Ryan Lizza’s much buzzed about recent piece in The New Yorker investigates what Barack Obama might focus on in a second term. Obama could focus on immigration reform, on clean energy and the environment, on shoring up healthcare reform to future attacks from Republicans, on foreign policy. These are all issues that candidate Obama promised
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Wal-Mart is America’s biggest corporation. It’s also one of the country’s worst union busters, so it’s hardly a surprise that it engages in under-handed tactics to get its way with its workers and with America’s politicians. But a story out of Southern California is particularly shocking. Warehouse Workers United (WWU), a new organization for warehouse workers in the area, caught
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Before June 18, the Senate is expected to vote on a proposal to repeal recently-issued safeguards on mercury and other toxic chemicals released by U.S. power plants. Senator James Inhofe (R-Ok.) claims to have the support of 29 of his colleagues in undoing these Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) mandates — 30 being the magic number
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The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), the corporate front group responsible for pushing voter ID and Stand Your Ground laws in states across the country, is on the run. Nearly two dozen major corporations (including Johnson & Johnson, yesterday) have been persuaded to cut ties with ALEC. ALEC is fighting back — and the group
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Earlier this week, Republic Report exclusively reported on a $500,000 bonus awarded to a Northrop Grumman lobbyist, named Thomas MacKenzie, who was hired to become a top staffer overseeing the military budget in the House Armed Services Committee. The unusual size of the bonus, and MacKenzie’s role in deciding how billions of dollars in taxpayer
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Imagine if, when suspects were taken before a court to testify, they were able to pay off the judge and jury to make sure there was no serious grilling. Unfortunately, this isn’t a hypothetical. This is the U.S. Senate. This morning, the Senate Finance Committee — which is managed by a former JP Morgan lobbyist
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Child health advocates are losing the war over school lunches and that’s because they face exceptionally strong adversaries: the food and beverage industry. While it’s pretty obvious that more vegetables and less sugar at lunch would be a good start to healthier kids, we’ve recently seen Congress declare pizza a vegetable and kill a plan
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Recently, former Senator Slade Gorton (R-WA) sat down to talk about issues of the day with other politicians from Washington State. Asked by an audience member about the role of lobbyists, Gorton reminded the crowd that he is a lobbyist, and went on to complain that lobbyists are too “over-regulated.” He argued that disclosure requirements
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