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Ilhan Omar & Bernie Sanders to introduce bill that cancels all $1.6 Trillion in US student debt

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Sanders is proposing the federal government pay to wipe clean the student debt held by 45 million Americans — including all private and graduate school debt — as part of a package that also would make public universities, community colleges and trade schools tuition-free. Sanders is proposing to pay for these plans with a tax on Wall Street his campaign says will raise more than $2 trillion over 10 years, though some tax experts give lower revenue estimates. Sanders will be joined Monday by Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), who will introduce legislation in the House to eliminate all student debt … Continue reading →

FL Senate bill teaches us why Bernie Sanders is right about voting from prison.

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We all have a right to choose our government. That right should be sacrosanct, and cannot not have any caveats. Bernie said as much a few days ago, to many, it sounded like a radical idea. Forgetting the millions of people disenfranchised for drug possession, too many gave into the right wing frame of asking whether the Boston bomber or a mass murderer should be able to vote. We should not have to plead for rights to be respected, but I will let the FL Senate explain why Bernie is right on this. Last week, Florida’s House set things in motion with … Continue reading →

Who is Pete Buttigieg?

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Have you watched the Showtime series House of Lies? It’s worth watching the first episode if nothing else. The series follows a small team of management consultants at a fictional firm that in the industry rankings is second only to McKinsey. The team is led by Marty Kaan, a partner at the fictional firm who happens to be black. He also has a bi-racial child who may be transgender. In the first episode, Marty and his team fly into New York to pitch to the fictional Metro Capital, a financial firm on Park Avenue that sold a lot of mortgages during the … Continue reading →

Elizabeth Warren: “You’ve been paying a wealth tax for years…”

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Elizabeth Warren has an uncanny ability to explain her policy proposals in easy to understand ways. She did that yesterday at her town hall in Nevada, and one line stood out. It explains her proposed wealth tax: Warren on what the wealth tax can pay for: Universal child care, universal pre-K, universal college, student debt cancellation for 95 percent of the country — "plus, if you sign up now, 12 steak knives." — Dave Weigel (@daveweigel) April 28, 2019 As a reminder, here’s what Warren is proposing: Under Warren’s plan, the tax rate on wealth would be two per cent, … Continue reading →

NYT finds the “stop Sanders” Democrats they’ve been looking for, on K Street.

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Thomas Edsall has an article in the NYT titled: Bernie Sanders Scares a Lot of People, and Quite a Few of Them Are Democrats Reading that headline, you’d expect they were talking about rank and file Democrats, you know voters. You’d be very wrong. The answers I got from Democrats who make their living in politics […] In this light, I asked a group of Democratic and liberal-leaning consultants, pollsters, economists and political scientists what the likelihood of a Sanders’ nomination was, what his prospects would be in the general election, and how Democratic House and Senate candidates might fare with … Continue reading →

What does Medicare For All mean for those with private insurance and health care companies?

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Let’s get right into it. If the Senate plan introduced by Bernie Sanders and 14 other Democrats were  to be enacted on March 1 2021, then: on Jan 1, 2025 (4th calendar year) benefits would be available to all residents of the US those under 19 can, if they wish enroll on Jan 1, 2022 So what happens to those with private insurance? You switch over to M4A. It’s simple: No deductibles, no surprise bills for out-of-network services, and no copays. And if you change jobs, no changing insurance plans or worrying about losing the coverage that you and your family depend on. — Bernie … Continue reading →

Senator Turbotax meet Congressman H&R Block

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  Just in time for Tax Day, the for-profit tax preparation industry is about to realize one of its long-sought goals. Congressional Democrats and Republicans are moving to permanently bar the IRS from creating a free electronic tax filing system. — www.propublica.org/… Several countries have systems that automatically calculate tax liability for most tax-payers and send it automatically to the tax-payer. That reduces tax preparation time and expense. It also reduces the incidence of fraud, we’ve seen numerous instances in the US where identity-thieves have filed fraudulent returns with the IRS and collected refunds. The victim of ID theft is left … Continue reading →

Rep. Ilhan Omar reminds us: “Stephen Miller is a White Nationalist”

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Rep. Ilhan Omar said the obvious yesterday: Stephen Miller is a white nationalist. The fact that he still has influence on policy and political appointments is an outrage. https://t.co/7NyMDgojd7— Ilhan Omar (@IlhanMN) April 8, 2019 This should not come as a shock to anyone. His family also knows he’s a white nationalist, his uncle wrote an Op-Ed about how he saw Miller’s politics as a betrayal of everything their family was: I have watched with dismay and increasing horror as my nephew, who is an educated man and well aware of his heritage, has become the architect of immigration policies … Continue reading →

