Amplifying the call for a universal basic income, a United Nations expert has presented a report describing the idea as “a bold and imaginative solution” at a time of growing economic insecurity.
“People feel exposed, vulnerable, overwhelmed, and helpless and some are being systematically marginalized both economically and socially,” Philip Alston, U.N. Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, told the Human Rights Council. “But the human rights community has barely engaged with this resulting phenomenon of deep economic insecurity,” he said.
His report challenges the human rights movement to broaden its scope and recognize “the profound challenges” of economic insecurity, which represents “a fundamental threat to all human rights,” and “now afflicts not just the unemployed and the underemployed, but also the precariously employed and those likely to be rendered unemployed in the foreseeable future as a result of various developments.”
“There’s a clear right to be able to live in dignity, to enjoy a decent standard of living to get access to education, healthcare, and so on. All of these things are fundamentally linked to human rights,” he said during a Facebook live event earlier this month.
Among the factors necessitating this expanded vision of human rights, he says, are the “Uber economy,” referring to precarious employment, zero hours, and outsourcing; the “rapid and seemingly unstoppable growth in inequality across the globe”; increasing job automation; and “The ascent of a new neoliberal agenda, which involves further fetishization of low tax rates, demonization of the administrative State, deregulation as a matter of principle, and the privatization of remaining State responsibilities in the social sector, [which] risks leaving the State in no position to protect or promote social rights.”
Affording each individual with a no-strings-attached, basic amount would help safeguard basic human rights, the report says.
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“In many respects, basic income offers a bold and imaginative solution to pressing problems that are about to become far more intractable as a result of the directions in which the global economy appears inexorably to be heading,” Alston writes.
“While there are many objections, relating to affordability in particular, the concept should not be rejected out of hand on the grounds that it is utopian. In today’s world of severe economic insecurity, creativity in social policy is necessary,” he adds.
Though the idea of a universal basic income is far from new, is hasn’t gained ground is the U.S.. The state of Hawaii, however, could change that, as a bill requesting the creation of a “basic economic security working group” recently passed the state’s legislature.
The idea also got a boost last month from historian Rutger Bregman’s talk at TED2017 in Vancouver. “Just imagine how much talent we would unleash if we got rid of poverty once and for all,” he said in his talk on the concept of a universal basic income.
“The time for small thoughts and little nudges is past,” according to Bregman. “The time has come for new, radical ideas. If this sounds utopian to you, then remember that every milestone of civilization—the end of slavery, democracy, equal rights for men and women—was once a utopian fantasy too.”
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Actor Channing Tatum posted a video on his Instagram on Tuesday urging young Alabamians to “go out and vote” for Democratic special election candidate Doug Jones.
Tatum, who is from Alabama, said that he is supporting Jones over GOP nominee Roy Moore in the Senate vote on Tuesday. Moore is facing allegations from at least nine women of sexual misconduct or assault when they were teenagers.
More than anything i just want young people to go out and vote.
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“Usually, I’m not a political person,” he said in the video. “For the record, I’m not a liberal, Democrat or Republican. I am my own mind and my own heart and that is more complex than red and blue.”
But “Roy Moore’s done things, in my opinion, that go beyond the line of trust,” the actor said, while Jones “has been an advocate on behalf of helping people his whole life.”
Tatum geared his message toward younger Alabamians, telling them, “They don’t think students are going to go out and vote, so prove them wrong.”
“It’s important for Alabama. It’s important for America.”
The Wall Street Journal’s editorial board ripped President TrumpDonald John TrumpSenate advances public lands bill in late-night vote Warren, Democrats urge Trump to back down from veto threat over changing Confederate-named bases Esper orders ‘After Action Review’ of National Guard’s role in protests MORE’s former chief strategist, Stephen Bannon, in the wake of Alabama Senate Republican nominee Roy Moore’s defeat, saying “Bannon is for losers.”
“The Alabama result shows that Mr. Bannon cares less about conservative policy victories than he does personal king-making. He wants to depose Mitch McConnellAddison (Mitch) Mitchell McConnellSenate advances public lands bill in late-night vote GOP senator to try to reverse requirement that Pentagon remove Confederate names from bases No, ‘blue states’ do not bail out ‘red states’ MORE as Majority Leader even if it costs Republicans Senate control. GOP voters, take note: Mr. Bannon is for losers,” the board wrote in an op-ed on Wednesday.
