Investigative reporter Gary Cohen recently appeared on radio station KPFK’s David Feldman Show to discuss the strange liaison between the Pew Charitable Trusts and the libertarian Laura and John Arnold Foundation. Cohn had written a piece for Frying Pan News linking the respected research organization with the public-pension-cutting agenda of John Arnold, a billionaire hedge-funder. Cohn also broke a story about a proposed state ballot initiative that would change California’s constitution in favor of gutting the retirement plans of state and municipal employees.
Listen here to a segment of Feldman’s show for a quick rundown of the Pew-Arnold alliance and what’s behind the move to cut funding for public pensions.
» Read more about: Radio: Gary Cohn Explains Pew-Arnold Alliance »
Governor Jerry Brown has included AB 1263, the Medical Interpreters Bill, in a group of bills passed by the California legislature that he vetoed. As Frying Pan News’ Gary Cohn wrote August 20, “Day after day, non-English speaking patients are seeing doctors and nurses throughout California without the aid of medical interpreters, sometimes with tragic results.”
Cohn’s article highlighted stories in which Californians lacking fluency in English received harmful or unintended medical advice, or who were kept in the dark on the medical conditions of loved ones. AB 1263, authored by Assembly Speaker John A. Pérez (D-Los Angeles), would have spent $200,000 to gain access to $270 million in Affordable Care Act funds to create about 7,000 interpreter jobs within 10 years.
The governor vetoed the measure Sunday, commenting, according to the Sacramento Bee, that “California has embarked on an unprecedented expansion to add more than a million people to our Medi-Cal program.
» Read more about: Governor Vetoes Medical Interpreters Bill »
(See full infographic at OnlinePhdPrograms)
Driving a 15-year-old car 70 miles a day between three different college campuses took a toll on my ride – and on me. I was teaching as adjunct professor at three different L.A. community colleges. An adjunct is a part-time professor who is hired on a contractual basis rather than being given tenure and a permanent position. Many universities hire large numbers of adjunct faculty members because they are flexible and cheaper to maintain than traditional full-time faculty members.
I had no health insurance, no savings and no other financial resources, so every penny went to rent, car repairs and food. I was expected to hold office hours, but the colleges where I taught did not provide office space for adjuncts – I had nowhere to meet students or grade papers on campus.
» Read more about: Adjunct Faculty: Straddling the Poverty Line »
One by one, like guests at a late party
They shake our hands and step into the dark:
Arabian ostrich; Long-eared kit fox; Mysterious starling.
One by one, like sheep counted to close our eyes,
They leap the fence and disappear into the woods:
Atlas bear; Passenger pigeon; North Island laughing owl;
Great auk; Dodo; Eastern wapiti; Badlands bighorn sheep.
One by one, like grade school friends,
They move away and fade out of memory:
Portuguese ibex; Blue buck; Auroch; Oregon bison;
Spanish imperial eagle; Japanese wolf; Hawksbill
Sea turtle; Cape lion; Heath hen; Raiatea thrush.
One by one, like children at a fire drill,
The New York Post reported that congressional gyms are staying open despite the government shutdown that, so far, has gone into its second week.
Andy Soltis of the Post wrote,
The taxpayer-subsidized gyms for members of Congress remain open despite the government shutdown.
The members have to rough it, though — going without trainers or attendants to provide fresh towels and other amenities.
The liberal organization Think Progress said Tuesday that the order to keep the House gym open came directly from Speaker John Boehner’s office.
The House gym — largely unknown to outsiders until Anthony Weiner took infamous photos of himself in the locker room in 2011 — has no sign on the door and members have to be buzzed in.
This exclusive health club in Washington D.C., which is subsidized by taxpayer dollars,
» Read more about: Capitol Dumbells: Congress’s Gym-Dandy Shutdown Perk »
It is widely reported that the Republicans are looking for a face-saving way to back down from the standoff they created on the budget and the debt ceiling. According to these news accounts, this route could involve another stab at the “grand bargain,” a deal that includes some tax increases and cuts to Social Security and Medicare.
This prospect should inspire outrage beyond the fact that it would make the Republicans huge winners coming from a disastrous losing position. (Polls show that shutting down the government to keep people from getting health care is not a popular position.) That’s an issue for political junkies; the more important point is that millions of seniors who are already struggling would be asked to make further sacrifices for basically no reason whatsoever.
What is not in dispute right now is that most seniors are not doing very well. The median income for a person over age 65 is less than $20,000 a year.
» Read more about: Will Seniors Lose in a ‘Grand Bargain’? »
“Frankly, I’m surprised that American jobs are so controversial.”
These words, spoken by Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy (LAANE) senior researcher Linda Nguyen-Perez, hung in the air of a Chicago hotel conference room last week during the American Public Transportation Association (APTA) Annual Meeting.
Linda and I attended the conference on behalf of the new Jobs to Move America campaign, explaining our effort to transit agency officials, consultants and transportation equipment manufacturers from across the nation. The budding coalition behind this movement unites community, small business, labor, faith, small business, philanthropy, academic and environmental groups, including LAANE, all of whom want to maximize the 5.4 billion American taxpayer dollars that public transportation agencies spend every year, to improve transportation systems, create good American jobs and generate opportunities for such struggling unemployed American workers as veterans, single parents and residents of low-income neighborhoods.
» Read more about: Are American Manufacturers Afraid of American Jobs? »
Whether BART [Bay Area Rapid Transit] closes down this week will come down to one issue and one issue only: whether the BART Board of Directors shows leadership or continues to act to hold Bay Area transit riders hostage by using the same playbook a small minority of elected officials in Washington, D.C. have used to close down our federal government.
No one in the Bay Area—whether they ride BART or not—wants to see a BART strike. This is especially true of BART workers, who live in one of the most expensive regions in the world and do not receive a paycheck while they are on strike.
To demonstrate their commitment to reaching a deal before a cooling-off period expires tonight, BART workers have put a proposal on the table that is fair and affordable and incentivizes BART workers to keep the system one of the nation’s best.
» Read more about: BART Directors Must Act to Avert Midnight Strike »
Under the dark cloud of government shutdowns and other conservative-created mayhem shines a silver lining — the recent gains of California’s low-wage workers. Governor Jerry Brown has signed one law raising the state’s minimum wage and another that provides domestic housekeepers, maids and nannies with the right to get overtime pay. These were huge triumphs in a climate of constriction and budget cuts. Such policies will improve the lives of hundreds of thousands of workers, as well as their families and communities.
These legislative victories are only as powerful as the organizing behind them. It was the huge numbers and commitment of thousands of organized workers (unionized or not) raising their voices that made it impossible for lawmakers to ignore their needs.
The exciting part of activating this new swath of workers is that many have historically not hailed from communities associated with trade unionism. Many come from low-income and/or immigrant communities of color.
» Read more about: California Love: Low-Wage Worker Activism »
San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed made it official today – sort of. Speaking to a pension “restructuring” conference at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution, Reed said he hoped to file papers “in a few days” to put a ballot measure before voters that would allow cities in California to gut the retirement plans of their public employees. But he acknowledged that he and a group of fellow activists weren’t sure whether to put the measure on the ballot for November 2014 or sometime in 2016. (If the pension group wants to beat an approaching deadline and keep 2014 open as an option, it has to file papers soon.)
The lack of urgency contrasted with Reed’s half-hour talk, during which he painted a picture of a California teetering on the brink of pension-fund disaster, in which public safety employees would be laid off, libraries closed and retirement benefits decimated.
“Time is of the essence,” Reed warned – claiming that the longer his proposed amendment to the state constitution is postponed,