The paradigm shift we need for single-payer

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In 1962, Thomas Kuhn published The Structure of Scientific Revolution a book that changed the way we think about scientific progress. Kuhn posits that scientific progress is punctuated progress where major advances are made by what he called “paradigm shifts”. These paradigm shifts open unexpected areas of enquiry, and allow scientists to accumulate knowledge in more gradual steps. These revolutions were often initiated by unknown scientists presenting radical ideas outside the mainstream. This powerful idea of “paradigm shifts” has since entered the general lexicon, but its implications are not always fully appreciated. Though Kuhn applied his conception of revolutionary change … Continue reading →

The time for playing games on Medicare For All is over

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Abdul El-Sayed said something yesterday that brings into focus the essential dysfunction which is the US health-care system: Cost of a SINGLE vial of insulin: Canada: $32United States: $300 That's TEN TIMES more for the same exact drug. Our healthcare system is broken — and it's putting lives at risk. We're long overdue for #MedicareForAll— Abdul El-Sayed (@AbdulElSayed) April 2, 2019 Millions of Americans need insulin to survive. The researchers (Frederick Banting, Charles Best and James Collip) who developed insulin in the 1920s knew this and wanted to ensure the medication would remain affordable and safe. They assigned the patent to the … Continue reading →

Armed Israeli soldiers threaten teachers, arrest 9-year old Palestinian boy from elementary school

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It was an average day in the occupied territories. Heavily armed Israeli soldiers arrested a 9 year old boy from his elementary school, brandishing their guns and threatening everyone around them. 'You threw a stone.' Video shows armed Israeli soldiers forcibly seizing 9-year-old Palestinian boy in his school https://t.co/kMeYmEmHm9 pic.twitter.com/SWy5y5Vlsz — CNN (@CNN) April 1, 2019 This is a regular occurrence in the West Bank, where young Palestinian children are routinely assaulted and arrested by Israeli soldiers, often no older than 18 themselves, but conscripted by their government to enforce an oppressive military occupation. You may remember, for instance the … Continue reading →

Will anyone remember Tongo Tongo, Niger, or Yakla, Yemen the way they do “Benghazi”?

The Progressive Wing Posted on by

Walk down any street in the US and ask people about Tongo, Tongo, Niger, you will get blank stares. Ask them about what happened in Yakla, Yemen and you will get confused looks. Now, ask them about “Benghazi” and you’ll get an immediate reaction. Why is that? Because Republicans took the attacks on two US compounds in Benghazi, Libya and held a hundred hearings about it, they made it part of the conversation. They made it news. To the point where there were books and movies made about it. Trey Gowdy practically made a career out of chairing one sub-committee. Americans … Continue reading →

We need to do better than “anyone but Trump”.

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At times, it seems the Trump years have been a daily assault on our senses, and for those vulnerable enough to be targeted by the police/ICE, then bodies. The impunity our deeply skewed system of justice grants the rich has been bared. Well connected serial child-rapists like Jeffrey Epstein get off with barely a slap on the wrist. People like Paul Manafort, guilty of innumerable crimes, get handed watered down sentences by judges who suddenly discover the injustice of mandatory sentencing rules when the person receiving the sentence looks like them. Meanwhile, the same judges don’t blink twice at sending a poor, … Continue reading →

Ayanna Pressley doesn’t like the DCCC’s new incumbent protection rules

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Most Americans live in gerrymandered House districts where the outcome of the general election is pre-determined in almost every cycle. This leaves most votes with almost no choice, reduces civic engagement and drives down voter participation. This is a fundamentally undemocratic system. The only thing keeping politicians from becoming completely unaccountable is the threat of a primary challenge. Ayanna Pressley was elected to Congress thanks to exactly such a primary challenge. She beat a 20-year incumbent, Michael Capuano to win the Democratic nomination for MA-7. So it’s understandable that she would take it a little personally when the DCCC revealed … Continue reading →

Elizabeth Warren visits Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, highlights poverty, housing, small farms

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One of the positive aspects of a competitive primary is seeing candidates campaign in a lot of states, not just the traditional “battle-grounds”. Candidates for president don’t always go to MS, TN, or AL because they aren’t battleground states. But I’m running to be president of the entire United States. I’m planning to travel to every corner of this country—and I’ve got the best staff who will make it happen! pic.twitter.com/8J1finLQZO — Elizabeth Warren (@ewarren) March 28, 2019 It is significant that Senator Warren conducted a three-state tour visiting Tennessee, Mississippi and Alabama. It is rare for Democratic primary candidates to … Continue reading →