“The Moore defeat should also be a lesson to the Republican Party, and President Trump, that many GOP voters are still at heart character voters. They will only accept so much misbehavior in a politician, no matter the policy stakes,” the op-ed continued.
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“Mr. Trump opposed Mr. Moore in the primary but came around to support him even after the accusations emerged about Mr. Moore’s pursuit of teenage girls while he was in his 30s. The GOP voters who ignored Mr. Trump and rejected Mr. Moore also want a President who acts presidential.”
The op-ed comes less than a day after Democrat Doug Jones defeated Moore, becoming the first Democrat to win a Senate race in Alabama in 25 years.
Moore’s defeat also marks a major blow for Trump and his allies, including Bannon, who hit the campaign trail for Moore in recent days.
Establishment Republicans, such as Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Sen. Richard ShelbyRichard Craig ShelbyHouse pushes back schedule to pass spending bills Top Republican says Trump greenlit budget fix for VA health care GOP senators not tested for coronavirus before lunch with Trump MORE (R-Ala.), had warned voters against voting for Moore, who had come under intense accusations in the wake of a slew of sexual misconduct allegations against him.
The McConnell-aligned Senate Leadership Fund also issued a scathing statement targeting Bannon after Moore’s loss on Tuesday.
“This is a brutal reminder that candidate quality matters regardless of where you are running. Not only did Steve Bannon cost us a critical Senate seat in one of the most Republican states in the country, but he also dragged the United States into his fiasco,” the statement read.
Former White House chief strategist Stephen Bannon and his conservative outlet, Breitbart News, have cut ties with a far-right activist challenging Speaker Paul RyanPaul Davis RyanBush, Romney won’t support Trump reelection: NYT Twitter joins Democrats to boost mail-in voting — here’s why Lobbying world MORE (R-Wis.) in 2018 after the candidate posted several controversial tweets.
“Nehlen is dead to us,” Arthur Schwartz, a Bannon adviser, told CNN on Wednesday regarding Wisconsin congressional candidate Paul Nehlen (R).
“We don’t support him,” Breitbart editor Joel Pollak tweeted late Tuesday. “He’s disqualified himself.”
No. We don’t support him. Haven’t covered him in months. I had no real idea of his recent antisemitic statements when we spoke, Jamie, but I’ve since looked into it (and responded). He’s disqualified himself. https://t.co/22JyunCbr1
— Joel B. Pollak (@joelpollak) December 27, 2017
Bannon has in the past supported anti-establishment Republican candidates, including Alabama Senate candidate Roy MooreRoy Stewart MooreSessions goes after Tuberville’s coaching record in challenging him to debate The 10 Senate seats most likely to flip Sessions fires back at Trump over recusal: ‘I did my duty & you’re damn fortunate I did” MORE, who lost the state’s special election to Democrat Doug Jones.
Nehlen on Saturday tweeted an illustration showing three Christian crosses with signs reading “No it’s not,” “It’s okay to be white” and “No it’s not.” The cross in the middle of the image was meant to represent Jesus Christ.
The meme originated on the messaging board 4chan, a forum that attracts neo-Nazis.
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Nehlen then shared Tuesday that he is reading “The Culture of Critique,” a book about Jewish involvement in political movements that is considered by many to be anti-Semitic.
Nehlen has made controversial statements in the past, including when he told a New York Post columnist earlier this month to “eat a bullet,” after the writer told him his brain needed nourishment.
Nehlen challenged Ryan last year and lost by 68 points.
Speculation has swirled that Ryan will retire in 2018, though he has denied such reports.
Republican National Committee (RNC) Chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel said in a new interview that she doesn’t believe her uncle, Mitt RomneyWillard (Mitt) Mitt RomneyMilley discussed resigning from post after Trump photo-op: report Trump on collision course with Congress over bases with Confederate names Attorney says 75-year-old man shoved by Buffalo police suffered brain injury MORE, is a “never Trumper.”
