Our campaign has chosen: we stand with the people – from every part of the state – who are coming together for a politics that cares about them first and always.” pic.twitter.com/fZXt3VIpYQ

— Abdul El-Sayed (@AbdulElSayed) March 7, 2018

FOX43 Capitol Beat: Lieutenant Gov. Candidate John Fetterman (Video @ Link)

John Fetterman, the fourth-term Democrat mayor of Braddock outside Pittsburgh who most recently announced his candidacy for Lieutenant Governor, stopped by the FOX43 studios to join Morning News anchor on the FOX43 Capitol Beat.

Fetterman, a 1987 graduate of Central York High School, has made national news since becoming Braddock’s mayor in 2005, decreasing crime in the former steel town and revitalizing the city. Fetterman also doesn’t look the part of your typical politician; despite standing 6’8″ tall with a bald head and gruff goatee, and typically preferring the casual wear of a black button-down and jeans instead of suits, he is Harvard educated.

Primary Election 2018: It’s not over yet for Denton County voters

Some Denton County Republicans who won their party’s nomination Tuesday may be watching the rearview mirror on the way to Election Day in November.

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The race between Democratic hopefuls Linsey Fagan and Will Fisher came down to the wire Tuesday night, with Fagan securing nearly 53 percent of the vote and winning the nomination for U.S. Congress District 26. She faces incumbent U.S. Rep. Michael Burgess, R-Pilot Point, in November.

More on Jan McDowell in TX-24:

Q&A: Jan McDowell is running for U.S. representative, Texas district 24

1. Why did you decide to run for this office?

I was originally inspired by the 2010 documentary “Inside Job,” which told the story of the ineptitude and complicity of our government in causing the financial and housing disaster of 2008. Watching it with friends, we agreed: “Someone needs to run for office to do something different.” By 2015, I had decided that enough is enough. I was determined to make a difference, so I began my 2016 campaign. This determination continues to motivate me in the 2018 campaign.

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3. If elected, what would be your top priorities?
My top priorities will be shrinking the enormous and ever-growing income and wealth inequality gap in our country, advocating for universal health care and protecting our environment.

We must level the playing field and provide equal opportunity for everyone to thrive and be full participants and contributors in our economy.

Health care is a right of every person, not a privilege for those able to afford it. It is appalling for the United States to be the only very highly developed nation in the world without universal health care. Studies have shown that we spend more and achieve poorer outcomes than other developed nations. A reordering of our priorities is clearly called for.

And now that I have three young grandchildren I’m more determined than ever to safeguard the health and sustainability of our planet.

Poll shows Watson with double-digit lead over Canon

If the primary election were held today, Liz Watson would win going away in the Democratic primary for the 9th District congressional seat, according to a recent poll.

The survey, conducted by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research, a firm based in Washington, D.C., sampled 400 Democratic voters across the 9th District. The poll was conducted using live telephone interviews on both landline and cell phones, March 3-5.

The numbers released Tuesday show Watson with a 13-point lead over challenger Dan Canon from New Albany. The same poll also showed a large amount of voters undecided. A third candidate in the Democratic Primary, Rob Chatlos, was not listed by name in the poll. Both Watson and Chatlos are from Bloomington.

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When reached by phone Wednesday, Watson said she is traveling the district each weekend and holding town hall meetings in several cities and towns, in an effort to get her message out to voters. She was also excited with the polling numbers.

“We are out in the district talking to voters about kitchen table issues that keep them up at night,” Watson said, adding those issues include health care, education, the opioid problem and good-paying jobs.

The poll released Tuesday is misleading, said Dustin Collins, campaign manager for Canon, who was unavailable for a phone interview Wednesday. Collins said an internal poll, conducted through telephone calls to Democratic voters and those newly registered to vote, shows Canon with a double-digit lead. He said “the campaign is going great.”

Getting To Know Sameena Mustafa

On March 20, the 5th Congressional District of Illinois is holding a Democratic primary. The district covers parts of Cook and DuPage counties, including Rosemont and a small part of Des Plaines.

Current 5th District seat holder Democratic U.S. Rep. Mike Quigley, who has held the position since 2009, is facing three Democratic primary challengers in the upcoming 2018 election. The winner of the March primary will face off against Republican Tom Hanson in the Nov. 6 general election.

In preparation for the upcoming primary, the Rosemont Journal asked the Democratic contenders some basic questions about their political positions.

This week, we get to know Chicago resident Sameena Mustafa, whose answers have been edited for length.

1) Why are you running?

This is a critical time in our nation’s history, and committed citizens are demanding better leadership at all levels of government…I was shocked to learn Quigley voted to increase national defense spending but did not support Medicare for All…The 5th District wants a bold, progressive leader in Washington who will fight for progressive policies like Medicare for All, a living wage and getting big money out of politics. We don’t have one right now. That’s why I’m running.

5) What do you think are the biggest issues facing your constituents?

Healthcare​ – Healthcare is a right, not a privilege. Our healthcare has been controlled for too long by health insurance and pharmaceutical companies who put profits over people.

A Living Wage​ – The income and wealth gap in the United States is unlike that of any country in the developed world. Over the last 25 years, only the most affluent families in America have added to their overall net worth.

Social Security​ – My generation and younger generations believe that they are paying into a system from which they will not see any benefits when they most need it.

