Representation Without Taxation

by Barry Weintraub

The Boston Tea Party, at it’s core, was a protest against taxation without representation. As bothersome as paying taxes has always been, the idea that a government could take your hard-earned income and deny you a say about how it is spent is even more unjust.

Worse still, is to see those who pay proportionately so much less than you do, have the loudest voice in governing.  I call that “representation without taxation” and that is the situation America’s wealthiest wage earners find themselves in today.

A chart published this week by Stephen Von Worley at Data …

House Committee To Consider ‘In God We Trust’. Because the Economy Can Wait.

by Sandi Behrns

For a party which swept into power, riding a surge of voter dissatisfaction with the economy and unemployment, the GOP has done precious little to address either. Aside from their budget proposals that will actually make things on the economic front worse, they have spent an inordinate amount of time on things which have absolutely no effect on anything. Here’s another fine example.

The House Judiciary Committee will consider a resolution Thursday to reaffirm “In God We Trust” as the national motto.

Rep. Randy Forbes (R-Va.) sponsored the resolution, which also encourages displaying the phrase in public

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Rep. Anthony Weiner Mocks GOP Attempts To Defund NPR

Congressman Anthony Weiner took to the floor to point out how ridiculous it is that Republicans had to rush a bill to defund NPR.

“What a relief. I’m glad we got the economy back going. I’m so glad we secured our nuclear power plants. So glad Americans are going back to work,” he said. “We discovered a target we can all agree on…it’s Click And Clack.”

For close to three minutes, Weiner went off on the Republican plan to zero out federal funds to NPR, a process that included an emergency hearing of the House Rules Committee on Wednesday.

Weiner, …

GOP “Young Gun” Indicted For Sexual Assault

by Sandi Behrns

Tom Ganley, auto dealer and GOP candidate for Ohio’s 13th District in the last election, has been indicted on 7 counts. From the Cleveland Plain Dealer:

Ganley, 68, faces three felony charges of gross sexual imposition, and single counts of kidnapping, abduction, solicitation, and menacing by stalking, according to Ryan Miday, a spokesman for County Prosecutor Bill Mason.

A county grand jury returned the indictments late Tuesday, nearly six months after the woman filed a lawsuit accusing Ganley of grabbing her from behind, wrapping his arms around her, kissing her and reaching into her pants during a

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Limbaugh Mocks Japanese Refugees

Desperately trying to stay top-of-mind, Rush Limbaugh mocked Japanese earthquake victims for being concerned about the environment.

A caller asked Limbaugh, “If these are the people that invented the Prius, have mastered public transportation, recycling, why did Mother Earth, Gaia if you will, hit them with this disaster?”

Limbaugh called this an “interesting question,” and played a clip of ABC’s Diane Sawyer reporting from a shelter in Japan. In the clip, Sawyer is surprised that the refugees in the shelter have maintained a recycling program. Limbaugh first mocked Sawyer, doing an impression of her and saying that “she sounds like …

Donald Trump A Semi-Birther

Besides saying he’d spend $600 million of his own money to run for president, Donald Trump told ABC’s Ashleigh Banfield he has a little bit of doubt about where President Obama was born.

Speaking about the president, Trump – in line with “birthers” who question the president’s citizenship – said he, too, had his doubts that Obama was born in the U.S.

“Everybody that even gives a hint of being a birther … even a little bit of a hint, like, gee, you know, maybe, just maybe this much of a chance, they label them as an idiot. Let me …

U.S. Nuclear Plants Are On Geologic Fault Lines

The Diablo Canyon nuclear plant in California is on a fault line.  And so are many others.

Across the country, a spider’s web of faults in the Earth’s crust raises questions about earthquakes and safety at aging nuclear plants, amplified by horrific images from Japan, where nuclear reactors were crippled by a tsunami caused by a 9-magnitude quake.

The Indian Point Energy Center, for example, lies near a fault line 35 miles north of Manhattan; on Wednesday, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo ordered a safety review at the plant.

But none of the questions are more pressing than in …

Bipartisan Agreement On FDA Funding?

by Stuart Shapiro

Well actually it is a bipartisan interest group agreement, not bipartisan agreement on Capitol Hill.  A new report from the Alliance for a Stronger FDA advocates strengthening the long-beleaguered agency.  The Alliance includes trade associations, individual firms, and advocates for patients and consumers.  The take-home line from the report:

The FDA’s mission is to ensure that the products it regulates are safe, effective, and properly made. Notably, the industries that the FDA regulates—unlike industries regulated by other federal agencies—have called for a stronger, more robust regulatory agency.

The industries regulated by the FDA depend upon an …

Why Did Japan Use Nuclear Power After Experiencing The Atomic Bomb?

The Globe and Mail asks an interesting question.

Japan’s 55 reactors produce nearly 30 per cent of the country’s electricity, and the long-term strategy before the Fukushima disaster was to push that figure to 50 per cent by 2030. Almost alone among its political allies, whose ambitions were reined in by the catastrophes at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl, the land that experienced the atomic bomb has chosen to expand its network of nuclear plants, many of them knowingly built in seismic zones.

But why? For one thing, after the oil crisis of 1973, oil prices doubled, and without …

On Wednesday’s Radio Show…

• Guest host Barry Weintraub fills in for Alan.

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RNC Chair Attacks Obama For Filling Out NCAA Brackets

According to conservatives, Barack Obama shouldn’t be playing golf, or even filling out an NCAA bracket as long as natural disasters and wars go in in the world. I man how dare the president act like a real person with a life! Republican National Committee Chair Reince Priebus Tweeted this ridiculousness with a link to a right-wing website.

How can @BarackObama say he is leading when puts his NCAA bracket over the budget & other pressing issues? http://bit.ly/ieSuCI

Doesn’t the head of one of the two major American political parties have something better to do than spend his time Tweeting?…