Nearly every 2016 presidential candidate, of both parties, has spoken out about the burgeoning student loan crisis in recent months. It’s a vital issue for young voters whose support the candidates know can make or break their bid for office. But as candidates promise to improve college affordability and accessibility, some of them also have developed… Continue reading “Candidates and the for-profit colleges”
Jeb Fared Extremely Well During 2008 Financial Crisis While serving as Governor of Florida John Ellis Bush (Jeb) forged a relationship with the Lehman Brothers that would prove catastrophic for Florida taxpayers and public employees, but the kicker is how Jeb was rewarded afterwards. In 2005 and 2006, International Business Times writes, the Wall Street investment… Continue reading “Jeb destroyed public pensions in Florida and cashed in”
H&R Block, looking out for the rights of people like them to force people like us to spend money on them:
In several letters to Congress over the past year, H&R Block has pushed to expand the Schedule EIC—the form required to claim the credit—as a backstop against tax fraud and improper payments. The new form would go from one page to five, and it would incorporate most of a 30-question eligibility checklist that only paid preparers, as opposed to self-filers, are currently required to submit. The Senate incorporated the proposal into its 2016 funding provisions, which require the IRS to use an expanded Schedule EIC next tax season.
In its letters and hearing testimony, H&R Block encouraged lawmakers to add similar paperwork to claims for other refundable tax credits. Again, the company was successful: The Senate bill adds paperwork to the Child Tax Credit; the American Opportunity Tax Credit, which reduces taxes owed for tuition-paying college students; and the Premium Tax Credit, which helps families pay for health insurance.
“Along with undercutting the EITC’s basic purpose…by discouraging eligible working families from filing for it, the committee’s proposed directive is unnecessary,” writesRobert Greenstein, president of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. That, he says, is because self-filers are already inundated with eligibility information: The rules are covered extensively in five pages of EITC instructions appended to tax-return forms, and in a separate 37-page IRS pamphlet.
“This seems to me like a fairly naked attempt by Block to get its market share up by basically driving a lot of people away from self-preparing,” Greenstein toldPolitico Pro. (Greenstein was not available for comment on this story.)
H&R Block said in a statement last week that “this is not about competitive business interests. It’s about reducing fraud and protecting the future of the EITC.”
I’ve heard of this in my city, too. Another scam!
A Jacksonville, Florida dentist has been accused of unnecessarily pulling children’s teeth while also ripping off Medicaid for millions of dollars. Dr. Howard Schneider was recently served with 58 notices of intent to sue by former patients who say the dentist performed unwanted and unneeded dental procedures on their children. The Florida Attorney General’s Office has… Continue reading “Dentist accused of ripping off Medicaid by pulling kids’ teeth”
Ron Fournier really outdid himself yesterday morning: Trumpmania is what you get after the conservative wasn’t compassionate and the liberal abandoned hope for change. He’s a symptom, not a cure — Ron Fournier (@ron_fournier) August 31, 2015 Yes. Liberals bear equal responsibility for a xenophobic whackjob making a mockery of the already mock-worthy electoral process because… Continue reading “The rules you have to pretend exist: Both sides do it”
They’re Republicans, so I guess it’s redundant. But there they are, on a day when three Category 4 hurricanes are lined up in the Pacific, talking like the fools they are:
WASHINGTON — The Senate rejected the scientific consensus that humans are causing climate change, days after NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration declared 2014 the hottest year ever recorded on Earth.
The Republican-controlled Senate defeated a measure Wednesday stating that climate change is real and that human activity significantly contributes to it. Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, offered the measure as the Senate debated the Keystone XL pipeline, which would tap the carbon-intensive oil sands in the Canadian province of Alberta.
The Senate voted 50-49 on the measure, which required 60 votes in order to pass.
“Only in the halls of Congress is this a controversial piece of legislation,” Schatz said.
The chairman of the environment committee, Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., is an enthusiastic denier of climate change, saying it is the “biggest hoax” perpetrated against mankind.
“The hoax is there are some people so arrogant to think they are so powerful they can change the climate,” Inhofe said Wednesday on the Senate floor. “Man can’t change the climate.”
The Senate, with Inhofe’s support, did pass a separate measure saying that climate change is real — just not that human activity is a cause. Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., was the only senator to vote against it.
Hurricanes #Kilo, #Ignacio, #Jimena & Tropical Depression #14E (#Kevin) spinning in the Pacific this morning [GIF] pic.twitter.com/enAAr4QfYm
— Dayna Vettese (@daynavettese) September 1, 2015
Here’s yet another example of “newspaper companies made the choice to destroy newspapers which means newspaper destruction was inevitable due to randomness and things like ‘change’ that we are not going to explain or quantify or really research anyway, here is some mush:” Hurricane Katrina dealt a staggering blow to New Orleans 10 years ago this… Continue reading “‘They made a decision not to be a viable newspaper’”
So in our eagerness to take down the Russians, we actually funded the Afghani provocation? Isn’t American Empire just peachy?
