Chris Matthews, host of MSNBCâs Hardball, met more than his match last Thursday when he took on lively freshman Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts. Looked as if Matthews got a bit more than he expected, in the form of a very well-reasoned and remarkably civil tongue-lashing from the Massachusetts peopleâs choice. A man with plenty
A firefighter pauses at the $2013 Rim Fire in Yosemite National Park, August-September 2013 (Calfire photo on facebook). President Obama released the federal budget for 2015 last week. Overall, it involves the lowest deficit ($514 billion) of his five-year tenure in office and restores some funding cut in last yearâs sequester. Parts of the new
Everyoneâs thinking about the U.S. government shutdown. American media have chosen to dramatize a health officialâs suggestion that children with cancer will not be able to receive advanced clinical treatments because funds are unavailable. But the kids with cancer are only a sideshow. The most frightening health effects concern the entire nation, and by extension,
 Have you ever tried to engage in a balanced discussion or debate over, say, macro-economics or maybe foreign policy â subjects that are complex and contingent upon many factors â and found yourself frustrated in your attempts by an extreme/unyielding ideological viewpoint? Well, the next time youâre confronted with an extreme (and typically over-simplified)
Republicans donât want taxes at all, whereas Democrats want to tax everything. It might be an oversimple explanation but itâs definitely going to be right more than itâs wrong. Itâs also a good indicator of your allegiance when you hear that US Senators Barbara Boxer and Bernie Sanders have proposed a tax on carbon emissions. The
In a country where to believe or disbelieve in the reality of global warming is almost a political necessity, it is unsurprising that Gallup recently found that Republicans and Democrats are more likely to disagree on just why the most recent winter was warmer than expected. Based on telephone interviews conducted across the weekend of