McDaniel told Fox Business Network’s Maria Bartiromo that she thinks Romney would support the Republican tax cuts and that he has “every interest” in working with Trump.
“I don’t think he’s a never Trumper. Listen, Mitt seriously considered taking the secretary of State position,” McDaniel said.
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“He wants to see President TrumpDonald John TrumpSenate advances public lands bill in late-night vote Warren, Democrats urge Trump to back down from veto threat over changing Confederate-named bases Esper orders ‘After Action Review’ of National Guard’s role in protests MORE do well. He wants to see our country to do well, and I think that’s going to be the overriding issue for him if he ends up becoming the next senator from Utah.”
Speculation over Romney’s political future reignited on Tuesday after Sen. Orrin HatchOrrin Grant HatchBottom line Bottom line Bottom line MORE (R-Utah) announced he would not seek reelection in 2018.
Romney, who mounted failed presidential bids in 2008 and 2012, has long been considered a potential candidate for the seat.
And his past attacks on Trump could end up benefitting Romney in otherwise deep-red Utah: Of the states Trump won in the 2016 presidential election, he received his lowest share of the vote, 45.5 percent, in Utah. Independent candidate Evan McMullin, who launched his campaign to offer a conservative alternative to Trump, won 21.5 percent of the vote in the state, his highest share by nearly 15 percentage points.
Romney, a former Massachusetts governor, famously gave a speech denouncing Trump during the 2016 Republican primary and has used Twitter to vent veiled criticisms of the president.
“Having created a natl inflection point of consequence, POTUS must apologize & repudiate the racists,” Romney said last August, referencing Trump’s controversial comments about the violence at a white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Va.
The government of Arkansas concluded its controversial and unprecedented killing spree Thursday night with what many are calling the botched execution of Kenneth Williams, which has prompted demands for an investigation into whether he was unlawfully “tortured” by the state before his death.
According to a timeline released by the the Arkansas Department of Correction, the execution drugs were administered to Williams beginning at 10:52pm CDT and he was pronounced dead at 11:05pm. However, witnesses at the execution said that he appeared to suffer as the lethal drug “cocktail” was administered, prompting one to say that “it looked like something was wrong.”
KATV News reports:
Shawn Nolan, of the Capital Habeaus Unit with the Federal Community Defender Office for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania and one of Williams’ attorneys, issued a statement following Williams’ death describing the accounts of his execution as “horrifying.”
“We tried over and over again to get the state to comport with their own protocol to avoid torturing our client to death,” Nolan said, “and yet reports from the execution witnesses indicate that Mr. Williams suffered during this execution. Press reports state that within three minutes into the execution, our client began coughing, convulsing, jerking, and lurching with sound that was audible even with the microphone turned off. This is very disturbing, but not at all surprising given the history of the risky sedative midazolam, which has been used in many botched executions.”
“What’s important right now, is that all the information about tonight’s execution must be meticulously documented and preserved so that we can discover exactly what happened in that execution chamber,” he continued. “We are requesting a full investigation into tonight’s problematic execution.”
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Rita Sklar, executive director of the ACLU of Arkansas, echoed that call saying that the grisly account raises “serious questions about whether the state, in its rush to use up its supply of midazolam before it expired, has violated the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment. Mr. Williams’ execution must be reviewed to investigate the witnesses’ accounts and determine whether the state tortured Mr. Williams before killing him.”
Williams’ death marked the fourth and final execution carried out within a week by the Arkansas government before the expiration of the controversial drug. Four additionally planned killings received court-ordered stays.
As Robert Dunham, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, pointed out on Twitter, “[a]ll of the eight scheduled executions involved white victims.” However, “three of the four white prisoners got stays” while “three of the four black prisoners did not.”
Before he was put to death, Williams read prepared remarks asking for forgiveness. “I was more than wrong. The crimes I perpetrated against you all were senseless, extremely hurtful, and inexcusable. I humbly beg your forgiveness and pray you find the peace, healing, and closure you all deserve,” Williams read. “I am not the same person I was. I have been transformed. Some things can’t be undone. I seek forgiveness.”
