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via Richard Wolf, USA Today WASHINGTON — If the range of possible Supreme Court rulings on gay marriage this month requires a scorecard, the potential confusion arising from those decisions may demand a manual. It’s not as simple as whether gays and lesbians can marry or not, and whether they become eligible for federal benefits. … Continue reading
via Paul Kane, The Washington Post House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) will remain atop the Democratic caucus for at least two more years, extending her role as Congress’s most vocal liberal voice opposing the Republican agenda despite a second straight election in which her party failed to win back the majority. She said she … Continue reading
via Bonnie Kavoussi, The Huffington Post If Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan have their way, then Americans of all ages may be spending more on health care during their retirement. If Romney becomes president and repeals the Affordable Care Act as promised, then retirement would cost $11,100 more for the average 65-year-old and $18,600 more … Continue reading
via Lester Brathwaite, Queerty Earlier this month, Mexico’s Supreme Court upheld Mexico City’s same-sex marriage law as constitutional, but on Tuesday the court extended the legality of those marriages to all 31 states. So basically, any gay marriage registered in Mexico City has to be honored in all of Mexico. Each state, however, is not required … Continue reading
via Hope Yen, The Huffington Post The ranks of America’s poor are on track to climb to levels unseen in nearly half a century, erasing gains from the war on poverty in the 1960s amid a weak economy and fraying government safety net. Census figures for 2011 will be released this fall in the critical … Continue reading
via Jonathan Cohn, The New Republic Before this week, the well-being of tens of millions of Americans was at stake in the lawsuits challenging the Affordable Care Act. Now something else is at stake, too: The legitimacy of the Supreme Court. Nobody knows how the justices will rule. And nobody can know, not even the … Continue reading
via Justin Elliot, Salon Is Occupy Wall Street, with its decentralized structure, lack of strong leaders and no concrete demands, a fundamentally new form of protest? Or does the current movement have antecedents or analogues in American history? If so, what does the past tell us about where this might be headed? For a dose … Continue reading
President Barack Obama is back in the good graces of progressives. For now. Hours after Obama delivered a fiery speech demanding that the wealthiest Americans “pay their fair share” in taxes as part of his $4 trillion deficit-reduction plan, MoveOn.org launched a new television ad on Monday hammering in the president’s message and ripping Republicans … Continue reading
Republicans who are mainly interested in making sure their party wins the 2012 presidential election would seem to face a catch-22. The man who currently leads the GOP race in national polls, Rick Perry, has a history of making reckless and inflammatory statements about Social Security — enough to raise serious questions about whether nominating … Continue reading
With her standing in the polls slipping, Michele Bachmann needed to find a way to capture the spotlight she held earlier this summer. She just may have done that tonight at the Tea Party Express/CNN debate in Tampa, Florida. Bachmann, the founder of the Tea Party Caucus in the House, knew her audience well and … Continue reading
Texas Gov. Rick Perry toned down his language on Social Security today, deviating from the harsh rhetoric that has fueled criticism from his Republican opponents as they gear up for the second presidential debate in less than a week. In an op-ed for USA Today, Perry replaced the term “Ponzi scheme” with descriptions of the entitlement program’s “financial … Continue reading
A battle over Social Security launched last week between the top two GOP presidential contenders doesn’t show any signs of quieting down as candidates prepare for round two at the first-ever CNN/Tea Party Republican Debate on Monday night. The debate, being held at the Florida State Fairgrounds in Tampa, will also give the six other … Continue reading
Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Iowa) believes Social Security, while troubled, needs to be retained for current beneficiaries and future generations. The presidential candidate said Friday that while the program is “in trouble,” the federal government has made a commitment to senior citizens that it must keep. “The United States made a decision 80 years ago about … Continue reading
President Barack Obama’s promise Thursday that everything in his jobs plan will be paid for rests on highly iffy propositions. It will only be paid for if a committee he can’t control does his bidding, if Congress puts that into law and if leaders in the future — the ones who will feel the fiscal … Continue reading
While men lost more jobs in the recession than women, women have been slower to recover, losing nearly 300,000 jobs since the economic “recovery” began in 2009. Some women’s organizations were concerned that President Obama’s jobs plan was going to focus on boosting male-dominated industries, such as construction and manufacturing, to the exclusion of the … Continue reading
The Brandt Standard 