Cigna to buy Express Scripts in $67 billion deal

Health insurer Cigna on Thursday announced it was acquiring pharmacy benefits manager Express Scripts in a $67 billion cash and stock deal.

Express Scripts is the largest independent drug middleman in the country. The acquisition is the latest to shake up the health industry as it looks to lower the rising cost of care. The move follows a similar merger of insurer Aetna and the drug store chain CVS in December.

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Cigna is aiming to lower costs by putting health insurance and pharmacy claims under the same umbrella company and to give themselves more leverage in price negotiations with drugmakers.

Pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) act as buying intermediaries between drug manufacturers and health insurance plans and their beneficiaries. They negotiate drug rebates and pass the savings on to patients.

Democrats must stop sabotaging candidates who can win in 2018

When you run a national political committee like the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, you need to very careful about publicly putting your thumb on the scales during a contested Democratic primary.

As a former chairman of the DCCC, I rarely am rarely critical about anything the committee does because I generally think they do a difficult job very well.

However, the DCCC made a major blunder this week by trying to sabotage the campaign of Laura Moser in the 7th congressional district in the Texas Democratic primary. Their public attack on her backfired. It permitted her to raise a significant amount of money online, and she qualified for a May runoff by finishing second.

Unfortunately, they are in the process of making the same mistake again by trying to undercut the campaign of Amy McGrath in the 6th district of Kentucky.

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She retired from the Marine Corps in early summer, moved her family (husband and three children) back to Kentucky, and hired a first-rate media firm (Putnam Partners) to help launch her campaign. By the middle of summer, they had produced a terrific announcement video, which went viral and helped her raise $1 million. She, of course, let the DCCC know about her plans and her progress.

However, the DCCC had its own agenda and spent months trying to recruit Jim Gray, an openly gay millionaire businessman who was serving as mayor of Lexington, Kentucky. By all press accounts, Mayor Gray had been a reluctant candidate, but the DCCC stayed after him until he agreed to run and announced his candidacy in November. The DCCC made no secret of its preference for Mayor Gray.

What’s wrong with this picture? First, Amy McGrath had already made a big splash as a candidate and had been working on her campaign for months. Second, it’s not rocket science to figure out that an articulate, smart female Marine was an excellent fit for a conservative congressional district in a Southern state. Third, it is clear that women are highly motivated to vote this year because of their dislike for Trump and will rally around qualified women running for public office.

Personally I wasn’t sold on McGraths original ad and prefer Reggie Thomas at the moment.

Sanders backs Ill. Dem primarying incumbent

Vermont Independent Sen. Bernie Sanders is throwing his weight behind an Illinois candidate threatening to unseat Rep. Dan Lipinski (D-Ill.) in the Democratic primary.

Sanders’s decision to endorse Democrat Marie Newman underscores the deep fault lines that are emerging in the race as progressives target Lipinski for his views on issues like LGBT rights and immigration.

“Marie Newman has made it clear that she will be a champion for working families in Illinois, which is why I am proud to support her campaign” Sanders said in a statement, citing her support for policies like health care for all and raising the minimum wage.
“She will defend women’s rights, LGBT rights and ensure immigrants have a safe path to citizenship. I am proud to stand with Marie and look forward to continuing to fight alongside her on these and other critical issues once she’s elected to Congress.”

Bill Nye Confronts Justin Trudeau Over Kinder Morgan Pipeline

At a recent sit-down at the University of Ottawa, TV personality and science advocate Bill Nye confronted Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau about his approval of the controversial Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain pipeline expansion.

“I’ve been to Fort McMurray, Alberta. It really is an amazing place in the most troubling way,” the Science Guy said, likely referring to the area’s notorious tar sands. “But this pipeline … tell us about the Kinder Morgan pipeline.”

Nye cited a study from The Solutions Project that found Canada could entirely replace fossil fuels by 2050 by switching to renewable energy sources.

“Nevertheless, there’s this enormous fossil fuel industry,” Nye said. “Tell us about that.”

“First of all, I agree,” Trudeau replied. “There is tremendous potential for renewable energy … However, we can’t get there tomorrow, right? We’re not going to get there tomorrow. So, we are going to have a transition phase while we develop alternatives to fossil fuels.”

Trudeau touted that his government is working on other environmental initiatives such as establishing a national price on carbon and a $1.5 billion ocean protection plan. All those initiatives, he said, are “pieces that go together.”

However, he ultimately defended his approval of the pipeline expansion, insisting “the environment and the economy need to go together.”

‘We’ll See You in Court’: Kids Climate Lawsuit Moves Forward After Judge Denies Trump

A federal court rejected the Trump administration’s attempt to shut down a landmark lawsuit initiated by 21 young plaintiffs suing the government for its creation of climate danger.

The three-judge panel with the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco denied the White House’s writ of mandamus petition filed in June, a rarely used legal maneuver that would have dismissed Juliana v. United States.

In the unanimous decision Wednesday, Chief Judge Sidney R. Thomas called the petition a “drastic and extraordinary remedy reserved for really extraordinary causes” and the Trump administration’s motion did not satisfy that standard.

“The issues that the defendants raise on mandamus are better addressed through the ordinary course of litigation,” Thomas wrote, thus allowing the case to move forward.