From an interview in Le Nouvel Observateur, Paris, 15-21 January 1998, translated by William Blum, available at http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/BRZ110A.html
Question: The former director of the CIA, Robert Gates, stated in his memoirs [“From the Shadows”], that American intelligence services began to aid the Mujahadeen in Afghanistan 6 months before the Soviet intervention. In this period you were the national security adviser to President Carter. You therefore played a role in this affair. Is that correct?
Brzezinski: Yes. According to the official version of history, CIA aid to the Mujahadeen began during 1980, that is to say, after the Soviet army invaded Afghanistan, 24 Dec 1979. But the reality, secretly guarded until now, is completely otherwise Indeed, it was July 3, 1979 that President Carter signed the first directive for secret aid to the opponents of the pro-Soviet regime in Kabul. And that very day, I wrote a note to the president in which I explained to him that in my opinion this aid was going to induce a Soviet military intervention.
Q: Despite this risk, you were an advocate of this covert action. But perhaps you yourself desired this Soviet entry into war and looked to provoke it?
B: It isn’t quite that. We didn’t push the Russians to intervene, but we knowingly increased the probability that they would.
Q: When the Soviets justified their intervention by asserting that they intended to fight against a secret involvement of the United States in Afghanistan, people didn’t believe them. However, there was a basis of truth. You don’t regret anything today?
B: Regret what? That secret operation was an excellent idea. It had the effect of drawing the Russians into the Afghan trap and you want me to regret it? The day that the Soviets officially crossed the border, I wrote to President Carter. We now have the opportunity of giving to the USSR its Vietnam war. Indeed, for almost 10 years, Moscow had to carry on a war unsupportable by the government, a conflict that brought about the demoralization and finally the breakup of the Soviet empire.
Q: And neither do you regret having supported the Islamic fundamentalism, having given arms and advice to future terrorists?
B: What is most important to the history of the world? The Taliban or the collapse of the Soviet empire? Some stirred-up Moslems or the liberation of Central Europe and the end of the cold war?
Q: Some stirred-up Moslems? But it has been said and repeated Islamic fundamentalism represents a world menace today.
B: Nonsense! It is said that the West had a global policy in regard to Islam. That is stupid. There isn’t a global Islam. Look at Islam in a rational manner and without demagoguery or emotion. It is the leading religion of the world with 1.5 billion followers. But what is there in common among Saudi Arabian fundamentalism, moderate Morocco, Pakistan militarism, Egyptian pro-Western or Central Asian secularism? Nothing more than what unites the Christian countries.
Q: "Are you an Old Testament guy or a New Testament guy?" http://t.co/j23RVUBPtm #TrumpBible
https://t.co/kMFirbxruJ
— Bloomberg Politics (@bpolitics) August 27, 2015
He “loves” the Bible, but doesn’t seem to remember which parts:
Donald Trump declined to name a favorite verse in the Bible on Bloomberg’s “With All Due Respect” on Wednesday. He also wouldn’t say which testament he preferred, saying he liked both equally. “The Bible means a lot to me, but I don’t want to get into specifics,” Trump said.
The response on Twitter:
Blessed are the meek, for without them who'd clean the toilets? #TrumpBible
— Jean Esselink (@Uncucumbered) August 28, 2015
Noah? I like people who build things. But wood? That's a low quality material. I will make arks great again. #TrumpBible
— Trump Bible (@TheTrumpBible) August 27, 2015
"OK, slave labor is bad. Maybe it's bad, I don't know. But look at those pyramids! Solid construction. I'd put my name on that." #TrumpBible
— Kevin M. Kruse (@KevinMKruse) August 27, 2015
"Nehemiah. What an idiot. Why not get the Ammonites to rebuild the wall? Easy." #TrumpBible
— Rachel Held Evans (@rachelheldevans) August 27, 2015
"Moses? Awful negotiator. 'Let my people go'? If I'd been there, it would've been: 'Hey, Pharoah. We're leaving. Deal with it.'" #TrumpBible
— Kevin M. Kruse (@KevinMKruse) August 27, 2015
I love God. He's a builder. Made the world in 6 days. That's YUUUUUUUGE. I would have used more marble. But He did a nice job. #TrumpBible
— Donald J. Drumpf (@RealDonalDrumpf) August 27, 2015
In Ferguson, before 2015. Good, since they were treating residents like cash cows:
The municipal court judge in Ferguson, Missouri, on Monday announced sweeping changes to the city’s court system, including an order to withdraw all arrest warrants issued in that city before December 31, 2014.
Municipal Court Judge Donald McCullin, who was appointed in June, also changed the conditions for pretrial release. According to a press release put out by Ferguson, all defendants will be given new court dates with alternative penalties like payment plans or community service.
Ferguson became the focal point of a national debate about race and policing in August 2014, after then-city police Officer Darren Wilson, who is white, shot and killed teenager Michael Brown, who is black.
A grand jury declined to charge Wilson in that case. Yet protests surrounding it also revealed other issues involving Ferguson police and the municipal court system.