Williams was convicted of killing four people, including Missouri resident Michael Greenwood. Greenwood’s daughter and widow had sought to testify before the Arkansas Parole Board and ask for clemency for Williams. In a letter sent to Governor Asa Hutchinson, Kayla Greenwood describes why “[h]is execution will not bring my father back or return to us what has been taken, but it will cause additional suffering.”
The letter recounts how the Greenwood family brought Williams’ daughter, Jasmine, and granddaughter to the prison to see him one last time. Kayla Greenwood writes:
Minutes before Williams was scheduled to be executed at 7pm, the U.S. Supreme Court requested time to review his case. Williams had filed an appeal arguing that “his execution should be put on hold to allow him to demonstrate that he is intellectually disabled and therefore cannot be put to death,” SCOTUS Blog reports. After reviewing, the justices declined to intervene.
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To the dismay of her constituents, Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s (D-Calif.) refuses to get behind a Medicare-for-All healthcare system. And it just so happens that she has accepted massive contributions from healthcare lobbyists also opposed to such a program, a deep dive into her campaign financing has revealed.
Bucking growing momentum in support of a national single-payer system, as well as a trailblazing effort within her home state, Feinstein told San Francisco voters during a town hall earlier this month: “If single-payer healthcare is going to mean the complete takeover by the government of all healthcare, I am not there.”
As Common Dreams reported, her remarks were met with boos and chants of “single-payer now!”
At a second town hall a few days later, when asked if she would sponsor Sen. Bernie Sanders’ (I-Vt.) pending Medicare-for-All bill, she dismissed the effort as “a takeover of all medicine in the United States.”
On Tuesday, the money in politics watchdog MapLight revealed that less than a week after those raucous meetings, Feinstein attended “a fundraising event at the Washington, D.C., office of Avenue Solutions, a lobbying firm that represents major health insurers, pharmaceutical companies and the primary trade association for doctors.”
According to reporter Andrew Perez, “Feinstein supporters at the event were expected to kick in $1,000 to $5,000 for her re-election bid.” Meaning that Feinstein, who is running for her fifth full Senate term, pocketed thousands from industry groups historically and vocally opposed to a government-run, universal healthcare system—at the same time that a popular push for such a program has never been stronger.
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Last month, an Economist/You Gov poll (pdf) found that 61 percent of Americans say they support “creating a federally funded health insurance system that covered every American.” At the same time, legislation to create such a program has reached a record 104 co-sponsors in the U.S. House.
According to MapLight’s review of campaign finance data, Feinstein has raised over $592,000 from lobbyists and political action committees since 2013. From January to March alone, her campaign committee has $655,822 in donations, more than $180,000 of which came from lobbyists and political action groups. Notably, Perez reports, “Her campaign saw substantial support from the healthcare industry during that time.”
He continues:
During her previous re-election campaign, the senior U.S. senator from California raised nearly $10 million, MapLight notes, with lobbyists comprising the “fifth-largest source of campaign revenue.”
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As the Trump administration continues to go off the rails, President Donald Trump on Friday morning threatened to “cancel all future ‘press briefings'” after once again berating the so-called “Fake Media” and saying the expectation of accuracy from the White House was unrealistic.
The president’s tweets about the press came after a day of tough reporting on his conflicting justifications for firing FBI director James Comey, and just ahead of a post threatening Comey.
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Given Trump’s previous animus toward the media, the tirade engendered predictable pushback from those unwilling to let the president threaten the fourth estate.
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President Donald Trump spent part of his first Monday in office following in the footsteps of other Republican presidents by reinstating the Global Gag Rule, officially known as the Mexico City Policy.
The Reagan-era rule bars U.S. aid from going to international NGOs that offer abortion services or even provide information about it as an option—even when they use non-U.S. funds to do so. It’s been criticized for devastating not only reproductive healthcare services but primary healthcare services as well, as clinics, faced with budget shortfalls, are forced to cut back or shut down completely.
And it was made clear, from that January memorandum, that Trump’s order would mark an expansion of the rule, as it directed the Secretary of State “to implement a plan to extend the requirements of the reinstated Memorandum to global health assistance furnished by all departments or agencies.” As Human Rights Watch explained in March:
On Monday, CBN reported that “Trump is taking the pro-life policy to a whole different level,” as the rule, rebranded as the “Protecting Life in Global Health Assistance” program, will affect $8.8 billion in funding.
