Color of Change Renews Demands to End the Senate’s “Jim Crow” Filibuster

Racial justice organization’s new digital tool outlines racist history of the filibuster and ways to petition for its end. WASHINGTON, May 4th—Today, Color Of Change, the nation’s largest online racial justice organization, released the Jim Crow Filibuster, a new website dedicated to detailing the long history of the filibuster being used to disempower and oppress Black communities. This site is a part of Color Of Change’s campaign to end the filibuster, which will include digital ad buys in states where Senators have not yet committed to filibuster reform. The organization’s campaign cites the filibuster as a tool to delay progress for Black people, and most …

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How Trump Saved Us From Covid

To the Editor: One major media expert after another ridiculed the idea and said it would take a miracle for President Trump to produce Covid-19 vaccines and begin protecting people in 2020. Trump worked that miracle and now almost one-third of the American people are fully vaccinated. Getting the vaccine produced and into peoples’ arms was a Herculean effort that had to overcome many technical, business, bureaucratic, and political obstacles. It required not just creating and beginning to produce nearly a billion vaccine doses but producing a billion vials, syringes, swabs, and other equipment, plus arrangements for refrigeration, transportation, tracking systems, distribution centers, and about …

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The Energy Innovation Act Will Cut Pollution And Put Money In Our Pockets

By Ian Hancock and Mark Reynolds Imagine getting to zero emissions by 2050, without big government spending and no new regulations. Not a fantasy—over 3,500 U.S. economists endorsed such a plan, according to the Wall Street Journal (January 17, 2019). On April 1st, Congressman Ted Deutch introduced HR 2307, the “Energy Innovation & Carbon Dividend Act” (EICDA), following the recommendations of those economists. How would the EICDA work? A “carbon fee” is charged on all carbon-emitting fuels when they are extracted from the ground. All collected fees are then handed back to every household as a “carbon cash-back” payment. The program pays for itself, and …

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PUC Nominee Lacks Qualifications

To the Editor: Do you know what the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) does? During this pandemic, many customers had difficulty keeping up with heat and electric bills. NHPUC worked with residents and our fuel and electric companies to protect the needs of both. A little extra insulation could save you dollars on your energy bill. NHPUC oversees energy efficiency programs. From their website: “It is the NHPUC’s mission to ensure that customers of regulated utilities receive safe, adequate and reliable service at just and reasonable rates.” Governor Sununu recently nominated a commissioner to the PUC, Daniel Goldner, a Texas Instruments executive. But is he a …

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List of Wise Democratic Votes

Dear Editor, This list represents how New Hampshire Democrat [sic] Representatives scattered throughout the state have been voting in the New Hampshire General Court in Concord through April 9, 2021. On all of these votes, more than 90 percent—in most cases 97 percent—of Republicans voted the other way. Taxes & Fees 97 percent AGAINST prohibiting an income tax on earned personal income. (CACR1) 97 percent AGAINST prohibiting any broad-based sales tax. (CACR2) 100 percent FOR requiring state taxpayers to make up for poor investments by the Retirement Board. (HB274) 98 percent AGAINST reducing the cost of electricity. (HB614) 99 percent AGAINST reducing the cost of …

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Democracy Must Grow in Every Town

To the Editor: We the People have our hands full! We’re dealing with a pandemic, climate change and drought, unending wars, millions of people lacking health care, refugees at our borders, extreme income disparities, no affordable housing for the next generation, and a corporate-controlled media telling us what to think. Where do we go from here? The answer is to get organized where we live, town by town, as that is where democracy starts and ends. By systemic design most people are uninvolved, uninformed, and politically dysfunctional, and if we don’t change that soon then the status quo will allow the oligarchs to continue to …

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