With public schools under attack everywhere, a inspiring victory came out of Wisconsin last week. The American Federation for Children (AFC), a pro school privatization group funded by billionaires from Michigan and millionaires from several other states, entered a slate of candidates in Democratic primaries for the state Assembly and Senate. The battle was joined when … Read More
Almost daily we read about another apparently stiff financial penalty meted out for corporate malfeasance. This year corporations are on track to pay as much as $8 billion to resolve charges of defrauding the government, a record sum, according to the Department of Justice. Last year big business paid the SEC $2.8 billion to settle disputes. … Read More
In 2012 we accept as received wisdom that government is unresponsive while a competitive marketplace forces private business to offer quality customer service. So when Representative Henry Cuellar (D-TX) introduced his warmly received bill, The Government Customer Service Improvement Act, we considered his announcement a truism, “When taxpayers interact with a government agency, they deserve the … Read More
The New York Times reports that on August 7 a federal judge approved a settlement between the Justice Department and Morgan Stanley. Here’s the crime. In 2006 Morgan Stanley entered into a complex swap agreement with the New York electricity company KeySpan that gave it a stake in the profits of a competitor, enabling both to … Read More
On this, the 20th anniversary of the opening of the first charter school, kudzu comes to mind. In the 1930s the Soil Conservation Service (SCS) paid farmers $8 per acre to plant this Japanese vine whose deep root structure helps reduce erosion and enrich depleted soil. Farmers planted more than 1.2 million acres. Twenty years later … Read More
Karen Piper, Professor of English at the University of Missouri in Columbia informs us of a factor behind the spring uprising in Egypt the mass media missed: the privatization of water. The American media focused mainly on internal corruption and oppression. They did not report on the role of the international superpowers in influencing the Mubarak … Read More
Nowhere is the phrase American Exceptionalism more appropriately used than when describing our debate over health care. Outside the bubble that is the United States health care is viewed as a right, recognition that sickness and injury can strike anyone despite their best efforts and an acknowledgement of a basic obligation civilized societies have to its … Read More
If chutzpah is killing your parents then throwing yourself on the mercy of the court because you’re an orphan then Peter Orszag is the poster child for chutzpah. In his recent article in Bloomberg News he insists the best fix for the post office is to take it private. Where does the chutzpah come from? Orszag … Read More
“Texas judge rules atmosphere, air is a public trust”, reads the headline in the Boston Globe. A tiny breakthrough but with big potential consequences. And as we continue to suffer from one of the most extended heat waves in US history, as major crops wither and fires rage in a dozen states, we need all the … Read More
