The Big Picture – By Glynn Wilson – WASHINGTON, D.C. — Imagine, if you will, what it would feel like to be a rain soaked soldier (like the ones depicted in “All Quiet on the Western Front”) huddled a muddy trench fighting a stalemated civil war for 40 years. Some days just north of the…
Staff Report – WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Biden administration announced Wednesday it is making $250 million available to develop innovative strategies to cut climate pollution and build clean energy economies. The money will distributed in the form of planning grants through the Environmental Protection Agency, and the funding will go to states, local governments, Tribes,…
By Topher Sanders and Dan Schwartz – ProPublica – ProPublica learned of the policy after reviewing the rules of the company, which is engulfed in controversy after one of its trains derailed this month, releasing toxic flammable gas over East Palestine, Ohio. The policy applies specifically to the company’s Wayside Detector Help Desk, which monitors…
EDITOR’S NOTE: There’s been much hand wringing and commentary on what’s wrong with America, democracy and why people don’t trust the federal government, which led in part to the Jan. 6 Capitol attack. We submit that the reason is pretty obvious and right in front of everyone’s face. Republicans have been running for office for…
By Ken Buck – Special to the New American Journal – The first brilliant idea Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page had was to “crawl” — and trawl — the World Wide Web. Using spiders, it would copy what it found, create vast databases of web content, and then “index” that content, evaluating it…
Staff Report – WASHINGTON, D.C. – Anyone who works in national parks, volunteers with the National Park Service or visits the parks can attest to the fact that staff shortages and maintenance backlogs have plagued the parks for years, through the administrations of Republicans and Democrats. If there is any truth to documentary filmmaker Ken…
ANALYSIS – By Glynn Wilson – WASHINGTON, D.C. — Funding the government of the United States used to be a fairly routine affair, and for most of its history, Congress went home in recess before Thanksgiving and members didn’t come back to Washington until the new year. Not anymore. For the past 40 years or…
Staff Report – WASHINGTON, D.C. — Back during the height of news covering during the midterm election campaign, mainstream media pundits and commentators often blamed Democrats for ineffective messaging and failing to get the word out on how President Joe Biden’s legislative successes would help suffering people even in rural America, where working class people…
By Glynn Wilson – WASHINGTON, D.C. — Some people say you shouldn’t talk about politics at family gatherings on holidays like Thanksgiving, as incendiary as that can be these days. But as power is shifting in the nation’s capital city and the Capitol building, and with juicy political plums to be plucked after Christmas, you…
When the Brook Trout Leaps – By Anonymous – The slender dew-tipped grasses are trembling in the breeze, The east is blushing rosy red beneath the Sun’s caress, The wild rose bends to kiss the stream—but only Nature sees, And the reed-harps play weird music just above the water cress. The quail is calling loudly…
Staff Report – WASHINGTON, D.C. – Spurred on by high gas prices and increasing evidence of climate change due to global warming from the burning of fossil fuels for transportation as well as energy, the Biden Administration moved quickly and aggressively to reverse Trump administration rollbacks in new car fuel economy standards and announced much…
By Glynn Wilson – WASHINGTON, D.C. – Thanksgiving turkey break time is over for members of Congress, who return to work in the Capitol this week and now have only a few weeks before the Christmas-New Years recess to find a way to fund the United States government and pass some key bills to show…
By Glynn Wilson – The Biden administration issued a final regulation Thursday aimed at cutting emissions that lead to global warming and climate change by announcing the establishment of a program to cap and phase down the production and consumption of hydrofluorocarbons in the United States by 85 percent over the next 15 years, according…
Staff Report – Hurricane Ida is forecast to rapidly intensify into a major hurricane as it draws closer to the northern Gulf Coast this weekend, where it will bring life-threatening storm surge, dangerous rainfall and flooding, and potentially catastrophic winds and tornadoes on the 16th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. Ida is currently centered 400 miles…
By Glynn Wilson – WASHINGTON, D.C. — Millions of children just in the United States have been diagnosed with some form of attention deficit disorder and/or hyperactivity disorder by psychiatrists and psychologists, and are often treated with pharmaceutical medication or behavioral therapy. But what if these problems are not genetic or cultural psychological issues, but…
By Lydia DePillis – ProPublica – Late last summer, after churning along through the pandemic with only a two-week pause, managers at FreightCar America called hundreds of workers into the break area at the company’s factory near Muscle Shoals, Alabama, to tell them that the plant was closing for good. For some employees, the news…
By Jesse Eisinger, Jeff Ernsthausen and Paul Kiel – ProPublica – In 2007, Jeff Bezos, then a multibillionaire and now the world’s richest man, did not pay a penny in federal income taxes. He achieved the feat again in 2011. In 2018, Tesla founder Elon Musk, the second-richest person in the world, also paid no…
Staff Report – WASHINGTON — The Biden-Harris administration submitted the President’s proposed budget for fiscal year 2022 to Congress on Friday, and it calls for a new investment of $3.5 billion in the National Park Service to help modernize the parks and park infrastructure. It calls for new investments in conservation efforts, expanding visitor access…
Staff Report – WASHINGTON, D.C. – In a clean break from the anti-nature politics and policies of the previous administration, the Biden-Harris administration has begun to outline a different vision for how the United States can work collaboratively to conserve and restore public lands, waters and wildlife that in many ways support and sustain the…
Guest Column – By Robert Reich – Income and wealth are now more concentrated at the top than at any time over the last 80 years, and our unjust tax system is a big reason why. The tax code is rigged for the rich, enabling a handful of wealthy individuals to exert undue influence over…
