Wendy McElroy: Unions are dropping their enthusiasm for Obamacare. Some push for the new subsidies. Others bristle over the excise tax. Many protest the impact of health care cutbacks by employers who cannot afford to fully implement Obamacare.
Gov. Brown Can Release Prisoners Early Without Compromising Public Safety
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Lizzie Buchen: Keeping low-risk inmates behind bars does not enhance public safety; in fact, doing so may endanger the public, as excessive prison terms hamper reentry, damage families, and weaken communities.
California Democratic Party Disses Fracking, Still Loves Money
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Wendy Block: It’s heartbreakingly clear that the Democrats won’t act courageously. But a number of non-partisan outside groups will. The MOVI coalition and Common Cause are sponsoring Prop C on the Los Angeles ballot next month, to let voters tell electeds to fight Citizens United. They need you.
The State of the State (Song) of the Golden State
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Michael Sigman: My next-door neighbor flagged me down recently to enthuse that the California State Song brought back memories of childhood hikes in the Alps. I wondered what in the world she was talking about.
Union Leaders and Activists Descend on Sacramento to Support Labor’s Legislative Agenda
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Rebecca Brand: From corporate tax breaks to immigration reform to environmental protections and health care, we’re working with hundreds unions across the state to move one of our most aggressive legislative campaigns in California history.
Why Jerry Brown Bucks Prison Realignment
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Gov. Brown’s recent actions show that it is not just the most visible partisans of the “prison industrial complex,” who we must persuade or overcome, but unfortunately the political establishment of the State.
How Shadow Drug Industry Avoids Regulation
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Peter Dreier and Donald Cohen: It is time for Congress to put the cop on this pharmaceutical beat before more Americans die from the profits-over-safety priorities of this rogue industry.
GMO Myths and Truths
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Download this free report, GMO Myths and Truths. It presents evidence that effective and sustainable solutions to food production already exist without the need for genetically engineered technology.
Alzheimer’s: The Approaching Gray Asteroid
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Charles Hayes: Alzheimer’s is off the charts for both victims and caregivers. Both are wounded. Caregivers live shorter lives because of the emotional toll. My grandmother took care of my grandfather at home, and the cost to her own health was enormous.
The Politics Behind the Killing of Americans
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Walt Brasch: Fifteen states, dominated by Republican governorships and legislatures, by declaring they won’t allow Medicaid expansion, are on record as placing political interests before the health of their citizens.
Fixing California’s Mass Incarceration Mess
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Dick Price: As California grapples with a prison system so broken that the U.S. Supreme Court has mandated reductions in the number of prisoners it holds, the three-part “Smart Justice: Rethinking Public Safety in California” discussion begun this past week is examining both consequences and possible solutions to the state’s mass incarceration mess.
Alzheimer’s Disease Specialist Shortage
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Jan Tucker: With the coming of age of the baby-boomer generation, Alzheimer’s Disease numbers are expected to increase dramatically, yet the number of geriatric certified physicians in America is dramatically declining.
Universal Neglect: A Failure to Protect Americans’ Health
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Walter Brasch: The new Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, which goes into effect next year, moved the United States closer to universal health care, already enjoyed by the citizens of 28 industrialized countries. But, it doesn’t cover dental care.
The Dudes Doth Protest Too Much, Methinks
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Tina Dupuy: What’s really disingenuous about this “cause” is the claim that men are the victims of what they call mutilation. They equate male circumcision with female circumcision, which is false. They also have the gall to compare themselves to the Jews during WWII.
In Healthcare, We’re # Last
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Claude Fischer: Whereas Americans used to live longer and stronger lives than our European counterparts, we have been lapped by the Old World. Maybe we need to think again about our “complex of traditions, principles and institutions.”
Obama Care vs. Don’t Care
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John MacMurrary: Tens of thousands of American families are forced into bankruptcy each year by medical bills, only to find that the Bush Administration has made it more difficult to file for bankruptcy.
Health Insurance Is Not Healthcare
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JP Sottile: Instead of retiring the health insurance industry and its actuarial tables and profit margins and wagers, Obama “saved” the health insurance industry and enshrined it in perpetuity as the “Health Insurance-Industrial Complex.”
The Deficit Debate and Our Broken Medical Care System
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Richard “RJ” Eskow: Our health care system — guess we’ll need to call it that for lack of an alternative — is the worst in the developed world. It costs far more, provides much less, and has worse outcomes than any system that’s even remotely comparable.
In Denial on Heath Reform
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Karen Finney: Despite clear legislative, judicial and electoral defeats, Boehner outlined how “tactics of our repeal efforts will have to change,” with a new battle plan seeking to include “ObamaCare” into the negotiations on the “fiscal cliff.”
Reclaim Obamacare, Republicans!
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Tina Dupuy: Just admit the individual mandate was first proposed by Nixon, promoted by George H. W. Bush and fleshed out by the Heritage Foundation. It was the “conservative answer” to the health care issue – it was the “free-market solution” to reform.
Urban Issues Forum: The Real Battleground — October 26
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The Right Wing, Voter Supression, and the November 6 Election. With Karen Bass, Curren Price, Lafonza Butler, Michael Green, and Ralph Miller. Saturday, 26 October.
Albany County Issues a Peace Dividend Proclamation
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Lawrence Wittner: The legislature of Albany County, New York has approved a proclamation calling upon Congress to withdraw U.S. troops from Afghanistan, cut the U.S. military budget, and use the savings to fund vital public programs at home.
Romney: Get Thee to an Emergency Room
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Karen Finney: Romney finally told us how he would deal with the more than 48 million Americans without health insurance: Get thee to an emergency room!
The Bronx Example: Urban Food Deserts
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Mark Naison: For the last few years, public health experts have used the term “Food Deserts” to describe communities where residents lack access to healthy food and suffer the twin problems of hunger and obesity
Matters of Life and Death
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Charles D. Hayes: We’d do anything to protect our combat soldiers but when their loved one’s at home who can’t afford medical insurance? Do we raise taxes? Send forth doctors and surgeons dressed in fatigues?
Conquer Alzheimers Disease
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Jan Tucker: If we don’t conquer this disease, the cost of medical care will continue to rise for Alzheimer’s patients and have an extremely detrimental effect on health care reform of any sort.
Health Care Reform: California’s Next Steps
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Diane Lefer: With the general practitioner or family practice doctor now a vanishing breed, yes we could and should put in place incentives to encourage more medical students to go into the field. But we also need to address the problem without delay.
The Elderly, Poverty, Alzheimers — And Me!
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Sharon Kyle: Five years ago, if someone were to tell me that the United States treats its elderly like discarded trash I would have ignored them. Today, I’m seeing it with my own eyes. I suspect we’d find quite a few homeless people are homeless because first they had dementia.
How Socialized Medicine Works in France
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Richard Greeland: I am once again amazed by how well run is France’s free health system (known as ‘Social Security’ or La Sécu), and I am eager to share my personal experience of the possible with my friends in the U.S. for whom accessible healthcare remains a constantly receeding mirage.
PCL offers monthly Open House Events on the 2nd Saturday at 2pm and 3rd Thursday at 6pm. Click here to learn more.
The Myth That Japan Is Broke
Ellen Brown: The Japanese government’s debt is the people’s money. They own each other, and they collectively reap the benefits.