CBN adds that the “nearly $9 billion in global health assistance funds will be appropriated to the Department of State, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), and the Department of Defense.”
The State Department also announced Monday its plan to implement the policy, stating:
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It adds:
NARAL said the announcement showed the president was “yet again throwing women under the bus.”
“President Trump is treating women’s lives like political bargaining chips, trading them away to shore up his flagging support,” said Sasha Bruce, senior vice president of campaigns and strategy for the pro-choice organization.
“Barely more than 100 days into his presidency, this pattern of behavior is an ominous portent of things to come for women and families. A man who was best known during the campaign for disrespecting and objectifying women clearly hasn’t changed his behavior despite wielding even more power,” Bruce added.
According to Brian Dixon, senior vice president of Population Connection Action Fund, Trump’s “dramatic expansion of the policy needlessly threatens the lives and well-being of millions,” and the re-branded rule is “just more brazen gaslighting by the Trump administration.”
“The Global Gag Rule doesn’t protect lives; it destroys them,” he continued.
“It causes health clinics to close; it causes contraceptive shortages; it significantly reduces access to critical reproductive health care; and it, not surprisingly, causes dramatic increases in unsafe abortion. Rather than recognizing the utter failure of the policy, this administration has expanded its breadth, threatening global efforts to fight malaria and Ebola and Zika and HIV. And it will stifle efforts to address the challenge that unsafe abortion poses throughout the developing world,” Dixon said.
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In an act of secrecy denounced by one commentator as “an insult to Americans and our democratic process,” two GOP aides told Axios on Monday that although the Senate will soon complete its version of the widely panned American Health Care Act—also known as TrumpCare—the bill will be withheld from the public indefinitely.
“We have no idea what’s being proposed. There’s a group of guys in a back room somewhere that are making decisions.” —Sen. Claire McCaskill
Explaining the reasoning behind the Senate’s lack of transparency, one of the aides remarked, “We aren’t stupid.”
Once the bill is complete, Axios‘s Caitlin Owens reported, it will be sent to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) to be scored.
“It’ll take CBO about two weeks to evaluate and score a draft bill,” Owen added. “Senate Republicans then want to vote on the bill before the July 4th recess.”
On social media, commentators were swift in denouncing the move as hypocritical and undemocratic. Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight observed, “Republicans know their health care bill is super unpopular and so are trying to shield it from public scrutiny.
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Before Axios’s reporting made clear the Republicans’ intentions to keep their deliberations secret, Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) castigated her colleagues during a recent Senate Finance Committee meeting for keeping the Congress and the public out of the health care loop.
“We have no idea what’s being proposed,” McCaskill said. “There’s a group of guys in a back room somewhere that are making decisions.”
She continued:
Andy Slavitt, who served as acting administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services from 2015 to 2017, also took aim at the GOP’s tactics in a Washington Post op-ed published over the weekend, accusing Senate Republicans of using “three tools” to ram through their wildly unpopular health care plan: “sabotage, speed, and secrecy.”
Slavitt noted that the architects of the health care plan face a vexing dilemma: “What to do with a bill that is clogging your agenda but only 8 percent of Americans want you to pass and members of your own caucus swore was dead on arrival?”
Instead of rewriting the bill from scratch and attempting to adopt measures that would make it less harmful—previous CBO estimates indicated that if the House version of TrumpCare were implemented, 23 million people would lose insurance—the Senate has instead decided to recede into the darkness, shielding their deliberations from criticism and keeping crucial information hidden from the public.
News that the Senate is planning to send their version of TrumpCare to the CBO without making it public comes as reports have indicated that “moderates” within the GOP who previously insisted that Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion be maintained are caving quickly under pressure from their fellow Republicans.
And as the Huffington Post recently reported, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) is attempting to capitalize on the attention being paid to other matters—namely former FBI James Comey’s recent testimony—to quietly pass deeply significant legislation.
“How bad is the Senate health care bill likely to be?” the official Twitter account of House Ways and Means Committee Democrats wondered. “So bad that they can’t share it with the public, apparently.”
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